After a short stint of professional training at school in 2018, I determine to change the activities that I do in class. But clearly going to secondary school for professional training does not give me a better idea how to teach university students. It is a fact.
There are certain things about my teaching that I decided to change. One of it is my class note. No more Powerpoint. So, I use Prezi which I subscribe for USD60 annually. It worth every penny that I spend. Based on feedback that I got from students for the past few semesters, they like Prezi notes as compared to Powerpoint because they can control which part they want to read or focus based on themes that I use as a means to organise my notes.
Other than my notes, I decided to “upgrade” my class activities. This is challenging. One of it is because I have little idea about how to do it. I don’t want the activities to be a burden to my students and they don’t learn much from such activities. So, what I normally do when I am struggling to get some ideas about the activities that I want to implement in class, I would put everything aside and just focus on reading. I have read and reread the books that I already have. I was a little bit lazy to go to the library to borrow books. So, I went to Popular bookstore (I still prefer to go to the physical bookstore, rather than shopping online).
As I browsed books on the Psychology section, I saw this book. The title is intriguing. My first thought was “Another autobiography book?” But it is not. As I read the book, I imagine Brian is my mentor. Even though I don’t know him personally, but I have watched his TED Talk. I got some ideas that I think I can try in my own class. In this case, I am thinking about in what way I can make my students enjoy and appreciate what they learn in class. It is not about me, but rather what they learn in class.
So, I tried one of the activities that Brian had used in his class. Even though I don’t have any clear idea about how he did it, but based on what I understand reading his book, I gave my students a question. A question that will prompt them to explore about their own selves. But unlike Brian, I gave my students other activities too. So, I combine the question based on what I find in Brian’s book with the class activities that I normally do in class.
Then, COVID-19 happens. Nobody ever thought how challenging teaching and learning would be. I was worried in the middle of the semester. I hope and pray that things will go well despite the challenges that we have to face. To know how my students were coping, I gave them a chance to let their feelings known. So, I asked a simple question “What they want to let me know as their instructor?” The following are some of the feedback that I got from the students.
