it's okay not to be okay

Dear flowers,

This post is one that I've been meaning to put up for quite a while.

It is meant as a reminder to myself and to all my friends to remain authentic in everything that you choose to do in your life.
It is okay to lose your balance and to lose sight of home.
It is okay to crack when you expect too much of yourself.
It is easy to be emotional and self-destructive.
It is hard to be bigger than your body and see things from a bird's eye view.

Please try to find strength in choosing to get up and embrace your fears.
To face and fight that eery, uncomfortable feeling or that wall that is persistently built up in front of you.
Life is too short for you to not do things that you love, things that you were born to do.
Realise that spark and seek authenticity wherever you go.

Take it away, Jessie J...

And if this doesn't make you smile, I'm pretty sure you're a robot. Just kidding(:

Love,

Miss Fun size

weeks 7 & 8: feeling individual

Dear flowers,

For the first time in my whole 3 and half years of being at university my peers and I were given the opportunity to sit with our facilitator individually to discuss our progress and plan our upcoming assessments during our tutorial. What is unique about this unit is that it has what's called a 'negotiated curriculum' where each individual students gets to decide what they would like to learn based on what they are specifically interested in. This process is guided and tracked by the facilitator who provides many opportunities for you to improve on an assessment through resubmission based on what you have gained and taken from the feedback. Is it wishful thinking to want tutors from other units to do the same? I guess it would be a cop-out to whinge about why tutors should be giving us the individual attention we need but in all honesty... what type of work would you do, outside of hours, if you weren't paid for it?

One of my pet peeves is receiving feedback after an assessment. In week 8 the class discussed the implications of not providing useful feedback and the results were unanimous. There are markers out there who aren't exactly getting it right. Some markers attack your thoughts personally with their experience rather than critique objectively the construction of your piece of work. Some markers comment on your grammar when it is not even part of the marking criteria. Some markers say 'elaborate' when your word count is minimal. Some markers say that you should have deserved a fail and that they marked you "generously." A peer who shared this last comment with me wasn't sure if they should have felt lucky or said thank you after receiving that feedback and ended up throwing the feedback in the bin. Some markers just tick and leave you with a mark with which you are to decipher where you went wrong, how to improve in future assessments and what you did well. At this point, you can imagine, the marking criteria becomes quite meaningless.

It is no secret that markers do not find marking fun and this is understandable, especially if you have to mark 300 essays alone and by a deadline. However, when you consider the implications of providing 'destructive' feedback don't the costs on a student's self-esteem far outweigh the benefits? I was fortunate to have completed a unit last semester convened by a passionate lecturer who said that the purpose of pedagogy, assessment and outcomes is alignment. Without alignment each element will not have a purpose and thus will not translate into anything meaningful for both students and teachers. It is clear that something must be done to change the attitudes of marking to teachers, but how? Shared teacher marking should be maximised especially for units with high numbers of students. Students can learn the power of self-marking to develop their self-regulation strategies. Student can participate in peer-marking, learning how to provide praise and polish type comments and seeing the benefit of receiving more polish than praise since it helps you to improve your work. Teachers can undergo training to reignite within their minds the purpose of assessment which is to inform instruction and to help students improve. These four methods can potentially serve to motivate teachers, convenors and tutors to mark more effectively by understanding the underlying framework of alignment.

In my future classroom I would like to communicate with students on an individual level in order for them to recognise their value and purpose in being part of the learning community. I think that this is something that organised, caring and the most influential teachers do and hence what I aspire for myself. I would do this by holding individual talks with each student during silent reading time and name it something like 'tracking time.' Tracking time will allow me to track each student's progress academically and socially. I can provide meaningful feedback to each student after assignments, set them differentiated tasks according to their ZPD, discuss homework effort and individualised standards and even mention observations if I notice they are doing something a bit different from their usual behaviour.  Tracking time will also allow me to target students who require extra assistance, for example students with learning difficulties, behavioural problems and gifted and talented students.

Meaningful feedback can be effectively translated through individualised interviews with students, more so than an undecipherable mark on a piece of paper. Marking should be something teachers, tutors and lecturers learn to do effectively in order to maximise each students' learning potential.


 Love,

 Miss Fun size

week 6: PAL's missing piece

Dear flowers,

Week 6 of PAL was quite interesting. We did a brainstorm of things that we think are missing at PAL at our uni. Have a look at it below. Isn't it beautiful?

The following are questions that I have considered personally. I believe that if these questions remain unsolved it will limit the growth of PAL at uni.

- Should students interested in PAL do a pre-test so that PAL leaders are well aware of each students strengths, weaknesses and learning preferences?
Perhaps in the first few PAL sessions students can be asked if they would like to complete an anonymous questionnaire or discuss as a group their learning styles and motivations. This may inform PAL leaders instruction, for example if students are shown to have more preference to present information visually than verbally the PAL leader can cater for this.

- Should there be PAL session dedicated to cognitive strategies?
For example, one session per week to cover effective note-taking, essay writing (understanding Bloom's Taxonomy) and research report writing. This can also be discipline specific. However, this will require PAL leaders to be trained in cognitive strategies as we cannot just assume that all PAL leaders are fully equipped or even feel confident themselves in using these skills. This is something I am quite interested in as a potential postgrad because I think that this issue is the elephant in the room that teachers are not finding the time to deal with. And so, as a result, students waste their time using the wrong skills which hinders their learning. Cognitive skills need to be taught explicitly rather than assumed of by students and PAL perhaps may be a good avenue for this.

- How does PAL cater for cultural differences in PAL sessions?
The implications of not catering to cultural differences may lead to the exclusion of some students. This is something that really needs to be considered at uni since we are such a diverse community and have many international students who I'm sure would be interested in PAL if it was perceived as more inclusive.

- How do we assess that students have learnt anything from PAL sessions?
The PAL leader whose session I attended last week liked to get students to present their main ideas to the rest of the group at the end of the session. However, on this occasion, a group of students left 10 minutes before the the PAL session was over because they needed time to walk to their next class which was on the other side of uni. And so, sadly, they were unable to present and the other focus were unable to benefit from the other group's discussion. How can PAL leaders 'make' people stay without feeling forced? Should PAL sessions be held in more central locations rather than on the outskirts of uni?

- How do we ensure that students maximise their benefit during PAL sessions?
Should we provide a basic guide of what PAL is all about to first year students? This guide can present the statistics of students who participate in PAL sessions and their final marks. This guide can make students aware that PAL sessions are not lecture-style or even tutorial-style sessions. They can also be made aware that PAL leaders are not lecturers nor tutors and will certainly not spoon-feed any answers. At the beginning of PAL sessions perhaps as a group they can complete a mind map of the lecture material covered that week. This can help to light up some neurons and active students prior knowledge so that they don't feel like they are diving into the deep end to quickly.

- Are PAL leaders receiving the training they need to become effective PAL leaders?
Something that I've been thinking about is developing a PAL leadership training manual. I think that it's important that PAL leaders with limited or no teaching experience should receive adequate training. They need to be equipped with strategies in dealing with classroom management and in particular students who refuse to cooperate with the way that PAL works. I cannot imagine being asked to run my first PAL session without being modelled some effective teaching strategies, observe a PAL session, and be expected to doing things ad hoc. Having a training manual that the PAL leader can constantly refer to would firstly help potential PAL leaders to develop interest in the PAL process and secondly, ensure that all PAL leaders are receiving the same standard level of training.

For the unit we were asked to work on a grant application which I found extremely challenging. And of course it would be, academics are vying for the same prize, as if I'd stand a chance? But honestly, it was nice to do an assessment that could potentially mean something to the university and that could potentially grow PAL.


Love,

Miss Fun size

week 5: the deep end of PAL

Dear flowers,

I attended my first PAL session with a classmate of mine and found that the reality of PAL was quite in line with the research I did for my essay, in terms of it's features, advantages and disadvantages.

Firstly, the PAL leader was incredibly friendly. The first thing she asked the group was, "What would you like to talk about today?" She explained to my classmate and I that the students get to decide how they would like to spend their time. That they divide themselves into focus groups and work through their problems together while she allocates time with each group depending on how much help she thinks they need. Also at the end of each session she asks each group to do an oral presentation so that the whole group can benefit from their individual group's discussion, which reminds me of Jigsaw learning.

The PAL leader was highly valued by the students which was made clear to me when one student mentioned that she must have been quite good since she was employed as a PAL leader for not just one but for numerous units and wouldn't be a PAL leader if she wasn't "exceptional". I asked this student if they judge their PAL leaders based on their marks and he said no, that they never ask them how they did in their exams but naturally assume that they are at least competent. The PAL leader kept things positive when students criticised lectures and tutorials, she told them how to better prepare for future PAL sessions, for example by providing a list of key terms that they were unfamiliar with and even suggested some note-taking strategies. This is something that clearly separates lecturers from PAL leaders. Since lecturers usually have quite a deep understanding of their unit, their 'basic knowledge' becomes not-so-basic for their students. PAL leaders are students themselves, they have experienced that unit, and hence are more cognitively congruent with first and second year students attending PAL sessions.

In addition, the PAL leader used her own lecture notes from when she did the course as a reference when discussing with the students and would frequently direct questions back to students rather than answering the questions herself. I particularly liked how inclusive she was of everyone even if they were running late.

I decided to listen in on the 'chemical sensors' focus group and observed the following. The conversation between the group members was reciprocated and on-task most of the time. At times they would make connections and go off on tangents but in the end someone would always bring things back on track. There was a sense of equality between the group as they acknowledged each others contributions by saying things like, "You're absolutely right" and "I didn't realise the significance of that so thank you." The group tended to focus on emphasised or key material and would classify content based on the likelihood of it being included in the upcoming exam. They finally reached a consensus being that everything was possibly examinable.

The PAL session reminded me of the study groups that I participate in just before exams where we focus on extracting meaning by manipulating the course content to suit our levels of experience. The chemical sensors group created metaphors such as, "it's like a lego set, there are a fixed amount of pieces to code for specific odours which are limited in number." I thought that this was particularly clever and was able to see the rest of the group understand a concept previously perceived as complex. They related the content to other subjects such as chemistry and physics which just provided more evidence for how PAL sessions are a place for meaning making and forming connections. It also made me really happy when members of the group would ask to make sure that everyone understood what was said before moving onto another topic. This revealed to me the authenticity of PAL and the genuineness of the hardworking people who attend.

The only disadvantage I was made aware of was when a student said that they get less out of PAL if they don't adequately prepare themselves. And that it can be frustrating when some new students expect a lecture-style seminar and so limit their contributions to the group.

This same student mentioned that he is aware that his level of knowledge can only get him so far. And that when he goes to PAL sessions he is able to benefit from other people's knowledge and hence extend his own which is something you can never achieve through independent study.

I really benefited from attending this PAL session. It opened my eyes to the reality and practicality of PAL, it's true nature. I can see myself setting up similarly styled PAL sessions when I become a primary school teacher. For example, year 6 students can run shared reading programs with younger grades, modelling to students effective reading strategies and perhaps resilience when they make mistakes. Also, year 6 students can help younger grades prepare for NAPLAN rather than time spent on teacher-directed activities.

I am excited to discover ways in which PAL can be implemented in the primary school setting as it is crystal clear that it is an effective program for students in higher education.


Love,
Miss Fun size

week 4: PBL & meaningful essay feedback

Dear flowers,

We did a problem-based learning (PBL) activity this week in class as you can see in the masterpiece we created above. The facilitator put up a slide of a scenario where we had to imagine ourselves as a teacher for a typical class composed of half boys and half girls including 3 disruptive children. We were asked to structure a classroom lesson on space and/or geometry, ensuring that we differentiate the curriculum for each of our students. So as a group we discussed the scenario starting with the possible reasons for the disruptive children's behaviour and decided to separate them into different groups. Thankfully we had a great group dynamic which was evident when we managed to bounce back and stay on topic whenever someone got bogged down on an issue. I think we did this by constantly recalling our main goal, integrating PAL concepts, we considered each others suggestions and negotiated solutions which was at challenging since everyone had such great views and experience. The constant questioning, clarification and negotiation is a unique characteristic of PAL and something I see as useful for my future primary classroom. For example, PAL can be used for Writer's Workshops and student-initiated scientific investigations.

Also, just thought I'd mention the hilarity of when the facilitator did a coffee run soon after he presented us with the PBL task. And when I asked for whiteboard markers he went all the way to his office to get them for us! I have learnt that the nature of PAL leaders is closely aligned with 'facilitators' who may be more cognitively congruent and hence more approachable compared to lecturers.

A confronting exercise was reflecting on our experience after completing the PBL activity and also writing down the worst things about the unit of so far. The facilitator actually read each reflection aloud which is something that I have never experienced. I thought that this was quite an effective strategy since we were all able to hear each other's genuine thoughts, free of judgement.

The essay I said I was working on in my last post is now complete. I felt a bit of added pressure to do better than usual for this assessment task since we constructed our marking rubric as a class. I felt more ownership and inevitably more responsibility for my piece of work. This anxiety translated into motivation which pushed me to monitor my research and the construction of my essay ensuring it was in line with rubric criteria. In hindsight this is definitely something I will do more often with future assessments. I'd also like to mention that we had to mark ourselves for this assessments, as in we had to highlight on the rubric how we think we did. For me it was surprisingly a hard task since I had to really step above myself, in a sense, and mark it objectively. I didn't give myself full marks because I knew that there was something lacking in my essay and also that it is extremely hard to get full marks at uni. (I wonder if we could ever see sample HD work for different assessments as evidence that HDs do exist and are not just given out to 2% of the cohort to satisfy norm-referenced assessment). The facilitator said that self-marking is quite an interesting exercise since you are forced to ask yourself, "Why would I hand this in if I don't think it deserves full marks?"

Within 2 days of handing the essay in I received feedback. Complete shock that a marker could mark like Speedy Gonzales. Never before have I received such constructive feedback. Have you ever read a journal article online, highlighted key text and annotated using that speech bubble function? Well, this is how I received my feedback. I think it reflected the effort of the marker since it meant that each of our essays were valued. Other lecturers should look into this method of marking that is both informative, aligned with the rubric and paperless! It is much more meaningful than tick-tick-BOOM, here's your mark!

Also thought I'd share my "teacher's haul" with you guys. I picked up all these goodies at Officeworks the other day. Did you know they close at 12am? Starting to collate materials for my PAL leadership assessment and also for another unit where we need to create maths and english resources for children to take home based on learning outcomes within the syllabus. I never knew how much fun laminating could be but sadly running out of things to laminate.

Looking forward to attending and observing a PAL session this week. I'll let you know how it goes down.


Love,
Miss Fun size.

week 3: students Vs lecturers

Dear flowers,

Choosing an angle for an essay topic, provided a given question, is quite difficult. Choosing an essay topic is even harder. I’ve chosen to critically discuss the following statement that really struck me when reading about a PAL program implemented at a UK university in 2008:

“Successful students are better equipped and better placed than lecturers to pass on [writing] skills to novice students in a peer-facilitated environment.”

My initial thoughts on this statement were that students are better placed than lecturers in some situations but lecturers still have a significant role to play in terms of their student’s learning. Perhaps lecturers are needed for the initial introduction of content, to authenticate and give purpose to what we the students are required to know. And, of course (how can I forget?), lecturers set assessments, which motivate students to keep up. Tutorials help us recall what we can remember from lectures, facilitated by more friendly professionals. But peer-facilitated groups such as study groups really give you a chance to cement and clarify what you know. In peer groups you feel free to make connections with lecture material without fear of being judged or embarrassed, which I think is a huge thing for first years trying to comfortably find their place at uni. In peer groups you can ask as many questions as you please because you know that lecturers will be especially pee’d off if you ask them silly questions that your peers can answer. You support each other more than a lecturer or tutor ever can because of the obvious ‘professional distance’ that they project. If lecturers weren’t so busy supervising their PHDs and whinging about uni-related political issues then perhaps we’d feel more inclined to approach them.

I read in an article that lecturers are beginning to feel obsolete due to the increasing availability of online lectures. Some students are saying that they are just if not more valuable than face-to-face lectures. After four years of being at uni I still prefer attending lectures rather than listening online. Maybe it’s due to the whole personal aspect of being able to see the lecturer and see how they speak since I am quite a visual learner. Or perhaps it has more to do with having a fixed scheduled time, requiring me to attend in order to minimise the guilt of not going. Maybe that’s why I sit in the front row, to make myself feel more accountable to the lecturer.

I know that some people think less of me sometimes because I don’t do what typical 21 year olds do but I choose to learn from experience and the experience of others. I know how I learn best which is by sitting in the front row, getting rid of distractions and working with authentic people. It produces amazing results.


Love,
Miss Fun size

week 2: will you be my PAL?

Dear flowers,

I'll be doing something different for the next 12 weeks.

I’ve recently started a unit called Theory and Practice of Peer-Assisted Learning where we are asked to write a reflective journal throughout the course. I was surprised that the convenor allowed me to use my blog for this assessment since it is the perfect outlet for me. What is a bit nerve-wracking about this assessment is that it doesn't feel like one. There are no real boundaries as to what we can write but we are to "assess our successes and ongoing professional development needs" to become "critically reflective teachers."

I thought that I would firstly share why I chose to enrol in this subject. Since high school I perceived effective study as something you do solo since it was ultimately a competition where other students were out to steal your hard-earned notes. In hindsight I find this perception shallow and quite hilarious after finally appreciating how much more meaningful study groups are.

My narrow view of effective study turned on me when I did a course at uni which required us to work together for a Writer's Workshop. The conditions of the workshop were that we could not say a word when each person read aloud their literacy autobiography, we had to take turns asking questions to clarify our understandings, we also had to provide 'praise' and 'polish'. Providing 'polish' meant giving suggestions as to how the reader may like to improve their work. I learnt from this exercise that receiving criticism is not all that bad and something that I ended up preferring over praise. Recently I read that the most effective way for lecturers to integrate PAL strategies is to make them explicit learning outcomes. Students experience the challenge of negative dynamics and thus learn to be more open and understanding. And in this instance, we learnt to get over the competitive side of things and appreciate the cooperative process.

I remember the sense of belonging and value I experienced throughout that assessment. My attitude towards co-operative learning definitely changed that day. For the first time it did not feel like we were out to do better than one another. We were all equal. We all had diverse literacy backgrounds. What also interested me was how the tutor did only 3 things that lesson: 1) told us to separate into small groups, 2) walked around the room, listening to our stories and discussion and 3) asked us how we felt after the exercise.

After this workshop I began to organise study groups that ended up being quite successful and productive. We, of course, went off on tangents but good tangents! I think that when people are engaged they see how concepts apply to their lives and so they can't help but share connections between the content and their real life experiences. This is a beautiful thing because from these connections you know that your study buddies have really learnt something that is meaningful and therefore will stick.

Some study groups I have been a part of hold 'mini lectures' in the pod area at the bottom of the library. This type of study is based on jigsaw learning where each person becomes an 'expert' of a particular lecture, writes big picture ideas on a whiteboard and discusses them with the rest of the group. So literally, like a jigsaw, we are actively constructing knowledge and we are all equally contributing to the masterpiece(: On the other hand I have also been involved with small group study where each member becomes responsible for a particular module, each typing up notes so that we have our own “version” of the course. We ending up with our own textbook that if we were lucky were able to take into exams that were open book.

So as explained it is only until very recently that I have realised the power of PAL and how if it is mutually reciprocated can produce amazing results for all involved. I think that the overarching requirement for PAL to be successful is the attitude of each member. If you all have a purpose for being there, whether that be to improve your understanding of the course, to revise or even to meet new people which may be the case for some first years, then you will naturally be more engaged and hence more open to negotiate meaning with others.

I have never done a course like this before where you get to hold the reigns on your essay topics, create a marking criteria as a class (as shown in the photo above) and write a reflective journal with no word limit. My uncertainty and anxiety, I feel, is beginning to motivate me to reflect on my teaching pedagogies more closely and to assess my conceptual understandings after each PAL seminar.

I am grateful for a unit that genuinely feels rather than claims to be learner-centred.

And now it's ESSAY TIME!


Love,
Miss Fun size

through the sticky times

Dear flowers,

For Valentine's day I decided to surprise my favourite girlies with a few treats. It was the perfect opportunity to let them know that although I was busy with school I was still thinking of them. I found a cute and cheap idea on the disney family fun website called Lollipop Flowers that I knew my girls would squeal over.

I bought a packet of lollipops, cut out leaves from green construction paper and employed the help of my 5-year old cousin who coloured in pictures of hearts just beautifully as evidenced below. I also downloaded a free iphone ap called Red Stamp that has plenty of templates for special occasion cards and proceeded to print them off as photos at Officeworks. Love that place. And luckily during my op-shopping the other day I stumbled upon a packet of 12 sparkly boxes for $5. Such a steal and perfect for each of my girlies who have such unique and equally brilliant personalities. The boxes were also great for concealing a secret Valentine's day message.

Happy Valentine's Day, boys and girls.

Love,
Miss Fun size

the smell of progress

Dear flowers,

Just thought I'd share a short and sweet post about my progress with uni work. I've finally done my research for my essay on factors influencing food choices in Australia which is due in two days. Looking at things from a distance I found that conflicting messages received from the school, home and societal environment are major determinants of how people choose their food. I think it's safe to argue that you need to look at people and their decisions based on their context. I found it fascinating where in one study Aussie children weren't able to classify if apple pie was 'good' or 'bad' since it had apple in it and also whether french fries were 'good' or 'bad' since they were made from potatoes. A study also found that Aussie adolescents aspire to have bodies that are different to what is perceived as a healthy body. Females desire to have even skinnier bodies whereas males prefer to be more muscular.

Hopefully with plenty of english breakfast tea and happy thoughts this baby will be done and dusted by midnight.

Been thinking a lot about future posts and I've decided on two things. One will be to show you some stuff I'm doing to help my tutees to prepare for NAPLAN which is coming up in May. And I'll upload a simple checklist that I've come up with after going through the marking criteria for the writing prompt component of NAPLAN. Hopefully it well help any tutors out there struggling to find resources besides those on the website. And secondly, I'll share a cool idea I found for the perfect Valentine's Day present to give to loved ones. And it's extremely purse friendly(:

Stay tuned.


Love,
Miss Fun size

like a balloon

Dear flowers,

Currently pumping the acoustic guitar music. It seems like the only thing at the moment that's filling the air with positivity. My situation right now is like when someone blows up a balloon then decides to release it, zooming around the room making that noise we all love to hear. And no, I'm not literally making that noise.

One of the many ways I like to procrastinate, besides procrasti-baking, is to blog hop. I just read a mate's blog called 'grubby pandas' and became engrossed in his post called 'reflecting on how I learn.' I loved how he related his learning to one of his failed baking experiences. Been there, that's for sure. I decided to make this post my version of his, hoping it will help me deconstruct those moments and those days when I do feel deflated and demotivated to do anything with a full heart.

So how do I learn?

Trying to write as candidly as possible, I learn by relating things to me. It sounds selfish and hence not always a good thing since I can't always relate to everyone else's knowledge and experiences but that's the first thing that comes to mind. On the plus side if you can't make something meaningful to you, or connect it to your life somehow, I think that it would be harder to apply that knowledge to real life situations. I also learn by being able to write or say things in my own words and discuss or debate about it with my peers. I definitely am all for learning that is playful and doesn't feel at all forced.

I always detested textbooks throughout highschool which made it a bit tricky in the first year of uni. I rolled my eyes at them because I didn't know how to read them effectively. Thank goodness we had a compulsory unit dedicated to effective note taking and textbook reading. Seems like a waste of time at face value to non-teachers but surprisingly I think for most students it ended up being one of the most memorable units they ever did. If I did a PHD I would look into cognitive strategies including note taking and research into why teachers, more specifically high school teachers, aren't explicitly showing students how to do well at school and teaching these strategies that are essential for doing well at uni. I think that teachers are doing a great job throughout primary school using more constructivist and playful techniques but when they reach high school it's like a tidal wave crashes over them, they aren't shown how to swim and are told that shore is over there somewhere. Of course, not everybody would have had the same experience but as teachers it's beneficial to look at students whose experiences weren't always positive to improve their instruction, to become better educators and to make a dent in the system. The elephant in the room is the ever increasing need for high school teachers. Why do so many of us prefer early childhood and primary school teaching?

If I were to do a Masters degree I would most likely do it on maths anxiety of which I can relate all too well. I desperately wanted to do well in Maths at school but despite having a great teacher and tutor it wouldn't always stick the way I wanted it to. I'd love to break down why many kids, like me, have the same dilemma despite their persistent and full-hearted efforts. I'd also like to provide fresh and I hate to say 'revolutionary' strategies on how to help teachers overcome any maths anxiety they have as it really can't be masked from students. I applied for an undergrad Summer research scholarship but didn't get in this time round. But to my mates who did make it, congratulations, you deserve it. Here is an excerpt from my application:

"From primary school through to University I have been pretty scared about Maths. In primary school, I remember being asked to create a poster on how to add fractions and had no clue how I could articulate an effective presentation of the concepts. I would then just volunteer to be the scribe as my classmates told me what to write. My experience as a high school student was that each time I begun to understand a Maths concept the teacher had already moved on to the next topic and would inform us about a ‘topic test’ occurring shortly. It was when I went to University where I began with an accounting degree and worked in an accounting firm as a Trainee Accountant where my experience with Maths was further challenged. At University, I found listening to Maths lectures laborious and I would blame myself for not trying hard enough although I was putting in the hours. I started to reflect on people who most inspired me on my interests. My role models had been my year 6 teacher, my Spanish teacher in high school and my two grandmothers who were both teachers.

Transferring from a business to an education course was the best decision I have made so far in my life. Effecting a change meant conquering my fear of challenging boundaries which I believe are situations which I will find in Educational Research. Making a change means that I am now prepared and determined to conquer both my known and unknown fears in learning Maths to enable students in future become more receptive to learning and make Maths a more exciting subject.

This research project aligns with my aspirations of conquering obstacles in my life that I have let weigh me down, in this case being my Maths anxiety. The main aim of my research is to help pre service teachers in a similar position to me feel good about themselves and harness their abilities, as well to help me embrace my innate fear of Maths. I believe that to help my students maximise their learning potential, I need to be able to conquer this inherent fear."

I revealed my blog to close friends of mine today which felt like a leap. Nervous about their reactions but at the same time feeling happy that I can unmask a deeper part of me with all of them.

Time to fly.


Love,
Miss Fun size

to summer school or not to summer school?

Dear flowers,

It was interesting when a lecturer at our on-campus session asked us to reflect upon the entire course which just started two weeks ago. Looking "back" I can't believe how much material we've actually covered, condensing normally twelve weeks of stuff into just four weeks. And funnily enough I've been more on top of things and absorb a lot more content compared to during normal semester. Interesting!

When my boyfriend first brought up the idea of summer school I thought he was insane in the brain ("in the membrane" doesn't make sense to me). There was no way I was going to waste away my precious holidays... stuck indoors... and spend my time studying of all things. But then I realised I wasn't going to start my new job at an after school care until February which meant I had no moolah to spend for the rest of the holidays.

It was then that I started looking into Summer School and I was lucky to find two early childhood units suitable for my electives. One of them is all about the benefits of playful learning and the other focuses on how to integrate PDHPE into your lessons. Both exceptional units that have opened my 'teaching eyes.'

When enrolling into units for the normal semester it became apparent that I get to graduate early next year. Summer school seemed pretty ideal to me at the point.

If any of you are genuinely interested in doing Summer School or even Winter School I believe it is worth it. All you need to do is keep calm and keep up. And there is definitely time to chill, no worries.

My list of to-dos include two major essays for each unit and one final exam on Valentine's day. Not long to go at all. I can do this.

Off I skip!

Love,
Miss Fun size

P.S Thanks for your pushiness and belief in me, Mikey.

chapter 5: the rebirth

Dear flowers,

I've attempted to rebirth this blog about 5 times, under different names and with different motivations. To my despair thepolkadotteacher.blogspot was taken (since I'm smitten for anything polka dotted at the moment) which is actually a pretty rockin' blog. I named this blog 'shorter than my students' simply because it's true and I'm learning to love myself for it.

My motivation for creating what is hopefully going to be my last blog is my confuzzled-ment. Next year when I graduate with a primary school degree I see 4 potential and equally enticing paths. (1)Do masters or honors? (2)Do an early childhood degree? (3)Jump into the deepest end of the pool and move to the country for a year working full time as a teacher? Mum says no, dad says yes. (4)Or stay in Sydney, working casual jobs and chasing down opportunities? Trying to choose which slice of the cake is the most appealing.

I have also been 'jokingly' confused at work as being one of the kiddies which has made me feel, on the one hand cute, but on the other like I can't be taken seriously because of my height. I have this recurring nightmare that I'll walk into my first classroom with most of my students literally looking down at me. Build a bridge and get over it, right? Right!

So this is me as an undergrad, awaiting pracs, being a tutor, working in after school care, childcare, party planning and learning about what's "totes awesome" from my younger cousins.

I've downloaded about 18 teaching blogs onto my iphone and still don't completely envisage how this blog will unfold. And someone wise once told me about the benefits of not planning things to death, mainly because you distract yourself from all the little, more candid and valuable things that are few in number. I've noticed that many bloggers go down the money making route by making templates for lesson plans and honestly I can't help but wish I could afford them all sometimes. But at this present moment I don't think I'll jump on that bandwagon. I foresee, for this blog, a scrapbook containing material that is fresh, inspiring, playful and oozing authenticity.

I am to the core grateful that I have had the chance to go to school and to uni to be able to even have the opportunity to make my own decisions about my future. It is my dream to help all my students, despite their weaknesses and handicaps that society doesn't offer a hand for, see that learning is sometimes painful, sometimes beautiful but always lifelong.

Are you ready to be apart of my story for which I have no idea of its ending?

Scary + exciting. Scariting? Oh, and another thing you should know about me, I like to create new words and also use puns because I think I'm the punniest. I'll stop before you PUNch me, virtually.


Love,
Miss Fun size