I have to agree with him, no doubt about that. The right way should be to get the students interested in the language first before imparting more knowledge to them
Not trying to be hao lian here but I still can't believe that I got an A1 for my Chinese in O Level. I belong to the ang moh breed of generation Y Singaporeans and my spoken Mandarin is CMI, let alone writing
So much so for being an ang moh but I do enjoy Mother Tongue periods especially during secondary two. The teacher was creative and conducted fun lessons that entertained the class for one whole hour
If I were a Chinese teacher, these are some things which I will and will never do
Watch Mandarin shows
Let's see what can I think of. Erm, the basketball-themed Hot Shot? No, not suitable for the non-sporty type. Police Story by Jackie Chan? The students will be more interested in the actions then dialogue. Ok, how about Initial D? Cannot what the hell is Jay Chou talking lah! Alright, forget about it. Dota, anyone? Eh, what do you call Dota in Mandarin?
No spelling and dictation
They are just like sit-ups. Practically useless but still favoured by many retarded people. The bottomline about spelling tests are memorizing but it is of no use
You memorize all the nonsense and score full marks this week, you memorize the next one for next week's test and score full marks again. You continue this routine week in week out but at the end of the day(or year), how many words have you actually memorized?
Actually, another reason why I disagree on having spelling is that it is very easy to cheat, therefore the results may not reflect one's linguistic ability accurately. How easy is it to cheat? Right here now, you are going to discover some world-class cheating methods for spelling never reavealed before by Raymond the professional cheater
If you know what are the words which are going to be tested, just write them down on a peice of paper and hide it somewhere during the test. In your pencil case, under the table or if possible, just place it underneath the spelling book or paper
If you don't know how to write the word, wait until the test is over and while people are handing in their answers to the front, grab one quickly and copy that bloody word
You see? It's so simple
I cannot believe that my spelling was so jialat in the past
Encourage creative writing
I remember when I was in secondary four, there was once when the composition title was "The computer and I"
I knew that all the other idiots (aka my classmates) would definitely write about the advantages of using a computer and what they use the computer for etc. Being the odd-one-out, I always try not to follow the crowd and be unique
I decided to write a horror story. I bet not many people in this world would not have thought of it given that the title was on computers. This was roughly how my story went
My parents bought a new computer because the previous one was spoiled. I immediately switched it on the very night and started playing with it. It was midnight and I finally switched it off and went to bed
Suddenly, a glow came out from the monitor. I looked at it and a voice came out asking me to come back. The computer was switched off already. I got really scared and rushed out of the house and spent the night the guard house downstairs
I told my parents the incident the next morning and they did not believe me
I can't remember how the story continued later on but this is a rough summary of what I wrote. How much marks would you award for that? The teacher who marked my script was either afraid of spooky stuff or belong to the old-fashioned style of teachers. I reckon it is the latter
Throughout my secondary school life, I had written a number of classic compositions which made me an overnight hero in my class and even the whole cohort
Like the narration of the affair which I had with Si Han during flag day and the one on whether money is important. These are all good memories where I can occasionally take them out to read to recall. I still keep my Chinese file at home
In a nutshell, just let students be creative to get them interested
A good example of poor Chinese
Ring Ring Ring. Ok, it's recess time
No comments:
Post a Comment