PACE Program Week 2

This is the second time of our PACE program on 7^th October 2014. On this week, we are still going to SMK(L)Methodist to help our mentees. Before going to the school, I was so excited to meet my mentee but I was so disappointed when I reached the school. This is because I was waiting my mentee until the teacher came in and my mentee who is Kian Weng did not appear. Therefore, Janet and I have another new mentee which did not attend on last week. The teacher was teaching Mathematics last week. When teacher teaches until half way, that boy has moved to front seat because he can see the words on the whiteboard since we sat at the back.

After that Janet and I was separated to help other classmates in mentoring their students. I was mentoring a Chinese boy with one of my classmates. Last week was an “easy” week for me since my mentees did not attend and the new mentees was good in Mathematic, so we just have to explain to him and teach him the hardest question which he could not solve. Besides that, we have also given him some extra questions since most of the questions are easy for him.

Last week was our group preparing after class activities. My group members are Elaine, Janet and me. Our game is we would play some music and the students pass the bottle around the classroom to their classmates. Once the music stop, the one who was holding the bottle has to answer a question in 30 seconds and those cannot answer correctly have to sing or dance. There are some limitations of the game that I get. First, the music was cannot spread all over the classroom although it is the maximum volume and the sounds of the students had covered the music. Second, we do not expect that students do not like to perform. Therefore, one of the students ran out from the classroom when he knew that he has to perform something. Some of the students also go out from class because they do not want to join the activities. At last, I think we had make it better by letting the students help their friends when they could not answer it. For those who did well all of us were giving them applause. I think it could give more confident in doing Mathematics.

In conclusion, I hope that I can meet my mentee on next week since he is a really good and kind mentee for me and I hope that what we do can help them in their studies.

PACE Program Week 1

I was joining PACE program on last Tuesday, 30^th of September. This program last for five weeks which we are going to SMK (L) Methodist Sentul for three times and the students go for Taylor’s University lakeside campus. This program is to for us to giving help for those who weak in their studies.  They are Form 2 students and we are trying to maximize their potential by raising their academic performance in English, BM and Mathematics to meet minimum competency requirement of a “C”. 

Last week was my first time going to SMK (L) Methodist Sentul and it was my first time to meet all the mentees. Before going to the school, some of the scenes about my secondary school life flash into my brain, it must be the most happy time when we spent with friends. When I reached the school, I just wonder that is a “boys’ school”. The second thing that I realize was there are most Indian and Malay in the class. 

My mentee called Kian Weng, he is a really shy and quiet boy. He seldom talk with me unless I talk to him or ask him some questions. There are only two Chinese in their class and may be because of this then he become shy since he can’t speak English and Malay very well since most of his classmates use this two languages to communicate.  One of my group mates who is Janet has join me in mentoring Kian Weng. 

Teacher was teaching English preposition last week. When she was giving exercises for them, I found that Kian Weng can do most of the questions by himself but he still shy to ask us when he did not understand. I told him do not hesitate to ask me because we won’t “bite” him. I found that Kian Weng weak in vocabularies therefore can’t answer the questions. So we use the language that he understand the most which is Chinese to explain with him. Besides that, he is also not confidence in pronouncing English. Therefore we encourage him and ask him to give it a try.

After the lesson, there are a game sessions prepared by our classmates. The students have to find out the papers which have the number of stationeries that stick around the classroom and calculate by using the equation given. The students are so enjoy the game and I think that it is a good idea to get close with them.

What I have found in this week activity is most of them really need our help in their studies since teacher at school could not put  so much attention among all the students. Therefore, I really hope the time we spend on them really useful.