1. Purposes of practicum
One of the reason this program is continually available to those students who are aspiring to be a future educators, the exposure to another type of setting with another sets of challenges that will arise and how we as future teachers ease and solve those problems.
Next purpose why there are a lot of students able to experience this program, is for them to apply continuously the practice of accurately adapt to be in a diversified community wherein you have to potray your best self so you can refrain from doing things that are not desirable in the views of others.
Another purpose is to be able to accumulate strategies and techniques that we student-teacher can apply to our respective communities. Since, we had stayed in a different setting for almost 4 weeks. A different area could mean a different and new way of applying teaching inside the class. When I observed inside the class, there was really a slight differentiation in terms of the curriculum and teaching strategy especially the sequencing of the lesson procedures.
There may be a lot of purpose to relay but the main point why this program incessantly working is for the participants to flourish to their fullest potential in regards to understanding culture and beliefs and be able to do a unified relationship despite the differences.
We come from different nations, but bond as one.
The participants with the student buddies.
2. Procedures of practicum
The student-teacher program is divided into 4 types for the participant to render their service. For the first week, the participant had to be observing the class of the cooperating teacher the student-teacher was assigned. The next week, the student-teacher was tasked to provide assistance to the cooperating teacher inside the class. Another week had been assigned for practicum teaching or internship. This will be the span of time the participant executed teaching the pupils following the weekly topics provided by the school. The last week was set for the evaluations and reflections about the perceived experiences of the participant.
3. Outcomes of practicum
The student-teacher was able to collate a collection of differences as well as similarities. I am able to grab the opportunity of retaining the strategies and techniques that I had seen that can be also be of great advantage for me to acquire as a skill in teaching and apply it to
1.4 The challenges of practicum
There were a lot of challenges that affected me in the process but what triggered me the most were:
The language barrier, it really built a limitation for me to be able to communicate and build rapport to the pupils. The pupils were restricted to approach and talk to me because we were not able to fully understand each other well.
The transportation, it was my first time using motorcycle as a type of transportation and had to travel more or less 20 kilometers to and fro from the dormitory provided by my receiving University, University of Lampung. Most often, when I went back home using the motorcycle, my back hurts a little for staying seated on an unparalleled seating for a long time.
The difference procedure of relaying the lesson, the wide variation of methods how in Indonesia and Philippine teach their lesson. Due to that reason, I was not able to get a spectacular teaching evaluation for I had applied the Philippine teaching procedure at class.
1.5 Overall impression
The program really helped people like me who were not really that thoroughly exposed to the difficulties and challenges that teacher experiences during teaching. It really was an eye opener to secure all possible problem that the teacher would undergo.
The problems aside, I really had fun connecting to new people, able to know their culture, to adapt to the commonalities and decent acceptable actuation that I should do.
I had been in awe by the Indonesia’s way of planning and executing the establishment’s designs. It really provided a sense of patriotism and culturally aligned sense of individuality.
1.6 Suggestions for future improvement
To the program provided by SEAMEO, I suggest they will maintain the program and able to reach more countries in Asia. I am hoping that all of the participants will have the support they need whether it be assistance financially or emotionally.
To my receiving university, University of Lampung, I suggest that they will have a more pre-planned schedule for the activities. I also propose that all participants of the Sea Teacher program will be assigned to a more accessible school. I want to add another suggestion in regards to the person buddy, I hope that there will be a constant companion specially to student-teacher who will be teaching in kindergarten and elementary.
