TIME MANAGEMENT'S TIPS FOR YOUR STUDENTS

     I was once invited to give a talk on time management to a group of incoming freshmen participating in my school’s newly organized orientation camp in July 2012. Time management is one of the realistic issues to discuss with teenagers although there has long been an existing problem on habitual tardiness in submitting homework, or projects. What might be the root of this? Might it be that a student has a lot of deadlines to meet? Might it be that, in particular, a student doesn’t have enough resources to utilize and that he or she should take time in collating everything needed at a certain circumstance. My last assumption is for the benefit of the doubt, knowing that a teacher has always a time frame or an allowance before closing the date of “handing in”.

To teach time management to students is crucial because of a habit formed. This habit is called procrastination which is like an incurable disease that is strongly and massively distributed from one society to another. It is a virus that terminates every opportunity for an individual. There are those who have become totally devastated because they have missed the bus when going for a work interview. There are also those who have failed in a board examination due to late appearance at the testing room. The worst thing is that there are those who have just missed a minute and have lost the chance of recognition. All these situations must be fully emphasized when teaching children and when they are ready to pursue a greater level of education. Promptness or punctuality is a value caught rather than taught.
     Time management is an important skill to hone among students especially when they reach college level. In high school, teachers have put more effort on providing what the students need including a structured class schedule for all. However, in college or university, the students own their time and therefore, they must know how to allocate their time wisely and how to prioritize the activities that they need to do; otherwise, they will end up cramming most of the time and will fail to produce good outcomes.
     Now, in my point of view, let me share with you some simple and functional tips on how to encourage your students to use their time efficiently and effectively. If you, as teachers, are imposing such kind of time discipline, you need to practice it religiously. (1) Be on time. Don’t break the rule in order for you to establish credibility. Credible teachers are regarded as role models of students. (2) Mean what you say and say what you mean. If you say that you’ll give incentives to punctual submission of project/homework, you must close your eyes and give what is due to them. (3) Use positive motivation rather than employing negative measures such as deduction from points and punishment. Psychologically, students always think of something advantageous for them like earning more scores rather than losing some. (4) Appreciate them when they show positive behavior or quality project. It inspires the students to show the best part of themselves. (5) Teach them how to do listing of activities according to their degree of importance and deadlines. (6) Introduce to them the Gantt chart, a tabulated illustration of schedule to begin and to finish projects/homework.
     In the workshop that I conducted, I asked the students to organize their activities through a “list of routines” and after that they developed their Gantt chart after a task was given to them.
     Therefore, teachers, do you take the challenge

WHAT ELSE CAN A TEACHER BE?

     Creation is one of man’s activities which give birth to the existence of a complex world because of necessity to provide convenience, luxury and happiness to men themselves. Although this certainty happens, human beings cannot just simply sit down and wait for something to occur. Efforts must be done to put all things in order, to establish connection among one another and to maintain balance among human, nature and community. This is the very reason why man has to be multi-tasking as much as possible so as to respond to endless needs.

     This idea is not just a circumstance. I am a parent of three active boys, a teacher in a public school and a servant in the community. This is what I have created myself because this is what I want to become. Multi-tasking is the best terminology to use when a person acts in many ways, or when a person works in more than one role or function.

CONFERENCE with TEACHERS and STUDENTS

     As a parent, I am not confined only within the four corners of my house by taking care of my family, by listening to every story of my children, by preparing food everyday or doing all household chores. There is more than one can give when being a mother or a father I believe. What I mean is that, while being a parent, one can be another individual who can make a difference to every child. Like what I am doing or anybody is doing…teaching the children during formation stage occurring at home. This is parenting and teaching alike. If you instruct a child how to brush his teeth, you are a mentor then. If you give advice to a child, you are a parent, too. Thus, you are saving the world from juvenile delinquency by taking care of your children and neighbors’ children. This is service in action. Oftentimes in this role, one doesn’t have to earn an education degree in a college or university. Practical applications work in a real community.

     To conclude my contention, I strongly believe that charity begins at home. Being good parents and teachers at the same time is what the world needs today. These are the tasks that can hone children into responsible young men and women Teachers of young generations have renewed commitment to uphold the quality education fit to the fast growing local and international societies.

VOCABULARY BUILDING STRATEGY

                                             Teacher’s way
     Learning new English words, the students seem to find a certain amount of difficulty or if not, they just hear the new words and forget them in a short time. Many strategies can be used to increase the amount of words and to retain them easily. Some of these strategies could be through definition with multiple synonyms, using those newly encountered words in context, and structural analysis of the word. Whatever strategy used by a teacher may or may not work well. It will still be leaving a great weight on the learning skill level of the students.
     To introduce a new word or new words to my students, I had my own way how to deal with it so that my students had put less effort on learning yet retention is proven. I used this strategy most often especially when I was teaching poetry or prose to my students. Normally, they came across with more than ten words at one setting and to handle such a time of vocabulary building was not easy at all. I wanted that they would find fun at the same time and they could easily remember the words when they would meet them again.
In one of my English classes, the first strategy I employed was “STICKY NOTE-WORD”. I distributed colorful sticky notes to my boys and girls. At first they wondered on what they would do until finally I explained to them the whole process.
    The first thing to be done, when using this strategy, is to write the words on the white board. The question, “What do you associate with the word on the board? Write your idea on the sticky note and post it on the board after writing.” As a result the students would do as fast as they could and as many as they could. Through this strategy, the students don’t just depend on the teacher himself/herself. They learn new ideas from one another, which is the best way of learning. It is not a one-man show in that case. The use of sticky notes is also good when you are introducing a short story or when you have a brainstorming session. To motivate the learners more, spend time to read and check their sticky notes to affirm their ideas. At the end of your session, make a summary of all the notes posted on the board.

A LOVE TO TEACH - A LOVE TO LEARN

     The concept of teaching as a profession is always associated with how a teacher is giving his or her quality time to a noble chosen career. It is life for an energetic teacher who prepares a plan for the next day, who imparts what he or she has in mind to the children and adolescents alike, who checks a number of homework and who marks the tests given after his or lesson is taught. On the contrary as a fair compact, it is the life of an individual put into the hands of an educator. The children, in most cases, trust their teachers more than they trust their parents and they believe in what their teachers say. Teachers have the most powerful part in honing a child’s behavior. That is why obviously, at home, the child speaks of “these and those” of a teacher. What a teacher says, the child does it, brings it back to the house and speaks about it most of the time.
     Being able to cope with the demands of globalization and fast growing societies in the world, I have been teaching for 24 years. I have come across different levels of learners ranging from toddlers to adults. The fact that education is a continuous process is very real in every dimension of a human being. At this time, teaching is never fading for as long as there is an individual who would want to learn, as long as there’s a child who loves to learn and as long as there are people who hunger for more wisdom and changes. This is the essence of education.
     In teaching, a teacher is like a torch which always glows in the dark. It means to say that, a teacher has to continue to learn ten steps ahead of his or her students. However, the law of nature when it comes to limitation of knowledge is a natural principle in education; a teacher should open his or her heart to the new ideas of students who are exposed to global issues, technology and changes. In this instance, learning becomes a two-way process: a teacher learns from students and students learn from a teacher. Gone are the days when teachers were considered as fountain of knowledge; that is already an outlandish idea.
     Nowadays, teaching as a vocation is equitably and squarely affected by many modern concepts and theories in order to meet the needs of the new generation. The chalk-talk and theory exposition are but having small chances to effectively impart a topic. To imagine what a teacher says is creating a big trouble in the young mind of a child. Therefore, all manners of technological advancements are brought into the classrooms so that the teachers find a means to utilize those which make teaching easier than before. We see that a teacher is like a sponge absorbing the blows of educational changes and expectations of the community. They are comparable to tall bamboos swaying through the “swish-swash” of the wind to find directions. Directions as applied in education perse are those that will generate good outcomes in the midst of flexibility and adaptation in addition to school’s vision and mission.
     The creation of this blog site, TEACHERSACADEMIA, is primarily addressing the needs of teachers in the light of selecting strategies in teaching and lesson planning. This is also an informative board which will offer teachers tips how to handle classroom outward behavior of children and adolescents, how to motivate them to learn more and how to become a successful teacher. Remember that there is no perfect teacher but there can be the most effective and influential “teacher” in a teacher.