I have one question to ask, that is,

"Is it important for teachers to be liked by students?"

So that's it. My entry.
*writer's block*

USING NEWSPAPER IN THE CLASSROOM

I love to use newspaper in the classroom. So, I want to share these ideas on what we can do with the newspapers. If I have time, I'll share what I've done with the newspaper in a proper entry. These are taken from a website.

TEN GREAT ACTIVITIES FOR USING THE NEWSPAPER
Read and write for meaning. Remove the headlines from a number of news stories. Display the headline-less stories on a classroom bulletin board. Provide students with the headlines, and ask them to match each to one of the stories. As students replace the missing headlines, ask them to point out the words in the headlines that helped them find the correct story. Then distribute headlines from less prominent stories and ask students to choose one and write a news story to go with it. When the stories have been completed, provide each student with the story that originally accompanied the headline. Ask: How close was your story to the original? How effectively did the headline convey the meaning of the story? You might follow up this activity by asking students to write a headline for their favorite fairy tale.
Read a map. Arrange students into groups, and assign each group one international story in the news. Have students explore Maps of the World and choose a map related to their assigned story. Ask students to use the map to answer some or all of these questions:

1. In what city did the story take place?
2. What country is that city in?
3. What is the capital of that country?
4. What language is spoken there?
5. What continent is the country part of?
6. What countries or bodies of water border the country on the north, south, east, and west?
7. What physical characteristics of the country might have contributed to the events in the story?
8. What effect might the event or series of events have on the physical characteristics of the country?

Understand the media. Distribute advertisements cut from newspapers, and ask students to list the products in order, according to the appeal of the ads. Create a chart showing how students rated each product. Then distribute a list of the following propaganda techniques:

• Bandwagon -- the implication that "everybody else is doing it."
• Plain folks -- the implication that "users of this product are just like you."
• Card stacking -- distorting or omitting facts.
• Name-calling -- stereotyping people or ideas.
• Glittering generalities -- using "good" labels, such as patriotic, beautiful, exciting, that are unsupported by facts.
• Testimonial -- an endorsement by a famous person.
• Snob appeal -- the implication that only the richest, smartest, or most important people are doing it.
• Transference -- the association of a respected person with a product or idea.

Discuss each ad, and determine the propaganda technique(s) used. Ask: Which techniques were most effective? Which were least effective? What factors, such as gender, geographic location, or age, might have influenced the effectiveness of each technique? As a follow-up to the activity, you might ask students to design their own ads using one of the propaganda techniques studied.
Arrange in sequence. Cut up some popular comic strips, provide each student with one complete strip, and ask students to put the comics back in the correct order. Or arrange students into groups, provide each group with several cut-up strips from the same comic, and ask them to separate the panels into strips and arrange the strips in the correct order. Then introduce older students to a series of stories about an ongoing news event, and ask them to arrange the stories in the order in which they appeared. Encourage them to use the stories to create a news time line.
Expand your vocabulary. Assign each student a letter of the alphabet. Ask students to browse through the newspaper, find five unfamiliar words beginning with the assigned letter, and look up the definition of each. Then have each student create and illustrate a dictionary page containing the five words and their meanings. Combine the pages into a classroom dictionary. In a variation of this activity, you might ask students to look in the newspaper for any of the following:

• words with a particular suffix or prefix
• words containing a particular vowel sound or consonant blend
• compound words
• words in the past, present, and future tenses
• possessives
• plurals

Older students might look for examples of similes, metaphors, irony, hyperbole, and satire.
Explore geography. Ask each student to search the newspaper for stories that illustrate each of the five themes of geography -- location, place, human interaction and the environment, movement and communication, and regions. Display the stories on a classroom bulletin board labeled with the five geography themes.
Hunt for classified math. Ask students to use classified pages of the newspaper to do the following:

• calculate the average price of a 1985 Cadillac
• find what fraction of the newspaper is composed of classified ads
• figure out the cost of running a 30-word ad for one week
• estimate the total number of classified ads (based on ads per column and columns per page)
• compare bank interest rates and determine the most and least interest $100 would earn in one year in your area
• find what percentage of job openings start with T. As a follow-up to this activity, ask each student to create a classified ad and exchange it with a classmate. Ask: Was all the necessary information included? If not, what was missing?

Sort and classify. Label each of seven shoe boxes with one of the following newspaper categories: News, Editorials, Features, Humor, Advertising, Sports, and Entertainment. Ask students to cut out the newspaper stories they read each day and put each one in the appropriately labeled shoe box. At the end of the week, have students skim as many of the stories as possible and write an adjective describing each on index cards attached to each box. You might suggest adjectives such as factual, sad, inspiring, opinionated, misleading, silly, serious, and biased. Discuss and compare the adjectives. What conclusions can students reach about each category based on those words?
Play a current events game. Make a list of five categories that might be created using the newspaper, such as Countries, Weather Events, Mathematical Symbols, Movies, and Technology Terms. Ask students to search the newspaper for information related to each category and to write a question based on the information they find. (Remind students to make a note of the answers to their questions.) Arrange students into teams, and use the question-and-answer combinations to play a Jeopardy type of current events game.
Make papier-mâché. Finally, when you've done everything else you can think of with your newspaper, don't throw it away. Make papier- mâché! Here's how:

• Make a paste by mixing together 1/2 cup of flour and 2 cups of cold water. Add the paste to 2 cups of boiling water and return to a boil. Remove from heat and stir in 3 tablespoons of sugar. Let the mixture cool and thicken. You can also make a quick no-cook paste by simply adding water to flour until it forms a soupy mix. (Since flour-based pastes get moldy over time, you might want to use powdered wallpaper paste mixed with water for a longer-lasting creation.)
• Tear newspaper into narrow strips, and dip the strips into the paste, coating them completely. Squeeze out excess paste and drape the strips over a mold, such as a balloon or shaped chicken wire, overlapping the edges.
• Apply as many layers as necessary, allowing each layer to dry before putting on another layer.
• Decorate as desired.

ADDITIONAL RESOURCE
KidBibs Learning Tip #40: Newspaper Activities Support Children's Learning in Many Ways
Joyce Melton Pagés, Ed.D, president of KidBibs, provides many activities that demonstrate how newspapers support language and literacy development, stimulate an interest in current events, support learning across the curriculum, promote higher level thinking skills, stimulate independent reading and writing, support character development, and more.
- See more at: http://www.educationworld.com/a_lesson/lesson/lesson139.shtml#sthash.olxcsWBz.dpuf

SHOULD OR SHOULDN'T I

Dear students,

Hah! today is not Sept eleventh, the date when World Trade Centre in New York crumbled into ashes. But today is Sept first. What is so significant with the date that without me realizing forces me to crack my palm-sized brain to pour some words so that they may be worthy for our thoughts for further thought.

Yesterday we Malaysians celebrated our most auspicious day though it might bring very little or no significance at all to some or many of us for struggling for freedom is not in most of the lexicon of today's x & y generations. I am 40 years old and though a bit rude or unpatriotic do admit that i don't feel like celebrating as nothing special that can associate me with the most auspicious date. I am above all muslim, the rest comes second or does not come at all. If i may put i am also a beetle lover as it in some ways teach me a few recipes of life which have some bearings  more than from what i have got from years of formal settings at universities or schools. I learn not to risk my dear life negotiating sharp corners after my beetle lost its clutch on the road and turned turtle  which left its all four tires and flat stomach for display to other motorists passing the lane heading to Pengkalawan Gawi Kenyir. I learned to be a good driver then at least to be careful at corners.

Thinking that by the end of this year i may no longer be at smas which of course bring lots of bitter sweet memories, i feel that it is a must to be to preserve some records of the last final laps i will have taken hoping it will become things worthy to share for the sake of you my dear students as well as teachers who might copy paste things deem good to apply for students. I do this as i do feel I did very little contribution to school compared to what I have squeezed from students or the school environment itself  to my benefits. So, now it is timely that i need to do something despite many claim that this is of little or small importance. Never mind I should straighten things up so that the road to exit is clear and no one is standing in my way to bid good bye to smas.

So, after more than one hundred words, it is now clear to me that I need to or I should do this so called 'unpaid efforts' so that i may leave this school feeling that i have done my part to help bring at least a small betterment to this school. So what i have done today? oh almost all is not worthy to record. I have for the first time on the second day in seven years finished checking two exam scripts for English paper two. the papers belong to Amar and Aziz from five taqwa respectively. i prior to marking their papers attempted all the objective questions the part which i myself hardly got all answers correct. This time, i managed to get all the answers correct. That means the questions for this year's trial is not tough like before or i am already a seasoned teacher whose experiences helped me guess the answers better.It sounds boastful but it is in fact nothing to feel proud of as hundreds of  students could easily get all 15 objective questions correct. I guessed the former is true but i need to check the answers from my A students first. You guys may guess whose my A students are?. Just wait.. time will tell as this year English panel headed by Madam Saliza unanimously agreed to churn out at least 10 students getting A for English. To top them all is none other than Siti Nor Ehsan. I could see her niche when i first read her short essay four years ago. I could see her gradual improvement over years as year in year out as i am the one who happens to teach her English. However, I strongly believe that her passion for English language  is what makes her better user of the language.

To end this musing , let us ponder this quote from a renowned figure Winston Churchill. He said '  Personally  I am always ready to learn although i do not always like being taught'.

Sir Yusri

WHAT A LONG HIATUS

Has teaching lost its appeal? At least to me? 

Hence, I feel the need to start writing, to start reflecting here so that the answers are found at least within yourself through muhasabah.

And it's nice to have people reading what's going on in your mind at times and I am even more motivated to write after learning that there are students reading this blog. 

Since my mind is a bit rusty from years of not writing, excuse me for this very short writing. Hope to write more soon, insha Allah.

👋✌️

MY SEVENTH YEAR AT SMAS

Dear students,

Not knowing whether they will take a glimpse or not at this blog is of no importance. What matters me is the act of writing itself continues unabated. The last entry was over a year when i wrote to share my gratefulness for having a good samaritan helping my students out during the exam of English paper. It turned out quite a number of my students got A for English. I should have written this long before not after another result of PMR was released. Like they say, better late than not to start all over again at all. 

This is my seventh year here at SMAS. I should have enough experience considering the length of time spent here. However, I think I am still my old self. I love doing things with minimal supervision from others regardless of their rank or position. Others' constant supervision stifles one's creativity. SMAS is like a pier the place where big and small ships docked. When they finished their business they might in no time start sailing to other islands or destinations. But until now, i have not been flocking like others as i rather sail solo as i don't want to cause others a headache due to my internal problems. 

So tired i am now that i need to pen off my pen as too many a task lie ahead waiting to be done. 

Sir 

THANK YOU ALLAH

Dearest students,

So thankful to Him as though the exam paper today was not a piece of cake at least the task was not an uphill battle for some of my in charge. The theme that i had asked them to commit to memory bore fruits and what a relief to see some of them grinning from ears to ears after exiting from the hall. I must be thankful to the invigilator who happened to be an English teacher. He was a great help to some students who were stuck with difficult words especially for guided writing as some of the vocabulary are not in students' lexicon for their lack of reading. i could not thank him more for his help as who else to give a hand at that time of moment - but was the act morally wrong or enough if i regard such an act as a helping hand only.

So thankful i am to Madam Farah for her tips a couple of days prior to the exam. She amongst others  mentioned about constructing compact essay that includes in it a variety of sentences and tenses aside from some powerful language expression be it idioms, passive voice and so forth. The sentences must be perfectly elaborated.

I could now feel the so called a void after the students finished both first and second paper for English. So, i must buck up and do something to better improve my own language acquisition. SPM candidates under my tutelage will sit the exam in no time. Preparation breeds success, the more small success we acquired the

OO ALLAH HELP THEM PLEASE

Dear students,

It is a known fact that miracles happen everyday. They know yet select day when the Almighty said so, things will be going as ordained. We tend to forget Him if things go our away, instead we invariably brag ourselves by taking full credits while basking in success that we forgot both success and failure are God's test to see whether or not we are in fear of Him. We usually prefer to be in solitude for self-reflection if things went wrong aside from blaming others but ourselves. This is not actually the attitude i we should put in practice as what should matter most is the efforts we have put in. The result, let the Almighty God decide as He knows best who deserve the most.

Sometimes, in the eyes of us mortals, certain students deserve but to Allah they are still not fit enough to be accorded a success for their bad deeds or for any reason only God knows like the laws of karma as some religious adherents hold onto strongly. He is of course All-knower. His knowledge is beyond our imagination. He gave us knowledge but very little.

Sadly to admit that despite being able to anticipate the outcome of last year's batch.The pain and shame rendered us reeling in shock and guilty for failure to convert even a student from lower grades to ace. This alone has since taught me some invaluable lessons that i hardly found elsewhere. So true when a once renowned US singer, Alanis in his song's lyrics read  , i  lose i learn i cry i learn and so forth. Learning is continuous act and it stops once we answer His call or we ourselves prefer to call it a quit though our mental and physical strength said no.

I hardly close my eyes as the time is counting and nothing much could i do now except keeping fingers across that the Almighty Allah we award us accordingly in proportion with the efforts that we put it. I know i could have done better should i have a comprehensive master plan, but this type of thinking dissipates our energy more than any other things.Why? because we put much attention to things in the past that no one can make amend. If the accident victim succumbed to injuries or impact, students as well teachers might paralysed mentally due to failure.

Oo Allah help us please as this will enable us to chart a new life especially students so that they would be able to give greater contribution to the Ummah of Muhammad. Let us chant salawats at all times without fail.

Sir