GGGE6293

CURRENT TRENDS IN LANGUAGE TEACHING RESEARCH

INDIVIDUAL WORK:

Assignment 3
Written Reflection

LECTURER
DR. AZLINA ABDUL AZIZ

PREPARED BY

KALSUM BINTI MOHAMED P106109

Introduction
Sarah, Vilogini, Priya and I worked together on our group work for Current Trends in
Language Teaching Research which started from the end of August 2020. For this, we were
assigned to create an oral history text in both written and graphic forms as well as developing
materials for all four language skills. We have to make it successful by interviewing a front line
during this COVID-19 pandemic. We chose Sarah’s younger brother as he is a male nurse who
began his career just a few months before the pandemic started. We prepared and uploaded the
interview questions. We waited for Sarah to interview her brother so that we could do the
transcription of the interview and could move on to other tasks too. However, in early of October,
Sarah informed us that she has changed to TESL 1 class and she still has not interviewed her
brother as he was in Sabah. Vilogini, Priya and I decided to change our front line since it would
be difficult to interview the same front liner, male nurse. We were lucky to get permission from
Dr Azlina binti Abdul Aziz and to find a new front line who is an NGO volunteer during this
pandemic. I opted to interview the NGO volunteer, Puan Salbiah, as I know her and live nearby.
As Priya is good in drawing, she opted to do the graphic and Vilogini volunteered to do the oral
history text.

What I have gained, the challenges I faced and how I overcame the challenges.
Questions and issues like how to organize our work, how to create the oral text, how to
make graphic illustrations and many more were always my top concerns. Interviewing someone
would be easy, but to do the transcription was not an easy task. In addition, as a primary school
teacher, I never cared to know about the DSKP for secondary school. I have seen the PULSE 1
textbook, but I have never read it. I have to transcribe the interview and develop materials for the
language skills based on the oral history text.
Although the tasks were challenging, but they were beneficial for me. It gave me a great
opportunity to prepare myself to be a better language teacher. Thus, I began to ask myself how to
transcribe the interview, how to write a lesson plan and how to create classroom materials if I am
not familiar with them. The answer was reading related articles and discussing with my group
members. After reading and discussing, I gained a better understanding which helped me to
expand my knowledge. I also learnt to think critically for any issues. Last but not least, I gained
the most valuable experience while doing the tasks which was the value of group work. I found
out that by doing a work in a collaborative way, it could multiply the effectiveness of any project
work. I am thankful for all of the learning that I have gained.
Designing the activity is another challenge for me. I tried to come up with appropriate
activities which are not only interesting but also incorporate with the oral history text. However,
when we discussed about activities, we found out that it is really hard to design activities which
connect to the class content. We looked for some the examples and make them as class activities.
This project assignment emphasized more on group work rather than individual work. We
had to make compromises when we confronted with differences such as different cultures,
different schedules and different perspectives on a particular question. We exchanged our views
on our understanding of the study and collaboratively came up with our approaches to do the
research and techniques to implement in our presentations. Thanks to Vilogini and Priya as they
helped me a lot in this project and I learnt a lot from them. I am very lucky to cooperate with
Vilogini and Priyadarshini in our group project, they are great companions who always refreshed
my mind and enlightened my creativity during our group work.
What I have gained from evaluating using the material evaluation checklist
After completing the two tasks in Assignment 1, I was given another task which is
Assignment 2 - Evaluation of materials. In this task, I had to evaluate the materials developed by
my group using the material evaluation checklist as a group work. We were given time to discuss
and to present our draft before starting to write up the report. As a group of three, we divided the
work. Vilogini volunteered to draft the oral history text and Priya volunteered to draft the graphic
and video. So, I drafted the lesson plans and classroom activities. We agreed to help each other
with the evaluation report write up after the presentation. We were happy with the feedbacks after
the draft presentation. We learned many things from other groups as well.
From the presentation, I learned many new techniques on how to create good graphics for
adding text such as the washout technique. I also found out there were many online apps that I
can apply in making a good animated video. I could use them for creating more materials for my
students. However, I had a little confusion on how to write the evaluation report. I discussed with
my group members and we gathered some examples from the internet sources. We were lucky to
have a very understanding lecturer who always willing to guide us and to help us when we were
stuck with the task. After studying the samples and reading more articles on evaluating materials,
I felt more confident to start writing the evaluation report. Three of us promised to start writing
the report after we ended the online classes for the semester and agreed to complete it before
January 10 so that we could have the peer’s check and we did it successfully.
What I have gained from evaluating using the material evaluation checklist is not only
being expertise on the topic, but also new ideas and methods in creating materials for my students
in future. From the material evaluation checklist, I learned the importance of good catchy title
and cover page to attract students and even adults. I learned that narrating a story for the video
was not an easy task. It was not just about voice projection, but also about vocal articulation.
There must be a variation in the voice tone. I read many books, journals and reports to get a better
understanding of the materials evaluation. I strongly believed that all of these learning will help
me to be a better teacher. It will give me an edge in learning about the current trends in language
teaching research, especially in creating lesson plans and classroom materials for non-textbook
based lesson.

Conclusion
COVID-19 pandemic is a significant threat to public health not only in Malaysia, but it is a
global health crisis. Being assigned to create an oral history text with graphic and video based on
this current global pandemic opened my eyes from many angles. Starting from choosing a front
line, interviewing, creating oral text, making the graphic video, writing lesson plans and
designing classroom activities until evaluating the materials did give me new knowledge from
many aspects. Honestly, I like the Current Trends in Language Teaching Research subject
because it helped in boosting up my spirits to be a better teacher and a better human. For me, the
material evaluation checklist is an important tool for teachers not only in evaluating own
materials for teaching and learning process, but also in evaluating a material before purchasing it.