Guru Adalah Pekerja yang Ajaib (A Teacher is a Miracle Worker)

Upon having my third and last week as a teacher in SMA 1 Padang, I have realized that indeed a teacher does more than just teaching, for in fact a teacher is a parent, a facilitator, a friend, a supervisor and a caretaker all at the same time. For this week, given the limited time and resources, I had to prepare to teach two lessons, namely Degrees of Comparison and Advertising. I knew that this would entail me a lot of preparation to manage the effective teaching methods and instructional materials.

For teaching the topic on Degrees of Adjectives, I have first started the day with an interactive activity for the students. I have grouped the class into smaller groups and assigned each group an object to describe through using the appropriate descriptive words. After talking among their group mates, the groups shall let the rest of the class to guess whatever object was assigned to them.

The said activity was a successful one for it did not only help the students get to know the topic for the day but they were also able to work among their peers to achieve their common goals. In addition, they also had fun while giving their guesses, though some were very bizarre ones, that brought enjoyment while learning.

However, also because of the happiness and enjoyment in the moment, the guessing game took much time from the discussion proper. The students had much fun, for even I forgot that I have already spent almost thirty minutes for the activity. To solve this incident, I have reminded the students on our regulations for the activity. In this way, their joy would not be abrupted but the objectives of the day will still be achieved.

Then after the activity, I have used the responses of the students in formalizing the topic on degrees of adjectives. It has been much easier to teach because the students could relate the points to their experiences from the activity. They were also able to share much on how similar and different the adjectives that they have used to the ones mentioned and identified in the lecture.

For my last topic on Advertising, my biggest issue was on efficient classroom management. Good thing that the students got excited on the advertisement examples that are commonly found in the television and online; however some of the students became talkative and rowdy that it became difficult to handle them. For my part, I stayed calm and thought deeply on how to handle the students without getting mad.

I resorted into having proximity with the unruly students, to catch their attention that they would need to behave properly inside the classroom. Oftentimes, I also called the talkative ones for class recitation for them to become more focused in the topic for the day instead of chatting with their seatmates. Fortunately, these strategies have brought the students into the momentum of learning. They were encouraged to place their eyes and ears to the discussion and not to other unnecessary things and matters.

Overall, my teaching experience for the past three weeks has brought me learnings that developed me into the educator that I am today. Not only that I improved in terms of my teaching methods and strategies, classroom management, time management and other classroom factors but my mind has also become more open and my heart became more understanding. Each day that I come to class is not only for the completion of my course requirement but my desire to serve as a vessel of learning and awareness of the youth. More importantly, I now understand that teaching is more than a profession, it is a lifetime commitment in touching the lives of one's students.

I have realized that definitely, teachers are miracle workers: crafting one by one their students into their own miracles - empowering each learner into the best individual they can be.