TRI SUTYOSO H.

907222407117
FINAL ASSIGNMENT-TEFL

Honestly, I never experienced to be a teacher in a formal institution or at least

informal institution. I just practiced to teach my niece. My nephew is senior high school
student at 3rd grade and my niece is an elementary school student at 1st grade. I gave
them such a private lesson. They usually have difficulty in doing their homework
particularly in English subject. As a sister that really loved them and I am an English
department student, I surely helped them with my encouragement. I did not want to let
them getting hard in their study. They talked to me that I am different, I mean in
teaching them. They stated that I am good in motivating them more than their parents.
They also added that I am really caring to them. My family said that I have enthusiasm
to talk. They said that I am able to make them interested in hearing my story. Any story,
whether it is about experience or funny story that I like to share. Yet, sometimes my
nephew and niece feel that I am too discipline and too serious in teaching them.
Truly, I did not really think that I have ability to motivate them. I just realized
that I really love children. I always listened to them when they shared their experience
in school. Sometimes, they complained about their English teacher in class. My nephew
said that his teacher is so boring even they are so demanding. While my niece told that
her teacher is too flat. They rarely gave her such kind of media to involve creativity. She
said that her teacher always used the book. Realizing those particular situations, I tried
to give them different way to teach. I gave my niece some pictures, English songs, short
stories, games and sometimes I watched English cartoon movie such as, Finding Nemo
and Happy Feet with her. She is so interested to know various pictures. She liked to
guess or describe it orally though there are some mistake pronunciations. She also loved
to sing a song and to play games that I gave. Besides, she is so curious when I narrated
short stories to her. She always asked when she did not know the meaning of the word I
spoke. I think it is really helpful to enrich her vocabularies. The most favorite thing to
her is watched movie since she could learn vocabulary, pronunciation and also the moral
value from the movies. Different with my nephew, he really liked football. Hence I gave

him exercise like reading. I made a text related with his hobby. It made him more
excited to learn.
According to the book that I read, teaching is a profession that requires a firm
commitment. This includes knowing and understanding the discipline, continuing to
grow with the changes in their chosen field, and a dedication to caring about the
students, all of them, those who struggle and those who are highly motivated. I really
agree with those arguments. Therefore, I really cared to my nephew and niece. Though I
am not a teacher, I really want to be. For the reason that teacher will have many
different characters of students. I imagined that it will be enjoyable to face various
characters. Then my father and my lecturer said a good teacher must have a good
character, good attitudes, good teaching skills, and have a good relation with the
students. I believed that it is true. Yet there is another argument:
Good teaching isn't about technique. I've asked students around the country to describe their
good teachers to me. Some of them describe people who lecture all the time, some of them
describe people who do little other than facilitate group process, and others describe everything
in between. But all of them describe people who have some sort of connective capacity, who
connect themselves to their students, their students to each other, and everyone to the subject
being studied. (Palmer, 1999:27)

From the excerpt above, I concluded that good teaching is not about technique.
Thus, I did really agree with that statement. If I become a teacher, I actually do not
really like to stand in the firm rule or procedure. I want to train my students to be
responsible with their acts and subjects. If they do such wrong things, they have to take
the risk, because of their own mistakes. But they should really notice about their
attitude. I want to give them more about awareness than force them with too many rules.
Even I did not like to stick on the firm rule, I did not like if my student did not respect
me as a teacher. What I am saying is not about a gap between teacher and student. But
in my intention, respect means giving chance to other like they hear me when I am
talking as well as I am teaching. They have to distinguish when we are focusing on
study and making some jokes. Thus, I will appreciate them when they are arguing
something. I really want to be an open-minded teacher. So they can discuss something
with me and also the other student that shows that we are connected.

REFERENCES
Palmer, Parker. 1999. "The Grace of Great Things: Reclaiming the Sacred in Knowing,
Teaching, and Learning." In The Heart of Knowing: Spirituality in Education. Ed.
Stephen Glazer. New York: Jeremy P. Tarcher/Putnam.
Ryan, Kevin. 2008. Teaching. Microsoft Encarta 2009 [DVD]. Redmond, WA:
Microsoft Corporation.