Teaching and learning:My experience (2)

Another experience I have had is teaching my four year old daughter. Each day we do memorization of letters and their sound combinations, writing and coloring activities for about two hours.

Teaching a child takes more time and patience than with an adult , because the attention span of a child is much shorter than that of an adult.For the first ten minutes into the lesson my daughter is very attentive , afterwards she becomes distracted and I have to say many times to her 'keep still' or 'pay attention'. During writing activities I have to help her along and at times she writes slowly . There are times when it gets frustrating, because I feel that we can
do more in a session or that maybe she is taking a bit long to move on to the next level. I have come to realize however, that I have to be patient; because each student learns at a different pace ,and should not be pushed beyond his learning capabilities and also, bieng a child she will naturally take a little more time to work with as opposed to someone older.

Through the experience of teaching my daughter , I have found that students love to be praised for a job well done from their teacher. My daughter is very happy when I commend her on a great job and she looks forward to her fun filled activities . As a result, she hurries me each morning to begin her lessons. She has motivated me by displaying a desire to learn and displaying her enjoyment and I have motivated her through praises.

It is the responsibility of the teacher to make learning as interesting as possible for the student for this will help to make learning easier.A good teacher observes the way his/her students learn and adopt teaching methods that would appeal to the students method of learning.A student should not be pushed beyond his learning capabilities for this may lessen the student's desire to learn.

Just as teaching is difficult ,in that students on different levels have to be made to understand an idea or theory. It should be noted that learning has some difficulties as well. A student must realize his own learning method and pace and apply it to his learning, this can be a
difficult task for some students. Both teaching and learning take a great deal of motivation , patience and hard work. If you have a motivated and happy teacher ,you will have a motivated and happy student.

Teaching and Learning : My experience (1)

Learning experiences are trials and observations through which people gain knowledge and form opinions that help them along throughout their life's journey .I will share two experiences that have shown me that teaching and learning take motivation and patience .Learning also has its obstacles but the task of teaching is one that wieghs heavy in its responsibilities.

I have been studying a second language for a year , during this time I have had two teachers .The first of them was a qualified teacher whom I feel did not have the right intention, I dont feel that she had the desire or intent of teaching so that I would learn and understand. My teacher started off very diligently at first ;but shortly after she began coming late to class , she began missing days without making them up. The classes that were two hourslong were shortened to an hour and a half. Her lessons were never prepared and she often gave me incorrect information.What was interesting though, was when pay day drew near ;she came to class on time and appeared interested in her teaching ,but then after bieng payed she went back to bieng late and missing classes .

I felt that this teacher's focus was only on the financial gians , she saw teaching as an oppurtunity to make money only and not as a responsibility that takes time and preparation.She did not realize, I felt; that a teacher has to sacrifice in order to ensure that his or students learning. I felt that my teacher made no sacrifices , she did not take the extra time to explain things in depth if it went over the lesson duration, I was not given assignments unless I requested it . Neither was I tested regularly to measure my progress. As a result of feeling that my teacher was not interested in my learning, I became uninterested and therefore I did not study or pay attention during class time.

From this experience I have come to believe that a teacher must first have a desire to teach , he /she must want to see their students excell in learning what is bieng communicated . A teacher must not only see teaching as a job , but as a job that carries great responsibilities . A teacher is a possessor of knowlegde and his / her job is to impart that knowledge in a way that it can be understood to his/ her students. At the end of the day , that student should be able to impart that knowledge to someone else .I feel that a teacher who shows interest in his or her students becomes a source of motivation for his/her students.

Finding your talent

Many of us have a hard time finding our talents, or the thing that sets us apart from the next person. Even I have asked myself many days ‘what makes you special’? Some people God have blessed with exceptional talents, some of us are very good writers, painters, seamstresses, accountants, hairstylists and the like; and then others of us are not good at anything or seemingly not anyway.

I have come to realize that in order to realize our talents we must know who we are. We must find something that we enjoy doing, even if we don’t do it well. Then, when we have found that special something that we love doing, we must take the time to find ways to develop it. Don’t be afraid to try out your new developments, making mistakes only makes us better . Most importantly look at all criticisms positively, and use them to help you to develop your talents into something spectacular and beneficial for yourself and others.

Faith in the face of adversities

Unfortunately , many people during times of trails and tribulations give up hope.We see this trend happening and increasing especially during these times of recession.Negative situations , whether it be the loss of a job, the loss of a spouse or loved one and other such experiences can be very difficult for anyone.

However, we must not allow the adversities that we will definitely experience to dictate the path we take .Instead , we must tap into and rely on our faith to carry us through times of hardship.When you have faith in God , you know that only he can get you through your difficulties .

If you really think about it, you will discover that your trials for the most part do not last very long.Or you may have found that being patient allowed you to take advantage of opportunities that may have occured as a result.To illustrate ,let's say you lost your job, it will perhaps be very rough for you for the many months ahead , but if you are patient and tough it out you may find a job that is better in many ways than the previous job.

Faith and patience only succeeds in strengthening you and making you a better person.
So let us employ faith in God in our daily lives, I guarantee you will be more patient and happier ;especially during difficult times.

How Easy is it to Teach the Communicative skills?

The teaching of any skill can be difficult , though some skills are more difficult than others to teach.From the communicative skills I think that speaking can be the most difficult of them to teach. Teaching a student how to read entails that the student memorizes letter and sound combinations; which can be difficult at first . With sufficient time and practice , I think this can be done easily .

Writing entails that the student memorize the letters of a word and the upper and lower case form of the letters.Based on my experiences in learning to read another language it has not been difficult. I learned to pronounce a word and learned how to spell and practice writing it as well. After learning letters an sound combinations , reading and writing becomes a matter of practice.


Listening skills may not be so easily attained as with reading and writing . Like the other skills , its acquisition take time and practice . Some students have very short attention spans . A student can be taught listening skills by having the student listen to audios and dictations and have them listen for specific information. This skill can help students in their speaking as well.
They can listen to the speech of others who speak the language better , this can help with the students with their own pronunciation.


I had assumed that once I was able to read and understand ,that speaking would become easy, but for my self and some of my companions,I found that this was not the case. Speaking entails knowing how to place a word in a sentence correctly , that is in correct grammatical order.
Though I have found this easy to do in my writing, it is difficult when one has to speak on the spot . This difficulty may arise for different reasons , such as the students confidence in his own ability to speak. A student can be taught grammar rules , word structure and conjugation,
but learning how to speak comes from listening to people and lots of practice with people of the same language. Speech develops over time , as the student discovers new words and sounds that may be he or she didn't learn in the classroom.


Since the target language is not the native language of the student , it can be difficult for the student to speak confidently.Some students are reluctant to speak in front of others , especially in front of native speakers; because they have no confidence in their own ability to speak the language.


I think that all of the communicative skills pose some difficulty for the teacher at some point of teaching.But I also think that all of them can be acquired successfully in the classroom and can be learned in a shorter time span , all except speaking. A native speaker can speak without
giving any thought to the sentence structure or grammar. This however, is not the case for one learning to speak a new language. The student has to give thought to word conjugations and grammar. As a student of a second language , I have found great difficulty in speaking on the spot .I always find myself conjugating a word in my mind and trying to structure a sentence while having a conversation. Though speaking can be learned over time and practice ,
in my opinion it requires a whole lot more time and effort than listening , reading and writing.

The Battle of The Pounds: Can I Win

Are you one of those people that struggle with weight loss? Well I am certainly one of the hundreds or thousands of people that do.The thing is though , I have never had a problem with loosing weight until after my second daughter was born and it was all down hill from there . I thought,' Although I am a little less active than I use to be , I still do a lot of walking'. So Why was I gaining these ugly pounds?

Well I have discovered that my eating late at night , my heavy lunch and breakfast was the problem, not drinking enough water and the list goes on and on .Okay , so I decided to get my self together and win this battle once and for all.

Every morning for at least 15 minutes, sometimes 20 - 3o minutes, I did aerobic exercises with Billy Blanks at home of course. I should mention that I did my exercising most times a half hour after I ate breakfast . Believe me , after exercising I feel like I can take on an the entire world and then some. My new found energy allows me to keep sooooo very busy , that I only have time for small portioned meals and lots and lots of water.

Yes , I know , I didn't mention any pills or diet plans . But that is the beauty of the whole experience , all I had to do to shed a few pounds and gain a couple of mountains of energy, was remain consistent with my exercising , cut down my meals and increase my water intake.

Can I win ? Oh yes I can and I sure did !

Thinking of Home

Many , many years ago when I was a young girl on the island , I remember our holidays consisted of going on the beach frolicking in the sand and splashing in the sea. After the beach we would take the long route home, driving around the island with my father , mother and siblings. We often stopped on the side of the street to pick sea grapes and cocoa plums . Ahh!! I can smell the salt water now .

I remember when I was in elementary school our 'uncle' (he isn't my uncle but that is what we called him back then) would pick up his daughters, my sisters and I from school in his lil' yellow buggy, yeah that's right his lil' ole buggy! lol.It seemed like he always took the long route home ,but we didn't mind as we sung and made jokes all the way home.Those times were always fun for us .

My uncle, my father's brother ; always spoiled us . He never failed to lavish upon us toys and money .He always tried to give us , no matter how little he had. Even though so many years have passed , he is still like that today.(smile)

I remember those days when my sister and I would fight over who got the last piece of jelly coconut and and who didn't get enough coconut water. Or sitting on the steps of the house or under a tree on a crate eating juicy mouth watering mangoes .

I miss mama's macaroni and cheese , fry fish, potatoe salad and a whole lot more .The delicious fresh leave you wanting for more conch salad at the dock. Oh yeah, and how can I forget the delicious crack conch Bamboo shack I comiiiin'!!

In those days we were so young and happy , we didn't have a care in the world . My sisters , peers and I lived as if there was no tomorrow. Those were the good old days , the great old days.

I would never trade the island life for the fast city life. Back on the Island , every body knows you or knows someone that knows you ,lol. Back then a sense of community seemed to exist. It is common to see people hailing each other from across the street in the midst of traffic (susieeee, hey susiieee!!!). Or neighbours greeting each other from their houses across the street . I remember my grandmother's neighbour , would shout Mrs. Maryyyyyyy , oohh Mrs. Mary ; good morning Mrs. Mary!! every morning as she left for work from her yard across the street (smile).

No matter where my life travels take me , I will always be an island girl at heart. I will always want to taste , and experience a piece of that good old island life that I shared with my family and friends back in the great old days in The Bahamas.