A Teacher's Record Book

My Ketua Bidang always reminds us to enter our classes with our record books. "If you don't bring it along with you," she warns. "You will face the risk of being severely fined or subjected to three month imprisonment."

I thank her awfully for the warning. It makes me more conscientious and hard working in writing my lesson plans. However, in my humble opinion, you don't have to repeat it too often.  The more you mention it, the more I tend to think you are trying to threaten us.

It is an accepted truth that a record book is the 'Periuk Nasi' or the source of income of every teacher.  Whatever you have written in the book is a concrete proof that you have planned and executed your teaching. I never subscribe to the practice of planning lessons three to six months in advance. Students are not as predictable as you think and what you have planned may not be situationally applicable in reality. It is more sensible to plan lessons three to five days ahead.

I find it challenging planning student-centred lessons.  I have been trying to make learning enjoyable but my creativity juices are running dry. In the past my lessons were very tepid and I decided to be different this year. Three months have passed and my attempts have yielded mixed results. The Form One kids like my self-devised activities but those in the higher forms pay little interest to them. 

Reflection-writing also gives me a headache. To this day I still have no idea what type of reflection teachers should write. In my reflections I always talk about how many students can grasp this and that, what I can do to improve their levels of proficiency, how  I struggle to meet the needs of different learners and the like. I hope I am on the right track.

No matter what happens, either you are happy or sad, stressed or not stressed, every Monday or Friday, all teachers have to make sure that their record books are filled and handed in.Again, the hateful reminder, if you fail to do so and the education inspector knows that, you will run afoul of Surat Pekeliling Ikthisas Bil. 3/1999 and face the most humiliating fate for a teacher.