edu3234 letters and diaries

We learnt about letter and diary on 13 August 2009. We were given letters of John Keats to his fiancée, Fanny Brawne. Actually, that day I discovered new information about him that is Keats suffered from a type of illness which makes him unable to stand bad weather in England. Miss Dzeelfa said that he had to move to Rome and continue his life there. Then, I realized in term of relationship, John Keats’s move to Rome strengthen his relationship with Brawne . This situation was different from me as I did not like long distance relationship. Then, I just thought that this difference is what makes this world a wonderful place to live in.Another letter that I studied is also related to Keats as this is a friend-to-friend letter from Keats to Mr. Shelly, his dear friend. In his letter, he appreciated Shelly’s advice to him. As I read the whole letter, I became conscious of Keat’s characteristic, he is actually a humble person. Miss Dzeelfa also told me that Keats respects Shelly as well.

After that, I learnt about diary, a popular work of fiction. “The Andy Warhol Diaries” belongs to Andy Warhol himself. He was born Andy Warhola in Prague. In his diary, he makes fun of people around him. He teased Hollywood lifestyle in cynical and lively tone. However, I wondered about his relationship with Hollywood; who is he? Is he also a prominent figure? Why I have never heard of him name before? Then, I thought that he must be someone of importance in Hollywood as he can describe vividly the occasions and events in Hollywood. I am so interested in his diary because I found out that he knew many Hollywood famous figures such as Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Gere. Maybe the reason is because and I like to entertainment section in daily newspaper.Miss Dzeelfa told us that Warhol never wrote his own diary but he asked his secretary to do it for him. Every day, he called up his secretary and asked her to jot down what happened to him in the previous day.

Lastly, I learnt about Kafka’s diary. His diary was written in Germany from the year of 1910 until 1923. The tone of his diary is depressing as it depicted his casual observations, details of daily life, reflections of philosophical ideas, accounts of dreams and ideas for stories. I noticed a repeated sentence in his diary; “I must say that my education has done me great harm in some respects.” He then questioned profoundly isolated, failed relationship and an attempt to provoke his stalled creativity. He mocked old family photographs as he claimed that the people in those photographs stand there to take photo because “they do not know what to do with each other.” Both letters and diaries can be useful means to expose student to English Language because sometimes they feel too bored to read stories or poems during literature lesson. This two texts gives them more choices on what they can learn. Letters and diaries also sometimes provides new perspectives of the world since every writers' opinion might differ from each other.The class ended after the discussion is over.

edu3234 autobiography : Nelson Mandela's life

On 11 August 2009, I learnt Autobiography and biography. A autobiography of Nelson Mandela depicts his objection over Apartheid system practiced in South Africa. His terrifying experience while being a prisoner in Robben Island opened up my eyes about his struggle to abolish this system. He was willing to ignore the long trousers that he got he was the only prisoner who was given that trousers. He insisted that “all African prisoner must have (that) long trousers.”
It is quite obvious that this type of text broadens my reading experience and it offers more forms of literary works that can be used in the classroom. Autobiography is written by a person to depict his life and character and it contains deflection and reflection. I am also well aware that autobiography is meant for public audience.

Next, we were asked to provide activities that will be suitable for classroom use. A friend of mine suggested that we can organize a field trip to Pudu prison and another classmate voiced out her opinion that we can asks the students to find other heroes who fights for the same reason (freedom). Stages a sketch to depict a scene in the text will also be a good activity to be conducted in the classroom.

After that, the class continued with biographies. Miss Dzeelfa told us that one of the reasons why reading biographies should be incorporated in the class is it exposes students to as many genres as possible. In our handouts, it is mentioned that a teacher named Chandler believes that reading biographies is important for students to realize that heroes and other people of importance were not born with all they needed to be successful.

edu 3234 marginalized literature: minority groups

On August 8 2009, we learnt about marginalized literature. For me, it is inevitable for us to be fair to all. There will be groups of people which we might leave unnoticed. Surely, pity on them as their works are being abandoned. However, I think marginalized works portrays issues which will be an eye-opener to us as we have never heard or experienced such situation and this works of literature helps the world to ‘see’ their problems and maybe try to find their solution.

In the class, we were taught about the works of African American like Langston Hughes and works portrays the lifestyle of Red Indians. I find that Langston Hughes who was born from inter-racial marriage also faced the same problem as the African American. It is a shame that people tend to judge people by the skin colour. This will only bring the social gap far apart. I am worried of what will happen next if we, the people of the world still stick to that stigma. Obviously, this world will get worse.

edu3234 pyramus and thisbe

Today, July 14, we had so much fun during our class. Miss Dzeelfa asked us to come out with a dialogue for the scene P discovered that T died. Many groups doing excellent works by adding humour into the acting. Seeing Iskandar as a girl really made me laughed, he swayed his hand while walking and I cannot believe my eyes as I saw his hard calluses hands swayed. His movement also seemed awkward. Jolyne’s group performance is also great as its name says, ‘China 5’. It was named after Jackson 5. Still I am surprised with MJ’s influence towards my classmate although he died almost two weeks now.

My group was named after the virus H1N2, which begin to spread all over Malaysia. I did love the name, “H1N2, maybe it should be harmless virus which bring happiness to us. I truly impressed with everybody’s hard effort to produce a marvellous job during our tutorial. I also heard a classmate of mine said that she totally enjoyed this class. Hopefully this enjoyment continues throughout this semester. I am waiting for more surprises...

edu 3234: sara and the wedding

On 16 July 2007, we learnt about position paper. Actually, before the class begin, I did not know how to write a position paper because I have never written that before. I felt glad right now since I had clearer picture on how to decide on the title. In the class we were given two texts on Si Tenggang’s Homecoming and Sara and the Wedding. Then, we were asked to answer a few questions about the story ‘Sara and the Wedding’. The questions asked about the profession of Sara, Sara’s behaviour before and now in physical, her attitude towards marriage and the attitude of people around her towards marriage. When finished reading the text, I felt embarrassed as it portrays a woman’s sexual desire. I felt like I want to hide my face under the table.
Then, we tried to come up with a thesis statement for this story. We were given examples of thesis statement as our guidance. Every group wrote the result of the discussion on the white board and we discussed the chosen thesis statements whether they are good or not. Our class ended after we finished the discussion.

edu3234: project paper ( Ist meeting with Dr. Arshad)

My group member consists of 9 people including me. Mimi, Yin Chean, MinHui, Auni, Geeta and me managed to attend the first meeting. The other two members went back home .We met at 9am today at Bilik Am FPP. We discussed about our project paper which will contribute 40 percent of our overall marks for this course. I asked whether I can use the same text as my position paper and Dr. Arshad said that he has no problem with it. He insisted us to put quotation for our research papers or else he will penalize us for it. He also suggested us to make comparison between two texts in our task. Dr. Arshad wanted to see our first draft in two week’s time.
At 11am today, Auni and I went to FPP library to search for the suitable materials. Unfortunately I left my pendrive at my room so I just jot down the important and useful points in a piece of paper. Hopefully, I will manage to retrieve all the info later. Right now I am having problem in trying to connect the theme in Barn Burning with the theme of A Rose for Emily but until now, I have no idea how to make the idea tally each other. I have read at a website which commented that these two texts actually portrayed the conflict within one self. I think the best way to do it is by asking for Miss Dzeelfa or my friends’ opinion. Who knows maybe I can gain new insights from them.