It's been awhile since I updated my blog. Nothing much lately….nothing that can be shared here….just lots and lots of personal stuff…..huwarghhhh
Here's something interesting. I have a Mat Saleh sensei…born and raised in New York. I am so lucky to have him as my English teacher…simply because he's a native speaker! Plus he's fun and so full with life. He's been travelling all around the world. Gaining experience by travelling to the third world country like Thailand and Vietnam…before landing in Japan and started to work here. Not to mention he married to a Japanese lady and I bet their child must be adorable…. ;)
So he invited me to join his undergraduate class every Friday afternoon ( I registered for his postgrad class on English Presentation for Engineers)…this undergrad class is an Oral class where almost 80% of the class was conducted in a way that students held group discussion. The objective of the class is really simple. Allowing students to speak English, hence improving their fluency in that 'bahasa orang puteh'…
Every Friday afternoon he would greet the class, have a little chat, telling important announcement if there's any then he would divide us into groups and each group has group leader that he has appointed weeks before that. Group leader have to find an article (in magazine, webs, newspapers etc), summarize the article and then discuss the article in their group; by first telling his/her group members about the article, then tell his personal-opinion on that topic(from the article), before asking his/her group members about the topic. It's a really casual class and I love every minute of it.
Before my sensei let us start the group discussion he would always say; 'So Speak English, Learn Something & Have Fun'.
I really love that class. Simply because I love every opportunity I get to increase my fluency in speaking this language (it's also the reason I have this blog…to improve my speaking and writing-skill in English).
To add it all, this class has a mixture of Japanese-Malaysian-Indonesian-Arabian-Chinese (from China) and also American mixed culture…because there's one of us in that class. Fun? It is, fun and very interesting indeed. I get bits-and-pieces about each country, for example; Do you know that in Saudi Arabia, studies are totally free? It's like study fees doesn't even exist there. And in Japan, a husband is expected to give all his salary (every month) to his wife, then his wife would give him a small sum of pocket-money and she will keep the rest. Americans doesn't use the term 'handphone'…it's Malaysian and Indonesian and maybe Singaporeans that use that term. So it's fun fact like that. Sometimes it is a more serious matter like the corruption in Indonesia and the great recession in China. I love all of this stuff. Makes me feel wiser… :p
Well, that is the highlight of my week. ;)