Heard of fish philosophy...?

Ahhh…we can’t save the assignment into the CD. What to do now? Whylah I don’t have my own CD burner…? This was what actually happened at the beginning of the day’s lesson …sorry but I have to confess that I was not concentrating at first…
Luckily we had help... Thanks to that sweet person…
So once it was settle, I turned from the computer to the lecturer…
She was actually throwing fishes around the class…
I was lost and confused. “What is going on with Dr. Raja Maznah? Is this some kind of self-expression? Hmmm…

When the lecturer introduced the day’s topic – “Fish Philosophy”, I was wondering – What has fish philosophy got to do with a teacher?

But before that, I feel that the lesson was different. It’s not everyday that fishes get throw around in a class…(lucky they were just toys). It was fun. But sad to say that only after being prompted by Dr. we started to throw the fishes around the class.
I guess we are losing the child in us, that’s sad… maybe because we are so used to listening to lectures that we forgot to enjoy ourselves while learning. I’m not saying that lecturing is boring cause I do like it. (Seriously I do, this is because I get notes from the lecturer heheehehe) However, once awhile “fun” is necessary to boost up our energy.

Ok getting back to Fish Philosophy…

After a brief introduction to the history of Pike Fish Market…where fun and flying are the main thing…
We were introduced to the four aspects of the Fish Philosophy. While listening I thought of ways a teacher or more specific what I could do. Below I have attempted to give some examples.

The first one –Choose Your Attitude
“Choosing the right attitude for the day should become a daily routine. It will provide you the energy and faith you need to guide you through the day”
Reading this sentence has its impact on me. I feel that it has truth in it. I have to agree that if we set our mind in the positive mode, anything is possible. Even the failure might have sweet to it. So what has this got to do with being a teacher? The teacher is the head of the class, if the head is sad and feeling low then the students will reflect the same. “Think sunny” is a good advice for a teacher. I actually tried this today. I was down and I thought “sunny”, I smiled too myself and I did feel much better. As teachers to-be I feel that we should have a policy to start the day with a personal positive thought so we could go through the day much easier. Another way is that we should be pleasant to students even though we are having a bad day. Why spoilt someone else’s day, right?

The second one – Make Work Like Play
“When work seems more like play you will have more interest and energy to get tasks started and finished”
I feel that this is better associated with students and it acts as a reminder to us, teacher –to be that learning can be fun and the traditional teacher – centred concept is best to be kept in the past. With “digital citizens” as our students, the old way might be boring for them. So if when ever possible change the class to a playground. Play in class, create jokes with students, have toys in the class and etc but I feel that it is important for the teacher to remind the students that “When its time to work, we work and when its time to play, we play”

The third one – Make Their Day
“Sharing a smile, a compliment, a thoughtful gesture will make someone’s day.”
Yes, this is so true. I’m a living example of it. If someone gives me a compliment or smile (someone special, heheehehe) my day is made. If I feel such way, what wonders will it do to young kids? So how do we do it? Kids love sweets, so have a sweet bowl in your class or give each student a sweet at the end of the lesson or you can even give it as a reward. When the students do things for you like bring you papers or collects for you worksheet, say thank you and compliment he or her for being so nice. You could even acknowledgement the students progress by giving a star which I’m sure they would love it.

The fourth one – Be Present
“Listen to others with all your senses…”
Being with young learners, listening is very important. They will love you for that. My cousin sister who is a teacher, says that sometimes she gets tired of listening cause her students have so much to say, but she still listens. I guess being a teacher; we will get use to it. But it’s important to listen and not get distracted. I feel that as a teacher we should try to make a point to get to know our students, at least their name. It is best to call your students by name rather than using such terms like “eh”, “you, the boy with the blue pencil” or etc. Would you like is someone calls you like that?

This Fish Philosophy is very flexible. It can be used by anyone – parents, worker and etc. I feel that it’s a workable philosophy and that it is easy to follow. So I thought to myself lets try it out. So lets see how longs can I last….