Strolling Around Thailand

      During my stay in Thailand I managed to visit some of Thailand’s famous landmarks as I spend my weekends. I am not going to explain so much about it, I just want to share my photos hehe....so, enjoy <3

      Thailand has been so nice! I will definitely go back here. Thank you for the sweet memories :)

Other School Activities

In Satit Bangna School I joined several activities that were held by the school. Those activities were Career Day, ASEAN Day, Mother's Day, and Science&Math Day.

1. Career Day
    Career day is a day where the school invites people with different career background such as chef, fashion designer, programmer, teacher, doctor, actor, flight attendance, etc. This program is aimed to let the students know about each of those career/profession so that they can prepare themselves for their future career.

2. ASEAN Day
    ASEAN day is the day where the students from primary level are introduced to each of ASEAN countries. They were given some general informations about each country in ASEAN as well as its traditions and cultures. In this day, I was given a chance to share some of greetings in Bahasa Indonesia to the students in Indonesia Class to be specific. I taught them to say "selamat pagi", "selamat siang", and also "selamat malam".

3. Mother’s Day
    Mother’s day is a day where people show their loves and appreciations towards mothers. The date itself is in august 12th to commemorate the birthday of Her Majesty Queen Sirikit, The mother of all Thai people. In this day, all of the students, staffs, the teachers, and most of Thai people wore a blue shirt.

4. Science and Math Day
    Science and Math day is the day where students from higher secondary level doing presentations related to science and math that to be presented to primary level students. Later, the primary students had to write down the important details of each presentations.

Chapter VI : Summary and Suggestion

After joining this program for around 1 month, it was the time for me to say goodbye to Thailand. One last important thing to do before going back to Indonesia was the evaluation. After all of us were being supervised by our mentors, we gathered in a room and evaluated how our teaching practices were going. We were also given so many suggestions for our own good. These are the conclusions from the evaluation.

              6.1     Purpose of Practicum

I have several motivations for joining this SEA-Teacher Project Batch 6th. Through this exchange program, I am given a chance to improve my teaching skills, practice my english communication skill, and also gain a broader world view. It has turned me into a way more open-minded person as I always try my best to understand the differences between Indonesia and Thailand in many aspects including the teaching process, language, behaviour, culture and even religion. I also managed to share Indonesia’s culture to my buddies during my stay in Thailand. Knowing that they were also really interested to Indonesia’s cultures is really flattering.

              6.2     Procedures of Practicum

I conducted this exchange program for around one month. There were at least five main activities that I had to do. The first was the orientation day. This was the day where we first met all the participants, mentors, and lecturers from the host university. In this day, we were introduced to our mentor and being told our practicum school as well. The next main activity is classroom observation. It was conducted in the first week of the practicum. Then, there were also teaching assistance and teaching practice in the second and the third week. Finally, the last week was the evaluation.

              6.3     Outcomes of Practicum

I got tons of priceless experiences after joining this exchange program. By conducting teaching practice in an evironment with a totally different language and cultural background definitely has given me so many new things to learn. I got a change to improve my teaching skills as I was conducting my teaching practices. I could practice my english communication skill as well since english was the only language that I understood during my stay in Thailand. Finally, I learned a little about Thai language and Thai culture and managed to share some Indonesia’s culture as well.

              6.4     The Challenges of Practicum

I faced several challenges during my stay in Thailand. But, all of those were still categorized as basic problems of someone who study abroad. One of them is the different language. Most of Thai people can not understand english that well, although they can, they have this kind of weird accent that made me hard to catch what they were talking about. So, I had to double check by saying “pardon me?” so many times just to ensure what exactly they just said. It was a little hard to communicate with them. But, this also motivate me to learn a little of Thai language. There were also the time where I didn’t really into Thai foods and some kind of culture shock as well. These challenges taught me to push beyond my limits to keep learning, have an open mind, and be more respectful to differences.

              6.5     Overall Impression

I am forever gratefull to be given the privilege to join this SEA-Teacher Project Batch 6th in Thailand. It is a good starting point for me to develop myself in so many aspects. There is no split second of my life I spent regretting to have joined this exchange program. I couldn’t say thank you enough to SEAMEO for letting me become one of the lucky participant to join this program.

              6.6     Suggestion for Future Improvement

For future improvement I suggest for the host university to choose closer practicum school so that it will ease the coordination. I also suggest the committees to give clearer instruction about the self-report (blog writing) so that there will be no miscommunication.

Thank you SEAMEO, Valaya Alongkorn Rajabhat University, and Satit Bangna School!