Time: More or Less? Fast of Slow?

Riding up to the Sun - Jakarta Sept 2012
Photo by Helena

Concept of Time is so relative and flexible that it bends and curves according to our mental and psychological state. The clock itself tick-tack-tick-ing in the same rhythms and the same measured distance. Well, of course we did turn back the clock for 1 hour last Sunday to mark the end of British Summer time (day light saving) and hopped back to GMT. It is still a bizarre concept for someone who came from the Equator.
This week we are entering Week 7 of our Autumn term dates. it means that in this 12 weeks course, we have 5 weeks to go before final term essay bound our hands and legs to Library and chained our hands, brains and senses to books and computers... oh well... it's a metaphoric exaggeration of course. Nevertheless, time has fly by, up to now, I still feel enormous lacking of understanding in key terms and ideas of subjects that I am taking this term. Feels like 24 hours is not enough to balance study, rest, entertainment, everyday life and homesick. Last week, I as pulling my bedroom curtains to close when I realized that it felt like I have just open the curtains to let the sunshine in a moment ago. How fast time went by from the opening to the closing of my bedroom curtain. It is not about the the darkness that fall early in this Autumnal weather but indeed... my brain cannot work as fast as I assumed it can.... poor brain..

On the other hand, time decided to almost stand still when I am missing my husband and daughter and awaiting for their arrival in December. It almost felt like eternity to realized that I simply just left home 2 months ago. In this 2 months my beautiful little girl, has develop an ability to form a complete sentence, a skill to use intonation, wh- words and cheeky banter. How I am so jealous! I longed to be part of that historic moment. The excruciating part of my everyday is bedtime. This last 1 week, I developed an insomnia. Unable to sleep because I miss her so much. I find myself tak about my husband many times (note to self... reduce that!) to my friends... "O my husband will like that'... "O he can do this/that with it"... "O Simon is a great DJ and Dancer"... etc etc etc etc... my beloved friends here I am sure been fed up but they are so sweet to just go along with me.

I re-discover that understanding that TIME is God's gift. Its flexibility enables us to see life in a different light: an opportunity to appreciate little things in life, an opportunity to reflect and to do better than the day before and a strengthening of faith that God is with you every millisecond of your life.

In the bible of Jeremiah 10:23 says ..

²³ Lord, I know that people’s lives are not their own;
    it is not for them to direct their steps.

and on I Samuel 20: 3  

³ But David took an oath and said, “Your father knows very well that I have found favor in your eyes, and he has said to himself, ‘Jonathan must not know this or he will be grieved.’ Yet as surely as the Lord lives and as you live, there is only a step between me and death.”

Be grateful for your blessings of time. Use it wisely and may it blesses others around you. Let me end it with a poem by Amy Darnbrook

TIME

by Amy Darnbrook

 Time goes fast
 Time goes slow
 Time sees people die
 Time sees the grass grow
 Time does not forget
 Time does not forgive
 Time crushes and kills
 Time takes all you have to give
 Time rushes past
 Time ticks and tocks
 Time is shown by the sun
 Time is on the kitchen clock
 Time is going slowly
 Time tells you what must be done
 Time is running out
 Time waits for you to have fun
 Time is impatient
 Time is kind
 Time is cruel
 Time doesn't mind
 Time is a second
 Time is forever
 Time is right this minute
 Time is now or never.-
 

Spanish Class - 1st Meeting: An Encounter

Photo taken from http://www.uni.edu/becker/Spanish3.html

Notes from Spanish Class1st meeting:
We were 2 Filipinos, 1 Kuwaiti, 4 Chinese and 1 Indonesian sitting around the table at Campus Dine Central.We munched on our sandwiched, cold pasta, doughnuts and hot beverages. They will be our early dinner and the preparation for our 2 hours adventure to the 'foreign land'. No... we are not going abroad. We are taking language classes and that day was our first class.

We talked in excited tone but no one cannot deny the underlying worry in every utterance. It may sounds funny of why us, the English speaking postgraduates whose native language are not English, should feel anxious and worrisome on second/foreign language class. We have been there and done that before.

I personally can feel the 'butterflies in your stomach' feeling. Start from that knot in my tummy, crept up to my throat, threatening the travel of my just-swallowed doughnut bite then it ends up on my now cold finger-tips. It is the thought of the 'unknown'  and unfamiliar language, pronunciation, word order, structures and grammar. The question of "can I do it?", "Will I ever be able to use it in basic conversation" and all the What-Ifs questions. Then comes the inquiries of "I wonder what the teacher will be like", "Is he/she strict? fun? Boring?", "What about my classmate? Will they be fun, friendly, cooperative or will they be snobbish, arrogant and uncooperative?", "Can I be all those for them? Will they be able to see me that way".

Registering all this questions might sounds, again, silly to you... but after much though I think I should put this in my learning diary. I am experiencing the anxiety of student learning second language. Referring to Krashen notion that in order to succeed in acquiring / learning a language, a student must have high motivation, high self-esteem/confidence and low (to null) Anxiety. My anxiety is considerably quite low for sure for I have deiced to come a long for an expereince, thus my level of 'burden' is lighter and that will contribute to the decrease of my level of anxiety.

OK, so it's time to go to class. I peek through the glass strip on the door and saw some of my fellow classmates are already there. I took one big breath and put a smile on my face as I opened the door.
"Hiya!", I said... and so it is... Hello, adventure! Bring it on!

You cannot study Second Language Acquisition without putting yourself in the shoes of the learner. I mean, we have all been there, as a student, learning our second language - be it English, Spanish, Dutch, German etc. But to rely entirely on those distant memory to fully understand all the notion of SLA will be very naive. Back then, we were studying, learning and acquiring the language. We didn't bother to think which part of our brain works to incorporated those strange noises that should make sense or which theory is applied for our case of acquisition and learning. In SLA class, it is safe to look back at these experience but this distant memory might be out of touch. Enrolling in a foreign/second language class along side the SLA study is a genious approach. For in my case, I have learned English for many many years now. I finish my undergraduate 5 years ago but my language learning experience 'finish' 12 years ago. It 'ended' when I begun my BA study on English teaching. In a sense I no longer studying the language (English) but the teaching aspects, approaches etc. During my BA, I went on teaching although I have been teaching long before I entered University life. Thus in my opinion, I (and us as teachers) sometimes forget how intimidating it is to begin studying a new language.

It was exactly what I felt when I came to sit at my 1st Spanish class. It was all those anxiety on whether I can cut it. I worry if I will make a fool of myself. I worry if I will not understand a single thing. But I am also excited of the experiences and possibility of speaking in another language.

Our first class doesn't exactly start with a big bang. Well of course, we barely know each other. Our teacher, Ms. Helen Quinn, has that warm smile that assure you that things will be alright. She got us to stand up and walk away from behind out tables and stand together in a circle in the middle of the room. We're going to introduce ourselves. -- This really broke the ice especially because at least we now each other name.
Then we got to 'Spanisized' (I know... I know... this is not English word...) our names. It means we need to pronounce our name the way they do it in Spain or modify your name to make it a Spanish one. My name Helena is pronouced 'Elena'. But some of my Chinese friends got a new modified names. Such as Lei lei becomes Layla, San Den becomes Cindy, Jin becomes Ginny etc. This exercise according to me, helped us with self-confidence. Because we got to choose the 'cool' version of our name.

We studied basic introduction sequence, alphabeth and numbers as well as learning the name of the country in spanish and name of profession in spanish. with lots of pair work, physical actions and trial and error.

My note for the teaching approach on the first class is that

1. The teacher enable to bring fun but serious class atmosphere but most importantly, 
2. Creating safe space for learning to happen
3. She taught the basic cue sentences that are useful in class
4. She speaks 60-70% in Spanish. 

Let's Talk about Second Language Acquisition (SLA)!!!

There are 2 words that are used quite overlapping and interchangeably... Acquiring and Learning...
According to Oxford Online Dictionary,

• Acquire means "... Learn or develop (a skill, habit or quality)
• Learn means "...gain or acquire knowledge of a skill (in something) by studying, experience or being taught. 

It is second language learning if there are guidance (teachers, self-study, structured course etc). It is Second Language Acquisition if the language is acquired through exposure to everyday use, listening, using, in a more practical way.

Rod Ellis, in Understanding Second Language Acquisition, pg. 6. says

"Second language Acquitision is sometimes contrasted with Second Language Learning on the assumption that these are different processes. The term 'acquisition' is used to refer to picking up a second  language through exposure, whereas the term 'learning; is used to refer to the concious study of second language."

Agreeing with Rod Ellis again, I will also wish to keep an open mind on the distinction and will be using the term Acquiring and Learning interchangeably through out my learning journal.

I am looking forward for this journey of Acquiring and Learning Spanish as my second (well actually third) language. This will be an honor to personally engaged and observed the process of how one learn second language. This will give me a broader perspective of how it is to be a student.

Lightbown - Spada, How Languages are Learned, 2011, pg 1 mentioned that

"Language Acquisition is one of the most impressive and fascinating aspect of human development"

It will be fascinating for me to observe how learning language means making sense of letter formations, bringing meaning to foreign word order and emphasize emotions through the intonations. Learning the new melody to be able to dance to the exotic rhythms.

As a note to myself, here are points that I will be observing during my Language Course
1. Teaching Method used - the sequenced, the approaches - and my personal response to them
2. My learning Strategies - Overcoming Difficulties and Celebrating Successes

My Spanish class will start tomorrow... More notes to follow...!