sacha chua

Read extensively. The university library’s an amazing resource. Yours might come with access to online research libraries, too. Combine that with Internet resources such as Wikipedia, blogs, and so on. Speed-reading can help you browse through information quickly so that you can focus on the good stuff.

Write. Writing is a great way to remember what you’re learning and reflect on how you’re doing things. This will help you get better and better at what you do, and you’ll be able to recognize the things you’re good at and that you enjoy. If you write on a blog, you can use it to reach out to people. Write about what you’re learning, and you’ll help other people who are learning about it too. Write about what you’re doing well, and you’ll start building a network and a reputation that will come in really handy when you’re looking for work.

Connect. Find out if there’s a Facebook group for your incoming university class. If not, start one and invite other people to join. It’s a great way to connect with people even before the first day of class. Feeling shy? That’s okay, everyone is too. If you focus on helping other people connect and make friends, you’ll become more and more comfortable, and you’ll make friends along the way too. Don’t hesitate to look for role models online, too. Many people have blogs that you can read to get a sense of what life is like in their industry. Read, then comment, then contact them, and you’ll get a head start on growing your network.

Behave online and offline. The Internet remembers, and even sites that promise you privacy occasionally mess up and expose things you’ve shared to the world. Think twice about posting pictures of wild parties, underwear-on-your-head shenanigans, and other things things that future employers and coworkers might take against you. In fact, since just about anyone can take a picture of you and post it up on the Net where you don’t have control of it, you might want to keep clean entirely. You don’t need to posture to be cool, and you can have fun without doing things you’ll regret.

Don’t let yourself be limited by anything or anywhere. I took my bachelor’s degree in a university in the Philippines. Great school, but it didn’t have all the courses I wanted. =) I was on the Internet learning from course materials from everywhere: MIT, Georgia Tech, wherever I could find information. Now there are even more choices. Check out places like MIT OpenCourseware and Stanford iTunes for free courses. This is great not only for learning things, but also for getting a better sense of what you like. In fact, it might be a good idea to check the courses out now before you declare a major. You don’t need to understand everything. You just have to get a sense of whether you’ll like the course or not. That way, you’ll spend less time switching around to find something you enjoy and will use.

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I think I’ll make a few sketches about this over the long weekend. =) Any other tips for incoming college and university students?

Tags: education, tips, web2.0 by Sacha Chua
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My mom reads my blog, and that's absolutely terrific. =) I love hearing her insights into the things I'm trying to figure out, and it makes me feel even warmer and fuzzier because she's my mom. Here's one of her recent comments:

"I want small groups, so no one can hide in the anonymity of crowds. ;) I'm tired of audiences. I want participants. I don't want to hear presentations. I want to be part of conversations." This kind of thinking is what is setting you apart as a teacher and as a student. I am proud that this is the way you think and feel, and I know you will try your best to bring out not only the best in you, but also the best in others, and you will acknowledge that the others are doing the same to you. We should approach each other, like you said, not in the traditional manner of teacher teaching and student learning. There is no reason why they can't be both teachers and students at the same time. I believe that the most exciting times are when teachers and students discover "lessons" (learnings?) at the same time. When a teacher helps to bring a student to where he is by teaching him what he knows, the teacher is still where he is; and save for the additional information, the student is!

probably still where he is, but when they discover something together, both move at least a step higher in the quest for knowledge.

So many of my thoughts on education and other things come from my mom. She checked out practically every grade school in the area looking for the best school for my sisters and me, choosing St. Scholastica's College because it offered small group instruction with individualized pacing. She pushed for the creation of a gifted program and then for its expansion to include all students. She read to me until her voice cracked: The Three Little Pigs, the Big Fish, One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish... And when I moved on to more complex material (having figured out how to read The Three Little Pigs upside down), she left interesting books lying around: kid-friendly encyclopedias and references, books on business and career, even books on parenting teenagers (which naturally I read from cover to cover).

She never dictated a career for me, but instead helped me learn how to listen to the world and to myself. She never emphasized grades, but instead emphasized the learning experience. That said, when I got three Ds (got bored in my merit English classes for fiction and poetry), she warned me that I'm going to have to work extra hard to get people to overlook that on my record. ;) But she taught me what it was like to love learning and to want to fill other people with that love.

I love my mom. =) Give your mom a hug today.

On Technorati: family, mom, education

Random Japanese sentence: 猫は闇で物が見える。 A cat can see in the dark.

Tags: education, family, mom by Sacha Chua
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Awwww! Someone found OnTutoring useful!

From http://www.personal.psu.edu/users/a/o/aog103/Tutor%20Manual/feedback2_mxplan.html :

This set of instructions for the tutor to take into account when tutoring is very helpful and lets the tutor know that it is not all about lecturing the student in the session. The student should speak more and the tutor should let the tutee set the agenda, this is how the tutee will really learn the subject matter. Also the tutor must keep a positive attitude so that the tutee stays positive about the subject and does not just give up. I chose this list because it is more descriptive than the first list, and it is more of an agenda helper while the last list was overall ideas that should come natural to the tutor.

I can use this list because it entails that the tutor will carry out these tasks so that the tutee is comfortable working with me. I think it is important for every new tutor to know that this is very important. You want to make the student feel welcome in the tutoring center, and you want to feel comfortable and personal in a session.

I would remove the parts that mention reading/writing because I am a math tutor, but overall this is a great list that every tutor can use.

On Technorati: teaching, education

Random Japanese sentence: Ａ ｓｐｏｔ ｏｆ ｓｈｕｔ−ｅｙｅ は、また猫のいねむりともいわれている。猫は１度に２〜３分しか寝ない癖があるからだ。 "A spot of shut-eye" is also called a cat nap because a cat is in the habit of sleeping only a few minutes at a time.

Tags: education, teaching by Sacha Chua
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Big thanks to Cindy A. Trinidad, Roy C. Nicolas, Dominique Cimafranca, Charo Nuguid, JM Ibanez, and Clair Ching for sharing their education-related insights with me. They helped me think about what I want to do after graduation. =)

Cindy shared how seminars on teaching technique greatly helped her manage her classes. She runs an end-user training company that caters to children and adults. This is how her new hires learn how to teach:

1. Take a course even if you already know the content. You need to learn about technique.
2. Practice and play around with the product until you feel comfortable with it.
3. Practice teaching the subject to your teacher, who can give you feedback on unclear or incorrect things.

We all think that teachers have to spend a lot of time walking around, keeping an eye on students' progress and making sure everyone can keep up. =)

Cindy also shared with us her thoughts on the need for good textbooks, and the abysmally low pay for writing such!

By asking questions, Roy helped me narrow down what I want to do. We came up with something along the lines of:

1. Find out who my market is and what they need. I'd like to focus first on finding highly-motivated teachers in private technical/vocational schools and colleges. I want to find out what they need.
2. ...
3. Profit! ;)

Heh. Well, must figure that out sometime.

That isn't the only way, though. Dominique told me about Positive(?), an initiative to help improve computer science education in colleges. (Whee! I'll just piggyback on that.) Charo told me about Voice of America(?) and that one can actually do quite a lot without major financial backing.

Anyway, here are the main insights:

• I might be able to turn this into a business. A business means I might be able to attract other people to get into it.
• I might also be able to get this funded by philanthropists. To do that, I need a good program.
• I can start small. Let's change my corner of the world first.
• Motivation is key. We spent a bit of time talking about how to deal with closed-minded people and people who don't want to share their knowledge. I'm in favor of going after people who don't need to be persuaded to share their knowledge. I want to find people who can't help but teach.
• Mentoring is very important, but most teachers are on their own in classrooms. Waah. Maybe there should be something like Toastmasters, but for teachers... ;)

On Technorati: education, teaching

Tags: education, teaching by Sacha Chua
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Irine Yu pointed me to the speech delivered by Intel Excellence in Teaching awardee Dr. Josette Biyo:

When your job becomes your mission, your primary concern is giving your best in everything you do. Knowing that you have contributed significantly towards the creation of a product which can make a difference in your company and the larger community is reward in itself.

We can make a difference no matter who or what or where we are. If we know _why_, then the _how_ follows. =)

On Technorati: passion, career, life, motivational, inspirational, teaching, education

Tags: career, education, inspirational, life, motivational, passion, teaching by Sacha Chua
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