On Saturday, July 8th, a sunny morning, SMK Taman Kosas had an Amazing English Day. The event was generously hosted by YPC International College. There were 82 Form 3 & Form 5 students participating. The cheerful students were divided into 8 competitive teams of mix abilities by grade. There was 8 Teachers in training (the majority were alumni of SMK Taman Kosas) from University of Selangor who did a super job mentoring their respective teams. There were many teachers from the school who made fine contributions for the event’s success. Kudos to Mr. K. Letchumanan (Head of Department), the catalyst and kingpin of the event, whose efforts and sacrifices made the whole thing possible.
The event started on time at 8:30 am, the students were seated in 8 groups according to their team affiliation. The students made circles of 8 and each received a sticky note with a different nouns, verbs or adjectives written on it. It was then stuck on the face not visible to the subject, but visible to their peers. This speaking exercise allowed the students to take turns asking their peers what word was stuck to them with a soft 20 questions limit. Students had a fun trying to guess the various vocabulary words.
The students were surveyed by a show of hands whether they thought English was difficult or easy? The crowd was split between the 2 views. We watched a short video about a professional ping pong player who has no arms and plays with his mouth. He repeats a motto of “nothing is impossible” and projects an attitude of gratefulness. The students then were asked, “Is it more difficult to play ping pong without arms or learn English?” The group unanimously decided learning English is easier and nothing is impossible.
Buy-In from the students was achieved and a healthy learning environment was established. The Students learned from a module known as Master Pone- Using Quotations Marks In Dialogue. There were tasks throughout the module related to three methods of writing dialogue, Students also learned how to distinguish paraphrase from dialogue. After they all developed the grammar capacity, they played a game based on quotations between 8 teams as an enrichment activity. The school provided tasty refreshments on the break for the students.
Students watched a short video followed by a small group speaking task on The Importance of Finishing High School. The students listed and ranked the important points, then each group shared their most important point collectively. It was a reflective activity aimed at motivating the students to continue their education.
The next activity began with Students being reminded that one of the stations in the afternoon is based on an infographic poster. Students were given a quick lesson and demo on making an infographic poster. The source of their data would be The Giving Tree, a short video they watched. Before viewing, they predicted the plot of the story in small groups. The mood turned a little somber about midway in the movie when the plot thickened. Students were given an individual 5 sentence story summary writing activity to guide them for station B. The students broke up into groups for a guided discussion on plot and characters. They were seemingly moved by the emotional story. In the afternoon, they went on to make very colourful and creative infographic posters.
Then we embarked on a Sentence Variety journey. Judge Judy was the module students learned simple, compound and complex sentences. We collectively played a game of Fragment or Not? You Be the Judge. Then the students had a compound sentences task using FANBOYS competition between the 8 groups. There were prizes given to the various teams during the closing ceremony based on team’s rank from accumulation of points throughout the days activities involving the 8 mixed-ability groups. The mood perked up during this activity and continued to crest all the way to the finale. The school provided a delicious lunch for the students.
The afternoon session began with a short video by Kid President. He impacted the students with his US brand of motivation, The Everyday Hero. The students discussed everyday heroes in their lives in a small group discussion format. The students also were asked to make their own superhero name.
The climax of the event was the 4 stations activity. The students combined groups to be divvied into 4 equal groups. Station A was a writing and reading activity based on madlibs and using parts of speech properly. Station B was making infographic posters based on the data from the Giving Tree. Students were reminded of earlier exercises as a source to organise their data for their posters. The students were very artistic and they had fun making their creations. Station C was The Living Sentence Game. Students had to unscramble sentences (some using dialogue), with one word or punctuation mark per card. They had to race against another team of students who had the same sentence, First group to arrange themselves properly one. Station D was my signature Parts of Speech Vocabulary Ballon Toss. The stations went well, but they creeped slightly over the time limit.
The students recollected in the lecture hall for the closing activity. Lyrics to We Are The World by the Berlin Children’s Philharmonic were distributed. The fact that the Berlin children’s second language is English was highlighted. The students watched the Berlin rendition once and sang along joyously 2 times. A thoughtful closing ceremony concluded the days festivities. It was a wonderful bunch of students, assistants and teachers who had an Amazing English Day!
