paglinang sa kaalaman

Education is just like the game of chess. Why chess? Why not basketball or football? Yes, these games may have common grounds to be understood before the players play, however, in chess, only one player plays and wins. One has to learn at least the names, arrangements and the different moves of the pieces more has an idea on how to give and get out of check. Basically, this is what I do in Tutorial Room 1 (TR1) with the children I am handling.

I don’t teach them chess literally because I know they’re good in playing it. As a facilitator, I just want them to realize that as they move their pieces they must already know the proper arrangements and the names of each member of the board game. Just like in education, the children can not read and blend words like cat, dog, goat or rainbow without knowing the letters and sounds of the alphabets or even find the value of X-Y without mastering the basic mathematical operations. I am handling children from Level 1 to Level 4 and some of them lack these abilities especially the one’s enrolled in the higher levels. There are some instances that the topics hardly penetrate their minds.

Being the initiator of these kids, I have to find other ways and techniques to help them dig in to their minds the concepts and applications of our topics. Sometimes, we need to do our lessons on the floor to make them comfortable and combine play activities to lessen their boredom. I have to involve their talents as well since most of them are very talented and artistic. They draw, color, cut and paste figures or pictures and even compose a poem or a song basing from the pictures that they like. They can create their own melody through the use of a guitar or can adopt the tune from their favorite songs. The children like challenges and do well if they understand the lesson. This motivates me to do our evaluation through a contest by giving them numbers to solve. We also do story telling through the use of puppets and power point presentation to make our session interesting instead of just merely reading the story book. Most often than not, we also sit or lie on the matted floor while watching movies related to our curriculum. It helps them think critically and teaches them to value life.

These are just among the things that I and my students do in TR1. I don’t want them to chase the rainbow but just like in chess, the player must plan first before executing a good move. It’s up to him to think and weigh before he do a checkmate. So come, let’s play chess in TR1. :)


*february 2007 nung dumalaw mga sponsors*

Swimming in RMC

*october 2006 sa swimming pool*
Another exciting event has happened again for this month courtesy of Magellan Learning Center (MLC) team/management. This was the two-hour swimming outing held at Rizal Memorial Sports Complex in Vito Cruz, Manila on September 17, 2006. The said event was organized for the children who attained excellent performance in MLC and even at home for the previous month.
A total number of 34 kids along with 6 staff joined the outing out of 50 requested participants. Ate Pie and Ate Malen, Project Coordinator (PC) of Caress Home and Social Worker of Ella Yallah Home respectively, said that the 16 kids were not able to come because of some reasons, one of which was the bad records committed at home even though they always attend MLC.

Anyhow, the children and staff were so excited that they even paraded under the heat of the afternoon sun in going to the jeeps terminal. Kuya Jeremie, the Center Coordinator of MLC, being the “majorette” led the vigorous kids jovially. Two jeepneys boarded the outers until Taft Avenue and had another 3-5 minutes “walk-a-thon” up to the main location. The team rented swimming gears for the children who were screened out of not having the accepted swimming attire.

The youngsters took their first shower before running to the swimming area where they drenched themselves. Mama Alma of Gabay Buhay Home (GBH) and Ate Malen joyfully served as watcher to the younger kids who delightfully played and splashed water to one another while Ate Pie acted as life-guard to the older children who gleefully jumped and dived at the other pool. On the other hand, Kuya Jeremie assisted some small kids and played as the Baywatch man as he taught them how to swim.

The writer had seen the happy faces of the children as they swam to and fro like fishes in the sea. It seemed like forever but just like in a movie, it had to end as well. At around 4 o’clock, the children took last quick shower, returned the gears and proceeded home.
There’s no denying that the children really relished themselves to this outing. Each of them has their own stories to share unaware of the stimuli which encourage the others to sail through in all the activities and behave satisfactorily at home. Guess this might be a challenge for them to do their best for next month.
Kudos to all those who partook! Good luck on the next level of the coming spree. See yah! ☺

Computer Technical Course

with the computer facilitator

hala! wak wak na ung cpu...

with another computer facilitator...




*during the visit of "the prince" last aug 2007*

Ayala Museum Outing

Ay grabe itong outing na ito. One of the children eh tumakas sa grupo. Sus! We tried to find him around and inside Glorietta. Sinundan namin siya mula Ayala hanggang sa may Fire Station. Good thing, Sunday yun, otherwise, baka nahuli na kami ng MAPSA sa ka-J-J walk. Para kaming mga ewan. Tapos pag-uwi, hinanap naming siya sa bahay kasi baka umuwi. Wala pa daw kaya muntik na namin siyang i-report sa pulis. Hapon na nung umuwi itong pasaway na bata na ito.

Mahirap manaway ng mga pasaway talagang mga bata.

On 5 Days ALS Seminar (flashback)

*August 2006 *

This is the first educators seminar on Alternative Learning System. This was attended by the MLC team together with the community facilitators conducted by the ALS Department of Education heads.

Got a very funny experience here. I got lost the first day of the seminar. The team agreed to meet in front of the main office (which was in Mola before) at exactly 6 in the morning but I was not able to meet them because I lived far. I told them I would not make it to Mola so they proceeded to the venue. I took a bus from C5 Taguig and told the driver to stop me somewhere in Cubao just near Quezon Ave. The driver forgot so he dropped me to a street which was already far from Quezon Ave. I didn’t know where I was. I asked the policeman who was just standing to a nearby post but showed me another way. I took a cab then and told the driver the address of the venue. He said he knew it but as we traveled he kept on asking me the direction. I noticed he was just pretending so I told him to better stop the taxi. I was already late. The team was already in the venue and the seminar was about to start. They called me to ask where I was. I told them I was somewhere in EDSA near Robinson Mall then suddenly I heard different reactions from the team like “What?! Why are you there?” and so on and so forth. I didn’t know they had a Manila map with them. They spread the map on the table and everybody tried to locate the street where I was. They instructed me to ride and to stop to a certain landmark. I took a cab again and I was able to reach my destination.

When I arrived at the venue, of course the seminar already started, I was damned ashamed because I was late. It was the first day pa! Anyway, I was just new in the city and I didn’t know the places.