NAMA JABATAN / UNIT: BAHASA INGGERIS

INSTITUT PENDIDIKAN GURU KAMPUS BAHASA ANTARABANGSA

LEMBAH PANTAI, 59200 KUALA LUMPUR

TUGASAN KERJA KURSUS

(INDIVIDU)

SESI
SEMESTER 2/ YEAR 1

Nama : GOOI WEN MIN

Angka Giliran : 2021212350276
Nombor Kad Pengenalan : 030428110524

Kumpulan/Unit : PISMP TESL G JUN 2021-2026

Kod dan Nama Kursus : TSLB3493 SONGS AND POEMS IN THE PRIMARY ESL CLASSROOM
Nama Pensyarah : SITI MAZLIN BINTI ABDUL RAHMAN
Tarikh Hantar : 14 FEBRUARI 2023
Tarikh Diterima :
(Diisi Oleh Pensyarah)

Pengakuan Pelajar

Saya mengaku bahawa kerja kursus ini adalah hasil kerja saya sendiri kecuali nukilan dan
ringkasan yang setiap satunya saya jelaskan sumbernya.

Pengesahan Pelajar

Saya mengesahkan bahawa maklum balas yang diberikan oleh pensyarah telah saya fahami.

Tandatangan Pelajar : GOOI Jumlah markah:

Tarikh : 14 FEBRUARY 2023

Catatan : Pastikan pensyarah telah memberi maklum balas di dalam tugasan kerja kursus pelajar.
TSLB3493 Academic Writing

In today’s era, English is a need. It is important for everyone to be able to communicate

in English as it is an international language. However, Malaysians find it strenuous to learn

English because they think that correct grammar is more important than being able to use the

language. This has caused many of us to feel intimidated by the language resulting in

difficulties in acquiring the language. In this case, the teachers play a significant role in

changing this mindset and showing the learners that learning English does not need to be

stressful at all.

Based on the report, I can see that Mr. Mano is facing the same problem as most

English teachers in Malaysia. This is because English is not practiced by most households

causing it difficult for students to familiarize themselves and the dependence on the first

language might also caused them to unable to learn English competently. To make English

fun and still adhere to the Malaysian Education Blueprint, I suggest Mr. Mano to use songs

and poems.

The first song is “Firework” by Katy Perry. This is a pop song. The word “pop” is a short

form of “popular”. Like the name, the song is a mainstream one whereby we can hear it

everywhere on the Internet, radio and even television. The reason I chose this song is that it

is loud has a lively rhythm. The words in the lyrics are pronounced clearly and at a pace that

students of Mr. Mano’s class are able to catch. According to An-nisa & Suwatorno (2020),

songs can act as a tool for drilling to help students with pronunciation and also connecting

simple phrases. It can be seen in the repetitions of the lyrics “ Baby you’re a firework, come

and let you colours burst,”. With repetition, it means rehearsal are done, thus; students are

able to sing and learn to say the word correctly. Besides that, Mr. Mano can use this song to

teach them to ask opinions too. Example from the song, “do you ever feel…”. To make learning

fun, Mr. Mano can do a song battle, whereby one group of students will sing one line and the

other group will sing the other line. This way, students can actually memorize and make use

of the phrases from the lyrics to actually express basic opinions.

 The next song is “Hello Song”, a nursery rhyme. This genre consists of easy vocabulary

and an adequate amount of repetition that is suitable for low-intermediate students. It also has

a bouncy rhyme to make students eager to follow along. Mr. Mano can sing and do actions

with his students. According to Macwan (2015), children learn best visually, thus actions can

help them remember the verbs in the song better. For example, the directions “Up, down, left,

right and all around”. Students can also learn basic phrases like “Hello teachers and friends”

and “How are you today?”. These phrases are important in daily life as they teach the students

the importance of maintaining a good relationship with teachers and peers. In addition, to

assess the students’ understanding, Mr. Mano can do the actions and let the students guess

the phrases. He can create healthy competition by giving incentives to motivate the students.

Besides, Mr. Mano can use shape poems in his class. A shape poem is a poem that

describes and has the shape of the object mentioned. For example, “The mouse’s tail” by

Lewis Carroll that has a shape of a curved mouse tail. Mr. Mano can take inspiration from this

poem by giving cut-outs of different shapes to the students and making them complete the

poem with the vocabulary that they know about the shape. After that, the students can

exchange the poems with their peers and try to recite it to one another. In this case, they are

actually learning through social constructivism theory whereby Kalina & Powell (2009) stated

that children are able to gain knowledge by communicating with the environment and the

people around them (the more knowledgeable others) with the help of prior knowledge. So,

students also learn to respect various opinions and cultures as they interact with each other

while practicing English.

Another poem is “We are now six” by A.A. Milne. It is a free verse poem. It does not

require any consistent patterns of rhyme and meter as there is no set rules for this poem, so

students are still free to make it rhyme depending on their creativity. This poem is suitable

because students can relate to it. The obvious reasons are learning numbers and expressing

one’s abilities as the poem goes by counting the age and also the skills the poet can do. Since

the lines of the poem are short and have words that are easy to read, it can help Mr. Mano’s
students to recite with confidence. Besides that, Mr. Mano can also let the students to continue

the poem after the age of 6 years old and state the things they can do at that age. Since

freedom is given during the learning process, it actually let the students explore the language;

maximizing their potential to foster individuality, decision-making, and also flexibility when it

comes to learning (Radovic-Markovic & Markovic, 2012). Students will feel a sense of trust in Mr.

Mano which will increase their self-esteem when using English in the classroom.

In conclusion, songs and poems can assist teachers in making the teaching and learning

of ELS classroom fun. Teachers have to keep in mind the students’ proficiency level when

selecting materials to use for teaching. With a good choice of songs and poems as well as the

correct application when teaching, it can help to boost the enthusiasm in learning English of

students who have low level of English proficiency. When they are excited and actively

interested to learn, only then meaningful learning experiences can occur because students

are willing to create connections with the knowledge they obtained from Mr. Mano.
Reference

An-nisa, N., & Suwartono, T. (2020). Fun Ways in Learning English. Journal of Applied

Linguistics (ALTICS), 2(1). https://doi.org/10.36423/altics.v2i1.477

Kalina, C., & Powell, K. C. (2009). Cognitive and social constructivism: Developing tools for

an effective classroom. Education, 130(2), 241-250.

Macwan, H. J. (2015). Using visual aids as authentic material in ESL classrooms. Research

Journal of English language and literature (RJELAL), 3(1), 91-96.

Radovic-Markovic, M., & Markovic, D. (2012). A new model of education: Development of

individuality through the freedom of learning. E-Journal of the World Academy of Art &

Science, 1(1), 97-114.

TSLB3493 Academic Writing

In today’s era, English is a need. It is important for everyone to be able to communicate

in English as it is an international language. However, Malaysians find it strenuous to learn

English because they think that correct grammar is more important than being able to use the

language. This has caused many of us to feel intimidated by the language resulting in

difficulties in acquiring the language. In this case, the teachers play a significant role in

changing this mindset and showing the learners that learning English does not need to be

stressful at all.

Based on the report, I can see that Mr. Mano is facing the same problem as most

English teachers in Malaysia. This is because English is not practiced by most households

causing it difficult for students to familiarize themselves and the dependence on the first

language might also caused them to unable to learn English competently. To make English

fun and still adhere to the Malaysian Education Blueprint, I suggest Mr. Mano to use songs

and poems.

The first song is “Firework” by Katy Perry. This is a pop song. The word “pop” is a short

form of “popular”. Like the name, the song is a mainstream one whereby we can hear it

everywhere on the Internet, radio and even television. The reason I chose this song is that it

is loud and has a lively rhythm. The words in the lyrics are pronounced clearly and at a pace

that students of Mr. Mano’s class are able to catch. According to An-nisa & Suwatorno (2020),

songs can act as a tool for drilling to help students with pronunciation and also connecting

simple phrases. It can be seen in the repetitions of the lyrics “ Baby you’re a firework, come

and let you colours burst,”. With repetition, it means rehearsal are done, thus; students are

able to sing and learn to say the word correctly. Besides that, Mr. Mano can use this song to

teach them to ask opinions too. Example from the song, “do you ever feel…”. To make learning

fun, Mr. Mano can do a song battle, whereby one group of students will sing one line and the

other group will sing the other line. This way, students can actually memorize and make use

of the phrases from the lyrics to actually express basic opinions.

 The next song is “Hello Song”, a nursery rhyme. This genre consists of easy vocabulary

and an adequate amount of repetition that is suitable for low-intermediate students. It also has

a bouncy rhyme to make students eager to follow along. Mr. Mano can sing and do actions

with his students. According to Macwan (2015), children learn best visually, thus actions can

help them remember the verbs in the song better. For example, the directions “Up, down, left,

right and all around”. Students can also learn basic phrases like “Hello teachers and friends”

and “How are you today?”. These phrases are important in daily life as they teach the students

the importance of maintaining a good relationship with teachers and peers. In addition, to

assess the students’ understanding, Mr. Mano can do the actions and let the students guess

the phrases. He can create healthy competition by giving incentives to motivate the students.

Besides, Mr. Mano can use shape poems in his class. A shape poem is a poem that

describes and has the shape of the object mentioned. For example, “The mouse’s tail” by

Lewis Carroll that has a shape of a curved mouse tail. Mr. Mano can take inspiration from this

poem by giving cut-outs of different shapes to the students and making them complete the

poem with the vocabulary that they know about the shape. After that, the students can

exchange the poems with their peers and try to recite it to one another. In this case, they are

actually learning through social constructivism theory whereby Kalina & Powell (2009) stated

that children are able to gain knowledge by communicating with the environment and the

people around them (the more knowledgeable others) with the help of prior knowledge. So,

students also learn to respect various opinions and cultures as they interact with each other

while practicing English.

Another poem is “We are now six” by A.A. Milne. It is a free verse poem. It does not

require any consistent patterns of rhyme and meter as there is no set rules for this poem, so

students are still free to make it rhyme depending on their creativity. This poem is suitable

because students can relate to it. The obvious reasons are learning numbers and expressing

one’s abilities as the poem goes by counting the age and also the skills the poet can do. Since

the lines of the poem are short and have words that are easy to read, it can help Mr. Mano’s
students to recite with confidence. Besides that, Mr. Mano can also let the students to continue

the poem after the age of 6 years old and state the things they can do at that age. Since

freedom is given during the learning process, it actually let the students explore the language;

maximizing their potential to foster individuality, decision-making, and also flexibility when it

comes to learning (Radovic-Markovic & Markovic, 2012). Students will feel a sense of trust in

Mr. Mano which will increase their self-esteem when using English in the classroom.

In conclusion, songs and poems can assist teachers in making the teaching and learning

of ELS classroom fun. Teachers have to keep in mind the students’ proficiency level when

selecting materials to use for teaching. With a good choice of songs and poems as well as the

correct application when teaching, it can help to boost the enthusiasm in learning English of

students who have low level of English proficiency. When they are excited and actively

interested to learn, only then meaningful learning experiences can occur because students

are willing to create connections with the knowledge they obtained from Mr. Mano.
References

An-nisa, N., & Suwartono, T. (2020). Fun Ways in Learning English. Journal of Applied

Linguistics (ALTICS), 2(1). https://doi.org/10.36423/altics.v2i1.477

Kalina, C., & Powell, K. C. (2009). Cognitive and social constructivism: Developing tools for

an effective classroom. Education, 130(2), 241-250.

Macwan, H. J. (2015). Using visual aids as authentic material in ESL classrooms. Research

Journal of English language and literature (RJELAL), 3(1), 91-96.

Radovic-Markovic, M., & Markovic, D. (2012). A new model of education: Development of

individuality through the freedom of learning. E-Journal of the World Academy of Art &

Science, 1(1), 97-114.