I received a call today from Pn. Catheriana, a new colleague of mine whom I never meet, informing me that she has been appointed as the lecturer of MRE3014 Design Aesthetics starting from the first semester of 2013/2014 academic year.
The visceral reaction of mine was surprised and shocked, because I have been preparing to meet the students on Monday morning. And I also planned to implement interactive lecture session using this Blog, Prezi and Socrative. It seems like they are no longer necessary now.
After talking to Catherina over the phone, I realised that she is equally shocked. My sense of empathy emerged and I comforted her that I will support and assist her in the transitional period. Also, I will accompany her to attend the first lecture on Monday morning.
If I think positively, perhaps I am too "deep" for the students. I knew 1/4 of the students have problem understanding what I teach or intend to teach. Indeed, I pity the students but I cannot degrade the teaching to suit the deficiency of the weak students--I still have 3/4 of good, dedicated and excellent students who intend to learn from me.
Nonetheless, I knew it is the time for me to move on, and I wish Catherina and the students all the best in the journey of teaching and learning Design Aesthetics. Good luck!
Thursday, 5 September 2013
Tuesday, 3 September 2013
The need for a text book in Design Aesthetics
I have been incubating the idea of writing or compiling a textbook for Design Aesthetics. The idea remains as an idea, and I have done nothing about it.
Perhaps, I can go deep into individual topics instead of writing a textbook that intend to cover multiple topics related to design and aesthetics.
Perhaps, I can go deep into individual topics instead of writing a textbook that intend to cover multiple topics related to design and aesthetics.
Monday, 2 September 2013
Good to have modest number of students
I attended the meeting with new intake yesterday. Dr. Zaff introduced me as Karate-do Blackbelter. Good introduction and I added, "I am second Dan". I think I had left good impact on the new students' memory. Enough for first semester's students.
I noticed that there are around 40 over students for two Bachelor of Design programmes. We actually expected 60, 30 for each programme. Anyway, there will be second intake in February next year. To me, 20 over students are just nice for me to teach in computer lab or studio. I had experience teaching 40+ students in the MMA3013 Computer Animation course and 40 students in the 3D Game Development course in computer lab. There was no fun at all!
Every time I finished my class, I felt like drained out and I didn't feel like doing anything. Exhausted, tired but my brain was spinning fast--trying to solve students' problems.
I always tell the students that, "never complain to me that you have a lot of assignments, because every assignment I give you, I actually gave myself all of your assignments to follow up!" Last sem when I taught Design Aesthetics, there were 123 students in the class. I spent two weeks, day and night, just to read through and mark their learning journals. Nonetheless, it was really enjoying when I found good work done by the students, but I still prefer to have modest number of students, so that I can allocate sufficient time for those who need my guidance and help. Not necessarily equally, but fair to the students.
I noticed that there are around 40 over students for two Bachelor of Design programmes. We actually expected 60, 30 for each programme. Anyway, there will be second intake in February next year. To me, 20 over students are just nice for me to teach in computer lab or studio. I had experience teaching 40+ students in the MMA3013 Computer Animation course and 40 students in the 3D Game Development course in computer lab. There was no fun at all!
Every time I finished my class, I felt like drained out and I didn't feel like doing anything. Exhausted, tired but my brain was spinning fast--trying to solve students' problems.
I always tell the students that, "never complain to me that you have a lot of assignments, because every assignment I give you, I actually gave myself all of your assignments to follow up!" Last sem when I taught Design Aesthetics, there were 123 students in the class. I spent two weeks, day and night, just to read through and mark their learning journals. Nonetheless, it was really enjoying when I found good work done by the students, but I still prefer to have modest number of students, so that I can allocate sufficient time for those who need my guidance and help. Not necessarily equally, but fair to the students.
Sunday, 1 September 2013
Preparing to meet new Bachelor of Design students tomorrow
The faculty has set tomorrow (Monday, 2 Sep 2013) as the date to meet new students. I look forward to meet them, and hopefully the quality of students we get this time would be good and fit for the programme. It was quite annoying to me to see students who make their choice of Bachelor of Design programme as 4th, 5th, 6th, 7th, 8th or worse, not as a choice at all.
Having said so, I wasn't sure myself whether to continue studying multimedia back then in 1999. After one semester of study the Creative Multimedia programme, I felt like moving to IT or Management programme--anything but not Multimedia! I couldn't forget the culture shock I had, shifting from Science stream to Art stream, learning to hold pencil in order to draw properly. I felt like being treated as a naive child...
I took the courage to meet my lecturer, Mr Abdul Halim to discuss about my change of programme.
Because of his encouragement, I stayed on studying creative multimedia, and then further study at Master's and PhD level. Eventually, I become a lecturer who teaches creative multimedia like him.
Many students intend to join UPSI because they thought this decision would lead them to become school teachers. This is still somewhat true but for those who are taking Bachelor of Design programmes, they will not become school teacher upon graduation. One profession that is similar to teaching is training, in which graduates of the Bachelor of Design programme may become in-house trainers--design-related or software-related.
Because of this, I insist to include a lecture on "Being Professional Design" in this course, so the students have to chance to explore and discuss about how they want to be professional designers.
Having said so, I wasn't sure myself whether to continue studying multimedia back then in 1999. After one semester of study the Creative Multimedia programme, I felt like moving to IT or Management programme--anything but not Multimedia! I couldn't forget the culture shock I had, shifting from Science stream to Art stream, learning to hold pencil in order to draw properly. I felt like being treated as a naive child...
I took the courage to meet my lecturer, Mr Abdul Halim to discuss about my change of programme.
Mr Abdul Halim, my lecturer in MMU.
After telling him my intention to change programme, he said the following:
"Tan, I see sparkling in your eyes! Your design work was average but you have good attitude in learning."
Because of his encouragement, I stayed on studying creative multimedia, and then further study at Master's and PhD level. Eventually, I become a lecturer who teaches creative multimedia like him.
Many students intend to join UPSI because they thought this decision would lead them to become school teachers. This is still somewhat true but for those who are taking Bachelor of Design programmes, they will not become school teacher upon graduation. One profession that is similar to teaching is training, in which graduates of the Bachelor of Design programme may become in-house trainers--design-related or software-related.
Because of this, I insist to include a lecture on "Being Professional Design" in this course, so the students have to chance to explore and discuss about how they want to be professional designers.
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