Have you learned everything there is to be learned?
By David Lopez
Learning is a life-long journey in our lives. From the moment we come into this world, we must immediately begin to learn and adapt; after that, learning takes place every day of our existence and until the day we die. When can one say that one has learned it all? The answer to this question is “never.” In fact, I heard someone put it this way “the more I know, the more I know that I don’t know much.” But, who decides what is it that we need to learn? This question can be answered in two parts. Others normally may have the power to decide what we must learn in life, but we also have the power to decide what we want to learn.
When we are little, we learn pretty much what our parents and teachers want us to learn. We have no option but to go to school and learn how to read and write. For some, having to learn Math and other school subjects is not their cup of tea. Learning doesn’t come easy to them. Nonetheless, others have the power to dictate our learning. This, however, tends to change as we become adults and we chose what subject we’ll study in college. For some, the academic journey doesn’t stop at the end of completing a bachelor degree; it carries on into obtaining a master or even a doctoral degree.
For the Badan Pendidikan Kristen PENABUR Junior and Senior High School principals, improving their English skills started in August of 2010. Friday after Friday, they took two hours off out of their busy schedules as school directors to come to UKRIDA’s Language Training Center to learn ways to improve their English. The name of the course they completed is called Communicative English for Education Professionals, also know as CEEP. What was most interesting about this course was that the students were all well educated, highly experienced principals of junior and senior high schools. Yet, they understood the need to enhance their knowledge of the English language. For UKRIDA LTC’s instructors, the subjects they touched on with the principals were directly related to the students’ occupations as school administrators. The learning that took place in this course was a two-way street type of learning. The principals brought extensive experience to the class and the instructor’s built on this knowledge to teach English skills to them.
I heard some one said this once; “The more a man knows, the more humble he/she should be.” What this really means is that we should never think that because we have attained a certain level of academic education or plenty of life experiences, we are better than those who are less experienced than us. We all have something to offer to society. We should remain open to the idea of learning as a life-long journey. If we fail to understand this, we run the risk of becoming obsolete.
(published in UKRIDA Newsletter | No. 71 - Year IX)
Communicative English Course (CEC) Program
By Ignasia Yuyun
UKRIDA Language Training Center offers some programs and services for the public. One of the ongoing programs is Communicative English Course (CEC) for teachers at SMPK 2 BPK PENABUR Jakarta. Since this school applies bilingual teaching to students, Mrs. Sutjiati, the Principal, therefore initiated to take Communicative English Course for non English teachers. This course is a general English course designed for non-English Education professionals. The CEC program is offered once a week, attended by 16 participants. This 30-hour course program reflects the fact that English is the world’s major language of international communication and is not limited to any one country, region or culture. In addition, this course covers general English topics that are relevant to participants’ lives, such as school visit, school activities, and class discussion.
CEC program provides its participants with the opportunity to share their opinions and experience actively since the UKRIDA LTC focuses on learner’s activity. In order to broaden the participants’ knowledge, cultural information is also added to provide cross-cultural comparison and discussion. In terms of standard competence, this course enables participants to communicate and use English appropriately in daily communication at education professional working environment. This program is scheduled to end on April 29, 2011.
Student's Performance on Activity Report
(published in UKRIDA Newsletter | No. 71 - Year IX)
