Message body

Introduction

Teaching is the profession that teaches all the other professions. Being a teacher has never been easy. It requires a lot of hard work and full commitment as teachers responsible for preparing the young generations for the future by giving them a perfect education. As we have vowed to the law of Ministry of Education, we must abide by the rules of the ministry, which is to give what is the best for the students and to the school as well.

My required task this time, whereby I had to make an interview with someone that is appropriate and caters the criteria needed by the task. I have some options such as headmasters, teachers, doctors, district education officers and others. This has made me think, who should I go for? After a deep and long thought, I finally came across an excellent teacher in my school. This is because he is my colleague, and this really helps me as we are in the same school. I am free to approach him without any hesitation and feel embarrassed as I will not have to undergo any procedures for such meetings. The fact of choosing En. Mazri is because he is a teacher like me, after all. We start off at the same platform and have gone through the similar environment. I believe education is more suitable for me to discover compared to other majors because education is the only way for me in which I use to educate people and to develop human capital to the public. This will increase my knowledge and ideas that I might be able to explore and use for the process of teaching and learning. Maybe this will winch up my spirits and definitely boost my confidence to become a better teacher someday, InshaAllah. Before I interviewed the interviewee, I have to make some preparations such as questions to be raised, and of course I

need to be ready physically and mentally so that everything will proceed smoothly without any hesitations. Interviews will be held at the school, on school holidays. This is because my time constraints. Too many do I need to either finish my job as a teacher at the school and my job as a student of distance learning. This all requires time to spare.

Biography of interviewee:

The person I choose to be interviewed is an excellent teacher, my colleague in school and he is Mr. Mazri b. Md. Hussin. He was born on June 18, 1973. En. Mazri is a science teacher. He is a competent and a very professional educator in technology too. He can also repair computer equipments during his free time. If there are technological tools that are damaged or old, he will perk up the tools and put together so that all his colleagues are able to use it. He is a good science teacher and he EMIS data teacher in my school. He is a kind man and always helps friends in need, especially in the IT field. He loves to surf the internet during his leisure time. He gets new and latest information whenever he surfs the internet. At times, he feels that the internet will make him more energetic and creative. En. Mazri too likes to spend his free time playing football in the school field with his friends and pupils. The game make him fits and healthy.

He was born in a family of medium, where his father was a labourer and his mother is a full-time housewife. He is the second child of five siblings. He has a sister who is now furthering her studies in the Faculty of Medicine at Mansoura University in Egypt. He has a wife who is also a teacher, and just completed her studies at Universiti Sains Malaysia majoring in Mathematics. He always gives full support and encouragement to her to finish her education because in his opinion, the burden of

duties as a wife, mother and teacher is challenging her credibility. So, he needs to give full encouragement and moral support to her beloved wife. He has three children, all girls, aged between six years to thirteen years old. His eldest daughter had scored 5As in the UPSR last year and is now studying at the Sekolah Menengah Maahad (P) in Kota Bharu. His second child is in year 4 and the youngest is now in the kinder garden.He began his schooling at Sekolah Kebangsaan Baung, Pengkalan Chepa Kota Bharu and continues his studies at Sekolah Menengah Kebangsaan Pengkalan Chepa, Kota Bharu. Then he got an offer to further his study at the Institute of Language Lembah Pantai, Kuala Lumpur. Not long after that, he continued his studies at Universiti Sains Malaysia to get hold of a degree. He also dreams to pursue his studies to the highest level. When I asked why he changed his option from the Malay language teachers to science teachers, he said that he had a great interest in science since childhood. If there is an opportunity, he will not let it slip away. Now as he is a Science and Bahasa Melayu educators, he can teach both subjects in school.

Report Mr. Mazri b. Md Hussin began his career as a teacher at Sekolah Kebangsaan Kuang, Rawang, Selangor in July 1997. After serving for seven years in the school he was awarded as the most outstanding teacher in PPD Gombak in 2004. Later, he joined Sekolah Kebangsaan Bintang, Setiu, Terengganu. As he was bestowed with the recognition as an excellent teacher, approximately on 16 July 2008, he earned that title while teaching in Sekolah Kebangsaan Bintang, Setiu, Terengganu. In 2009, he was transferred to Sekolah Kebangsaan Kuala Nal, Kuala Krai. While teaching in Sekolah Kebangsaan Kuala Nal, Kuala Krai, he received awards for excellence in teaching and learning from PPD Kuala Krai. This is the sweetest and joyous victory

for him as he worked hard to get it. He is satisfied. When I asked about the feeling of recognition as an outstanding teacher, he just gave me a smile yet so proud and thrilled. Above all, deep in his heart he realizes the burden he has to face each day is never going to be easy. However, he is very grateful to his parents, wife and daughters who are the inspiration for his successes. To gain recognition as an excellent teacher, a person must meet up the condition of service as an excellent teacher as set by the Ministry of Education and the annual performance must be outstanding three years in row. The path is tough but when you have the determination and give completely your full commitment, everything is possible.

Among the characteristic that an excellent teacher should have are, a very good personality and charismatic attitude. He/she has to cover an extensive knowledge and skills, as for En. Mazri in Science of course. He has to make sure that the effort he presents can be used efficiently by the teachers as well as the pupils. As an excellent teacher, communication skills play a vital and an important role for En. Mazri. Since he has to motivate and be an expert in the relevant subjects, being able to deliver and answer all the problems arouse by the teachers. He has to contribute not only to his school but also to other schools in PPD Kuala Krai. He must always be dedicated, innovated and be motivated all the time in implementing his duty and responsibility. He also must provide an internal training to enhance a better teachers professionalism to other teachers, not only to his colleagues but to other teachers as well. Excellent teachers also must determine the approach and the latest teaching strategies as well as be able to communicate to other teachers. En. Mazri also helps another Science teacher in the school by planning and implementing co-curricular activities that can help improve students'

academic performance. Using co-curricular activities, he can construct numerous non-academic activities that are fun and enjoyable yet knowledgeable.

Speaking on the challenges that he received either before or after being an excellent teacher, he mentioned that before he hold the title of an excellent teacher, he had to work hard to maintain the best annual performance for three years in row. He too has to pass the selection that is made by the selection committee or his representative. Every teacher has to go through this observation because the selection committee wants to maintain the quality of the services itself. After he was appointed as an excellent teacher, he received another great challenge in which people often talk about his integrity as an outstanding Science teacher. Here he had to show his ability as an excellent teacher so that his authority as an excellent teacher will not be doubt. He also had to work hard to maintain excellent performance to remain reliability with the title of an excellent teacher that he holds. He must also ensure the educational progress of students is increasing pleasantly, together taught by excellent teachers and did not disappoint the expectations of the school administrators. Besides that, he too must constantly come with many appealing and long-winded ideas. Mentally, he has to keep up with many challenges and keep on learning along with the increase of work in school.

As far as he concerned, he too must reflect a highly good self-image and occupied with self-confident. This is to ensure that other people can be inspired by him and also be induced by the credibility that he carries with himself. On top, leadership skill is a must when you are awarded with such title. For En. Mazri, he has to master the skills and has the ability to influence other teachers. He again stressed that all the above problems are burden and the challenges he must face

and overcome. As time goes by, it is a trivial problem and may be considered as trifles. As of today, he is still able to face all the challenges and put aside the unimportant matters as for him teaching is his passion.

When talking about the achievement or contribution to society, especially public schools, he quickly answered, there are too many things to be done and too many teachers and pupils who want him to help and contribute, but time constraints has limit his eagerness. He stressed again, as of today, he managed to build a module of teaching and learning of science. Based on these modules, he is able to provide new knowledge to the students. He stated again, as an excellent teacher, a person must be served with full during the period. This is the greatest contribution to the pupils. In addition, he stated that he would conduct a science camp where students will be exposed to techniques on how to answer questions. This is not just for children in year six that are facing their examination in September but also for children in year four and five. This will be a great exposure for the pupils as they rely to their teachers to gain knowledge. Science Camp is not just for his students but open to other schools. He will also hold a camp for science teachers on teaching techniques and learning science in primary schools. This is to make sure that the learning methods are done efficiently to all schools in the district of Kuala Krai. He will continue to teach on how to create a new and selective module in Science Panel where he is always invited to many school to give talk on new techniques of teaching and learning in Science subject. In addition, he has prepared a management module in science laboratory. This is for the use of other science teachers at the school. By using the module, teaching of science and the usage of the science room will be more organized and done more efficiently.

He is also being invited by the PPD to give lectures and share any latest ideas on subjects of science to science teachers in another school regularly. He would provide a clearer view of the teaching techniques and give many new ideas to the science teachers in other school. En. Mazri is also willing to share brilliant ideas and at the same time he is ready to learn more from other Science teachers. He also joined the trip to Gua Musang with the PPD group to visit and come together with

the native people for a week. While there, he mixed around and learnt how native people's lives and how the cultures revolved around there as well as teaching them about the features of life. In addition, he also joined another excellent teacher to visit schools with lower percentage in Kuala Krai and Gua Musang to provide guidance and proper solutions to the problems they are having. He too gave advices about learning and teaching difficulties. These are some of the achievements and contributions that he has accomplished and given to the school or community during his service as an excellent teacher.

En. Mazri expects the younger generation to be more interested in the teaching profession because it is more beneficial either to themselves or to others. As the saying goes, if we be kind to others and they will give us more. People will make use of the knowledge we delivered, and in return we may be rewarded with something. So he hopes younger generations not only choose the teaching profession because of the fear that they will not get any occupation but to love the profession from the bottom of the heart. Choose the teaching profession because of interest and not forced by others or condition. Becoming a teacher who is professional, dedicated, competent and high attitude as this is the picture of a good teacher and a great educator in the publics eye.

En. Mazri also hopes that the younger generations will have more interest in IT. He is looking forward to see that the future youth ahead of him to use the IT by means in the proper way. Not just for leisure and spending their spare time only but to get full use of the technology to learn and explore the world beyond our expectation.

Conclusion

From my interview with Mr. Mazri that I had conducted recently, I can conclude that Mr. Mazri believes that is not easy to become an excellent teacher. He has to face many challenges before or after being an excellent and brilliant teacher. But armed with patience and persistence he finally managed to hold the title. During the interview with Mr. Mazri, I was a little bit messy because of the questions that I gave did not fulfil the requirements of the lecturers need. In that case, I had to prepare another question and this takes time. Fortunately Mr. Mazri is willing to cooperate even though he had come all the way from home only to be interviewed by me. His cooperation is very much appreciated. The situation is more complicated because the interview occurred on school holidays. There are some questions that I had missed and I had to call him. This was my first experience interviewing someone. It is not as easy as I expected. There are many procedures that I should follow and from Mr. Mazris experience as an excellent teacher, there are lot of new knowledge that can be applied in my teaching skills and learning process. Even though I am

not a science teacher, but I may be able to carry and make use of some of his creative ideas in science module to the Malay Language or Mathematics subject. I too feel quite encouraging to listen to him talking about his dream and achievement. Deep in my heart I feel like to follow his footsteps and work together with him in

making education more interesting and enjoyable. This interview really opens my minds and I am more confident to pursue my study higher to the next level.

Above all this, I could hardly notice myself in his place. I have the picture of me being the next excellent teacher in my school. By the time, I will work hard and try to do my very best. The effort to achieve my dreams to be an excellent teacher can be done in no time if I have the gut to give what is needed to get to my higher level of education. At the end of the interview, he mentioned that as an excellent teacher, he had a dream to be implemented in his schools that is to create a school of excellence and achieve high percentage especially in science subjects. Even if he will be transferred to another school he will pursue and continue his dreams in order to see a glimpse of the future generations success. I hope that Mr. Mazri dreams be answered by God and I also hope one day I will get the chance to be able to taste the success as En. Mazri had.

Appendices :

Appendix 1

Interview Questions

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.

What What Tell Tell us us What What is

are are about about

the the an the

conditions tasks an interesting

for

the excellent

teachers? teacher? teachers? teachers? teachers?

time

to during as

be the

challenges faced or or dreams

hopes the

contribution

achievement

as

teachers?

7. What are the expectations of teachers to the younger generation now in education?

Appendix 2

Appendix 3