Last month was a rollercoaster for me, at least emotionally. Every TnL need to be consciously planned, reviewed, revised and revisited. Sometimes I feel like a failure. I’m starting to feel the weight of the responsibility to truly reach my students. I know from past experience that learners often need something extra to stay motivated — something that feels exciting, rewarding, and personal.

After a conversation with a surprisingly insightful doctor (who was supposed to be treating me, not advising me!), I walked away with more than just medication — I left with a renewed sense of purpose and a practical idea: “Children thrive on competition.”

And just like that, a new plan started forming in my mind.

🎯 A Simple But Hopeful Intervention: Weekly Competitions

I haven’t launched it yet — but I’ve been preparing with hope and excitement. The idea is to hold weekly competitions that alternate between team-based and individual games, tied closely to what the students are learning in class.

Here’s the plan I’m praying will spark a difference:

📅 The Competition Breakdown

💻 Week 1 & 3: Super Kahoot! (Individual Game)

These weeks will feature quick-fire Kahoot quizzes based on our lessons.

• The Top 5 scorers will earn the Super Kahoot title

• Winners will receive small instant prizes right after the game

🔤 Week 2 & 4: Spelling Star Challenge (Group Game)

Students will be grouped into teams of five and will play either:

• Spelling Bee – where they spell aloud in front of the class

• Hot Seat – where one player guesses a word while teammates give clues

🏆 Scores will be tracked on a big mahjong paper scoreboard, and at the end of the month, the best-performing team will receive a small prize and the title Spelling Star Team. I’m keeping it fun, low-cost, and meaningful — with certificates and possibly Perky Piung merchandise if I can find a way to get them!

I want students to feel that hard work and focus are rewarded, and that learning can be something to look forward to — not fear.

🎁 Bonus Motivation: Stickers & Badges

To keep the momentum going, I’m also planning:

• A Sticker Redemption Poster where students can trade classroom task submissions for stickers. 

• Helper Badges to give students class responsibilities and pride in their role.

🌈 My Hope

I haven’t rolled this out yet — but my heart is full of hope. I want to believe that with the right mix of structure, encouragement, and fun, my students will feel:

• Seen

• Motivated

• Excited to participate

• And most importantly — confident in their ability to learn

It’s not just about prizes. It’s about giving them moments to shine.

If this works, I’ll share the journey — the ups, the flops, and hopefully, the wins too. 💛

If you’re a teacher trying something similar, I’d love to hear from you. Let’s keep supporting each other as we do our best for our learners — one star at a time.

Full of hope! 

Teacher Asniem

Hi Parents,

This week’s homework is a short reading task. Don’t worry — your child won’t be doing it alone! I’ve made a video where I read with them. 🎥📖

✅ Just play the video

✅ Let your child follow along

✅ Encourage them to read out loud

✅ Praise their effort 🌟

📚 Kerja Rumah Tahun 5: Jom Baca Bersama!

Hai Ibu Bapa,

Kerja rumah minggu ini ialah tugasan membaca. Jangan risau — anak anda tidak akan keseorangan! Saya dah sediakan video bacaan. 🎥📖

✅ Mainkan video

✅ Biar anak ikut bacaan

✅ Galakkan mereka baca kuat

✅ Puji usaha mereka 🌟

Thank you for your support. A little help from you goes a long way! 💖

Teacher Asniem

 Hi everyone!

For this week’s English homework, our young learners will be diving into a fun and simple reading assignment. 💡 Don’t worry, dear parents — you won’t have to do it alone! I’ve recorded a video where I read the text with the children. 🧑‍🏫🎥

You can play the video at home to help your child follow along, listen to the pronunciation, and build confidence in reading. 🎶📖 It’s a great way for them to learn at their own pace, with your gentle support.

💬 How you can help:

• Sit with your child while they watch the video 📺

• Pause and repeat parts together 🔁

• Encourage them to try reading out loud 📢

• Celebrate their effort with a smile or a high five! 🙌💕

Let’s make reading a joyful routine — even just 10 minutes daily can make a big difference! 💖✨

Hai semua!

Untuk tugasan Bahasa Inggeris minggu ini, anak-anak kita akan menjalankan aktiviti membaca yang mudah dan menyeronokkan. 💡 Ibu bapa jangan risau — anda tidak perlu mengajar seorang diri! Saya telah menyediakan video khas di mana saya akan membaca bersama anak-anak. 🧑‍🏫🎥

Ibu bapa boleh memainkan video tersebut di rumah supaya anak-anak dapat mengikut bacaan, mendengar sebutan yang betul, dan membina keyakinan dalam membaca. 🎶📖 Ia juga membantu mereka belajar mengikut rentak sendiri, dengan sokongan lembut daripada ibu bapa tersayang.

💬 Bagaimana anda boleh membantu:

• Luangkan masa bersama anak semasa menonton video 📺

• Hentikan dan ulang semula bahagian tertentu untuk latihan 🔁

• Galakkan mereka membaca dengan suara kuat 📢

• Beri pujian, senyuman atau ‘high five’ atas usaha mereka! 🙌💕

Jadikan membaca sebagai rutin yang menggembirakan — hanya 10 minit sehari pun sudah cukup untuk memberi kesan besar! 💖✨

With care,

Teacher Asniem

💌 Hi there, amazing parents! 👋😊

If you’ve landed here from my link, that means you’re the proud parents of my Year Two class! 🎉📚

Welcome to my blog — I’m so happy to have you here! 💖🌟

👩‍🏫 My name is Asmah, but I go by my pen name — Asniem ✍️

I’ve asked my learners to call me Teacher Asniem because it’s fun and easy to remember! 🥰✨

🎵 Starting this week, we’ll begin each class with a cheerful song! 🎶☀️

I would love your help to show this song to your child at home. 🏡💞

You’re welcome to sing along too — the more, the merrier! 🎤🕺💃

🎉 So here it is… our happy class song! Enjoy and have fun singing together! 🎤😊🌟

💌 Hai ibu bapa yang hebat! 👋😊

Jika anda sampai ke sini melalui pautan saya, itu bermaksud anda adalah ibu bapa murid Tahun Dua saya! 🎉📚

Selamat datang ke blog saya — saya sangat gembira dengan kehadiran anda! 💖🌟

That's all for now, happy singing and see you soon!

Not all lessons land the first time—and that’s something I’m learning to accept with more patience.

Last week  session with this class was tough. We focused on listening and vocabulary related to the days of the week and months of the year, using a listening activity as the main anchor. The plan was simple: listen, match words to pictures, and build towards sentence construction using key phrases.

In reality, the class struggled to cope.

Even with support, the learners had difficulty keeping up with the fill-in-the-blanks tasks. I found myself pausing frequently to help individuals catch up or re-explain the activity entirely. Despite breaking down the instructions and reducing the language load, many learners were still lost midway through. By the afternoon session—when we revisited the same vocabulary through another listening-based fill-in-the-blanks exercise—it became clear: they weren’t ready to move on yet.

In hindsight, the lesson needs to be repeated next week. But this time, with a stronger emphasis on sentence patterns and structured vocabulary reinforcement.

What Didn’t Work

One major hurdle was the textbook itself. The presentation was too crowded, too wordy, and didn’t guide the learners’ attention to key ideas. The layout overwhelmed rather than supported. I’ve now realised that for this class, I need to adapt the materials much more carefully—simplified visuals, clearer focus, and just one language skill at a time.

Moving Forward

This weekend, I’ll be planning a full one-cycle lesson built around the four core skills:

• Listening
• Speaking
• Reading
• Writing

Plus a little Language Arts for creativity and fun.

The centre of it all? Vocabulary and sentence patterns. If learners can grasp these clearly, the rest will follow more naturally.

The goal isn’t speed—it’s clarity. If it takes two or even three rounds to get there, then so be it.

Some classes push me to teach differently—and this is one of them. They’re not less capable, just differently paced. And it’s my job to meet them where they are.

Let’s see how the next cycle goes. Am praying hard. 

This week, I had the pleasure of meeting Class 2Z for English 💚📚. First classes are always a mix of excitement and curiosity—on both sides! 😄🤓 But starting with smiles 😁 and a bit of structure 📋 really helps ease everyone in.

Before we dived into anything, I took a moment to let them know how sorry I was for being away for so long 😢💬. I explained that I had broken my wrist 🤕 and their responses were so sweet it melted my heart 💖🥹.

They asked the kindest little questions:

• “Does it still hurt, teacher?” 🥺

• “Can you write yet?” ✍️

And some just gave me big, warm smiles 😍. It was such a lovely moment of connection 🤝💫.

I also reminded them gently to be careful in the bathroom 🚻🧼—accidents can happen so fast, especially on slippery floors! 😬💦 Safety first, always! 🛑👟

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We kicked off the English lesson with a cheerful greeting 🎶 and a quick intro. I gave them a light vocabulary warm-up 🧠—nothing too heavy, just classroom language we’ll be using a lot 💬🖍️.

Plan to do it every day!

Then it was group work time! 🧑‍🤝‍🧑👩‍👧‍👦

We explored the calendar together—day, date, month 📅🗓️. I asked them to brainstorm what they already knew 🧠💭 and invited brave volunteers to write on the board 🧑‍🏫✏️. The enthusiasm was so lovely to see! 😄👏

Next up: Spell-Robic! 🕺📣

We got moving and grooving with the days of the week and the months of the year 💃🗓️🕰️. I’ve featured Spell-Robic before, but I’ll definitely post a demo video 🎥 soon—it’s way easier to show than tell! 😅🎬

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Midway through, I introduced our class attention-getter:

🎤 “1-2-3, eyes on me!”

👀 “1-2-3, eyes on you!”

We practised it a few times and had so much fun with it 😆🧏‍♀️. It really helped us get our focus back quickly! ✨

We ended the day with a vocab revision on parts of houses 🏠🪟🛏️. Most of them nailed it! 💪 Which means… I think we’re ready to tackle those exam questions next week! 💯📖

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The next day, we dove into colours 🎨🌈 and items from the textbooks. I used my iPad to project images 📲🖼️, and we used them to build sentences together ✍️📚.

We:

1. Drew the object ✏️

2. Coloured it based on instructions 🟤🔴🟢

3. Wrote a sentence about it! ✍️

Example:

• 🖍️ Draw a ball

• 🎨 Colour the ball brown

• ✏️ “This is a brown ball.”

Then we added another ball:

• “There are two balls.” 🎾🎾

🧐 Upon reflection, I realised the sentence pairs were a little mismatched 😅:

Instead of:

“This is a brown ball.”

“There are two balls.”

It should be:

✅ “This is a brown ball.”

✅ “These are brown balls.”

OR

✅ “There is a brown ball.”

✅ “There are two brown balls.”

Oh dear! 😅 SILLY ME! 🫣 I’ll do better next time! 💪✏️

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All in all, it felt soooo good to be back in the classroom 🎉💗. I missed being with the learners, and their warm welcome reminded me why I love this job so much 🥰🍎.

Here’s to more magical classroom moments ahead! 🌟🌱📚✨

Teacher Asniem

Hi again, lovely readers! 🍎

Today, I checked off another fun and creative lesson from the Apple Education Learning Center as part of my Apple Teacher journey—Animate with Stop Motion! And let me tell you… I had a blast! 🤩

The activity taught me how to use everyday objects to tell stories through stop-motion animation. I immediately thought of my quirky little character Perky Piung—of course, I had to try animating her! 🐣✨

🛠️ What I Did:

✅ Set up a basic stop motion scene

✅ Captured images step by step

✅ Used Keynote (yay, previous lesson skills!) to add motion graphics and finesse it all together

Okay, okay… the animation turned out a little jerky 😅 but you know what? I did it! Thanks for my daughter who did the voice over in one of the slides. And that’s what matters. 🎉

💡 What I Learned:

This project reminded me that creativity is often a work in progress. With more time, I know I could plan a storyboard, shoot more carefully, and create a much smoother and more coherent story. But even in a rush, I was able to bring my ideas to life—and that’s powerful! 🧠💥

🎈 Teaching Ideas:

Stop motion is such a great way to help students:

🎥 Tell stories visually

🎭 Express creativity

📚 Understand sequences and timelines

🧩 Break down complex ideas into steps

It’s hands-on, meaningful, and honestly… just plain fun! 😄

If you’re a teacher on the Apple Education journey, definitely give this one a go. Your inner child will thank you—and so will your students. 😉

Until next time, keep learning and creating! 🎨💻

Love,

Teacher Asniem 🍎✨

Hi everyone! 😊

I recently explored the “Make Photo Text Art” lesson on the Apple Education Learning Center, and I just had to share how much I enjoyed it! It was such a smooth and inspiring experience, and best of all—it sparked so many creative ideas I can bring into my classroom. ✨

📚 This mini-course helped me:

✅ Understand how to choose interesting textures to photograph

✅ Use the iPad camera to take high-quality close-up shots

✅ Get creative with Keynote to turn those textures into text art!

The steps were very easy to follow, and the activity was so engaging. I really liked how everything was hands-on and practical. It didn’t feel like a tutorial—it felt like play! 🎨📲

💡 How I’ll Use This in My Classroom:

As a teacher, I’m always looking for new ways to bring creativity into my lessons. This activity gave me a simple but powerful tool to help my students:

🧠 Develop visual literacy

✏️ Improve language skills

📷 Connect their learning to the real world

I can’t wait to use this in my class presentations and encourage my students to try it too. Imagine vocabulary words filled with textures from nature, classroom objects, or even their own artwork! 🌿🪵✂️ It’ll make our slides and learning materials so much more visually rich and personal.

I used my pillow as the background

If you’re a teacher looking for simple, creative ideas to enhance your students’ learning—and your own presentations—I highly recommend giving this a try! 💖

Let’s keep learning and creating! 💻🌈

Love,

Teacher 👩‍🏫Asniem🍎