When I turn back the hands of time and go back to 2006 when I first started teaching, I can clearly remember the moments when I used to complain about the fact that I had no miraculous activities to enrich my lessons. Later on, I learned several different activities to spice up my lessons and cultivate learning. To tell you the truth, they worked very well for quite a while. Students were having fun and learning at the same time (‘learning’ is a dodgy word, though).However, there was still something missing.  What was that? REFLECTION!!!

Reflection is essential to effective and transferable learning, particularly in cognitively demanding situations. Although I realised the importance of ‘reflection’ both in my personal life and teaching career at a later stage of my life and thence feel sort of guilty about this, I’ve been trying hard to compensate for it by, first of all, fostering an awareness/ a deeper awareness of what reflection is and how it works and then getting learners to habitualize it. Most of my previous students have started taking 101 and 102 classes, so I asked them to reflect on how they were getting on with Undergraduate courses and how they could link the skills they’d learned in SELI to their new experience.

I’d like to say a big THANK YOU to my students who have shared their reflections.

Here are those lovely reflections…..

‘Many students know that taking the preperation class in Ozyegin University is harder than the others; however, as long as you study hard, you can pass the Trace easily. When I started  Ozyegin University, I was an elemantry student. I had a great time in elemantry and pre intermadiate. I failed two courses which are ıntermadiate and upper. When I heard that I’d failed, I was very sad, but after that my mind was changing because if I had passed these courses, I wouldn’t have learnt where I had weaknesses in English.

The department is more different than the preperation class.We learn academic English in preperation class and when we start our own department,we obviously see that learning academic English in preperation class is beneficial, but we still have some weaknesses which are regarding some mathematical terms. In my humble opinion, in preperation class the teachers of SELI can also demonstrate them, such as functions, domain, range when the students take Advanced course’   Elif Aydogan

‘Dear Ms.Sirin,

To begin with, Students who are in different levels in SELI need you. When I consider old days that we were in advanced level, I recall how many things we learned. I wish one day you came back for advanced students.

We have great teachers here, too. They are all cheerful and have a good relationship with us. We continue from where we have left. I utilize our earlier notes in class and complex sentences. Moreover, we have begun to write summary – response essay. In point of fact, i’m planning to use these sentences in my essays in order to take a good job by Mr. Gerald.:)

I see all my classmates but generally I spend time who is student of business school. Our lectures are very intensive but I don’t complain about it – even I like that. I wonder what I’ll further learn and read. All courses attract my attention.

In my opinion, I have received a good education in SELI. I can overcome reading my schoolbook. I’m learning many different words such as academic terms but since the book explains them clearly and have some examples about it I can understand new terms. That’s why English schoolbooks seem easier.

All of my teachers who are young and dynamic have a great education. They have academic career in the most prestigious schools around the world.

Thanks for everything Ms Sirin, see you soon.’

  Ugur Gürer                                                            

 

‘When I remember my days in SELI, I can state that it was not complicated because just now I have passed the ENG101 course which is quite difficult. When I was a SELI student, I said that I want to pass SELI and I want to be undergraduate student. However, ENG101 course or any other course such as Math, Physic and Computer science and so on so forth is more difficult to understand. If students come to Cekmekoy, they can understand me. Nowadays, I am waiting for my courses’ score, which is exciting for m . As for my English level, I can say that I cannot concentrate on English as much as I want, but in ENG101, which is related to merely writing summary and response task, I have learnt different things. Owing to my SELI experience in particular your support; I did not have difficulty in understanding this course. All in all, SELI experiences were very helpful for undergraduate  courses.’ Büşra Uydaşoğlu

‘Higschool stage had been succesfully completed! Now, it was the time to start University stage and I’ve started the game. The life, if it is a game, University should be one of the hardest level of it as much as enjoyable. ‘I’m worried, will I able to pass this level?’ This was the question which I was asking to myself for many days and  now the answer was taking shape , by the reason having the first lesson-day in Ozyegin University of mine.
Like everyone else, I was observing the people around me. All we were trying to act like university students in the view of information which we’ve heard about it before. The most challenging thing was getting used to and having a good environment as well as in our highschools, at least for me, after a whole 5 highschool years. I started with intermediate level, that’s why I was a little bit more more relaxed than my friends who started with elementary.
Learning english and passing to the department, having good social environment, taking role in the clubs, in a nutshell being succesful, useful and gaining experiences are the missions of this game. Sometimes you will meet with heroes wich are ready to help you in the path to success, like PT. J Sometimes you will face with evil things which are to demoralize you. Despite all negative effects and enemies, you will have more friends and I think that, you all are able to finish this part of the game. I can easily say you as a experienced player of this part. Good luck!’  Mehmet Aydın

 

‘First of all, I miss SELİ and Altunizade 🙂  when I was a student in Seli I never thought I would miss SELİ.The majority of student in Özyeğin complain regarding Homeworks, compulsory attendance, teachers, homeworks,copulsory attendance, teachers 🙂 All student of SELİ tend to get into a vicious circle like this and they continue to complain until graduated from SEli. This behaviour pattern be inherited from generation to generation in Özyeğin:) After the facts of seli I want to say something about my story. When  I came Seli I have no any idea about English. I didn’t know Simple tense, Past tense, I didn’t know nothing. I never watch movie with english subtitles or TV series. I mean that nobody in Seli had worse english knowledge than me. I tried to be engilish an indivisible part of my life and I made an effort to eliminate any my bias about English. As you know that the process of learning a new language is difficult for students who are older than 18-19, so many student have great difficulty in  the process of learning English at the beginning. Sometimes many students think that the majority of homework  is  unnecessary (in fact all homeworks J ) and they tend to  think why  I should do this homework  but they will  realize  that  homeworks  are playing a key role in  the proccess of learning a new language after Seli. If you want to achive something you have to eradicate prejudices about it and you must be part of what you want to achive. It must be empasized that Seli is difficult. I get tired  so  I  want to stay away from  ( summarize , response etc.  J )  I withdrawed  ENG101 for some other reasons. I hope so everbody  graduate from Seli as soon as possible. I fell myselfy under obligation to give  a social message  at the end of my  writing 🙂 Love Engilish Do your homework!’   Gokhan Yasar

‘Actually, we miss you and preparation school because preparation school is kind of highschool but now everything is different.We improve ourselves in terms of english in SELI but I’d like to improve my speaking more.Our undergraduate program is english and some students that have taken TOEFL or IELTS can not understand  lessons accurately especially in english 101 because they do not know summary or some academic articles and I think SELI is necessary for these skills.Your pin students can be pessimistic about their lengths of preparation school but they will understand like us.You have chosen a pin class.I think this can influence range of passing trace because students that receive advanced level can not benefit from your skills.Therefore, I gave my advanced notebook that include your academic sentences to some preparation students and now everyone wants my notebook to make a photocopy:D I wish you all the best:D‘  Faruk Cort