After two and half years being studying most of the theories, skills and basics in counseling, it is time for me to put them in a real life situation, practicum. As a matter of fact, I can say that this is my first ever practicum in my life since I have been studying. As considered, I was positioned as in training counselor for about seven weeks at Sekolah Menengah Teknik Gombak, Kuala Lumpur started from 19th April till 2nd June 2010. I believed that, same with my friends that having their practicum, there were hundreds of questions in our head that need to be answered mostly by ourselves. How can I handle hundreds of students at school assembly, what is other teachers perception towards me as practicum counselor, how about the school’s culture, can I be patient enough with students and so on. Those are only pieces of questions that repeatedly play in my mind just before the practicum started. What about the feelings? I cannot deny that anxiety is increasing, quite worry, not sure of what will happen and also concern on how far can I performs on my first practicum.
Talk about anxieties, firstly I must stay calm and accept this situation as it will happen sooner or later. Therefore, I cannot say that I’m not ready for it yet. The best I can do is just prepared to face the practicum from physical and mental condition. During on holidays before practicum, I went to Johor Bahru to visits my sister’s family. Luckily, my brother in law is a teacher in one of the school there. So, it is an opportunity for me to tell him about my first practicum and get tips from him on what to do during my practicum. He did share on his first experience during his practicum and it quite helping. At least, I can get a picture on the school culture and environment, how to tackle students and teachers from the school, my role as a practicum teacher and etc. From his story, I can feel that there are lots of feelings emerge inside of me such as happy, worry and exited and they all mixed up together. When coming back to Kuala Lumpur a week after, first thing I’ve done as my preparation to lesser the anxiety attacks, I did my haircut. Maybe, it’s kind of out on topic, but it helps me to be more confident when I face school’s teachers and students for the first time. I also bought some of new clothes and neckties to be wear during my practicum. Other than that, I just praying to Allah s.w.t so that everything will go as planned.
What if something happen not according to the plan? What if the school cannot accept me and students are very reluctant and not participative enough during my session? All this questions also arising and increase my worries toward my practicum time. As my preparation to counter this feeling, I try to be more positive and confident in what I’m doing. I must aware that this is a normal feeling for every one of my friends in term of facing their first practicum in school. It means that, I must learn very quick to get use to the school environment and students.
My concern right now to face the coming practicum is preparation on myself towards my appearance, time management, knowledge such as skills and basics in counseling, interpersonal skills, and try to be more natural and can mingle with school especially students and teachers. One more thing, I must get use to wake up earlier than before since school start at 7.30 in the morning. I feel very lucky because my school is located near with IIUM. One week before practicum started, I train myself to wake up at 6.00 o’clock in the morning and not continue to sleep after performing Subuh prayer.
As conclusion, this coming practicum quite nerves me up and there are certain things that I need to sacrifice in order to run this well. And I hope it worth it. I hope that for this coming seven weeks will go usually as planned and nothing worst will happen. Thanks to everyone around me for the support in making my first practicum going well and good luck to you too. Thank you.
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