When I received an email from Bu Santi on my gmail account, I just couldn’t be sure about it at first. The email offered me to be a presenter, along with my ICT mentor Pak Gumawang Jati, in a workshop at Sekolah Tinggi Agama Islam Negeri (STAIN) Palangka Raya, Kalimantan. To go to Kalimantan is always one of my future plans and I got this offer. However, as it was sent to my email through my Google Profile (not my email address), I was a bit, well let say, suspicious. You know what happens in the online world today, don’t you? Scams, phisings, etc. I then replied asking whether it was true or not. It turned out to be serious. Bu Santi told me that she got my name from a Pak Bambang Yudi, a professor in Malang State University – a very good friend of mine. I met him several times, and even once we shared our room during the TEFLIN Conference in UIN Jakarta several years ago. I can say, I learn a lot from him.

The idea for the workshop was to share and discuss new ideas on ICT, Technology, E-Learning in English Education. As I am extensively working on these, I was willing to proceed. In addition, my mentor where I learned about these areas firstly, tagged along. I once offered a possibility to sponsor myself to fly to Palangka Raya as I am currently outside Indonesia. But, Bu Santi as the Head of Department admitted there was not enough budget for that, which was alright for me. In fact, I already predicted that. Again, that’s not my main purpose. Sharing is.

I had to contact Pak Jati who was at the same time busy, as always, traveling for similar activities. He needed to check whether the infrastructure at the school was sufficient. It turned out that it was not really supportive. We then decided to have viber so I could talk and the participants could hear my voice. Pak Jati would help me on site for sure. As agreed, I took the first chance to share more on pedagogical principles and perspectives. Pak Jati would take a more direct approach, to provide hands-on materials for the participants to practice.

This is my embedded slide for the workshop. Have a look and I would be happy if you can share your thoughts 🙂 Thanks for reading.

©mhsantosa (2013)
I am happy to share this. Please feel free to reblog or share the link, all with my accreditation. Thank you.