Li Chuan Yun does it again...

How can any violin music aficionados miss a concert by this man! And yet again he showed his brilliance on stage. I can see him perform live endless yet come out of the hall with an entirely new experience, such is his creativity onstage. As usual, technique is always assured and nothing seems out of reach with his technical virtuosity. He makes every single piece of music that he plays new to the audience with slight improvisational touches everywhere.

The concert programme mirrors that of his DVD with Poloarts La Ronde Des Lutins, and yet nothing beats seeing him performing live. Gershwin was particularly sprightly coming from him, and the additional embellishments in La Ronde Des Lutins, already chokeful with fiendish phrases, cannot fail to amaze.

And he gifted the audience with not one, not two, but three encore pieces of solo violin music, something virtually unheard of in concerts featuring the instrument. He first stunned us with (What i think is) the Chaconne from the movie 'The Red Violin', blazing through it with terrifying momentum, and then striking the last note so hard that the bow knocked off the violin with a thud and flew to the ground! A very dramatic piece of showmanship definitely.

Next came the 24^th caprice of Paganini - none of the variation was played 'straight', every single one of it had a touch of Chuan Yun's difference to them. To round it off, he gave us an entirely new smooth jazzy beat variation of his own making, now how many violinists can boast of playing such improvisations on stage?

Finally, to round off this over-the-top astounding performance, he dismantled his bow, wrapped the bowhair over the strings and therefore sandwiching his violin with the stick on the other side, held it together with his right hand, and played a fully developed short composition on all four strings simultaneously throughout, making it sound like an accordian piece and knocking on the violin's back with the stick at intervals for hilarious effects. That stunt alone is worth the price of the ticket, which I paid a miserable $15 for.

Geniuses doesn't come any better than this.

Writing and personality

Although graphology is considered a pseudoscience by many, especially for its claims of being a health and psychological state diagnostic tool etc, I think some of its basic principles are true though. I get to read writings from many different students everyday, and very often their writing seems to have a correlation to their personality, according to graphological rules.

• Students from the normal technical classes often do not bother to form their alphabets legibly, have large clumsy alignments of the words, or have some pretty dramatic in-your-face fonts.
• Many of the girls also writes in hardly visible small fonts even when they are not restricted by space constraints on the page. In fact, it might be that the space frightens them.
• Given a huge piece of mahjong paper today to do group work, most of them write in tiny fonts and constantly asks about where their writing should fit into the paper. Children on the other hand will probably delight at the space and scribble all over.
• Those who takes out considerable space on the paper writing and drawing are more often than not the more confident ones.
• One kid even used a ruler beneath the pen when writing on the huge unlined paper to straighten the script - here's one who needs to impose control!

It's really fascinating to see how often their awkward adolescent consciousness get displayed on the page, or at least that's how I see it. The blank paper is indeed a fearsome thing, daring the writer to deface boldly without shame. I think that's why many secondary school children hate art.

Life is...

...sitting in a quiet staff room enjoying butter cookies after a long 6pm day of work, which was what I did last week. Looking forward to doing the same tomorrow...

A change of weather

It just stormed outside my school over here, as a finished my last class. Before that I thought of a fun project work for the kids to do and then walk around to view each others'. They had to write me a self-introduction on paper as warmup activity, so I'll probably have a good read later. Then I went into a relief class, was very happy to have managed it well and teach them how to complete their work too. Handled one mischievous kid fairly and also taught them to work individually and be self-motivated. It's teaching these life skills that's important, and if I felt that I had communicated this over to them that'll make my day.

And there were 2 PE classes in the morning - I conducted the second one for 1T1 and it was amazing. They took a while to warmup to the game as usual, but after that they just ran themselves to the ground playing, and it was such a joy to see that.

And yet again...

Okay, let me revise what went wrong today that left me in such a sour mood till the early part of the evening.

• I was given relief lessons before my PE observation, therefore I had no time for preparation. Mind you, it is a laborious chore to set up the field for PE classes.
• I had to deal with an insolent brat who refuses to sit still, played with a lighter, used hokkien right in front of me, and refuses to stand and listen to what I said when I addressed him.
• I failed to make the class work hard at the games. I failed to make them gather for instructions quickly. I failed to make them pay attention to me. I was too bothered by the situation then to think about rational solutions.
• My supervisor gave me some feedback which I do not think is helpful or appropriate.
• My laptop blank out on me countless times when I try to work.
• I missed lunch.
• It started drizzling just as I wanted to leave school.
• I went down to the IBM service center at Bugis to service my laptop and it was closed.
• I missed dinner.
• I played badminton in NTU with some strangers, and I suck.
  
• Then my racket strings went bust.

Tomorrow will be a better day, cos it definitely can’t be worse.

First supervisor practicum assessment

...and I got a C+ for it. Well it's not that bad really, that shows I'm slightly above average; Singaporeans are mostly spoilt for B's and C's I think. But then again, I didn't assess myself the same way though, but my supervisor is entitled to his opinion of course.

The short of the episode is: I didn't had adequate time and wasn't in the right mood for the lesson because I was arrowed to do relief for the 2 periods before my observation when I was supposed to prepare for it. Then the class has some irritating kids who likes to do whatever they want (which is mostly dissimilar to what a teacher wants of them). So time was wasted in transitions and management, but I don't see why that makes my grade a C+. I don't recall him talking about the content at all actually.

Was quite fed up everytime I have to gather the kids for instructions, and when they didn't want to play the games and rather moan and groan about the sun, I just gave up and got them to sit down to look at the only court that was playing actively. Gathered them for closure debrief, they couldn't settle down at all, so I just gave up and stare at them blankly. No point telling them anything when they don't keep quiet, so just wait for them to pass loh, all of us in the hot morning sun.

Oh well whatever. Pass can already. Today is my off day, try again next week.

What's new?

• I got into a bicycle accident 3 days ago - Was cycling along Yio Chu Kang road back home speeding down the slope. A car turned into Seletar Garden without signalling and I had to jam my brakes to avoid a collision. Flew out to the front, skidded along the road. Grazed my knees and my left forearm, and my bike saddle and handlebar got scratched. My gloves' palm padding was totally torn off. Don't worry I'm fine still, will be back in no time, just have to stop blading and canoe polo meanwhile.
• Work still busy. Lots of documents to churn out everyday. Saturday is my official homework day.
• Unlike in the past, holidays are totally out of my head now. Not interested to think about where I can go next, even though I enjoy reading the Lonely Planet's 'Bluelist'. Don't know when my holiday is, and don't know whether I should part with the money.
  
• I have been getting my class to do homework and submit by the end of the lesson, or if not, after their school day end. That means I actually have to be there get it from them after their class. Hope I have the energy to keep things running like this throughout.
• It seems to me less and less about teaching and more and more about management and values education. Literature is a 'worthless' subject in lower sec levels, there's nothing wrong with failing it, and trying to get students who can't be bothered about it to love it is wasted effort.
  

Anyway...

...the recent spate of school blog entries were published because that's all that's occupying my mind these days. I bring home work everyday, think about PE activities every single waking hour, and worrying incessantly about successes and failures in the classroom. Even though I am much better off in terms of workload than some of my peers, I am a perfectionist at heart and cannot rest easy because no plans can be perfect enough. I look forward to my leisure activities but feel that they are drawing away time for work.

Sighhh.......

Reading into the future

Often I wonder how the kids in class will turn out to be. Usually, this doesn't happen when I deal with the bright and enthusiastic kids, but only when I see the recalcitrant few who blatantly refuse to do their work, never read their books, and don't speak more than a handful of English sentences each day. They are all only in sec 1, but perhaps that's the worrying thing - I wonder if their attitude will change for the better when they mature, and if it is still in time for them to save their own future.

I feel like telling them (and in fact I did today to 1N1): "Hello? This is only secondary 1! What's so difficult? Nothing here is unachievable, you know that it is just because you don't want to even put in the minimal effort. Do you want to be 20 years old and still read and speak like a 15 year old? Do you think you can survive in Polytechnics or JCs like this? Who do you think will want to employ you..." blah blah.

It probably wouldn't change their daily attitudes, but still, I probably have to say it some times, if only to get it out of my system. These kids, most of them don't even know what they want when they are presented with rational choices. And the most 'ah beng' and naughty ones are the most childish ones, that's the exasperating thing.

Reply to a letter

In today's Forum section in ST (17th March), a certain Mdm Lam wrote in to draw a comparison between "an international school and an autonomous school in Singapore". Among other things, she suggested that the former has better customer-service, later starting hours, "curriculum that allows learning to take place; good and motivated teachers; small classroom size; no pressure on students/staff to win accolades; minimal homework and tests/exams; hiphop dancing exercise for PE and, best of all, cellphone and laptop usage".

And also, the most incredulous thing in the letter is this "Everyone is using cellphones everywhere, except in our conservative schools. How do you expect students to learn to use their phones properly in public if they are not allowed to do so in school? Education is also about teaching them responsible use of the phone during lessons."

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First, it amazed me that this letter is published in the first place - what is the editor thinking? What purpose does this letter serve? Does it do anyone any good? Secondly, the quality of the argument is outright silly and ridiculous, and I don't think I'm the only one to hold this opinion.

All right, a point by point reply to her letter:

• It is an unqualified generalisation to say that international schools offer better customer-service. Service is all dependent on the individual. Even if the majority of school teachers here supposedly scream at students in class, there are always those who treat students with respect, like myself (I'm not shy to admit that btw).
• It is costly to study in international schools, so of course they should have a better teacher:student ratio. Previously MOE also officially said that most parents do not want school to start later because they want to send them to school first before going to work.
• Does she mean that the curriculum in government schools (autonomous or otherwise) does not allow "learning to take place"? What kind of statement is that?
• Again, the motivation of teachers is dependent on the individual. I think NIE does a good job at trying to inspire student teachers to make teaching a passion as it is.
  
• I can't see why trying to win accolades is a negative matter: Competition boosts standards and teaches students certain values.
• I can see teachers in school already minimizing homework, so that there can be immediate feedback for them in class and also to ensure that the work gets done and returned. Anyway this depends on the policies of individual teachers, so there's nothing much to comment on. As for minimal tests and exams, I have this to say: If it is worth knowing, it is worth testing.
• Hiphop dancing in PE? I'm not impressed - what's so great about that? It is just an attempt to do something odd. I do know that PE teaching in many secondary schools are substandard though, refer to my previous post here.
• About teaching responsible cellphone usage: The only "responsible use of the cellphone" we need to teach is that they should not be used in the classroom, period. What else is there to teach about it?

I have half a mind to send this response to ST, but am too lazy to draft a more appropriate sounding reply. Anyway, people might think I'm equally silly to even try to reply to such nonsense.

My first odac camp in school

The absence of new blog entries this past week was due to the fact that I was at my school's odac camp from last saturday to wednesday. I didn't do much really; the camp was planned before I came into the school, and so not being in charge of anything I basically just walked around and followed along with the activities.

I came out of the camp with a few beliefs reinforced, and also some ideals moderated. My belief in the ability of an outdoor activities club to mould young peoples' characters positively is reaffirmed, and I see a group that possesses the right attitudes and values, constantly attempting to lead with initiative and achieve group cooperation in tasks.

But I was somewhat disappointed with a seeming lack of purpose for participation in the camp. There might be some frontloading of the participants about the learning objectives of the camp, but overall short debriefs during the camp is only activity-specific, random in nature and not focussed in channelling reflection towards a certain fixed direction. An overall debrief for the entire camp is also absent at the end of it. The seniors and juniors should also have separate objectives in participating, but that was not really emphasised at all. Finally, there's too much physical punishment meted out during the camp, and too much time-wasting during transitional moments, two of the things that I never could tolerate.

It seems to me that the camp is just an annual affair without much thought given to the opportunities for development channels. The weekly meeting sessions for the club also seems to tend towards physical training rather than learning. I hope I can change the way things are eventually, but I can only be very patient and wait till I firmly establish my position as the club's in-charge.

Teaching Literature with the use of IT

There was a lesson in the previous week where my supervising teacher had no plans for the class except for them to read Roald Dahl's Matilda (their upcoming term's lit text). Of course most of the kids couldn't concentrate on doing that for a straight hour, while some read it already. For the second period, she brought in her laptop and showed them some random powerpoint slides with satellite photos, pictures of her niece studying overseas and jokes in emails circulated around.

It was amazing - the kids all sat up straight in attention, as though expecting fireworks to burst out of the screen anytime. They even waited quietly and patiently for content to download onto the computer. And when the pictures showed, all were silent and in awe of the pictures shown, though the images had nothing to do at all with the content or their own lives or interests. The power of screen images on the modern child.

But there's no way I'm going touch IT to teach content for literature. I might use it as an energizer or to calm down the class after the lesson, or as a diversion or distraction or to make an interesting opening for a topic. I am not, however, ever going to depend on the computer screen to show them what literature is. These kids are getting too mesmerized by the screen as it is, and it is about time teachers try to convert them into book lovers instead. It makes no sense for teachers to draw them to books and its histories by using IT to impress them.

Delusional little creatures...

Children are...

• full of ego, selfish, and likes to be praised. Above all, they like to have whatever they want.
• able to tell right from wrong, but if it conflicts with their desire to obtain something, they can easily and wilfully ignore these distinctions.
• not likely to want you to preach and sermonise to them. However, do so all the same, for they do listen to your words, whether they like it or not. One day when they are less selfish, perhaps they will heed your words.
• not likely to see far ahead and therefore to consider far-reaching consequences. Many will stupidly do silly things that they fully well know will earn them punishments just because they want to get some momentary rewards.
• best in wanting respect (they hate to realise that they are childish), but worst in giving it to others. They don't know they have to earn it, they just know they want it.
• able to prioritise things but have skewed criterias for ranking priorities.
• willing to engage in logical reasoning sometimes, but are all too ready to abandon it when it doesn't serve their purposes.
  

And yes, kids say the darnest things. And when they reach puberty, these things are often described in vulgar terms.

Home schooling

ST published an article about parents who home-school their kids today, and sadly I have to admit that, for the parents who are really dedicated enough to put so much effort into their child's education, that is one of the best kind of education they can receive.

I say this even though I am a school teacher who feels some loss of self-respect and shame for not being able to do better, but frankly, a 1:1 teacher-student ratio is unbeatable, even though the home may lack certain facilities. All too often, a teacher's attention is disproportionately devoted to taming the misbehaving students or praising the better-performing students, with the rest suffering from attention neglect in the process. If what this article says is true, boys will also do better if they have more attention on them.

For those who teaches, do be fair to everyone in class as far as possible. Subdue the loud kids quickly and do not get distracted by them. Focus on recognising and helping everyone, not just the weaker ones; it is not only about making them reach a minimal standard, it is also about letting them develop their potential and go further. And mass punishments are unfair in all situations.

Colour personality test

A personality test forwarded by Roland, based on making some colour choices in order of preference.

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Free personality analysis of Wolfie.
Generated on Sun Mar 4 23:37:35 2007.

Wolfie's Existing Situation

Easily affected by his environment and readily moved by the emotions of others. Seeks congenial relationships and an occupation which will promote them.



Wolfie's Stress Sources

Wants to overcome a feeling of emptiness and to bridge the gap which he feels separates himself from others. Anxious to experience life in all its aspects, to explore all its possibilities, and to live it to the fullest. He therefore resents any restriction or limitation being imposed on him and insists on being free and unhampered.



Wolfie's Restrained Characteristics

Feels cut off and unhappy because of the difficulty in achieving the essential degree of cooperation and harmony which he desires.

Willing to become emotionally involved and able to achieve satisfaction through sexual activity, but tries to avoid conflict.




Wolfie's Desired Objective

Wants to make a favorable impression and be rewarded as a special personality. Is therefore constantly on the watch to see whether he is succeeding in this and how others are reacting to him; this makes him feel that he is in control. Uses tactics cleverly in order to obtain influence and special recognition. Susceptible to the esthetic or original.



Wolfie's Actual Problem

Seeks to avoid criticism and to prevent restriction of his freedom to act, and to decide for himself by the exercise of great personal charm in his dealings with others.



Wolfie's Actual Problem #2

Has a fear that he might be prevented from achieving the things he wants. This leads him to employ great personal charm in his dealings with others, hoping that this will make it easier for him to reach his objectives.

Take the ColorQuiz yourself right now!

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Some clarifications:

• Yes I'm easily affected by emotions evoked from others. Seeks congenial relationships...generally yes, though I think of late I can't be bothered with PR stuff.
• Yes I want to live life to the fullest and do not like to feel restricted.
• Yes I think I am "able to achieve satisfaction through sexual activity" ahhahaha...but who wouldn't??
• Yes I like the original and the esthetic and to be in control, but do not need to resort to tactics to impress others with my personality. Doesn't that comes naturally? :p
• I like to decide for myself, but I really don't think I employ my "great personal charm" to get what I want. Most probably I'll just do things my way and don't really care who gets pissed off by that if I am convinced I am doing the right thing.

The state of Physical Education in Singapore

Kids scream out the numbers like bloody murder, counting down to the end of the inane static stretches exercises they perform every PE session as a 'warmup' routine - it doesn't take a pedagogical expert to gauge their level of enthusiasm. They walk around while holding the spastic stretching poses, fool around, talk to each other, and basically does everything lackadaisically.

I too wish for the torture to end, even though I am only observing the lesson. I hide behind my clipboard, pretending to be furiously writing insightful observation notes when my HOD walks around. Some things that I wrote

• "No momentum at start of class - should have settled all admin first"
• "Students without uniform just asked to sit down"
• "IS PE JUST A SET OF ROUTINES WITHOUT CONTENT!?!?!"

I cannot stand seeing class after class do these silly things day in and out. I never want to help my co-teacher (poor her, she's a contract teacher going into NIE in July who doesn't know better) for fear of showing implicit consent for this sorry scene. I don't care if I'm being seen as lazy or not showing initiative in helping out with the class - I simply can't condone this and every strand of my moral fibre resist the compulsion to be an accomplice to such atrocities.

In the news today...

"Bringing Literature to life for students"

• Give every child in lower secondary school a National Library card - I received the NLB card (my first ever card with my name printed on it) in primary 2 when my form teacher took the effort to provide the entire class with it. From then on I pestered my mum to bring me there every weekend, and eventually camped inside AMK library everyday after school.
• Make them love the library - My primary 4 English teacher brings us to the school library everyday after the exams, and we played word games, run amok, read, clean, dust and organise the books there, making it our sanctuary from the dreary classroom.
• Give book prizes - I got a 3-in-1 Agatha Christie mystery stories tome in P5 I think. It's a big book for a primary school student to read, but that challenge made me who I am today.
• Provide a variety for reading - everything from popular science, fiction, poetry, magazines.

"Hollywood's Asian affair"
So 'The Departed' won its director an Oscar, while 'Infernal Affairs' didn't even make it for the running when it was out. Shame on the Western world for valuing a pirated movie. Is it cos the leads in 'The Departed' got blond hair?

"The Naked Truth about Nudes"
The government deemed it inappropriate for an art gallery to show a nude painting out in the open, gallery withdrew it, ST then writes an article about it and splashes 2 full broadsheets of nude paintings right in the middle of Lifestyle, for everyone big and small in the household to appreciate. Maybe ST should be fined big time for wilfully showing pornography?

Sex Education

Sex was on my mind today ha.

First, a poor fellow practicum teacher with me was told to prepare for a science teaching lesson previously and today was surprised that he will be teaching the chapter sex education class instead. He stumped me when he asked if I got any suggestions for that, so obviously he had no idea or training for teaching it.

And then I flipped the papers and read this article about an art gallery withdrawing a nude painting from public viewing due to government censorship. It brought back memories about a past letter in ST of a reader complaining about parents bringing little kids into the opposite genders' toilet. Someone interview about the matter said that there will be too much to explain if a child sees a painting of a naked woman. It should be safe to assume that that parent is not intending on giving sex talks to the kids in the future. Such shyness in seeing the natural state of the human body.

To get a new teacher only trained in teaching the sciences to teach sex education, coupled with the prudish attitude of the government, seems to be an implicit sign that this issue is still not being taken seriously by our country. To constantly treat the naked body as being taboo is to cultivate an unhealthy attitude towards learning about sex. You can't have it both ways, to get kids to take sex education seriously and to see it as being natural, and at the same time having it censored everywhere! Furthermore, teaching sex education is a big responsibility, and it should be a proper program by itself to deal more with the associated social and medical issues, and not just be another chapter in the science textbook.

Anyway, I found this resource for my friend, maybe you guys will be interested to read more about the state of sexual education, particularly in the UK. You can take the sex test there too, and see the video episodes of the reports.