2019 Secondary 4 Week 13 Update

School started and in the beginning of the week, I went to GG’s school for a breakfast session with her principal and school leaders.

It was a light hearted session and GG’s form teacher had only good things to say about her. Though he doesn’t teach her any subject, he has heard about her from her other subject Teachers.

Otherwise the week was the usual one. Pace has slightly increased because schools are trying to finish the syllabus by the end of this term so they have plenty of time for revision.

GG is also gearing up for the Singapore Youth Festival, after which she steps down from her CCA, both in terms of leadership as well as actual CCA.

Hope your Sunday is as good as mine promises to be!

2019 Secondary 4 Week 12 Update

This week is the school holiday week but GG barely had time to breathe. She was practically in school almost every day and got so tired that she says she wants a holiday before school starts tomorrow.

BB on the other hand, surprisingly didn’t have school at all. I was actually surprised by this given that they are the pure science class but I guess his teachers do enough of extra lessons during term time that they probably felt it was unnecessary during the holidays.

School starts tomorrow and with that term 2 where the pace will be intensified to rush to finish the curriculum before June so that students have ample time to revise for their O levels.

Have a wonderful Sunday folks!

2019 Secondary 4 Week 11 Update

This was an emotional week for me. Early in the week, I was so frustated with BB and his inability to do his school work, especially given that this is a crucial year for him, I decided to have a very emotional heart-to-heart talk with him.

I reached out online and found some answers which I used as ammunition to speak with BB. I told him bluntly how his life will turn out to be if he continues in the same vein and shared statistics with him on what kind of income levels he can expect. There was a bit of crying and the offshoot of this session was that he has decided to work hard so he can get into the course of his choice.

This week is the school term break. While BB does not have to go back to school, GG’s school is asking them to come back almost daily, whether for make-up lessons or for CCA practice. She was moaning the other day that holidays is just a misnomer in her case.

Happy Sunday folks and have a wonderful weekend!

2019 Secondary 4 Week 10 Update

This week was the Applied Learning Week in both BB & GG’s school for most of the week.

BB’s school had hired an external vendor to do a motivation and exam techniques camp in their school for around three days. The last day, during the last part, parents were asked to join the students and the trainer gave us tips on how to motivate them and also how to and not to scold and nag them. Quite a few students also went up on the stage and spoke to their parents. There were a lot of tears involved and then the children were asked to give their parents the letters they had written. As expected, BB did not write a letter, just came up to me, gave me a big hug and said “I love you”. I have told him I am still expecting the letter, hopefully he will give it to me later today.

GG’s school also did something similar, but without the use any external vendors. They called some junior colleges and polytechnics as well had talks by their counsellors and former students. Then on Friday, the entire cohort went on a day trip to Universal Studios Singapore, somthing they had been looking forward to since they reached Secondary 3. GG had a wonderful time with her friends and was relunctant to come home.

All in all, this is the penultimate week before the March school holidays. BB will get the balance of his marks and then we need to see what else he needs to work on before his mid-year exams.

Happy Sunday folks!

2019 Secondary 4 Week 9 Update

This was mostly test week for both BBc& GG. BB’s school still continued with the traditional common tests, while GG’s school started on the newly introduced weighted assessments. They have not gotten back most results, so that’s news for another week.

Next week in both schools is some kind of learning week. BB’s school has contracted an external vendor to come and do a motivation camp for the O level cohort which means long hours for two days, till 6 pm and then on the last day it will be till 9 pm! The last day is also when parents are invited. I am really looking forward to tips that I can use on BB to get him to become more motivated.

GG’s school, on the other hand, is doing a series of talks by alumni as well as talks on how to get direct and early admissions plus talks on junior college versus polytechnics. They will also be going to Universal Studios Singapore at Sentosa as part of a learning journey. This is something she and her friends are very excited about and have been talking about since school started. There was some talk at the beginning of the year that this excursion would be cancelled this year due to budget constraints and the kids were very disappointed, but I am happy the school decided to keep the tradition alive for the 2019 cohort too.

In other news, the Singapore Examinations and Assessments Board (SEAB) released the timetable for the O level exams and it’s real now! The exam timetable is a convoluted one because they have to take into account all the different subject combinations and this means some days they have more than one paper which means not much time for last minute revision, while for other subjects, they get a couple of days in-between to revise. GG’s exams end earlier compared to BB, mostly because he has an extra subject. She is planning on celebrating while BB continues to study!

That was our news for the week. Have a wonderful Sunday people!