Another week has gone by and we’re edging towards the end of the year, just a few more months to go now…
GG has her Common Tests from the week after next, while BB does not have Common Tests, what he has are class tests which will account for a percentage of the final marks.
Yesterday evening, we went all the way to Resorts World in Sentosa to watch GG’s school choir team battle it out for the show choir competition called B-Dazzled. GG’s choir did not win, but they did a great job. GG had some lines to sing solo and I was so proud of her. She is the only Secondary 1 student who has any solo lines to sing. There were loads of students from the other schools who were competing to support their mates, but hardly anyone from GG’s school. Also the students in the audience made so much noise, at times it was so difficult to hear the music.
In addition to the show choir segment, the competition also included soloists, two sisters who were fantastic! They sang as if we were in an Opera and I can see a great future for them in music. Their voices went to such high pitches, wow!
Last week I went to a Parent Support Group in GG’s school and as it is usually the case in such meetings, one of the topics discussed was the amount of time the children spent on their mobile phones and other devices. The meeting in GG’s school was for the lower secondary parents (13-14-year-olds) while the PSG meetings at BB’s school are for all parents (children between 12-16 years old).
One of the biggest gripes that parents had was the excessive Whatsapp messages that seem to come in all the time. I too have noticed messages on their phones, some which come in at 1 pm on a school night! I’ve always wondered why the children’s parents do not seem to have any objections on their children being on their phones so late.
But then that is me. So I read a lot, spoke to people and came to some ground rules before we brought BB & GG a phone when they started the school year.
One of my biggest takeaways was this wonderful app which was recommended to me by a parent from BB’s school. The app is called OurPact and I really love it. Both the parent and child have to download the app and the parent has control over the child’s phone. How the app works is like this – as a parent, you can decide when you want to lock the child’s phone. You can lock/unlock the phone for specific times or even set up schedules for the phone to be locked/unlocked for certain periods of the day and this schedule will be followed all week. The app is available on both iOS and Android platforms.
OurPact is a contract between the parent and the child, but the app will work only if the child is willing to download the app and does not delete it. Also if either the parent o the child does not have access to wifi or data, the app will not work. When the app lock is on, the child can only use the phone to make calls, send messages through SMS or listen to music using the music stored. Whatsapp, Internet browsers, Youtube are all locked until the app is turned on again.
In our home, so far both GG & BB have taken to the app, they grumble when I lock their phones but have not indicated they want to delete the app. We also have other rules such as their phones have to be charged in my room at night and this will not happen later than 9:30 pm (their phones go into lock mode aka sleep time mode then). Most of the time, both will bring in their phones to be charged before 9:30 pm.
I don’t know how long this compliance will last and I will take it as long as I can. Hopefully by the time they insist on having their phones with them 24/7, they would have learned good digital manners. One can only hope and pray, right!
One more week which was uneventful! BB & GG are settled in school and preparing for the end-of-year exams.
For the first time this year, GG’s school had a Parent-Support Group meeting and even though it clashed with BB’s school meeting, I decided to go for this one as I wanted to meet the PSG folks. In the beginning of the year, I had written to them but had not gotten any response from them.
I also understood that they have parents class Whatsapp groups, again, this was news to me so I am glad I went for the meeting and hopefully I will now become part of the group.
The other day I learnt that GG had been removed from one of her class chat groups. I am not sure why this has happened and have asked her to check with her other friends. If she is being cyber bullied, then I do want to take steps about this.
GG’s competition is at the end of the week and BB also has an aeromodelling competition next week, so they both are going to be super busy this week….
Another school week comes to an end, but this was a short week for the children. Monday was a school holiday in Singapore as it was celebrated as Youth Day here. Then Wednesday was a public holiday due to Ramzan Id or Hari Raya Puasa as it is called in this part of the world.
GG is busy in school and preparing for their show choir competition Bedazzled and she comes home very tired when she has practice. I am glad the competition is later this month so that she can then start focusing on her Common Tests which start from the 1st of August as well as the second Semester Exam which will be later in October.
BB on the other hand, still has a very ‘don’t care‘ attitude when it comes to studying. He is smart, but not hard working. He is the kind of person who will only study what he wants to study, that is the subjects which interest him – which are usually Science and Maths and when he gets bored of these two, some English. The other subjects, especially Hindi and the Humanities are relegated to when I start nagging him to study! GG on the other hand, is more focussed!
That was the school week for us. How was it for you all? Have a wonderful Sunday!!
This was week 1 of term 3 and the pace has started picking up. This term along with the next (term 4) will be very short ones. I understand that in secondary school, the year-end exams start and finish before primary school and they will start their year-end holidays by the first week of November, as opposed to mid-November in Primary school.
The first week also saw new subjects being introduced for both GG & BB. Since secondary school involves between 8-10 subjects, many schools introduce them, especially the newer subjects like history, geography, food & nutrition, design and technology etc. in piecemeal fashion. So they do one in terms 1 & 2 and the other in terms 3 & 4.
We’ve also gotten the dates for the common tests which will be in early August, so have to start preparing for those too.
GG came back from school the other day and mentioned she wants to try for the scholarship prize given by the government to the top 5/10% of each cohort per school. That’s a good thing to aim for, as that will mean she will be among the top 3 of her cohort. Let’s see if she is able to do so….
Other than that, we had a fairly normal week. Tomorrow is a holiday here for students as it has been declared ‘Youth Day‘. Youth Day is celebrated on the first sunday of July and the next working day which is Monday is a school holiday. This week, there’s another holiday in the form of Hari Raya Puasa or Ramzan Id, which marks end of the fasting month for muslims….
To all my muslim readers, here’s wishing you a very happy Ramzan Id! Id Mubarak….
Memories and Such 