T2 W3-5

Ok, let me finish updating the recent events!

Firstly, something v funny that I left out. T2 W1 Wed - Went to find 10S103 to give out my hand-made prizes for the winners of the redox half-equation challenge that they did during the last week of Term 1. I gave them styrofoam stars that I bought from Artfriend decorated with an animal sticker and also wrote on each arm of the star a common half equation (those involving MnO4-/Mn2+, Cr2O72-/Cr3+, Fe2+/Fe3+, I-/I2 and S2O32-/S4O62-) and also signed on the opposite side of the star.

Some cheeky kid (who didn't get the star) was joking, "Huh? Mr Lau, that's it ah?" And I was joking back, "Eh, this is priceless ok! You think you can get this from anywhere? This involves my precious time and effort you know! Besides, it has my signature on it! Who knows maybe 10 years down the road if I'm famous you could even sell it!" =P Then the kid joked again, "Later she kenna scolded by you in class then she scold you and cut off one part of the arm each time she gets scolded!" LOL. So full of nonsense man! In addition, the kid gave such a funny face and made such dramatic cutting actions that I just burst out laughing in my fits again and they all cracked up as usual.

Then as I was talking to them about their CCAs cos I went to do some research somebody joked that I was stalking them and I joked, "You think I'm sooooo free to go and stalk you all ah? It's to know moooooore about you so that I can foresee your CCA commitments!" Then as I was naming each of their CCAs I realised I forgot one of them so I took 2 dramatic steps back and gave this funny face as I tried to recall and we all laughed again. Funny!

T2 W3 (Mon)- Tut with 10S103 was funny again and the best part was prob when one of the students sitting in front saw my new cufflinks and asked what was written on it and I jokingly said something like, "How come you're paying soooooo much attention to me? I know I'm VERY interesting but you should be focusing more about what I'm teaching rather than on me!" So funny! Anyway I took 10 sec to pose and showed them the words - one of the cuff-links said "I'm the Boss" and the other one said "I'm Never Wrong". Haha I like the cuff-links! Only $20 some more!

Double period tut with 10S417 and it's always tough during these kind of periods esp at the end of the day at 3.25pm with the hot weather and stuffy lab - confirm the students (and myself to some extent) are half-dead so gotta do even more to keep them on task. They also asked if they can finish earlier so basically I set the agenda of completing the few items that I had in mind and as long as we finish then they can go.

As I was asking questions, again they were a bit dead even for a simple yes/no question to check if they have any problems so I suanned them and said, "Eh, you want to go back early then you need to participate? If everytime I ask a simple question and it takes so long to be answered then how to finish early?" Then suddenly they got all hyped up and answered a lot faster. Think in the end it works much better cos they are more focused when they know I'll let them off so they are more motivated to answer faster. =)

Met up with the EXCO Nominees to run through ideas regarding the publicity and marketing strategies for our 8th SC Presents fund-raising event and it was quite interesting cos I gave them detailed feedback over the weekend regarding their plans so they refined it a bit and we came up with quite a few interesting gimmicks about how to make things more visual and appealing to people and ideas for interesting videos to promote our cause.

Tue - H1 Tut on Redox was painful and it was a struggle getting the answers from the kids so much so that I gave a dramatic look and acted like I was going to kill myself to liven up the lesson as I got various ppl to answer my questions. Really needed to work from the basics for many of the questions but ok lah, it's a challenge that I enjoy. Ultimately it's v different teaching H1 and H2 but I feel it's more of the time factor rather than just solely motivation factor cos with more time I could afford to go slowly to make sure they understand.

PBL Presentation for both my H2 classes and it was quite interesting since it's our first time conducting PBL. The funniest part was again with 10S103 when someone was rattling on about a whole lot of fanciful stuff and I was trying to process everything that he was saying and making sense out of it so I was making some funny action which got the kids laughing and apparently I made a face which someone described as "classic". =p

Wed and Fri - Had our 8th SC Council EXCO Nominee Interviews and there were some interesting interviews though at certain junctures it felt a bit like the earlier interviews for the "normal" Council Nominees so it was not so interesting.

Fri - With the help of my teacher I cooked fried rice again and it was again well received so yippee! We also had a lot of other good food to eat courtesy of my si-fu like honey-coated chicken wings, fried wanton, and dessert and we had our Wii Party in the pantry so it was an awesome night of relaxation after a hard week of working!

T2 W4 (Mon) - Tut with 10S103 and the funniest moment was when I was stuck at asking someone a question on noble gas configuration and it was clear the person didn't know what was going on and didn't even seem to understand my question when everyone else seemed to have understood. The person was like looking all over the place and looking blur and said that must find me for consultation and I was like replying in a dramatic tone, "YES, definitely PLEASE!"
Then someone pointed out I pronounced the person's name wrongly and I was just repeating the person's name when I randomly said that it rhymed with a fruit which entertained them.

Tue - H1 Tut was quite funny today cos it started with me implementing my new rule for punctuality regarding the H1 class and I locked the classroom doors to prevent the latecomers from entering and questioned them why they were late. In the end some of them were made to stand at the back of the class until they could answer my questions since they were only slightly late. Hopefully that'll put them in place for future tutorials!

8th SC Presents (Fund-raising Event) - Our SC started this new event this time for the Council Elects because we wanted to see how they work together and also to test out the abilities of the EXCO Nominees and I was in charge of the fund-raising event which I felt was really interesting cos I enjoyed the planning of the publicity and marketing and also tabulating the finances hahaha for some strange reason. So today was the start of our soft launch for the event and it was ok but it was a very busy morning getting the things shipped out and setting up the booths for everyone.

Later in the evening, our Council TAs met up with the 7th SC EXCO to decide who would be in the 8th SC EXCO and the various posts of the other councillors and it was an interesting debate regarding some of the keenly contested posts. Quite an interesting process and it wasn't the perfect EXCO but it's something we can work with since people can be trained and overall we were happy with the outcomes so hopefully in time to come our judgment will prove to be correct =)

Took me a super long time to get home cos waited super long for the bus and still had to sort out our video for publicity tmr till almost midnight =s

Wed - Publicity for our SPAMAD (Suggestions, Power and Might - our feedback and suggestions segment of 8th SC Presents and Make a Difference - our fund-raising segment) and it was a stressful morning as we felt the preparations were not thorough enough and in the end I rushed to come up with something for the kids (the script, Powerpoint slides, and emphasis of the briefing) in order to make an impactful publicity. The final outcome was pretty satisfactory but I wondered how they would've done if we left them to their own devices. Certainly something to be reviewed during our AAR!

Council TA Meeting - Started with the guys watching this cartoon movie which was pretty funny but we didn't get to finish it as we had to start working on deciding the events ICs for the 8th SC and also refining the 8th SC Constitution, which was also something new. It was very funny as with all our TA Meetings and the funniest part was the suggestion to play music before assembly, starting with soothing music then as the time for assembly nears it gets more upbeat and then our funniest TA got all dramatic again and started to sing the music from Phantom of the Opera together with all the dramatic actions! Hilarious!

Thu - It's Maths Awareness Month and today there was apparently a Sudoku mini-competition during Common Lunch with teachers and students which I didn't know initially until they announced during morning assembly so I was joking with my good friend from the Maths Department how come they didn't invite the other teachers (which they did in the email actually but I missed it haha =p) then she joked with me saying that she'll let the teacher-in-charge know.

The next thing I know in the morning I got a call to ask me to make a guest appearance and play a PK match against the winner, which I agreed. So during common lunch after helping the Council kids to set up our fund-raising booth, I popped down to make my guest appearance and won both rounds of the Sudoku game. Some of my 10S417 kids were cheering me on and after that they asked me how come I didn't inform them to come support. Haha, well, it was a last-minute thing and it seemed kinda weird and stressful to ask them to support haha. Like so bhb. Anyway it was certainly a thrill for me since it's been sometime when I took part in any form of competition and I liked the adrenaline rush that I used to feel when I play in chess/bridge competitions. =)

Chrystal was about time-management and I spent some time at the start talking about the significance of this coming Sat. I asked them, "Do you know what special day is this Saturday?" Then they started guessing things like my birthday, World Sudoku day and can't rem what other funny stuff which I said it was wrong. Then I drew their attention to the date as I wrote on the board 4 17 (April 17th) and said, "It's 417 DAY!" They were so amused and some were joking that it's lame and some said that it's sweet haha.

Anyway I told them that we'll have a class party tmr and I'll order pizza in to eat after our tut since it's our last period and that I'll pay for it but they must make sure they entertain me. They asked me to sing and I jokingly said, "What? I'm paying and I have to sing to entertain you? You should be entertaining me!" Haha. I came up with the idea cos I felt that more needed to be done to get the class bonded together and what better than eating and playing together so in the end I borrowed some simple games also from IGC for them.

Fri - Had our 417 class party as planned and the food was pretty good though they sure were a bunch of hungry kids! 6 extra large pizzas for 4 guys and 18 girls and everything was gone in a flash. Got them to play various games and some also played their own reflexes/coordination game which was very funny and even I had some difficulties. Overall I think it helped them to bond a bit more but not as successful as I hoped for cos some were not around due to CCA then some were still quite detached during the playing. Need to work on it still!

Went out for dinner with some of my friends at Tampines One, the Japanese foodcourt on level 3, and it was pretty ok before we went to shop. Funny part was both said they wanted to shop but in the end it was me who ended up buying about $300+ worth of stuff from Natural Project and I wore my new belt and shoes immediately haha. Nice!

Later on, we all went for the guitar concert by our Guitar Ensemble Meridian (GEM) and it was really fantastic! Without a doubt, it was the best school production I've attended. They had a musical about a love story and even though the storyline had some cliche parts, I found it very entertaining cos the lead actor was really super comical and he had such a comical face to boot so the humorous moments were really funny and yet also touching at certain parts cos of the storyline and believeable acting, to the point that I had some tears in my eyes. Not so cold and aloof as some people make me out to be I guess haha.

I also appreciated the original composition by the lead actor which showcased his talents, the video/spotlights which were done professionally, the pieces chosen and background to match the various parts of the musical. All in all, I think the story was enthralling to say the least (with a sad ending like those Korean dramas as a friend said) and apart from the first piece which was quite messy, the playing was generally pretty decent, esp the alumni which was v good. If they ever perform this musical again, I'd strongly recommend anyone to watch it as I'm sure you'll enjoy it!

After that we met up with some of our other friends and went out to chill. Initially we went to Swissotel but the place we wanted to go was closed so we ended up going to Dempsey Road which had a lot of pubs/bars and we settled down for drinks at a quiet dinery before moving on to this place called CMPB (nothing related to the army!) where we bumped into an ex-student from MJC who just graduated. Anyway I was soooo tired I was already falling asleep at the first place so by the time I reach the second place I was just resting in my chair

Sat - Went out for lunch at Aston's and then pool with Jon, Leon, PY, ZT and Samuel. Pool was disappointing to say the least and the last game was totally disgusting. Having gone 6-0 up with some good play I contrived to lose the game with quite a few disgusting shots. Crap! Oh, in between I sent out a msg to my CG to wish them happy 10S417 day haha!

Anyway I had to rush off cos I was meeting another group of ppl for dinner - 2 x MY, Caroline and HS. Met up with Meiyan and Minyu first then we jalan around Somerset 313 and the funniest part was when Minyu bumped into me at the shop. Then I got a drink as we sat down to rest and chat about various stuff like teaching, their future plans, and even horoscopes.

We met the other two later on at the Marche there and proceeded for dinner which was pretty ok, but nothing fantastic. After that we went to Cold Rock Ice Creamery for dessert. My first time there and I liked the Cheesecake and Aussie Vanilla ice-cream! Smooth and yummy! Then we headed to the Sky Garden at OC to chill for a really short while and it was so funny to see HS and Meiyan's reactions cos they were scared of heights (actually me too but I was still quite ok that night haha). Finally we took photos inside OC before making our way home. Good to see them after so long!

T2 W5 (Mon) - 10S103 seemed quite hyped up today even without me having to do anything haha. However when I was greeting them they sounded so dead so I made fun of them by saying in a dead tone, "It's only Monday and all of you are dead already..." That cracked them up haha. Funniest part was when I drew out the Periodic table (a pretty ugly-looking one) to illustrate the s, p and d-block elements to discuss electronic configuration and they all jokingly said and nodded together, "Ya, ya" as they were laughing at my drawing.
My forever hungry student was again griping jokingly about being hungry so I said something like, "If it makes you feel better, remember that I don't get to eat until you have eaten".

10S417 SPA was ok - some funny parts as I showed the demo about collecting gases and two girls were hugging each other when they got back their test results cos they both got A which I thought was quite funny but it's good to celebrate your little successes =)

Wed - Tut with 10S103 and there was this funny moment when I was suanning somebody. I was at this question which asked them to suggest some reason why radon is not used for lighting up signs (like neon signs) so I said that this question needed them to think out of the box so I directed the question at somebody and said, "Let's get you to try answering it. After all, you are FOREVER thinking out of the box."

Some of them got my drift and laughed at my subtle poking haha. As the student started explaining quickly at length about all kinds of things I gave another stunned face which the kids were laughing at. But anyway, for all the various mumbo-jumbo stuff that was said, there were segments which were correct so well, it's not that bad.

Had Council Investiture in the afternoon and it was quite good I felt. Looking forward to an interesting time working with the 8th SC and it was a good experience working with the 7th also, despite the little time that I had with them. We had our final debrief for the 7th SC where we gave them their name tags with their nicknames and some were really funny! The funniest part had to be in the evening where our funniest TA had a showdown with the 7th SC and we laughed our guts out at the events that followed. Super hilarious and it was like watching a horror movie with all the screaming and running!

Thu - Chrystal lesson was a talk by this Mr Martin Tan who talked about the concept of Paying It Forward like the movie and it was an interesting talk! The part about the meeting between Nixon and Mao Ze Dong was pretty funny but it was a good link to ask the students to think about who they are.

Sat - Went out for dinner with friends at Sun Restaurant at Chijmes and the food there was AWESOME! I enjoyed my mocktails (a calpis drink and a mango Mojito), the foie gras, beef steak sushi, salmon sushi and salad, unagi rice, and prawns. The foie gras and prawns were really fantastic and the fizzy drinks just gave more kick to the food!

Then we headed to The Loof to chill and ended up talking about something funny regarding men, women and fruits and I got another mocktail called "Running Amock" hahaha! Funny name! Then it was off to Fullerton Hotel Post Bar which had really comfy chairs but it was in the open before finally going to New Asia Bar at Swissotel. I just tagged along for the experience but I'm sure I won't be going to any disco place anytime soon or in the future cos I really don't like all the noise. I like a place with ambience to chill rather than music pumping away. But oh well, it's all for the experience ya? =)

Ok, finally finished updating everything (save maybe for some other things that I may recall next time)! Time to get some work done and then sleep!

T2 W1-2

Thought I'd carry on and finish posting once and for all so that I can be more timely in my updates in future and not spend time remembering what happened a long time ago. Time management - don't procrastinate!

T2 W1 (Mon) - Back to school! Busy clearing up residual work from the holidays and also with last minute meeting and helping to cover a colleague's lesson.

Lab with 10S417 was very funny, esp. during the demonstrations. Firstly, I was showing them the demo of the preparation of a standard solution whereby I barely took a pinch of salt to put in the weighing bottle. As I showed them the salt and explained to them the need to be economical, some were joking, "Wah, Mr Lau, it's so little I can't even see the salt!" I was saying that it's ok and they can imagine that I had a lot of salt which has dissolved already (though I did stress to them that they would need a fair bit of water to dissolve in the experiment later cos they will be taking a lot more salt then I did). Then during preparation I reminded them that they must follow everything that I do in order to get accurate results. So as I was topping up to the mark for the volumetric flask and closing one of my eye, somebody commented, "Ok, we must also close one eye to see clearly." Everyone started laughing. Finally, as I was shaking I told them they must give shake energetically and I shook really vigorously and gave some stupid face when doing that to make them laugh. Super funny sia but it's good to see that they enjoyed it. Tough crowd to entertain!

During the weighing, as one of the groups was standing around me, somebody commented, "Wah, Mr Lau, new pants ah?" I was very surprised that anyone would notice such things and joked, "Eh, how come you notice such things? Wah, are you stalking me?" Then as I was going through the explanation of how the weighing balance works, somebody asked me a really "duh" question and I teased the person cos she and her classmates call her bimbo and I said, "That was quite bimbotic!" Then she jokingly hit my hand lightly with her lab manual and I said, "Wah, later newspaper come up with story of student assaulting the teacher!" Quite a series of hilarious moments there. Then throughout most of the lab I was squatting to check their solution level for their standard solution until my knees were hurting and I was adopting some funny postures when I was squatting haha. =p

Tue - Tut with 10S417 - funniest moment was when I was explaining how to sketch gases graph and I came to this part where they had to sketch a y = k type of graph. I think I was describing something like sketching pV vs P for a fixed mass of gas at constant T so since pV = nRT, if n, R and T are constants, then what is pV equal to? I actually had something lame prepared already so I turned towards my student and said, "Constance!" LOL. It was like OMG lame. =D

Lab with 10S103 - Super hilarious. Started with me suanning them cos many of them didn't have their lab manual with them. During the session, I wanted to show them a demo so I told them to come to the front and those with lab manuals are to bring them. For the next 5-10 seconds there was barely any movement and I was like, "What? Hello? Why isn't anyone moving?" They all gave me this innocent look and said, "I thought you said only those with lab manuals come to the front?" I was like, "Duh! I said EVERYONE come to the front. IF you have your lab manual, then you bring it along." Then they burst out laughing at the miscommunication and started moving. During the demo for preparation of a standard solution, I entertained them with my usual repertoire of "cooking show" and telling them not to do the bartender style of shaking the flask. During the dissolving of the salt part, I burst out laughing at the little amount of salt and again there was a chain reaction cos I think that's the first time they heard me laugh like that. =p

The lab itself was very funny also and there were a few incidents of people dropping their glassware and I commented, "Oh, that sounds expensive!" Some of the incidents were false alarms but when something really broke there were some busybodies and I said something like, "Aiyoh, why are you all so kaypoh? Go back and do your work!" Then there was a shortage of chemicals near the end of the session so I was joking, "Who is the UNSCRUPULOUS person who took more chemicals than you're supposed to?"

Wed - Had HRD Elective in the morning and many of the chem teachers opted to go for this Chrystal workshop which was pretty good and we learnt about energising the class and disciplining students through a variety of strategies.

Was running late for tutorial with 10S103 after our meeting so I ran to class and some of them were there already and someone was joking at how eager they are to be in my lesson that's why they're so early and they asked me why I ran. I explained that since I set the rules about punctuality, I better not be late or else later I might be asked to stand at the back of the class. =p I also joked with them about my eagerness to teach them the beauty of chemistry.

Had our AAR for 2009 A Levels in the afternoon and I didn't realise how well we had actually done until the significance of the results was all revealed to us. In a way I was really motivated by the results and I think that's why I have a lot of drive this year to push the kids. A few of my friends said I'm very seow on (even more so than last time) and I feel that I am also, in terms of the things that I'm doing but I'm happy doing the things I'm doing for now. Just hope that I have enough time and energy to do everything that I want to and still maintain a work-life balance. =)

Went out for dinner at Espirito Santo at Parkway Parade which was quite a nice cosy place serving various kinds of meat. Had pork belly, pork knuckles and steak and my fav was the steak cos it was really tender. It was awesome!

Thur - Had Council meeting in the morning and we all played along that we forgot one of the TA's birthday (though it didn't really work cos we did it before already haha) then did admin work till lunchtime when we celebrated our TA's birthday. It was quite an elaborate setup with some of the TAs decorating the meeting room (with banners that we used for the last TA's birthday - they used the reverse side! LOLOL!!!), some cooking food and I prepared Powerpoint slides with a special birthday song as well as pictures of a monkey and the TA cos he LOVES monkeys. Then we hid in the meeting room behind a sofa, each of us holding a monkey soft toy until he entered with another TA (who tricked him by saying the OM wanted to meet him) then burst out to celebrate. Really like school kids hahaha but it's fun! =p

Chrystal - Part 2 of creating a personal vision and in the morning I collected a lot of their Chrystal journals to compile their drafts and they were amazed that I typed out every single thing about their strengths and answers to certain questions and I explained I wanted to know more about them because if I am to write their testimonials, I would want to write something truthful so I want to start early and guide them towards what they desire. It was interesting looking through the various descriptions so that they could try guessing who fits the description and also for them to see that actually some of them have the same aim (e.g. to enter into business). I appreciated that quite a few of them did write out something meaningful so that I can work on them cos there were, not surprisingly I suppose, some who just wrote for the sake of writing and you can tell there's no desire in wanting what they've written.

Somebody commented that it was quite funny that I even included the emoticons when I typed out what they had written and I said that it's important to me to know how the person is feeling what he/she wrote that. I explained also that whenever I send out smses I make it a point to include emoticons or at least exclamation marks if I'm happy/excited to convey the right tone. I told them it doesn't mean that when I put a smiley face I'm really overjoyed and am smiling from ear-to-ear (I gave them a funny face when I said that to make them laugh) but really it's just so that I don't sound very cold towards my recipient.

Fri - Start of Council Training Camp! First time I actually attended a camp and it was interesting! Started off with some ice-breakers and team-building games then it was our 1st TA Time which was a new segment to allow the TAs and Council Elects to mingle and share our views. Started off with our vision of the council and each of them were given a picture and asked to explain how that picture represented council and leadership. Thought that was quite fun and cool then we all shared our vision of what council meant to us, which was meaningful to me. =)

Had dinner after that then it was my segment, the Fast March. As we went to meet the councillors to get ready to set off, we saw a lot of the 6th SC councillors turn up to give their support - thank you! =)

So off we went and it was really hot and stuffy outside and we took a really long route to get to Pasir Ris Park before we started our 1st activity, which was some water game. I felt there were some flaws very early on already with the activity and I gave my feedback and discussed with the kids but I left it to them in the end cos I didn't have time to change it and I also wanted to let the councillors in charge have some say in it since there are no serious repercussions anyway if the activity was not perfect. I think in the end, the IC realised there was room for improvement and they did manage to have some teaching point (though it was unplanned) so it was ok.

2nd activity was interesting for me but took way too long so we'll know how to improvise it next time. I liked the activity cos of the meaning in the activity and it really forced the councillors to work together and dig deep.

3rd activity was the one I thought of cos I wanted something simple but meaningful. I think because of the activities they went through earlier in the day and during the fast march, somebody actually realised the aim already and proceeded to lead the councillors to the best outcome which was good because I wanted them to learn to share the burden.

After that it was really late and the councillors were moving really slowly esp. with the stretchers activated cos there were 19 girls and 6 guys so we changed our plans of going to Sunplaza Park and headed back to MJC directly. Got back to school at about 1.40a.m. and by the time we had our quick debrief, bathe and everything it was almost 3+am for bedtime!

Sat - Slept till about 8am before proceeding to look at the kids doing morning PT then went to get some work done. Was quite hands-off today cos they were doing things like Wet Games and Proposal Writing so I only met them during the TA time and nearing the end of CTC. Many of us were catching up on sleep cos we were very tired and some were falling sick. At the end of the camp, each of the TAs made a little speech, which was not planned for so I had only a few minutes to come up with something coherent (I'm not really comfortable speaking under certain circumstances, as much as I seem comfortable when I'm teaching and performing).

Some of the kids were shouting "Cry! Cry! Cry!" cos the TA before me was sharing her emotional experience as a TA and I said something like, "Real men don't cry" and how I've tried not to cry ever since 7 years ago when I cried over some personal matters and being stronger for the experience. Regretted a bit though cos I could sense some disagreed with what I said and in a way I also don't totally agree with myself (that's why I prefer writing - I get more time to reason out my feelings).

Anyway I started off telling them that I usually prefer writing than talking and then shared with them a random thought that came in my mind as I was traveling. I asked, "What do you get when you add lamb to porridge?" They were all stunned when I said, "You get LAMB ZHOU (pronounced in such a way to sound like LAME JOKE)" but quite a few got the joke. Personally I thought it was pretty hilarious, esp coming from me hahahaha. Some of them said that my fellow chem TA has a competitor for cold jokes already haha. =p

Moving on, I shared with them my life as a student and a teacher in terms of the CCA I chose and how different it was to change from something like Chess Club and IGC to Students' Council because it was so different and also because there was so much more work involved but I believe it's worth it cos it's meaningful work and you get to work with the best. I also spoke about the many things that I've already learnt during my short stint as a Council TA and the things I've enjoyed, such as hearing my fellow TA speak because I appreciate the wisdom of his words. In closing, I wished the 7th SC well and encouraged them to find me for consultation though I may not know all of them well and sang a chem song for them for entertainment (which led to some TAs joking that CTC is Chemistry Training Camp haha) and also encourage the 8th SC to join me in my learning journey and that I look forward to getting to know them better rather than just knowing their names.

T2 W2 (Mon) - H1 Lec - Had a pep talk with the cohort after the disappointing test results last week and in my pep talk I used an analogy and said that the reagents to getting an A for H1 Chem at A Levels is their effort, their intelligence, our effort, and a little bit of luck. Then I said, "Regarding our effort, it is in large EXCESS and the LIMITING reagent is your effort". Some of them laughed to that as they appreciated the humour behind my sarcasm and somebody asked about "our intelligence" to which I said, "Needless to say, that is also in large excess". =p

Tut with 10S103 - Some kid kept saying that she was hungry and I said that at least they could eat after the tutorial but I had to attend lecture then she made fun of me at the end of tutorial by proclaiming that they were going for lunch and asked me to enjoy my lecture. Funny sia haha =p

Met our EXCO Nominees to share with them regarding our new project called "8th SC Presents" and got them to choose their IC-ship for the various parts of the project, such as fund-raising event, getting suggestions and feedback, council maintenance and council T-Shirt and MJ Roar (our events board).

Wed - Had Chrystal workshop again in the morning and one of the funniest part was when we did this survival quiz and we each had to choose an answer then convince the others in our group that this answer was correct. It was really interesting and some of them apparently have been watching a lot of shows which teach them survival skills. There was one question asking us how to judge if something can be eaten and most of us chose something like observing if a bird eats it and is ok then we'll eat it too. Turns out that seemingly logical answer was wrong and someone joked that after eating, we see the bird drop dead and then we scream "Aw, you bird-brain!" Super crappy! Then another question was about the colour of the flame in your tent which signals danger and somebody joked that red is dangerous because it means our eyes are bleeding! Lol so much nonsense!

Oh, we also had this activity called "Last Word" where each person had to say something linked to the last word said by the previous person. So we tried to see how we could use it for a protein chemistry and the funniest part was when someone ended with "amide bonds" and then the next person said "Amide bonds are also known as peptide bonds". LOL! So cheaterbuck lah! We all laughed like crazy!

Had Council Meeting and we briefed them about our new event as well as a tour of the council store, which really had a lot of things and was pretty messy that's why we need some council maintenance and also try to sell some of the stuff away to help raise funds for the students' lounge since it's killing two birds with one stone!

Met up with Ain and Jonathan for dinner at Bugis and we ended up in NYDC. The food took soooo long and sad to say, Ain says I look haggard. Oh man, I really must find more time to sleep! That's prob the main reason for looking older! Anyway, good to hear that she's doing reasonably well in NTU. Will prob get a 2nd upper comfortably at least!

Thu - April Fools' Day and I suppose you can't escape from a prank on a day like this. Turns out that my CG had something in store for me but I missed part one of it cos I was too busy setting up my laptop for our Chrystal lesson. They were actually hiding in an adjacent classroom and waiting for me to call them so that they could surprise me! But I kenna part 2 where someone pretended to be ill (and did look quite sick indeed) and then came back looking like she wanted to throw up. In the end she "threw up" some toilet paper and as I opened it I saw the words "Happy April Fools' Day Mr Lau!" and I was screaming "I knew it! I knew it!" Seriously, I suspected something already but I followed along haha. =p Anyway they took a video of the thing and apparently my shirt was tucked out -.-

During Chrystal, I decided to share with them my draft of my personal vision cos I still had quite a few who haven't done it despite my efforts to teach them so I decided I had to Model The Way. I got them to guess what they think would describe my vision and I also shared with them as I went through my vision what drives me so I actually took out some of the cards that I received from students over the years and read out to them some of the lines that touched my heart and continued to fuel my passion for teaching. Then I told them I would refine my draft and email them by the afternoon to show that it is important to share their vision with others so that through their comments they can refine their vision. After that I went into the lesson on setting goals and shared with them my army experiences and how sometimes you must be put through tough times to realise the latent potential in you and to achieve things that you never believed that you could before. I mentioned something about being put through the grill and gave some funny hand action to simulate it to entertain them. =p

After that we had a really fun time during their self-study with some class bonding playing all kinds of retarded but very fun games like taking idiot quizzes about crosses, pineapples, staircase, church, room with a tap, "I know! I know!", "Johnny Woosh" (which I still don't know the secret), "What number is this?", amongst many others. It was so funny cos I was sitting down doing the idiot quiz and like the whole class was staring at me and I joked that I felt pressured and I can understand how they feel when I look at them doing their test. =p I felt that many of them really bonded so hopefully that would help them to be closer cos to me I feel that class spirit is really critical in getting them to do well, based on my experience over the years.

Fri & Sat - Went with a group of 12 to Kukup and most of us were our MJC Chem teachers. It was a really fun trip and a short and relaxing getaway. For $84 we had transport to Kukup, a night's stay (3 room and 1 hall and dining area outside), and 3 seafood meals (2 lunch and 1 dinner), which I thought was really good. Spent almost the whole time playing mahjong there and it was fun! Super exciting almost all the way with ppl making big hands almost every single game. Quite insane I must say. At the moment we're planning to go Batam in about a month's time so hopefully things will go to plan. Looking forward to another enjoyable trip!

Looks like I don't have enough time to finish everything but hopefully I can catch up on it soon! Only 2 more weeks of stuff to update! =)

T1 W8-9 and School Holidays

Swamped with a thousand and one things to do the last few weeks, it's been quite insane! Sad to say I've prob forgotten a lot of the funny things that took place, which is a real pity, so I'll just make do with whatever remains in my memory. Updates:

T1 W8 (Tue)- Stayed back to see my group of council nominees rehearse for their rally. They wanted to perform a dance and skit using "Sorry Sorry" so their mentors and myself were giving advice on how to make their rally more effective and to make their dancing more slick and coordinated. Wasn't easy and I can only say not everyone is cut out to dance so I found it strange that they decided to do a dance item. In fact some of the teachers did comment like, "What has their dancing got to do with being a councillor?" Was tough for me to answer cos I also saw no link so I could only reply them that it's to help them with teamwork and creativity to get the students' attention.

Wed - Rallying day for both my groups of council nominees and I ended up helping my other group to create a rap cos they decided to all do raps for their rally but there was nothing to link them together so it was very incoherent for me and showed no group effort. Was quite proud of myself with the raps I came up for them to start and end their rally with considering my time constraints. So here it goes!

Start: Yo good morning MJC! We're your council nominees! We're gonna rap for you today and this is what we have to say!

End: So that's the end of all our raps! We wish to serve you, that's a fact! So keep our numbers in your mind - 21, 23, 24, 25! [that's their numbers to represent them)

Sat - Remembered this incident when I bumped into an ex-MJC student from the recently graduated batch at Tampines Mall. I had no idea who she was but she suddenly called out to me, "Cai Hong!" Haha, apparently she still remembered the chem song I first created for their batch and many others also remembered me for that song rather than the other songs, which surprised me cos in a chemical sense the other songs were more meaningful and had more content.

T1 W9 (Mon) - 10S417 (Dbl tut) - had some time in class so tried to hype them up by having a competition on redox (I called it the 1/2 equation challenge). Think they had fun and my friend who walked past my lab also said she saw they were a lot more active than they normally are (cos I told her how they normally are in class) so my efforts paid off. =)

Tue - Did the same challenge with 10S103 and it was quite an exciting fight all the way to the end. I was suanning one of the groups who still got 0 after 7 questions that if they still ended up with 0 after the last question then they would do a forfeit. Somehow after that they managed to come in 1st for the last question so we didn't get a chance to see haha. Was a battle of the sexes also cos there were 3 groups of guys and girls each and in the end a girl group came up tops and there was a bit of bantering amongst the class ppl. =p Oh, and I was also pretty annoyed that they took their time to come to lab so I implemented my new rule of standing at the back of class if >5 min late and stand outside the class if >7 min late starting w.e.f. tmr.

Wed - Tut with 10S103 and ironically, many of them turned up for the tutorial at 1.03p.m., which meant they were 8 min late for tut so I told them I'm sticking to my guns as said and sent about 2/3 of the class outside. They took it in good spirit though I must say cos when I greeted the class, they greeted even louder than usual. It was tough on me though haha cos I had to project my voice loud enough for them to hear and need to keep an eye on those in the class and outside but it did help to quite an extent cos they were generally very punctual after that and most of the time they were even earlier than me! Anyway, I told them I'm sorry I had to do it but sometimes certain things need to be done and I wished them a good day and told them it was their day cos it's 10th Mar (103) and they were amused by it so we're all cool. =)

Council Election Day - The day where all the council nominees turn up to make their final rally speech and also show their videos to the cohort, some of which were really creative. There was a particularly memorable speech and I really enjoyed listening to it. It was funny but yet impactful and had the crowd cheering at many points. Awesome!

Stayed back till about 10pm after voting results were out to discuss about who were going to be in the 8th SC. A really tiring night! =s

Thur - Last H2 lecture of the term and I went up to present my briefing regarding Problem-Based Learning (PBL). Basically we had two tasks and I was quite happy with the tasks created cos I felt they were quite interesting and they were relevant to real-life problems. Perhaps some might say it's a biased view cos I created the poem for one of the task and was in the video for the other task but honestly I felt they were both fun to solve for the students. We also finally showed the edited video that we filmed about 5 weeks ago.

It started with a segment from a Youtube video showing cars sliding along icy roads and crashing into each other cos they couldn't stop then later it cut to the part that we filmed in MJC. Basically, I was wrapped up in winter clothing (jacket, earmuffs, gloves, scarf, beanie) sitting in my chem bro's car pretending to have just crashed and this news reporter came up to me to asked what happened and I said in some weird slang, "I don't know! It must be all this ice! Somebody should do something about it!" We even had special effects where we got another teacher to drop paper confetti in front of the video camera to simulate the snow. It was a hilarious video and the kids were totally entertained and I was joking in my briefing that the person in the video wasn't me cos after all, how could they see who it was with all that winter clothing? =p

Tut with 10S417 - The kids started joking about me in the video and I said it was for their entertainment. I also joked with them about the bad acting and that I hope I don't get a Razzie award (an award for terrible acting) for it. =p

Chrystal - Today's lesson was about setting a personal vision and I started by sharing with the class the A Level results of 08S416 because I found their profiles v similar in terms of their L1R5, O Level Chem grades, and even the gender distribution. They were quite shocked by some of the results so I took some time to explain to them the profile of the students and why they didn't do well (btw, I didn't include any names to avoid possible sensitive issues since I could rem who had what results). I also explained to them my rationale of the way I'm doing things this time - why I'm so meticulous in recording their results (down to the point of recording my comments that I wrote on their scripts and the mistakes that I see in their tests/assignments)so that I can keep track of them and nip the problem in the bud if I foresee problems. I also suggested that they see me for consultations asap so that they can clear up their doubts early in JC1 when they still have time and energy before CCA and PW kicks in. Also spoke to the class about setting a personal vision and how I understood my strengths and changed my ways of studying after I aimed to do well in university.

After Chrystal we went to the canteen to celebrate the birthday of one of the students. During the celebration I realised what was the meaning of "TEFH" cos I saw quite a few students wearing colourful tags on the top left of their uniform with the acronym TEFH so I was wondering what it was all about. When I heard the explanation I was soooooo entertained that I just burst out laughing and apparently my laugh was so funny that all the kids around me burst out laughing also. Absolutely hilarious! Anyway I can't say it here but if you wanna know, just ask me about it. =p

Release of Council Election results - The results were delivered by one of our most popular TAs and I really enjoyed his delivery. He started out with a story about buying a house with his fiancee, how they found a flat and almost got it. Just as they were about to buy it, the seller found another buyer (I think). The feeling was like they were so happy that they were going to step into the house they wanted but the door closed on them. They were frustrated but moved on and found another house which was also nice but was much cheaper. As I was wondering what it was all about, he started to make the link that in life, you often find that as one door closes, another one opens. But if we keep being fixated with the closed door and feeling frustrated about it, we can never move on. Just like the council nominees who went all the way from signing up, to going through the interviews and rallies but eventually some of them find the door was closed to them and they need to learn to move on. I thought it was a brilliant story and it made so much sense!

Fri - It was a school holiday for us in celebration of the A Level results but I had to go to Pasir Ris Park for recce cos I was in charge of the Fast March section of our Council Training Camp which was coming up soon. But it was a quick trip as we made our way around and chose the venues that we wanted for our activities. Then it was back to school for some work before heading down to Carousel for a second round of treats for the excellent A Level results!

After that some of us headed down to Singapore Poly before we went down to HSA for an industrial visit cos we signed up for a course on Forensics. It was pretty interesting to see the various departments and the things they did - other than the criminology stuff which most ppl associate forensics with, we also saw other work such as testing of cosmetics and food for toxic chemicals and handwriting analysis, amongst other pretty interesting stuff.

Random event of the week: I rem an incident when I was walking with my CG after their recess/lunch then a student was describing how discreet their Maths tutor was and how difficult it was to get his number. Then apparently some of her classmates asked him personally for his number and she sneaked up behind them to get his number also. Her description and action was sooooo funny that I burst out laughing again and that led to another chain reaction. =p

March Holidays (Mon) - Went for the Forensics course at SP for almost the whole day. Quite interesting stuff as we learnt about kidnapping and murders amongst other stuff. I always had quite a fascination with this kind of stuff, dunno why. I rem reading about famous crime stories in Singapore and around the world in primary school though it was kinda scary also.. =s

Tue - Last day of our Forensics course and we ended early in the morning so after that I went on a shopping spree! Spent about 5 hours plus walking around the Marina Square area and spent $472 on 7 shirts and a pair of black pants. Felt satisfied cos I felt the designs of the shirts I bought were quite cool/striking and the pants was pretty cheap and slim fit, which was nicer cos I don't like those shapeless ones which look quite uncool (still have one now which I should throw away soon).

Wed - Back to school early for some intensive consultations - 8am to 1+pm. That's like so crazy huh? Hahaha. I mean it's JC1 Mar Holidays right? But I'm glad that my CG heeded my advice and I saw about half the class in 3 groups to go through their questions regarding redox and gases and also taught my 2 students going to Italy for a choir competition about atomic structure. It was pretty fulfilling though it reminded me of some of the JC2 consultations last year which seemed to go on like forever haha.

Thu - Went down to school again but only in the afternoon to get some work done before I met up with some of my friends at Geylang for some supposedly famous beef kway teow but it seemed a bit overrated to me. Headed down to the city to chill and get a drink. We went to this place called "The Loof" cos somebody went there before and seems like it's a nice place but it was full so we went to the Chijmes but couldn't find anywhere nice to chill. Finally we ended up at The Swissotel and we went to the top floor but were denied entry cos one of my friends was wearing berms and sandals lol. We spent some time taking in a wonderful night view of the city before we went to this place called Introbar to chat. The drinks were pretty ex though (cos we missed the Happy Hour which ended at 9 sad to say) but we found out the nuts was free flow and started whacking it. Then we went down to Selegie area to eat bean curd and "you tiao" and continued to talk and there was this really funny part which we all burst out laughing at but it's not appropriate to say here hahaha. =p

Fri - Back to school (again!) to do some work and also a short consultation. So funny - one of the students was talking about our school anthem and how it sounded like a National Day song and he could even visualise the airplanes flying by while the song was being played. Then I saw this post-it on another student's work which said "Ask Monk". Apparently "Monk" is the nickname she gave to her Chemistry remedial tutor. =p

Ok, gonna carry on with Part 2 (T2 W1-4) later!