Sesame Street - Yip Yip Martians and the telephone:
This is how I learnt about telephones when I was young. Education on television, especially with Sesame Street and Electric City, was so fun and entertaining, right? Yip...yip...yip...yip...yip...yip.
Showing posts with label Education. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Education. Show all posts
Wednesday, December 30, 2009
Thursday, November 12, 2009
Singapore Children's Society Project Cabin Camp 2009 9 Nov to 11 Nov
I have just returned from the above-mentioned camp as a volunteer group leader and this blog post is all about all the interesting encounters that have happened during this camp. The objective of the camp is to enrich the values of the students using the core motto of the camp for this year "No Man Is An Island".
The camp started on 09 November 2009 (Monday) from Bukit Merah Student Hub Centre with a group of 10 staff, 9 volunteers and 64 Cabin Club students and the entire group traveled all the way to Pasir Ris Holiday Flats and Dormitories for the residential part of the camp.
I was in charge of one of the eight groups of students and was also in charge of a group of 14 students in the male dormitory whilst the rest of the campers were residing either inside the female dormitory or the holiday flats. It will be too cluttered to write everything inside this post so I will just highlight some of the major events and what I considered to be really memorable encounters during the camp itself.
Night Trail at Pasir Ris Park Mangrove Boardwalk:
This was one of the biggest event for Day One where students would have to traverse the Mangrove Boardwalk in pitch dark conditions to reach five different stations within the Boardwalk to perform certain activities to earn tokens for a subsequent camp event the following day.
Although each of the groups, led by a volunteer group leader, was allowed to bring torch lights, the lighting conditions inside the Boardwalk were so bad that none of the torches could shine beyond 5 meters before the darkness enveloped each group. Hence, the Night Trail was of considerable challenge to students who had to overcome their individual fear of the dark and rely on the strength and courage of the group to complete the tasks at hand.
Special Encounter - Dark Presence in the Forest:
(Disclaimer: I am not advocating any idea of superstition or negating any form of religious beliefs here. I am merely stating what I have encountered during the camp.)
During the second station, where each group was supposed to visit a unmanned pavilion to search for some tokens in a treasure chest, my group, which was the last one, made quite a racket in the darkness, talking and discussing loudly about the search for the tokens when I noticed the surrounding darkness becoming "thicker" and "thicker".
Logically, darkness should only constitute the color of black, but the longer my group lingered at the station (they were really keen on finding every single token), the darkness surrounding the pavilion seemed to have increased its shade of black multiple times over in the space of a few minutes and the surrounding air became much colder.
Realizing something was amiss, I quickly warned my group to keep their volume down and exit the station as quickly as they could. As we were leaving the pavilion (I placed myself as the last person of the group), a deep chill ran down the entire length of my spine and I felt a huge dark presence standing right behind me. I remembered what my National Service platoon commander told me - resist the temptation to look back in the middle of the forest so I did exactly that - I walked quietly without a word as my entire group proceeded to the next station.
For what it seemed like an eternity, the dark presence followed right behind me, and I had to resist the urge to push my group to go faster lest I aroused the curiosity of the students who might look back at me. We prodded until the next station was nearly in sight and suddenly the dark presence just stopped following me and seemed to have turned back. The cold chill in my spine disappeared instantly as well.
When I reached home, I "googled" what I had encountered and realized that dark presences are part of paranormal activities and cross-checking with some of the more experienced ones revealed that a possibility of that particular dark presence was a manifestation of what they would call as a shadow giant - an ancient of the dark dimension that resides in extremely dark places. Reputed sizes of these shadow giants could reach up to several stories high. According to what I had estimated, that dark presence was at least 9 feet tall so it could have tallied with what the experienced ones had said.
Thankfully, that shadow giant seemed more intent on escorting the entire group out of its territory than on harming us. I was so worried that the students in my group might be harmed in any way while it was following us for that seemingly forever few minutes. I am going to stay away from that particular pavilion from now onwards.
Loss: Thankfully none.
Gain: +1 Luck, +1 Wisdom
Outdoor Fun at VivoCity:
The second major camp activity was on Day Two where the groups had to weave in and out of the many shops within VivoCity to try and compare prices of items. Simply put, they are supposed to find items starting with a set number of letters in the alphabet and to collate the prices of these items. The group with the lowest prices from all these items wins. The activity was enormously draining because groups had to run around the entire VivoCity to fulfill the task which was further interspersed with three game stations that they had to find using only clues.
Special Encounter - The Defiant Rebel
My group, in my opinion, was the most difficult group to lead in the entire camp. That was because the group was fractured into very different groups - half the group had such close friends who were allocated to other groups was always clinging onto their friends for most of the time, refusing to temporarily leave their cliques even for the camp. The other half consisted of loners who barely uttered more than twenty sentences in the forty-eight-hour camp, sleepy heads who would grab any possible time to return to the sleeping quarters to nap, and rebels who would want to defy any instructions because their philosophy of life was "rules are meant to be broken".
What I considered to the most obnoxious rebel happened to be in my group. During the Outdoor Fun activity at VivoCity, he was shouting and ordering another volunteer group leader around at one of the game stations in front of many groups and members of the public that I had to yell at him to shut up. Although I was given pre-camp advice that "everyone had some good in them", I did not seem to see what good was there in that blatantly rude behavior of that Obnoxious Rebel.
After lodging a seriously-worded complaint with the relevant staff member from the Singapore Children's Society, a meeting between that staff member, the Obnoxious Rebel and myself was convened later that afternoon where the student in error apologized for his behavior, citing the reason that all his friends had always been giving way to his antics. I explained that although some rules could be broken given the circumstances, not all rules and decorum are to be abandoned at the cost and embarrassment of so many innocent others. I also told him that his actions at VivoCity had put his fellow groups to shame, offended the other volunteer group leader, disgraced his authority over the other group's campers and brought bad light to Singapore Children's Society in the eyes of those members of the public who witnessed the incident.
The Obnoxious Rebel subsequently tried to participate and cooperate more actively in the remaining activities without a single word of complaint and the camp eventually passed with no further incident or conflict. I learned that some rebellious youths expected everyone to give way to them and to understand their every action and word, no matter what the potential consequences are. I also understood that I had, and will continue to have, nearly zero tolerance for selfish individuals when they are supposed to take into consideration the best interests of the group before themselves.
Loss: The remaining members of the group caught on his bad example of rebelling and began to laze during most of the camp, making my work even harder at times.
Gain: +1 Speech, +1 Knowledge
The Night Watch at Pasir Ris Holiday Compound:
On the final night of the Project Cabin Camp 2009, all the nine volunteers agreed to take over the night watch duties for the entire camp compound so the over-worked staff members could take some much-needed rest. What followed was a night of eating, drinking, playing, observing and catching of some naughty campers who tried to slip out of their sleeping quarters for unknown objectives.
The nine volunteers dragged out a number of chairs and arranged them in a circle in the middle of the only road running through the camp compound at around 12.30am. We also lugged our favorite items with us to accompany us for the long watch of nearly 6 hours ahead of us - soft toys, mini pillows, torch lights, windbreakers, ipods, video cameras and not forgetting, loads of packet drinks, snacks and leftover food from that night's buffet dinner.
For nearly an hour, the volunteers were talking about some of their most interesting personalities within their respective groups. At around 1.30am, we began to play the game "Murderer" to pass time. Believe me, it was really difficult in the semi-darkness to see those winks and we had a lot of fun trying to find out who the murderer and the detective was. We surely had a good laugh over one of the volunteers who seemed to be always one of the first victims to be "killed", one of the most unobservant detectives who took a long time to seek out the murderer and also one of the most reluctant murderer who took a long time to seek out his victims. To sum it up, we labeled him as the worst player for the game which he still took it within his stride in good sport. ^__^
Special Encounter - The "Night Crawlers"
Somewhere around 3am to 4am, two of the male campers tried to slip out of their holiday flat quarters for reasons unknown. A stealthy and quiet opening of the door followed by two crawling figures in the semi-darkness. However, my night vision was better than what they had expected and I already spotted their movements and pointed out the little misadventure. One of the volunteers immediately recognized the identities of the crawling figures and quickly ran up to stop them from crawling towards a back stairway.
The volunteers continued their night watch by playing a prank on one of the female volunteers who had just returned from a regular patrol session around the camp compound. The prank was hilariously simple - totally ignore the presence of that volunteer as if she had already returned to the sleeping quarters to sleep. The results was wriggling fun as the volunteer was stomping her feet and going around "strangling" all the volunteers seated at the circle, only to be answered with "Oh my god! I felt something touching my neck! Was it the wind?"
The whole prank continued to balloon with the inclusion of the "Flying Plastic Fork". The female volunteer had a white plastic fork in her mouth then and we all commented with pretentious awe that a "holy fork" had joined the circle of night watch and whenever the "holy fork" moved, we would hail it as some sort of divine sign of communication. The end result - the female volunteer was so tickled that she played along with the game and used the fork to continue some silly charade for another hour or so.
When the night watch ended the next morning, I thought to myself - it was definitely the most entertaining and enjoyable night watch that I had ever participated in as the jokes were great, the pranks were hilarious and the watch was fruitful with another four more students caught walking out of their sleeping quarters before the reverie hour was approaching. If I had another chance to go on another night watch, I would definitely seek the company of those eight people.
Loss: I only managed to grab 15 minutes of sleep after my night watch duties ended.
Gain: +1 Fun, +1 Experience in Night Watch
The volunteers were under strict instructions not to take any photos or videos of students during the camp so as to protect the identities of these students whom the Singapore Children's Society consider as children/youths-at-risk. Hence, I could only take back memories and recollections on this blog. The following are some of the more scenic pictures that I had taken.
The sunrise photograph was taken on the morning of Day 3 when I was nearing the end of my guard duty. I was stretching myself and waiting for the campers to wake up when I noticed the beautiful sunrise creeping up from the tree horizon.
The sky was full of alto-cumulus clouds - small and fluffy like numerous cotton buds. It provided a really serene touch to that particular morning. It has been so long since I could find time to cloud-watch and snap such pictures. What a beautiful world of Nature if one could only stop and smell the flowers and feel the breeze.
As a volunteer group leader and dormitory in-charge, my in-camp schedule was usually so tightly-packed that I could only have time to put up a picture of the dinner that was handed to us during Day One - packet lunch with rice, eggs, chicken pieces, beancurd and mixed vegetables. It tasted delicious because I was already famished from all the work from settling in the campers, briefings and ice-breakers.
The camp started on 09 November 2009 (Monday) from Bukit Merah Student Hub Centre with a group of 10 staff, 9 volunteers and 64 Cabin Club students and the entire group traveled all the way to Pasir Ris Holiday Flats and Dormitories for the residential part of the camp.
I was in charge of one of the eight groups of students and was also in charge of a group of 14 students in the male dormitory whilst the rest of the campers were residing either inside the female dormitory or the holiday flats. It will be too cluttered to write everything inside this post so I will just highlight some of the major events and what I considered to be really memorable encounters during the camp itself.
Night Trail at Pasir Ris Park Mangrove Boardwalk:
This was one of the biggest event for Day One where students would have to traverse the Mangrove Boardwalk in pitch dark conditions to reach five different stations within the Boardwalk to perform certain activities to earn tokens for a subsequent camp event the following day.
Although each of the groups, led by a volunteer group leader, was allowed to bring torch lights, the lighting conditions inside the Boardwalk were so bad that none of the torches could shine beyond 5 meters before the darkness enveloped each group. Hence, the Night Trail was of considerable challenge to students who had to overcome their individual fear of the dark and rely on the strength and courage of the group to complete the tasks at hand.
Special Encounter - Dark Presence in the Forest:
(Disclaimer: I am not advocating any idea of superstition or negating any form of religious beliefs here. I am merely stating what I have encountered during the camp.)
During the second station, where each group was supposed to visit a unmanned pavilion to search for some tokens in a treasure chest, my group, which was the last one, made quite a racket in the darkness, talking and discussing loudly about the search for the tokens when I noticed the surrounding darkness becoming "thicker" and "thicker".
Logically, darkness should only constitute the color of black, but the longer my group lingered at the station (they were really keen on finding every single token), the darkness surrounding the pavilion seemed to have increased its shade of black multiple times over in the space of a few minutes and the surrounding air became much colder.
Realizing something was amiss, I quickly warned my group to keep their volume down and exit the station as quickly as they could. As we were leaving the pavilion (I placed myself as the last person of the group), a deep chill ran down the entire length of my spine and I felt a huge dark presence standing right behind me. I remembered what my National Service platoon commander told me - resist the temptation to look back in the middle of the forest so I did exactly that - I walked quietly without a word as my entire group proceeded to the next station.
For what it seemed like an eternity, the dark presence followed right behind me, and I had to resist the urge to push my group to go faster lest I aroused the curiosity of the students who might look back at me. We prodded until the next station was nearly in sight and suddenly the dark presence just stopped following me and seemed to have turned back. The cold chill in my spine disappeared instantly as well.
When I reached home, I "googled" what I had encountered and realized that dark presences are part of paranormal activities and cross-checking with some of the more experienced ones revealed that a possibility of that particular dark presence was a manifestation of what they would call as a shadow giant - an ancient of the dark dimension that resides in extremely dark places. Reputed sizes of these shadow giants could reach up to several stories high. According to what I had estimated, that dark presence was at least 9 feet tall so it could have tallied with what the experienced ones had said.
Thankfully, that shadow giant seemed more intent on escorting the entire group out of its territory than on harming us. I was so worried that the students in my group might be harmed in any way while it was following us for that seemingly forever few minutes. I am going to stay away from that particular pavilion from now onwards.
Loss: Thankfully none.
Gain: +1 Luck, +1 Wisdom
Outdoor Fun at VivoCity:
The second major camp activity was on Day Two where the groups had to weave in and out of the many shops within VivoCity to try and compare prices of items. Simply put, they are supposed to find items starting with a set number of letters in the alphabet and to collate the prices of these items. The group with the lowest prices from all these items wins. The activity was enormously draining because groups had to run around the entire VivoCity to fulfill the task which was further interspersed with three game stations that they had to find using only clues.
Special Encounter - The Defiant Rebel
My group, in my opinion, was the most difficult group to lead in the entire camp. That was because the group was fractured into very different groups - half the group had such close friends who were allocated to other groups was always clinging onto their friends for most of the time, refusing to temporarily leave their cliques even for the camp. The other half consisted of loners who barely uttered more than twenty sentences in the forty-eight-hour camp, sleepy heads who would grab any possible time to return to the sleeping quarters to nap, and rebels who would want to defy any instructions because their philosophy of life was "rules are meant to be broken".
What I considered to the most obnoxious rebel happened to be in my group. During the Outdoor Fun activity at VivoCity, he was shouting and ordering another volunteer group leader around at one of the game stations in front of many groups and members of the public that I had to yell at him to shut up. Although I was given pre-camp advice that "everyone had some good in them", I did not seem to see what good was there in that blatantly rude behavior of that Obnoxious Rebel.
After lodging a seriously-worded complaint with the relevant staff member from the Singapore Children's Society, a meeting between that staff member, the Obnoxious Rebel and myself was convened later that afternoon where the student in error apologized for his behavior, citing the reason that all his friends had always been giving way to his antics. I explained that although some rules could be broken given the circumstances, not all rules and decorum are to be abandoned at the cost and embarrassment of so many innocent others. I also told him that his actions at VivoCity had put his fellow groups to shame, offended the other volunteer group leader, disgraced his authority over the other group's campers and brought bad light to Singapore Children's Society in the eyes of those members of the public who witnessed the incident.
The Obnoxious Rebel subsequently tried to participate and cooperate more actively in the remaining activities without a single word of complaint and the camp eventually passed with no further incident or conflict. I learned that some rebellious youths expected everyone to give way to them and to understand their every action and word, no matter what the potential consequences are. I also understood that I had, and will continue to have, nearly zero tolerance for selfish individuals when they are supposed to take into consideration the best interests of the group before themselves.
Loss: The remaining members of the group caught on his bad example of rebelling and began to laze during most of the camp, making my work even harder at times.
Gain: +1 Speech, +1 Knowledge
The Night Watch at Pasir Ris Holiday Compound:
On the final night of the Project Cabin Camp 2009, all the nine volunteers agreed to take over the night watch duties for the entire camp compound so the over-worked staff members could take some much-needed rest. What followed was a night of eating, drinking, playing, observing and catching of some naughty campers who tried to slip out of their sleeping quarters for unknown objectives.
The nine volunteers dragged out a number of chairs and arranged them in a circle in the middle of the only road running through the camp compound at around 12.30am. We also lugged our favorite items with us to accompany us for the long watch of nearly 6 hours ahead of us - soft toys, mini pillows, torch lights, windbreakers, ipods, video cameras and not forgetting, loads of packet drinks, snacks and leftover food from that night's buffet dinner.
For nearly an hour, the volunteers were talking about some of their most interesting personalities within their respective groups. At around 1.30am, we began to play the game "Murderer" to pass time. Believe me, it was really difficult in the semi-darkness to see those winks and we had a lot of fun trying to find out who the murderer and the detective was. We surely had a good laugh over one of the volunteers who seemed to be always one of the first victims to be "killed", one of the most unobservant detectives who took a long time to seek out the murderer and also one of the most reluctant murderer who took a long time to seek out his victims. To sum it up, we labeled him as the worst player for the game which he still took it within his stride in good sport. ^__^
Special Encounter - The "Night Crawlers"
Somewhere around 3am to 4am, two of the male campers tried to slip out of their holiday flat quarters for reasons unknown. A stealthy and quiet opening of the door followed by two crawling figures in the semi-darkness. However, my night vision was better than what they had expected and I already spotted their movements and pointed out the little misadventure. One of the volunteers immediately recognized the identities of the crawling figures and quickly ran up to stop them from crawling towards a back stairway.
The volunteers continued their night watch by playing a prank on one of the female volunteers who had just returned from a regular patrol session around the camp compound. The prank was hilariously simple - totally ignore the presence of that volunteer as if she had already returned to the sleeping quarters to sleep. The results was wriggling fun as the volunteer was stomping her feet and going around "strangling" all the volunteers seated at the circle, only to be answered with "Oh my god! I felt something touching my neck! Was it the wind?"
The whole prank continued to balloon with the inclusion of the "Flying Plastic Fork". The female volunteer had a white plastic fork in her mouth then and we all commented with pretentious awe that a "holy fork" had joined the circle of night watch and whenever the "holy fork" moved, we would hail it as some sort of divine sign of communication. The end result - the female volunteer was so tickled that she played along with the game and used the fork to continue some silly charade for another hour or so.
When the night watch ended the next morning, I thought to myself - it was definitely the most entertaining and enjoyable night watch that I had ever participated in as the jokes were great, the pranks were hilarious and the watch was fruitful with another four more students caught walking out of their sleeping quarters before the reverie hour was approaching. If I had another chance to go on another night watch, I would definitely seek the company of those eight people.
Loss: I only managed to grab 15 minutes of sleep after my night watch duties ended.
Gain: +1 Fun, +1 Experience in Night Watch
The volunteers were under strict instructions not to take any photos or videos of students during the camp so as to protect the identities of these students whom the Singapore Children's Society consider as children/youths-at-risk. Hence, I could only take back memories and recollections on this blog. The following are some of the more scenic pictures that I had taken.
The sunrise photograph was taken on the morning of Day 3 when I was nearing the end of my guard duty. I was stretching myself and waiting for the campers to wake up when I noticed the beautiful sunrise creeping up from the tree horizon.
The sky was full of alto-cumulus clouds - small and fluffy like numerous cotton buds. It provided a really serene touch to that particular morning. It has been so long since I could find time to cloud-watch and snap such pictures. What a beautiful world of Nature if one could only stop and smell the flowers and feel the breeze.
As a volunteer group leader and dormitory in-charge, my in-camp schedule was usually so tightly-packed that I could only have time to put up a picture of the dinner that was handed to us during Day One - packet lunch with rice, eggs, chicken pieces, beancurd and mixed vegetables. It tasted delicious because I was already famished from all the work from settling in the campers, briefings and ice-breakers.
Friday, January 30, 2009
Personal Thoughts about Proposed Changes to Primary 1 and Primary 2 Students in Singapore
I recently saw two pieces of news regarding some proposed changes to Primary 1 and Primary 2 students in Singapore and I have some personal thoughts to blog about. First, the articles:
Second, my personal thoughts:
1) Format adjustments - Bit-sized tests for Primary 1 and Primary 2 students may not be effective because unless bit-sized tests are also introduced throughout the entire primary school systems all the way and abolish PSLE, those tests will not prepare the students for the very different form of learning from Primary 3 to Primary 6. Imagine the chaos when the students who had gotten used to learning bit-sized tests are then to change to textbook based and final exam formats? Nothing has been mentioned about how to help those who may be maladjusted to the system switches at such a young age. It seems that the Ministry of Education just assumes that the students can smoothly transit to a completely different form of learning.
2) Suitability - Bit-sized tests will add even further pressure on the Primary 1 and Primary 2 students because they will have to be constantly at their toes throughout the entire two years to make sure their "continual assessments" are not poorly done to drag down their overall changes.
Of course, proponents say this will be a good way to push students to work hard throughout the year rather than cram for the final couple of months but we are talking about very young students who may not even be getting used to public schools, let alone project work and oral presentations which involves complex team and presentation skills.
3) Training of teachers - It may sound cool to train very young students who are able to form into teams, actively research and present their findings in stunning presentations but are our school teachers properly-trained to know how to handle teams, team-related problems and accurately assess the quality of the research and presentations?
I already have ongoing complaints from people around me that there are problems of free-loaders during project work, conflicts between team members, research being aided by overly-protective parents and marred presentations due to stage fright. Does the Ministry of Education have enough experience in tackling such issues before allowing these new myriad of problems plague those young students?
4) Psychological Barriers - Let's face it - not every student is suitable for teamwork, research work, oral presentations, sports, outdoor education, performing and visual arts. Imagine that kind of psychological strain when students, especially at their nascent study years, start to realize that they may be so far behind those who are exceptionally talented in one or more of those areas.
Of course, one may argue that it is a blessing for the nation to discover the truly talented ones and nurture them from young but what about the average Joe or Jane? Are these students to suffer the possibly self-imposed, peer-imposed, teacher-imposed or parent-imposed sense of inferior complex and start to wane in their interest in being basically educated since they realized their average creative competencies will never be able to match those talented peers?
Are the education system or the school teachers ready and properly-trained to address and dispel such a possible pervasive sense of hopelessness in the average Joe or Jane, or just leave them to their fates as what it is being done now in schools with "bit-sized tests"?
5) Implementation feasibility - Let's look at the infamous workload of teachers in Singapore. If the new proposals go through as being said, teachers will have to provide even more regular updates on the progress of each individual student to their respective parents. My personal thoughts now shift to the following questions: How much more time can we squeeze from the average school teacher away from lesson planning time, lesson time, marking time, department meeting time, CCA time, upgrading time, seminar & workshop time, parent-meeting time to do those regular progress updates?
Are the school teachers trained to properly communicate such minute progresses to the parents who may not understand how such minute progresses work at all? What happens if there is a conflict of opinions about those minute progresses between the teachers and the parents? How much more time and effort are needed to resolve those conflicts and do the Ministry of Education have the means to do so?
To conclude - I think the Ministry of Education has good intentions to vary the education system to make it more interesting and nurturing. But if they try to actualize such a drastic change to these young students without considering the above-mentioned questions, it may actually make things worse.
As of now, schools with such bit-sized tests have already forced students to sleep far fewer hours every night just to make the datelines each week or even every few days and these older students are already suffering from education trauma because they neither have enough rest for their bodies, enough time to digest the information and skills which they might have acquired or enough space to flex those skills because weighing on these bit-sized tests are still the looming shadows of the final exam papers - PSLE, O Levels and A Levels.
Is our education environment, students, teachers and parents even ready for the bit-sized tests at any school level? We seem to be still struggling with no clear solution in sight. Dare we impose such chaos on our young Primary 1 and Primary 2 students?
I hope not.
(Article Source: http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporelocalnews/view/405140/1/.html)S$4.5b to be spent in next 10 years to revamp primary school system
By Hoe Yeen Nie, Channel NewsAsia | Posted: 27 January 2009 1917 hrs
SINGAPORE: Big changes are in store for Singapore's primary school system. Over the next ten years, more schools will be built and more teachers recruited on a budget of S$4.5 billion.
But what will surely get the attention of parents is a plan to do away with examinations for students in Primary 1 and 2.
Senior Minister of State for Education Grace Fu, chairperson of Primary Education Review and Implementation (PERI) Committee, said: "We'd like our students to enjoy the process of learning, and therefore having assessment that is tailored to the way that we teach is important.
"Having them sit through very important year-end exams may not be the best idea and I think there are better ways of assessing their progress. We can find better substitutes than just a one-off examination at year-end."
Instead of examinations, the PERI Committee has recommended that schools introduce bite-sized tests for Primary 1 and 2 students, and for parents to be given regular updates on the children's progress.
Telok Kurau Primary School did just that in 2006, but some parents were concerned about the changes where assessments take the form of project work and oral presentations.
Wilbur Wong, principal of Telok Kurau Primary School, said: "They say, 'Oh! Now you don't have the mid-year exams, how do I know how my child is? How do I know how much they have learnt?' But the reassurance needs to go out to the parents that no final year exam doesn't mean no assessment."
To change the way children learn in schools, all Primary 1s and 2s will also get more exposure to sports and the arts through their curriculum.
This comes under the new Programme for Active Learning (PAL) where students will have to participate in modular activities in two broad areas – Sports & Outdoor Education and Performing & Visual Arts. These activities will take up to two hours each week.
The broad strokes of these initiatives were announced at the Education Ministry's (MOE) Workplan Seminar last September. Since then, the taskforce led by Ms Fu has held several public consultation exercises to hammer out the details.
The PERI Committee has recommended that 18 new primary schools be built to aid the move towards a single-session structure by 2016. It has also suggested that schools should have the flexibility to decide on their start and end times.
MOE will work with the Land Transport Authority and school bus operators on transportation issues once the recommendations are accepted by Education Minister Ng Eng Hen.
More facilities will also be added for more voluntary welfare organisations (VWOs) to provide student care services.
Ms Fu said: "We have a segment in our society where the children may not have a good home environment to go back to. It could be that their parents are working or they may have problems at home. So the child needs a safe environment in the school where a VWO could help them."
The report by the PERI Committee was the result of discussions with educators and the public.
A lot of public feedback was given to the suggestion to recruit only degree-holders for teaching positions by 2015.
The committee said it recognises the need for MOE to improve the standard of its teaching pool, but it said interest and aptitude should always take priority, no matter how academically brilliant the applicant may be.
And besides plans to beef up MOE's pool of teacher aides, more training will also be given to existing teachers.
- CNA/so
(Article Source: http://www.xin.sg/article.php?article=28313&st=dtl)废除低年级考试 小三生负担或增
29 January 2009 2123hrs
薛淑慧
新传媒新闻报道，小学教育检讨及执行委员会建议教育部，以单元测试来取代小一和小二学生的所有学段考试，受访补习中心大多认为，这并不会减轻孩子的压力，反而会加重他们应付小三考试的负担。
平日下课后，不少小一、小二的学生，除了上补习班，还得参与其他课外活动。
学生说：
“我有去其他地方学英语和华语。”
“有学画画。”
“还有汉语拼音。”
受访补习中心认为，这反映了父母望子成龙，望女成凤的心态，因此即使废除了低年级学生的考试制度，相信仍会有不少父母，继续让孩子上补习班。
小博士教育集团经理蔡玉婷表示，“这里的家长们也明白，也了解到新加坡是个竞争力很强的国家，所以如果不尽早让孩子们补习，孩子们可能追不上。”
业者表示，如果善加利用废除学段考试后所腾出的时间，将有助于小一小二生获得更全面的教育。不过如果处理不当，孩子到了小三时，可能会被考试的压力，压得透不过气。
蔡玉婷说，“会第一次年终考试的压力和更沉重的课程，因为又有增加了科学这个新科目。”
Whiz-Land教育与咨询董事经理约翰帕特认为，“小一小二的课业压力将推至小三，而小三生却没有低年级生应有的备考能力，这将加重他们在小四小五和小六的学习困难和提升试卷出题的挑战。”
受访的业者担心，如果单元测试的次数太频密，这反而会削弱学生对它的重视。再加上如果分数最终没有算到成绩单里头，这反而会减少学生对考试的动力。
小学教育检讨及执行委员会将在今年3月，把最终的报告和建议呈交给教育部。
Second, my personal thoughts:
1) Format adjustments - Bit-sized tests for Primary 1 and Primary 2 students may not be effective because unless bit-sized tests are also introduced throughout the entire primary school systems all the way and abolish PSLE, those tests will not prepare the students for the very different form of learning from Primary 3 to Primary 6. Imagine the chaos when the students who had gotten used to learning bit-sized tests are then to change to textbook based and final exam formats? Nothing has been mentioned about how to help those who may be maladjusted to the system switches at such a young age. It seems that the Ministry of Education just assumes that the students can smoothly transit to a completely different form of learning.
2) Suitability - Bit-sized tests will add even further pressure on the Primary 1 and Primary 2 students because they will have to be constantly at their toes throughout the entire two years to make sure their "continual assessments" are not poorly done to drag down their overall changes.
Of course, proponents say this will be a good way to push students to work hard throughout the year rather than cram for the final couple of months but we are talking about very young students who may not even be getting used to public schools, let alone project work and oral presentations which involves complex team and presentation skills.
3) Training of teachers - It may sound cool to train very young students who are able to form into teams, actively research and present their findings in stunning presentations but are our school teachers properly-trained to know how to handle teams, team-related problems and accurately assess the quality of the research and presentations?
I already have ongoing complaints from people around me that there are problems of free-loaders during project work, conflicts between team members, research being aided by overly-protective parents and marred presentations due to stage fright. Does the Ministry of Education have enough experience in tackling such issues before allowing these new myriad of problems plague those young students?
4) Psychological Barriers - Let's face it - not every student is suitable for teamwork, research work, oral presentations, sports, outdoor education, performing and visual arts. Imagine that kind of psychological strain when students, especially at their nascent study years, start to realize that they may be so far behind those who are exceptionally talented in one or more of those areas.
Of course, one may argue that it is a blessing for the nation to discover the truly talented ones and nurture them from young but what about the average Joe or Jane? Are these students to suffer the possibly self-imposed, peer-imposed, teacher-imposed or parent-imposed sense of inferior complex and start to wane in their interest in being basically educated since they realized their average creative competencies will never be able to match those talented peers?
Are the education system or the school teachers ready and properly-trained to address and dispel such a possible pervasive sense of hopelessness in the average Joe or Jane, or just leave them to their fates as what it is being done now in schools with "bit-sized tests"?
5) Implementation feasibility - Let's look at the infamous workload of teachers in Singapore. If the new proposals go through as being said, teachers will have to provide even more regular updates on the progress of each individual student to their respective parents. My personal thoughts now shift to the following questions: How much more time can we squeeze from the average school teacher away from lesson planning time, lesson time, marking time, department meeting time, CCA time, upgrading time, seminar & workshop time, parent-meeting time to do those regular progress updates?
Are the school teachers trained to properly communicate such minute progresses to the parents who may not understand how such minute progresses work at all? What happens if there is a conflict of opinions about those minute progresses between the teachers and the parents? How much more time and effort are needed to resolve those conflicts and do the Ministry of Education have the means to do so?
To conclude - I think the Ministry of Education has good intentions to vary the education system to make it more interesting and nurturing. But if they try to actualize such a drastic change to these young students without considering the above-mentioned questions, it may actually make things worse.
As of now, schools with such bit-sized tests have already forced students to sleep far fewer hours every night just to make the datelines each week or even every few days and these older students are already suffering from education trauma because they neither have enough rest for their bodies, enough time to digest the information and skills which they might have acquired or enough space to flex those skills because weighing on these bit-sized tests are still the looming shadows of the final exam papers - PSLE, O Levels and A Levels.
Is our education environment, students, teachers and parents even ready for the bit-sized tests at any school level? We seem to be still struggling with no clear solution in sight. Dare we impose such chaos on our young Primary 1 and Primary 2 students?
I hope not.
Monday, October 06, 2008
Treetop Trail Walk, Lazing At Pacific Coffee, MOE "Teach" Career and Networking Session
Treetop Trail Walk:
Upon the recommendation of the Married Soldier, The Changed Man (along with his girlfriend whom I had not found a suitable codename yet) and I went off to the Treetop Trail. I have only heard of it on the newspapers so this is my first visit. We started off at a visitor's center near Telok Blangah Heights and here are some of the photos I took during our trip over the F1 race weekend.
The visitor center was beautiful. Luxuriant with wood finishings and plenty of water features. It feels like some huge condominium clubhouse. Nobody's sitting on those sofas though because the day was very sunny but I like. 
A bridge to nowhere? I think it's meant for the disabled to edge closer to the water to enjoy the scenery beyond. Very picturesque view of the surrounding forested area. I could never imagine such a place in Singapore until I visited it myself. 
The large assembly area of the visitor centre. I particularly like the high wooden roofs and the openness of the views. Very relaxing, especially since the whole bunch of us wanted to escape the noise and smoke of the F1 racing in the city. 
I didn't notice the man in yellow before I quick-snapped this shot. He must be taking the photo of the bridge in the midst of the greenery too. I must admit the bridge seemed like some ordinary pedestrian bridge so I didn't notice how it actually marks one of the stops for the treetop trail. Here we go on the trail now... 
First few moments of the treetop trail reveal a maze-like walkway. There wasn't much to see initially because this stretch of trail is still above the highway roads below but The Changed Man's girlfriend was already jittery because she is afraid of heights since we are walking along metal grilles which one can see through to the bottom. The height above ground is already 8 meters. 
The treetop trail eventually smooths out to much more luxuriant greenery and it was nice and comfortable walking amidst it because you can literally touch the trees right in the middle of the forests. At this point of time, we got used to the height, which was easily 20 meters above ground or more. A pity that few animals and birds were spotted because there was a crowd of people on the trail during the weekend. I even bumped into my secondary school friend who was accompanying her parents there too! 
This was the part where The Changed Man and his girlfriend (who wore slippers) started to tire out. As you can see, the treetop trail started to climb up Telok Blangah Hill gradually and we were only 2.4kilometers onto the supposedly 10km trail. By the time we reached the top, they were too tired to go on and we turned back. I cheerfully suggested that we should come more prepared next time and finish the trail together as a group. I am looking forward to getting up close with nature again. 
Dinner after the treetop trail was settled at IKEA where The Married Soldier was persuading us how delicious the Swedish meatballs (which came topped with jam) was. Whilst we shared the meatballs, I myself ordered a salmon dish which tasted not bad either. The place was crowded though but we enjoyed our dinner after a good 2.5 hour walk on the treetop trail.
Lazing at Pacific Coffee @ Marina Square:
Last Saturday afternoon was spent with The Busy Bee. We ate lunch at a Hongkong food mini-outlet at the basement of Raffles City before we took a short browse through the Marina Square mall. She was looking for some clothes for her friend's wedding but found none suitable there. We eventually propped ourselves down at Pacific Coffee near Marina Square and spent a good part of the afternoon reading away.
We found sofa seats near a strange screen which showed the latest stock market rates as well as weather forecasts for several cities (some of which I have never heard of before) but some on-screen information provided visual relief from reading. The Busy Bee was reading some hedge fund book whilst I was trying to revise the first-aid manual book. 
The Busy Bee was tired from reading after a couple of hours and started to use MSN on her phone and snap photos of the cafe itself. I like the cafe a lot because it's quiet, the people are well-behaved, the sofas are comfortable and the music is soothing. We probably were lucky because moments after we were seated, the place was nearly completely occupied. 
You can see a little bit of me seated opposite The Busy Bee's shot of the cafe. Most of the people were reading quietly at their own seats and you could also see how messy our table was - newspapers, books, drinks, hand phones and stationery.
MOE "Teach" Career and Networking Session:
For the frequent readers of my blog, they would know that I am a tutor so naturally, I would be interested to hear what the Ministry of Education in Singapore has in store for people who love teaching. I wanted to know if there is still a possibility that I can teach in government schools but the session proved to be a disappointment which reinforces my belief that I can function much better as a private tutor rather than as a government school teacher.
Although the session was glamorously held at an esteemed hotel in Singapore, in my opinion, it will probably fail to attract mid-career professionals (it's targeted group) due to the following reasons:
1) The speakers were too young to convince the mid-career professionals that the session was genuinely meant to impress and attract people to teach. I thought they looked amateur at best onstage, stammering away with poor self-confidence and conviction. The most experienced one seemed to harp on her nineteen years of teaching experience even when some of the audience looked probably much more experienced in their line of work than she could ever boast. She kept mentioning "distinguished-looking" as her adjective for describing the audience but never went far to say why, which I thought sounded more like plain flattery.
2) The highest ranking speaker was a Deputy Director but I thought that was not high level enough to attract mid-career professionals to switch their jobs. I thought a Director level or Minister level speaker would have carried more weight and respect to the mid-career professionals who took precious time off to see what the Ministry has to offer/showcase to them.
3) There were Powerpoint presentations attempts to inform and impress that teaching is a good career option for the mid-career professionals but I was bemused by the choice of presentation. Most of these professionals would have seen countless presentations and would have been easily bored by them, no matter how well-made they were. I thought much more would have been achieved if they conducted a Q & A session which would be much better than a confusing networking segment where the venue was too crowded with people, food and noise to be effective. I believe there were so many questions unanswered in the minds of the audience.
4) The session's punchlines were "Changing Lives", "Passion" and "Vocation" but the speakers did not seem qualified to mention "Changing Lives" since they looked too young to be "preaching" about such a principle to the audience (some looked like 50 years old whilst the speakers were mostly 30+). The word "passion" was mentioned at least five times but none of the speeches were even close to passionate (they sounded very measured and well-rehearsed). "Vocation" was used at least twice but the presentation slides were featuring alot more technical jargon and career prospects of titles of teachers which meant nothing to people who genuinely wanted to teach.
To sum up all my grouses, the session was expensively adorned but hollowed out in sincerity and effectiveness. It did not manage to answer my foremost questions -
A) How does MOE intend to reduce the unnecessary workload of teachers so that they could concentrate on teaching and deliverance rather than attending seminars, workshops, course, meetings, projects which will definitely take away much of the 24 hours of each day? One can always wax lyrical about "good time management" but I thought one should look to the root of the common problem faced - what about "realistic time management"?
B) How does MOE intend to reduce the unnecessary enrichment classes/programs of students so that they could concentrate on revising their work and absorbing whatever the teachers are trying to impart without burning out?
To conclude, there is still much room for improvement before MOE can truly attract people who have the real passion to teach (no matter how complex or simple the career track is to them).
Upon the recommendation of the Married Soldier, The Changed Man (along with his girlfriend whom I had not found a suitable codename yet) and I went off to the Treetop Trail. I have only heard of it on the newspapers so this is my first visit. We started off at a visitor's center near Telok Blangah Heights and here are some of the photos I took during our trip over the F1 race weekend.
The visitor center was beautiful. Luxuriant with wood finishings and plenty of water features. It feels like some huge condominium clubhouse. Nobody's sitting on those sofas though because the day was very sunny but I like. 
A bridge to nowhere? I think it's meant for the disabled to edge closer to the water to enjoy the scenery beyond. Very picturesque view of the surrounding forested area. I could never imagine such a place in Singapore until I visited it myself. 
The large assembly area of the visitor centre. I particularly like the high wooden roofs and the openness of the views. Very relaxing, especially since the whole bunch of us wanted to escape the noise and smoke of the F1 racing in the city. 
I didn't notice the man in yellow before I quick-snapped this shot. He must be taking the photo of the bridge in the midst of the greenery too. I must admit the bridge seemed like some ordinary pedestrian bridge so I didn't notice how it actually marks one of the stops for the treetop trail. Here we go on the trail now... 
First few moments of the treetop trail reveal a maze-like walkway. There wasn't much to see initially because this stretch of trail is still above the highway roads below but The Changed Man's girlfriend was already jittery because she is afraid of heights since we are walking along metal grilles which one can see through to the bottom. The height above ground is already 8 meters. 
The treetop trail eventually smooths out to much more luxuriant greenery and it was nice and comfortable walking amidst it because you can literally touch the trees right in the middle of the forests. At this point of time, we got used to the height, which was easily 20 meters above ground or more. A pity that few animals and birds were spotted because there was a crowd of people on the trail during the weekend. I even bumped into my secondary school friend who was accompanying her parents there too! 
This was the part where The Changed Man and his girlfriend (who wore slippers) started to tire out. As you can see, the treetop trail started to climb up Telok Blangah Hill gradually and we were only 2.4kilometers onto the supposedly 10km trail. By the time we reached the top, they were too tired to go on and we turned back. I cheerfully suggested that we should come more prepared next time and finish the trail together as a group. I am looking forward to getting up close with nature again. 
Dinner after the treetop trail was settled at IKEA where The Married Soldier was persuading us how delicious the Swedish meatballs (which came topped with jam) was. Whilst we shared the meatballs, I myself ordered a salmon dish which tasted not bad either. The place was crowded though but we enjoyed our dinner after a good 2.5 hour walk on the treetop trail.Lazing at Pacific Coffee @ Marina Square:
Last Saturday afternoon was spent with The Busy Bee. We ate lunch at a Hongkong food mini-outlet at the basement of Raffles City before we took a short browse through the Marina Square mall. She was looking for some clothes for her friend's wedding but found none suitable there. We eventually propped ourselves down at Pacific Coffee near Marina Square and spent a good part of the afternoon reading away.
We found sofa seats near a strange screen which showed the latest stock market rates as well as weather forecasts for several cities (some of which I have never heard of before) but some on-screen information provided visual relief from reading. The Busy Bee was reading some hedge fund book whilst I was trying to revise the first-aid manual book. 
The Busy Bee was tired from reading after a couple of hours and started to use MSN on her phone and snap photos of the cafe itself. I like the cafe a lot because it's quiet, the people are well-behaved, the sofas are comfortable and the music is soothing. We probably were lucky because moments after we were seated, the place was nearly completely occupied. 
You can see a little bit of me seated opposite The Busy Bee's shot of the cafe. Most of the people were reading quietly at their own seats and you could also see how messy our table was - newspapers, books, drinks, hand phones and stationery.MOE "Teach" Career and Networking Session:
For the frequent readers of my blog, they would know that I am a tutor so naturally, I would be interested to hear what the Ministry of Education in Singapore has in store for people who love teaching. I wanted to know if there is still a possibility that I can teach in government schools but the session proved to be a disappointment which reinforces my belief that I can function much better as a private tutor rather than as a government school teacher.
Although the session was glamorously held at an esteemed hotel in Singapore, in my opinion, it will probably fail to attract mid-career professionals (it's targeted group) due to the following reasons:
1) The speakers were too young to convince the mid-career professionals that the session was genuinely meant to impress and attract people to teach. I thought they looked amateur at best onstage, stammering away with poor self-confidence and conviction. The most experienced one seemed to harp on her nineteen years of teaching experience even when some of the audience looked probably much more experienced in their line of work than she could ever boast. She kept mentioning "distinguished-looking" as her adjective for describing the audience but never went far to say why, which I thought sounded more like plain flattery.
2) The highest ranking speaker was a Deputy Director but I thought that was not high level enough to attract mid-career professionals to switch their jobs. I thought a Director level or Minister level speaker would have carried more weight and respect to the mid-career professionals who took precious time off to see what the Ministry has to offer/showcase to them.
3) There were Powerpoint presentations attempts to inform and impress that teaching is a good career option for the mid-career professionals but I was bemused by the choice of presentation. Most of these professionals would have seen countless presentations and would have been easily bored by them, no matter how well-made they were. I thought much more would have been achieved if they conducted a Q & A session which would be much better than a confusing networking segment where the venue was too crowded with people, food and noise to be effective. I believe there were so many questions unanswered in the minds of the audience.
4) The session's punchlines were "Changing Lives", "Passion" and "Vocation" but the speakers did not seem qualified to mention "Changing Lives" since they looked too young to be "preaching" about such a principle to the audience (some looked like 50 years old whilst the speakers were mostly 30+). The word "passion" was mentioned at least five times but none of the speeches were even close to passionate (they sounded very measured and well-rehearsed). "Vocation" was used at least twice but the presentation slides were featuring alot more technical jargon and career prospects of titles of teachers which meant nothing to people who genuinely wanted to teach.
To sum up all my grouses, the session was expensively adorned but hollowed out in sincerity and effectiveness. It did not manage to answer my foremost questions -
A) How does MOE intend to reduce the unnecessary workload of teachers so that they could concentrate on teaching and deliverance rather than attending seminars, workshops, course, meetings, projects which will definitely take away much of the 24 hours of each day? One can always wax lyrical about "good time management" but I thought one should look to the root of the common problem faced - what about "realistic time management"?
B) How does MOE intend to reduce the unnecessary enrichment classes/programs of students so that they could concentrate on revising their work and absorbing whatever the teachers are trying to impart without burning out?
To conclude, there is still much room for improvement before MOE can truly attract people who have the real passion to teach (no matter how complex or simple the career track is to them).
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
Water Exhibition at Singapore Science Centre
Last Thursday was an interesting day because one of my tuition lessons was converted into a field excursion into Singapore Science Centre. This was actually at the request of a parent who wanted her children to learn about Science first-hand.
One of the exhibits was the Water Barrage where a huge water reservoir will be built at the Marina Bay area in order to store more water and create some water recreational area as well. I was impressed - this is one of the things Singapore did well to plan ahead for and the need will be absolutely crucial.
A nice polar bear exhibit to show how natural water resources are depleted can threaten our survival. I love this shot because of the lighting, making the polar bear looks more life-like. Then again, I am just bragging it myself..hahaha. 
It looks like water, right? It isn't. The illusion is created using undulating glass to form the supposed ripples of the water. Pretty? 
A nice, revolving globe which has moving images on it. This is made possible by four projectors from four corners. It's a cool concept and the globe was one of the most beautiful exhibits on the exhibitions. I will try to remember this exhibit technical layout as an idea if I am to design my own exhibition in the future. 
This was dinner at some Bah Ku Teh place at Kallang with The Busy Bee on last Saturday evening. The soup was really spicy but the pork ribs were delicious and I was completely stuffed by the time dinner was over. The vegetables were fresh and crunchy but the omelette was abit soggy and bland.
Time to bathe. Long day tomorrow for me. Goodnight my blog readers! =D
One of the exhibits was the Water Barrage where a huge water reservoir will be built at the Marina Bay area in order to store more water and create some water recreational area as well. I was impressed - this is one of the things Singapore did well to plan ahead for and the need will be absolutely crucial.
A nice polar bear exhibit to show how natural water resources are depleted can threaten our survival. I love this shot because of the lighting, making the polar bear looks more life-like. Then again, I am just bragging it myself..hahaha. 
It looks like water, right? It isn't. The illusion is created using undulating glass to form the supposed ripples of the water. Pretty? 
A nice, revolving globe which has moving images on it. This is made possible by four projectors from four corners. It's a cool concept and the globe was one of the most beautiful exhibits on the exhibitions. I will try to remember this exhibit technical layout as an idea if I am to design my own exhibition in the future. 
This was dinner at some Bah Ku Teh place at Kallang with The Busy Bee on last Saturday evening. The soup was really spicy but the pork ribs were delicious and I was completely stuffed by the time dinner was over. The vegetables were fresh and crunchy but the omelette was abit soggy and bland.Time to bathe. Long day tomorrow for me. Goodnight my blog readers! =D
Tuesday, July 29, 2008
Literature in English: Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen (Updated on 06-Aug-2008)
This blog post is more for my English Literature students but interested readers who know a bit or two about the book probably will gain some insights from the extracts I am typing from two books that I borrowed. I just thought of sharing these instead of wasting paper printing out pages of pages of notes. After all, we must be environmentally-conscious whenever we can if we want to stick around on the planet.
As the outspoken champion of the perogatives of individual desire, Elizabeth Bennet should jeopardise both the social order, which demands self-denial, and the moral order, which is based on the absolute Christian principles...In fact, Elizabeth's triumph signals the achievement of the balance that characterizes Austen's mature novels, for it is the result, on the the hand, of the gradual transformation of social and pyschological realism into romance and, on the other, of a redefinition of romance.
--- From Mary Poovey, Chapter 6: Ideological Contradictions and the Consolations of Form (2) in Sense and Sensibility and Pride and Prejudice (1994); New Casebooks: pg 101
'Principles' are often merely prejudices, and prejudices simply projects one's own interests on to the shifting scene outside so as to defend and reinforce the self.
--- From Mary Poovey, Chapter 6: Ideological Contradictions and the Consolations of Form (2) in Sense and Sensibility and Pride and Prejudice (1994); New Casebooks: pg 102
Just as her father's defensive intelligence refracts and exaggerates Elizabeth's intellectual 'livliness', so Lydia's wild, noisy laughter helps clarify Elizabeth's 'impertinence'. But perhaps the most important function of Lydia's story derives from its placement. For Austen positions the annoucement of Lydia's elopement so as to precipirate the second, and most important, stage of Elizabeth's education.
--- From Mary Poovey, Chapter 6: Ideological Contradictions and the Consolations of Form (2) in Sense and Sensibility and Pride and Prejudice (1994); New Casebooks: pg 106
Individualism is not simply morally suspect, Austen suggests; it is also based on a naive overestimation of personal autonomy and power. To pretend that one can transcend social categories or refuse a social role (as Mr Bennet does) is not only irresponsible; it also reveals a radical misunderstanding of the fact that, for an individual living in society, every action is automatically linked to the actions of others.
--- From Mary Poovey, Chapter 6: Ideological Contradictions and the Consolations of Form (2) in Sense and Sensibility and Pride and Prejudice (1994); New Casebooks: pg 106
The entailed fortunte which so obviously benefits Mr Collins and so obviously restricts Jane Austen's heroine is merely the epitome of an economic privilege that is granted to men in general and of an economic restriction that is imposed on women, and the details of that privilege and restriction are explicitly recorded throughout the novel. It is the right of Austen's men to have work that pays to to rise through preference and education, and we are directly told who has had access to what.
--- From Judith Lowder Newton, Chapter 7: Women, Power and Subversion in Sense and Sensibility and Pride and Prejudice (1994); New Casebooks: pg 119
Elizabeth too must learn that simplifications are dangerous; both she and Darcy insist on what is only provisional and half-true as final. Of her complacement division of humanity into intricate and simple characters, for example, Elizabeth comes to say, 'The more I see of the world, the more am I dissatisfied with it; and every day confirms my belief of the inconsistency of all human characters, and of the little dependence that can be placed on the appearance of either merit or sense' (pg 135). The irony of the novel's opening sentence lies in its assurance in simplification and generalizations, it's insistence that the local perception is universal, absolute, permanent.
--- From Judith Lowder Newton, Chapter 8: Neccessary Conjunctions in Sense and Sensibility and Pride and Prejudice (1994); New Casebooks: pg 147
The shamelessness of Mrs Bennet's response is both an intellectual and a moral failing. Lydia, educated and admired by her mother, is the best example of Austen's understanding of ingratitude. Lydia...is without shame, unconscious of the suffering and inconvenience she exacts from others...Lydia's blindness is a matter of both the mind and the heart. In her letter of elopement to Mrs Forster - 'My Dear Harriet, You will laugh when you know where I am gone' (pg 291) - she reveals a numbness of preception as well as of feeling.
--- From Judith Lowder Newton, Chapter 8: Neccessary Conjunctions in Sense and Sensibility and Pride and Prejudice (1994); New Casebooks: pg 151 to 152
The world of Rosings is one of meaningless formality, of material luxury and spiritual vacancy, even of ill health. And Charlotte Lucas's life with Mr Collins is not only a 'preservative from want' but a preservative from intelligence, gaiety, and love, an embalmed safety from possibility and the requirement of morality and hope.
--- From Judith Lowder Newton, Chapter 8: Neccessary Conjunctions in Sense and Sensibility and Pride and Prejudice (1994); New Casebooks: pg 151 to 152
Marriage of course spawns other chief acts of life: birth, initiation, and, once again, mating and marriage. The first responsibility of parents is to educate and prepare their offspring for participation in his most central process so that they will harm neither themselves or others. Mr and Mrs Bennet are guilty of not preparing Lydia for mature initiation into this rite. As a result, her marriage is emotionally vacant and economically irresponsible; the narrative review of the three marriages at the close of the novel informs us that the Wickams are freeloaders.
--- From Judith Lowder Newton, Chapter 8: Neccessary Conjunctions in Sense and Sensibility and Pride and Prejudice (1994); New Casebooks: pg 151 to 152
Trade - employed, due form, collect, receipt, buy, sell, business, supply, terms, means, venture.
Arithmetric - equally, added, proportion, addition, enumerate, figure, calculated, amount, amounting, inconsiderable, consideration.
Money - pounds, credit, capital, pay, fortune, valuable, principal, interest, afford, indebted, undervalue.
Material Possessions - estate, property, owner, house, manor, tenant, substantial, establishment, provided, foundation, belongs to.
Social Integration - town, society, civil, neighbourhood, county, fashion, breeding, genteel, marriage, husband, connection.
The general directions of reference taken by Jane Austen's language, as indicated by such list as those given above, are clearly materialistic. They reflect a culture whose institutions are solidly defined by materialistic interests - property and banking and trade and the law that keeps order in these matters - institutions which determine, in turn, the character of family relations, the amenities of community life, and the whole complex economy of the emotions.
--- From Dorothy Van Ghent, On Pride and Prejudice in Pride and Prejudice: A Norton Critical Edition (edited by Donald Gray) (2001) Norton and Company: pg 305
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