french toast with banana @ Hong Kong Cafe. i was rather intrigued by how my friends' hands formed the background for this picture

then, i went to bishan library and flipped through a couple of photography books

one book detailed pictures of the photographer's shadow juxtaposed against interesting objects, of which the most memorable was a house which had letters on its roof spelling "God Bless America". what a cool concept. i thought it was an interesting way to ponder the impact the surroundings had on him and vice versa. occasionally, his shadow was also superimposed on the shadows of other objects.

another book explored the process in which Taiwanese men chose Vietnamese women as their brides. the "stoned" looks of the women were saddening and rather disturbing to watch. i scanned through it to see whether there were photos of them smiling. there were.

i then wondered what prompted them to be relaxed and smile.

maybe that's the motivation of this photographer bah.

i guess there has to be a larger purpose that the photographer gathers strength from, some unique point of view s/he wishes to share with the world.

maybe during the upcoming school holidays, i should get down to pestering people to pose in front of my camera, with their middle finger obstructing their face. i have two such photos already (though i secured them by accident) and it would be nice to collect more. it's sad that i have to restrain myself from posting one of them since i am sure that kenny won't be too pleased. haha.

something universally understood, something ambiguous, something provocative, something not necessarily offensive, something that is unique

yah, i know lar. people will say that i am siaoz. but 人，因为梦想而伟大。

i

Actually, i feel more than a tinge of self-doubt. what makes me think that these photos are good enough for the competition? and this attempt doesn't exactly come cheap. $5 per Super 8R photo. my gosh.

but i guess all i can is try. since i really hope the photo of my boys is deemed good enough.

here goes.....:P

In an attempt to avoid a didactic mode of instruction, I got my students to draw the three significant events in their lives so that they would be attuned to how they use the English language to describe their feelings towards certain things. I also hoped to foster cohesiveness within the class. Here's a memento of the class after a fun-filled two-hour lesson.

Yishun Junior College organised a Heritage Hunt for J1 students. In the midst of scurrying around for answers, some YJCians took the time out to enjoy a steaming hot bowl of beancurd at the famous stall in Rocher Road. It was a memorable experience savouring the quietness together in the back alley, marred only by our admiration of the interesting graffti drawings.

Chong Boon Secondary School students concentrating intently and giving their best performance---a neat way of celebrating our nation\'s birthday and making the arts accessible for Teck Ghee Community Centre residents at the same time

**********

okay, i'm running out fast of photos and imagination.

2nd entry to singaporealbum.sg

Rathi (the gal in the dark blue tee) was kind enough to invite her class (and tutor) to her house for an intimate post-Deepavali celebration. Before we left her house, I initiated that we take class photos for remembrance.
For my last attempt, I instructed my students not to smile at the camera and exude a cool exterior. While most of them did so, some continued to beam at the camera. Perhaps they were having so much fun that they could not quite adjust facial expressions on short notice. Or maybe they just did not listen to instructions :P

*******

dinner with shenglong and samuel. the former was agonising about whether he would be promoted; the latter was admirably imperturbable about the likelihood of not making it.

i didn't want to keep telling them that "you'll deal with it when it comes. play while it lasts" because they should ventilate some of their apprehensions. it's sad that not all my students would make it to J2. not that i think being retained is necessarily bad but because of the crushing blow it would deliver to their self-esteem.

i am very happy to teach 114 and 125. i hope that i have taught you certain things in the few months that we have spent together and that you may find certain skills/techniques useful in your future endeavours. i regret that i had neither the time to teach you more things nor the experience to perhaps teach certain things more effectively. i am drained by PW but am warmed by the times we chionged for WR in the computer lab.

i am but a small fry and my opinion doesn't count but regardless of how angry you may have made me at times, you are worth so much more as a person in my eyes. and if you don't make it, i hope you look past the humiliating (?) fact of repeating J1 and believe it yourself.

With advancements in technology, schools have been incorporating new instructional methods such as datalogging so as to create more authentic and meaningful learning experiences for students. Here, 5 students from Chong Boon Secondary School smile gamely with their MultiLog Pro dataloggers, eager to utilise them as learning tools.

********
posted this to singaporealbum.sg in my quest to assemble a portfolio of published work

They grow up pretty fast, don't they?

Not too long ago, they were lazily suckling milk from their mother. Now, they are all eager to explore the world.

I just realised that the black kitty has been adopted. it's kinda sad. i didn't have a chance to say goodbye.

i realised belatedly about the final submission of WR.

when i broke the news to 125, i felt so lousy that i almost lost it.

multi-tasking right before their promos? how can?!

what with anger management issues and now this, PW is turning me into quite the emo creature. haha.

**********

happy 14th birthday, chiahao!
regret that i couldn't spend more time with you and the crappies



okay, the black kitten is growing on me.

***********

me: even if you work on WR during the weekend, you also won't be able to make substantial improvements to it. so, it's time to let go.

114 peeps: wahhhhhhhhhhhh (as if i had uttered something profound)

i think i'm getting to be preachy

***********

me: wah, shameless

zf: learn from you one

me: huh? how so?

zf: that's the last thing you wrote on the whiteboard before you left

ch: yah. yah

me: (stirred by some distant memory) oh yah hor. what did i write before the "shameless"?

zf: (confidently) be effectively bilingual like ME

it would be tragic if the crappies remember nothing about adjective and adverbial phrases but the way i bragged about my proficiency in languages. haha

Introducing Lele junior!

and showcasing the diverse talents in YJC:

coursework that this student handed in as part of A levels. well, this spoke to me.

don't limit scope to S'pore

i have lost count of the times i have scribbled this comment

one student thinks that her english is sucky

when i was marking her essay for P1, i realised that it wasn't half bad. admittedly, she could have stuck to the 4 + 2 format, instead of just giving one counter-argument. admittedly, she could have elaborated more so as to score points for depth. admittedly, she could have tried to use a variety of sentence structures and vocabulary to score higher for language

but it was a respectable attempt. to make such an improvement in 3 months is commendable.

of course, i don't profess that her improvement is due to my efforts. though i would like to believe that my drilling of the 4 +2 format and one paragraph = one main idea helped somewhat. shameless, haha. but i kinda stared in awe at her script, feeling really proud of her progress

isn't this the purpose of me being here?

*******
on a side note, as cheena as i am, i really miss having dyed hair


i wonder how these kids are doing...

it's nice to be part of the community of YJCians who are besotted with the 4 kittens

Ooooooohhhhhhh, soooooooooo cute!

i think i have effectively burnt all bridges with 114.

haha.

i can empathise the stress they're grappling with and they certainly need no crap from me

but seriously, how can you expect me not to get angry when you leave your writing of the WR the night before submission?

when you want me to grant you such a generous deadline, obviously i expect you to work at it consistently so that your draft is respectable rather than something hastily scribbled so as to get it over and done with

when you can unabashedly give me lame excuses like "oh, saras's internet access is down. i couldn't get a copy"

i guess on hindsight, i ought to assume some responsibility since i didn't explicitly tell saras' group my expectations. then again, aren't such expectations obvious? isn't it tragic if i need to spell them out for you?

or i suppose Attitude reflects leadership and i am just not a good teacher since i'm sure they would never have given Jennifer Liou such crap

perhaps but i am v v angry. i have never been so angry in my life

so angry that i didn't have the mood to mark my scripts

so angry that i couldn't even scold them properly because i wasn't thinking straight. which means that they probably resent me rather than learn something from this episode

sigh. i think the only saving grace from this saga is that i realise the depths of my anger (melodramatic. haha) so that for subsequent incidents, i will be able to conduct myself with dignity and make them learn something

odds and ends

having marked some not-very-promising/uninspiring/soul-sapping essays so far, i feel all the more determined to whip my new students into shape right from the start so that they would not suffer

zf and ch wish to treat me to a belated birthday dinner. whether it will materialise is immaterial

i received a motivational(?) card from guanz. put a smile on my face

i took some lackluster photos of the 4 kittens of YJ. i need to try again



i am daydreaming about my dec vacation spot. which means i have more or less adjusted to life in YJ

am i a nice teacher? i wonder

would my current state of mind be different if i were posted to another school? if so, how?

there's karaoke and there's KARAOKE

and today was KARAOKE

it's hard to come across a karaoke group who knows more or less the same songs and can sing (shout?) together (in somewhat unison) with reckless abandon

年轻真好. 真的

yesterday was an interesting day. though the bits that made it interesting seemed quite fragmented

i don't pretend to be cultured and refined but since i like to take photographs of beautiful things, i got down to exploring just what Singapore biennale 2006 was all about

turned out that this photographer Yim Chee Peng was holding an Aesthetically Yours, Singapore exhibition at the National Library. He was giving out free copies of his photo book because he had very generous sponsorships from this Lippo Group. like, woah lar!

i gasped when i saw this photo because i thought this had a lot of 意 境. and since this photo was placed at the last of his book, well my judgement about what makes a memorable photo seems spot-on. haha. anyway, it's nice to see my affinity for this photo aligned with the preferences of the photographer/editor/layout designer?

luckily, it was raining. so this photo is slightly more interesting. haha.

this is Cosmic Orphans. i found it weird how this man dressed in business suits stood out against the rest. and as far as i can tell, he was the sole representative of urban people. i wonder why.

and on to my favourite photo of the day:

meet li ping, another of my ex-students from CBSS. she looked quite sweet in this photo hor. usually, she is a 小辣椒. and i should really start to cultivate a habit of marking students' assignments at home so that i would not chance upon chongboonitez who would inevitably go, "mr heng, what u doing? v loser leh. mark scripts."

*******

I have been mulling over this idea for the longest time:

give students a few articles on National Identity, and get them to explore Singapore and snap photos that would represent their take on "What it means to be Singaporean"/"Is there a Singaporean culture?". Captions that add on value to their photos would of course boost their Daily Work grades as well

yesterday was the day in which i decided that i would do it for my new batch of students next June, devil may care.

huh? Mr Heng? why photos? can do other things or not?

would you rather write essays or take photos? am i your teacher or are you my teacher? and since i like photography, you will do what i say or NO DW grades.

*evil laughs*