My exploration in life… (diary for baby!)

It was been raining for many days in the past week.  The rain has affected quite a few PE lessons we conduct, especially now that we are trying to let students complete the 1.6km run part of the test.  Together with the lack of a proper stopwatch / working lap counter machine, it is not just frustrating for the children, but myself included.

The Chinese (Beijing) visitors had spent five days in our school.  They were not able to show much interest in the lessons as they had to grapple with the English language.  The four students in my english class had witnessed how badly behaved the class was and I’m sure would bring back unfavourable testaments of students in Singapore.

Mum had her birthday yesterday.  We are having a steamboat dinner with EDDIE and HUIJUN later.  My mind, however, is with the impending birth of our second child in a couple of weeks’ time, and the pendular mood swings of our princess…

Wow, a month has quickly passed, ever since I started teaching.  It has not all been a bed of roses (especially on the end of managing the students; but that’s a reality check), but after meeting up with FAIZAL, JIANWEN and MARCUS at the end of last week, I guess I’m very lucky in the great position that I am in.

They spoke about a few of our classmates not being asked to teach any physical education lessons.  I don’t really enjoy teaching PE lessons, but I guess it is so much better than being asked to teach in areas we are not well-versed in, like science, mathematics (for those who took up english), etc.  They spoke about many who have been given quite a few roles / responsibilities; here I am in the school without a confirmed CCA.

Well, I think it’s hard enough to plan and teach, let alone having to handle so many other jobs at the same time.  I really have to hand it to people who can multi-task so successfully, and at the same time, encourage the others who are trying, but staying afloat, albeit barely.

Back at home, YEN is dreading the day that she needs to deliver.  NO!  It’s not that she is detesting our little one already!  It is just that she is having so much undone at work that she hopes to accomplish more before she needs to take a break and recuperate at home.  She is feelign sorry for her poor colleagues, but I guess it cannot be helped now.  All we can hope is that she finds some miraculous way to do more each day with the same 24 hours we have in life.

My precious girl was given another immunisation jab on Wednesday.  RACHEL was so distressed and in so much pain that she cried buckets.  I went to pick my mother and RACHEL up immediately after school to send them home.  She took so long to settle down, my mother told me.  Poor girl!  I hope she understands later that all those things were done for her good!

The past week had seen a flurry of activities in school.  To start off with, my HOD, Mdm CHUNG was out on medical leave the past week.  I wonder if we will go ahead with the NAPFA test this coming week as they had planned earlier.  Even if they do, I wonder how it would be conducted.

I finally got my account at lead.com.  It is a website where the students in my school all log in to for email, assignments, e-lessons, etc.  They even have blogging facilities!  I have started a blog over there too - to write more about work in school especially for my English class.  I hope they will pick up a thing or two from reading the blog I set-up especially for them there.  And that means more of my time is taken up too.  =(  Being a teacher is time demanding, I tell you.

On Tuesday, I brought the P4 class on a social studies trip to Kampong Glam to visit its Malay heritage / roots.  I’m not teaching social studies, but I went in place of the form teacher of the class.  Ok, at least I got to spend some time with the class.  The tour guide for our class commented that I must have "a tough job taking charge of the kids of the class".  Yes, in fact, I do.  Some teachers say that the children will listen to you, "die for you" even, after you win their trust and hearts.  I wonder if I’ll ever get half that chance from this class.

Jobs pile on in school for me.  I suddenly find that I do not have time for quite a lot of things, even though I stay from 7am to about 6pm in school daily.  I struggle to find time to do things.  On separate occasions this week, my Principal and Vice-Principal told me that I am doing well so far, "showing good potential and a bright future" on separate occasions.  I wonder if its really true?  Ha…

I attended reluctantly my graduation ceremony on Thursday at NTU.  We had to report before 9am, were one of the last people (out of 800+ people) to receive our diplomas / certificates, and were allowed off at about 12+pm.  It was a silly event, I still maintain, as we are forced to attend an event we (at least I) do not wish to be present for, pay for the event and waste a day from school (I had things I wished to teach in school).

Sigh.  At least it’s over.  We recieve a pay increment as trained teachers now (less than $150 for me; my classmates without working experience had only at $80 one!) so meagre I can really laugh over.  Ha…  So much for a respectable job with good pay…

I’ve looked through on "Male Baby Names" quite a bit recently - finally decided on the name ‘FELIX’ for our second child.  ‘FELIX’ means ‘cheerful’.  It was painstaking chosen to avoid possible teasing or embarrassment later when the name is read together with my surname.  You know how funny names like ‘CHARLIE LEE’ (read together fast) sound like!

We avoided names that could possibly give others different connotaions of it, as well as names that some famous people already bears the same surname as I (e.g. BRUCE, BRANDON, DICK, etc.).  Selecting a name for your baby is tough work, I tell you.  We have decided to use a hanyu name coined by my mum for our baby, as has how RACHEL got hers.

Second week of the term and my teaching career, I am already a little "disillusioned" after looking at the children’s first ever composition under my wings.  Okay, maybe I shouldn’t expect too much from an average class of a primary four neighbourhood school.  The school works in recent years that there are no examinations for the primary ones, to create a "Happy learning" environment.  But what have they been taught in the previous three years??

I’m not launching an attack on the school or their previous teachers, don’t get me wrong here.  I just wonder what has been done, what has been absorbed by them, was it some miracle that they got so far to where they are today…

They wrote without linking their ideas together, with most using wrong tenses most of the time.  Sigh.  Quite a bit of work to be done, seriously!  I hope to do as much as I can for them, at least until the end of the year…

I’m happy to announce that the first week of my teaching career at ZHANGDE PRIMARY SCHOOL has passed without big incidents.  I’ve met and taught the classes that I am to teach - 1 P3, 1 P4, 2 P5 and 2P6 classes.  For the record, I’m teaching one of the P4 classes English and I teach Health Education to all classes that I teach PE for.

No big incident to note - as I’d expected, the P6 classes are a little defiant and dificult, the P3 class can make you a hero over little instances.  I have a P4 boy who has learning dificulties - he can hardly express himself in speech or writing (I hear from the form teacher that she is trying to transfer him out of the school) whom I will try to work closely with (if he allows himself to learn).

My HOD, Mdm CATHERINE CHUNG, was not around the whole week as her grandmum passed away at the end of the last week.  Her absence left me to fend for myself for the whole of the week.  Or perhaps, her absence was a good thing as I was left alone to do my things and find out more alone.  Nevertheless, I have yet been told of the CCA I’ll be helping out in (I stood in for cultural dance last week!).  It’ll probably be table-tennis (duh!) that I’ll be helping out due to the retirement of one of the teachers.  We’ll see…

I finally put the "height chart / ruler" that I had bought earlier, up.  RACHEL stood beside it and she measured 80cm tall!  (I can use "tall" now as she is standing and walking; ha!)  And YEN told me that our 34-week-old unborn was already 1.8kg heavy in her stomach.  I cannot believe that time has passed so fast - we’re going to have a second child in less than 2 months!  =)

It’s holiday for me tomorrow - YOUTH DAY.  It’s been years since I’ve enjoyed a Youth Day holiday!  Dates back to the time when I was 16 and still in Secondary School!  I’m glad I have more time to spend at home with RACHEL and to prepare for my lessons for the coming week.  And of course, more time at home with YEN over the precious weekend!