Perhaps it is a 'rewarding' career after all??

"Why choose teaching as a profession?" the interviewer asked me five years ago at my job interview.  I had a ready (well thought through) answer.  I wanted to impact and influence the lives of children, who I believe can make changes to contribute to the society, to become useful persons.  Five years later, after withdrawing myself from the ministry, how much of that has changed?

Not too much, I guess.  After all, I am not a hypocrite, to have said things I did not believed in, just to clinch the job.  That's why I am still in the profession.  It is just that I have changed my employer, the environment.  The target audience is still the same - students.

Some, like my good buddy Wilson's mother, have went on and on to share with me the joys of teaching, on how rewarding a career it would be.  I guess it would be one, but was just not too sure if I would stay sane enough to reap the rewards of the seeds I sow.  I mean - I will have to wait years - and I emphasise, YEARS - to have an inking of my former students' success in life, for them to grow up and have their own jobs and families...

The first wave of rewards, perhaps, is usually from the parents.  Their commendations, their praises, their thanks - the first sign of whether you have taught, or not, to their children.  Before you get turned off here, I just want to quantify again that this is not my avenue of self-glorification, of narcissism.  No, just a reflection of things in life...  Back to the subject at-hand...

My students may remember me telling them, borrowing a phrase, "I am not teaching you how to pass your examinations and tests; I am teaching you how to 'fish', so that you will not starve when you are on your own in future..."  I am not sure how many of them understood what I meant when I told them what I said, but I sincerely hope they will 'see the light', sooner rather than later.

I do not think I am that likeable to my students as an English language teacher (they could like my Physical Education lessons, though).  Thus, I have not, in my short span of three years as a teacher in school, received many notes of thanks and appreciation.  However, I am always happy when parents of my students tell me, in the form of verbal confrontations, text messages, emails or letters, that their children love to be in my class and have been learning a lot from me.  Or they could just thank me for my effort I had put in.  That is enough for me.

One of my former students' parents did more than that this morning.  Mrs Chew, mother of Sherman, called me up the previous night to ask me to meet her as she had something to pass to me.  It was, she said, some chocolates / sweets for my children, in appreciation for the time I had spent working with Sherman on my own free will.

You see, I had planned to leave the ministry some time ago and this year, I just thought I wanted to do more for some of my students.  I approached two of them - Qishun and Sherman - and asked them if they were interested in doing some additional work in English language with me.  They were both my students in my maiden year as a form teacher in 2008, P4 Robin.  Why them?  Were they THAT poor in the language, you might ask?  Were they financially poor that they cannot afford tuition lessons?  No, on the contrary, they were my number two and three in the class at the end of that year.  I asked them as I thought they are very hardworking and driven, and should benefit with an extra adult looking at their work with them.

Why not other students?  Was I not being fair?  You see, I did not close off all doors to other students.  If any student were to approach me to ask me why I was being unfair and doing extra with only these two, I would have invited them to join us with open arms.  I asked the two of them merely because I believed that they would want me to 'do some work' with them.  I gave them extra work - on top of those that they have been given in school and at tuition - and they completed the work faithfully almost everytime I asked them to, giving me no excuses for anything that would have thwarted their attempts to complete work I asked them to do.

We had our weekly, two-hour session in an open area of the school while I was still a member of the school I was teaching.  From June, we had our sessions in Tiong Bahru Plaza.  Thankfully, we were not chased out by the management and staff at the Burger King there.  We were not distracted by the people or things around us.  The sessions were enjoyable.

I received a text message from Sherman's mother, saying that she wanted to pass me something as a form of their gratitude to me for having 'tutored' their son.  I did not ask, neither did I expect to receive anything, so I did not know what to expect.  I met them at the front gate of the school this morning and spoke to them.  They expressed their thanks for my having helped their son for nothing, and spending my 'personal' time.  It left a warm feeling in my heart, knowing that we had done the best we could in our circumstances for Sherman, and I could recognise the unconditional love in Mr and Mrs Chew.

I had not spent time doing extra 'work' with the two boys for the bag of sweets that came from Japan.  I had not done them for money (though it would have helped me financially...).  It was, perhaps, the joy of teaching, the smile that I hope to see on the faces of the children and their parents come next week, or for something more meaningful they were going to do later in life.

Mega-memory (not!)

“Daddy!  Did you remember to ask about Kayleen’s uniform for their play-school?”  Yen checked with me casually (well, it sounded casually at first!) just the other day.  I forgot.  I provided some silly excuse, about how the neighbouring squirrel in the play-school’s compounds distracted me…  “And where is the lunchbox that was used to contain their breakfast?” I almost choked.  Left in play-school!  How can someone so muddle-headed and forgetful be left alone to take care of three children?

True enough, I shall have to admit that memory work is not one of my strengths.  Tell me something and I’ll forget about it fifteen minutes flat later.  Serious.  But ‘To err is with human’, right?  We are bound to make errors.  It is just that mine are more glaring when it comes to recalling things. 

Friends schooled in psychology will tell you that ‘forgetting’ is an area of research as well, as will Wikipedia.  It explained that it may be due to something that has not been done before – that is somewhat new to us – that we may not be able to commit to memory (I cannot say I had never done this breakfast thing with them before!).  Or it may be that we were ‘disturbed’ by other things when we were trying to remember something (in my case – the squirrel).  Worse, it is the work of a greater illness, like dementia or something!

Dementia?  No!  According to a website, there is no cure for it at this moment and “it is currently not possible to restore brain cells affected by the disease”.  How do we avoid dementia then?

Our very own Health Promotion Board recommends taking fruit, vegetables, cocoa, etc. to improve blood flow and protect brain tissues.  Of course, we have to keep thinking and moving.  Makes sense as staying thoughtless probably aids one in going senile.


Food for thought.  Mull over it.  I'll catch up with you later, after I sip a nice cup of coffee studying why the squirrel can run along a barbwire without getting itself injured.

Mountains of bills!!

I did not think I had to stay with Kayleen in play-school this morning.  The energetic girl took little time to settle into play-school and was even waving goodbye to me without any trace of ever wanting to turn back when she was led to her class area by her elder sister.  That gave me a little 'me' time (like what my friend Nancy called it) to sort out the odds and ends at home.

The first task without children around was one that was long-overdue.  The document tray in our study looked badly overloaded, like another piece of document or letter placed on it will cause it to fall apart and crumble anytime.  There was a hill, no - a mountain, of documents waiting for me to file up over the past ten months.  Okay, I was over-exaggerating here.  But you get the idea.

This is only a 'part' of the mess I created this morning

A couple of hours into it only saw me managing to sort them out by category.  Of course, I never fail to side-track and manage to start a new Excel spreadsheet to track my family's expenses using the bills.  I have to constantly keep my expenses and monies in check.  Rising costs and growing children...  Parents can attest to what I have mentioned here!

SingTel bill, StarHub bill,  Singapore Power bill...  whoa!  We spent excessively on water and electricity that month...  Can I scrimp on my SCV and power usage in the house?  Is there a better plan, or one that would suit my uses better?  What sort of insurance policies have I bought for my mother, wife and children?  Are they enough??  Sigh...  All these go through my mind during my tidying up.  They all mean money out of the pocket (or bank, if you use GIRO).

But I digress.  Three hours in, I have yet to accomplish my tidying.  *Gasp*  There is another part to go...  have to complete everything before my children return and re-mess up the mess!

Kayleen's first day at play-school

It is the time of our children’s lives again – the first day of school!  Yes, it is just play-school, and we have two previous experiences earlier in Rachel and Felix, so everything should be a breeze for Kayleen’s first day at play-school.  Or is it?

I was lulled into complacency.  A false sense of belief that we have everything that Kayleen might need two weeks before her scheduled entrance into The Little Skool-House (On-the-Hill).  She must have everything that is needed!  She can always get things from hand-me-downs…  It was Yen who pressed urgently for us to get Kayleen a new bag and waterbottle days before the past Monday that jolted me back into reality.  That sprang us into action over the past weekend, before we finally settled on a ‘Minnie Mouse’ pink bag and a ‘Barney’ bottle that she could readily identify.

As of our elder princess and prince, who had Yen to accompany them and ensure that they would gel into the play-school and its environment, Kayleen had, well, yours truly.  Not her obvious choice, I am sure, but the play-school was probably glad that I had come as Kayleen did not cling on to me that much.

She was oblivious to the change from norm - she needed to follow us in the morning on her first day.  She explored the toys around upon reaching the ‘Toddler’ class activity area and showed no signs of not being used to the place at all.

Kaleen experienced many ‘first’s this day – attending play-school, playing in the midst of a class, as well as playing with paint.  That is something we have not tried giving our children due to the mess that comes along with the fun.  Kayleen took all these in good stride, I guess, from the look of things.

Lunch was a chore as she has only developed four teeth – the two upper and lower front ones.  That, and the fact that she had always been pampered and fed at home gave the teachers an additional task during her meal-time.  I stayed with her until a quick bath and nap.  Kayleen had trouble napping initially.  Perhaps it was due to the fact that she normally slept at two-plus.  Or perhaps I was around.  So I left the premises of the play-school a little before midday to try letting her gain her independence from family.

By the time I returned, she had awoken and on seeing me, Kayleen stretched out her arms to me, signalling that she wanted me to carry her.  Smart lass!  Thinking of home already!  Unfortunately, her elder siblings had enrichment programmes (in the form of some gymnastics class) and I had to leave her wanting.  Sigh!

By the time we were ready to go at five, she had attended her first full-day at play-school.  She was probably excited to see Yen when we made a stop to pick Yen up.  At home, she was quite normal too.  All things bode well for day two at play-school, the beginning of her few years here…  =)

An eye-opening weekend with a Volkswagen Golf

"Call in now for your chance to win a weekend-drive with a Volkswagen..." Sounded interesting enough!  I had never driven a Volkswagen car before this...  Why not try?  I called in on the cue and after a few tries, and I got through!  The Flying Dutchman from Class 95FM asked me a simple-enough question on the Volkswagen after I had sent my wife to work and children to play-school.  That happened a couple of weeks ago and I won the chance for a weekend drive for a Volkswagen car!

Luck would have it that there was some communication error between the radio deejay and me, and he did not get my contact number down clearly enough.  I was wondering if the whole episode was a dream as I had not received any telephone call from anyone a couple of weeks after 'winning' the contest over the air?  A couple of weeks later, I was checking my email (which I sometimes have the tendency not to check regularly) and found that the good people at Volkswagen Singapore had been waiting for me to give them my contact number via email!  Ha, I still had the chance for the drive!

I have to confess that I had thought I won the chance to drive a Beetle for a weekend.  I knew there were quite a few models (I found out that there were a total of 28!) of Volkswagen cars, but I was perhaps believing in what I was hoping for more than anything!  Ha!  I only found out later that it was a Golf I had won the chance to drive.  I was not really disappointed.  I mean - it was still a prestigious Volkswagen car I was going to drive!

Visiting the Volkswagen centre in Leng Kee Road for the first time on the day I ws to pick the car up, I was in awe.  It was not just big, but rather, it was humongous!  It had more than enough 'leg-room' to display the many models of cars they had to showcase, spick-and-span and very high-tech!  It had a cafe for its prospective customers to enjoy a cuppa, tipping the scales towards buying a car with the brand.  Awesome!

The lady who came to help me with claiming the drive, Ms Choo, was very friendly and helpful too!    Though I was not there on the premise of buying a car, she did not make me feel like I needed to be obliged to do so.  Ms Choo handed me a little goodie-bag (nice gesture from Volkswagen) and got the relevant paperwork done with me within minutes.  Efficient!

Ms Choo brought me up to the centre's roof where my 'prize' was parked.  I liked what I saw - the light-blue hatchback glimmered against the hue of the evening sun.  She went through every detail I needed to know about the car and made me feel at ease with everything.  I was thoroughly sold-on the grandeur of the vehicle and its interior that made me feel at ease the moment I set-foot in it!  Ms Choo gave me contact numbers I needed, in case I needed to call anyone (touch wood!).  Finally, the drive!

First stop, I went to pick Yen and my elder children up.  They liked the exterior of the blue car I drove there.  Yen got in the passenger's seat and felt the same way that I did - the dashboard of the car looks very nice!  Futuristic but not over-the-top, the user-friendly display won our hearts hands-down.  When I got it on the road, she liked the smooth acceleration, the seemingly "uninterrupted gear-changes" - the way Class 95's Glenn Ong put it.  Unlike some cars, the car did not produce any noise during gear changes  Smooth!

Oh, I haven't mentioned how light the doors were, that my four-year-old elder princess and three-year-old prince found no trouble in handling?  It gives me a very sturdy and comfortable feel - my children fell asleep a little past ten minutes into the drive from East Coast to our place in Jurong West, and they were not awokened by any bump or rough jerks the car might have made along the way.  Great comfort!

I could not wait to hear the review from my brother, Eddie, when we went to our old place in Clementi in a proposed meeting between us and our long-time neighbours.  Being a previous car-dealer, he was impressed by the Golf's performance considering it was only a 1.2L.  The car had a 'Sport' mode, kind of like a 'Cruising' mode - I guess - that maximised fuel economy too.

The drive these few days has given me a very good impression of the car with its new TSI engine.  It brought smiles to my my and children.  I would seriously consider purchasing the car if I had to change our family WISH years later...

Investing for children

It takes a village to raise a child.  In my case, the village needs to work hard to raise not one, but three adorable children.  Where do I find help for my village?

Being in school earlier and still in the education sector, I understand the importance of being literate.  I feel sad for children who fail to master reading.  That aside, for children who do not understand what they are reading too.  Sigh.  I made a mental note years ago when Rachel was an infant that I had to teach her, and teach her well.  The same goes for the other of my children.

Though I took a pay cut to join teaching, struggling to make ends meet when I was a trainee teacher, especially, I willingly spent on my children.  This was the same, I reckon, of any parent who love their child(ren).  Clothes, toys, dispensables, etc...  It takes a huge amount, really.  Then it came to books.

Books are a must.  Sure, they can borrow from friends, from school or from the library later.  The interest-building starts now.  Parents have to read to children, research says, from the time the child is in the womb.  Then, we have to continue to read to them, to excite them with the colourful pictures and interesting storylines, with the way we make characters come to life with our reading.  Having said that, I have started to build my own collection of books for them, from young until they are much older.  Here is the result:

Do not call me a 'kiasu' parent.  I just want them to be as savvy and educated, if not more, as other children.  I want to build up some wealth of knowledge in them of nature and science, in fairy tales and ficitional titles, of the real world and fantasy world.  I invested in this series of encyclopedia, good enough I hope, to last them through their primary education at least.

How can they understand the books, you ask?  Well, I have categorised the books according to their difficulty, and told my elder two darlings which they are able to read on their own for now.  The other books, I told them, will be for later, when they go to kindergaten and beyond.  If they need help with the books, Yen and I are around for them.  That's why I took on my current job to be with them in the day after they return from play-school...

In the meantime, I have to do some financial planning.  I need to plan on which courses I can send them to for their learning and increasing their experiences...

Leaving teaching in school

Felix vomitted on Sunday after lunch and was not quite his usual self the rest of the day.  He was having runny-nose on the day itself but he was his bubbly self before the food-spewing incident.  We took his temperature and found him to be slightly feverish.  It meant that he was not going to play-school the next day.

Since I was officially having my holidays (makes me feel like a student!) from Monday, I took on the task of caring for him, just as any parent who could afford to do so, on Monday.  After sending Yen and Rachel off, I returned home to find Felix watching television programmes on Disney Channel in the licing room with Kayleen.  He ran to embrace me, a pitiful look on his face.

I decided to take him downstairs for a walk.  He was excited.  I did not have to change him as he was found to have wet his bed slightly earlier and had been changed out of his pyjamas.  We put on our shoes and wandered aimlessly around the neighbourhood.  It was in my mind that he should get a little bit of exercise and not get cropped up at home.  We came to a playground and he was enthralled about playing there.

I let his hand go.  Watching Felix run off to the playground was a relief to me, seeing his off-colour form before.  He played, though not too confidently, merrily.  Felix did not throw tantrums when I told him we were moving off.  I was thinking of exploring the neighbouring estates a little and told him we were looking for more playgrounds.
"We play at new playground?" the angelic-faced boy asked, not bothering to try contain his excitement.  I nodded.  How could I refuse him in that state and time?

We played at a few and I called the shots for time to have breakfast.  At the coffeeshop, his less-enthusiastic self returned.  Only a glass of milo made him feel a little better.

We got home, bathed, did colouring together on a much unused colouring book.  Felix was so happy and proud that we finished colouring a page together, as a team.  I was tired and told him that daddy want to take a nap.  "I sleep here," he pointed and lay beside me.  He did not need much coaxing and fell asleep beside me shortly.  We woke to my mother returning with Kayleen from the supermarket and had lunch.

My younger two children watched a little bit more of Playhouse Disney after the late lunch and we went to fetch Yen and Rachel.  Felix repeated a couple of times proudly that we had coloured a page and he was going to show his mother when they returned home later.  I smiled behind the wheel.

This was a happy day I had.  One that I had probably left the ministry for when I parted ways with them in June.  A life of less stress, less worries, less answering for to other children's parents which mostly I had no idea of was happening.  One that I can be more involved in with my own children.  I definitely do not want to look back ten / twenty years later and lament that I should have been there with them.

My wife sees me more too.  Though I work daily (with the exception of public and school holidays), I can definitely be more involved in our children's lives and on the weekends.  Though I do not work on weekends previously, I still had to plan and prepare for the next week's lessons for school.  Now, I leave marking mostly for time when our children are in play-school on weekdays.  I am finding more space to breathe and time for myself, possibly to pick up on a few peeves.  I think I have made the right-choice of leaving the ministry, for the sake of my family.  =)