Have a friend who doesn’t speak English well and seek help from to deal with this U***** Home agency at katong. Since Apr 08, this agency has been providing her with lousy indo maids, either steal things or doesn’t have personal hygiene (so bad that the entire family has food poisoning). After 3 switches, she decided to change agency for ‘better’ luck. Thus, she requested the agency to pay back the insurance amt for the 3 maids which is abt $500. Till now, she haven’t got back a single cent despite the insurance company told her that the amt has been settled and returned to the agency, but the person-in-charge from agency has been telling her the amt is pending for approval from the insurance company.

Such a pain, think we’ve to seek help from CASE to deal with them.

Hoping to get a 2nd hand U1 or U2 yamaha piano, any lobang, let me know. Thanks!

Due to distance and convience, thought if sending my k2 boy to Han Language at kovan, it’s seems that this school is not very popular in this forum. Mind to share any experience with Han Language?

Hi


My boy started with CMA in may 08 (K1)…once he’s in the class he started with simple addition using abacus and mental calculation. The teacher will normally brief the parent on the formula or method before the class so that you can help her if she encounters any problem at home. To my boy’s feedback, they’ll do work throughout the class, no time to ‘wander’ around, so I guess it’ll be difficult for your gal to feel restless!
Each session is 90mins and they revised the fee from $22 to $25 per session last Oct. Have swtiched my boy to twice-a-week classes so the fee is $18 per session. Anyway, if you’re keen, can always go down and have a look at the place. Look for May, she’s the administrator and a very nice lady to talk to…oh ya, you have to go down after 7.15pm in the weekday coz the class is from 7.30-9pm. My boy’s info (check if you can get discount)

Nicholas Tay
ID: 0050206

Any good music school to recommand in kovan/hougang area? My son has been with My Music Inspiration for 1 year, per individual piano lesson is $30 for 45min. He’s doing ok except that there’s no much feedback from the teacher, I don’t really have any idea how’s his progress (am not musically trained) and he doesn’t seem to have much interest in playing at home. I want him to embrace music as something that he will enjoy in his later part of life…doesn’t seem like the teacher is installing this interest or motivation in him. In fact, I often heard her raising her voice at the kids for not ‘memorising’ the notes for their theoratical homework. Now pondering am I paying too much for him to this kind of exposure?

Just to share my experiences…have started my boy in a cc abacus class, initial idea is to let him try out the class coz he’s K1 at that time and worried that he may not be able to cope. It was a BIG mistake! The cc teacher is loud and fierce, the class size is abt 15 and rowdy, and due to different level (and age) of students in that particular class, my son is the youngest and often gets neglected or even ‘bullied’ by his classmates.

After 2 weeks of his constant begging, I’ve decided to stop his class. Then a friend recommanded me to CMA at Kovan, it’s a total different scenario. The teachers are so much more friendly. The class size is abt 10 per session with normally 2 teachers in the class. The person-in-charge is personally coaching the students as well. Feedback will be given to the parents before or after each session, whr your kid is coping well, how to coach them on a particular formula or when they have to start on a new book. More importantly, my boy who has been there for 10 months now is enjoying his classes and he can do addition/substraction up to hundreds. Ha, now I very relaxed with his school work, only need to spend time doing english writing and chinese with him at home.

Thanks for your comments! Have surveyed a few PCFs around my area, and my gosh, they’ve very different syllabus and learning environment! Some teachers can’t even communicate well enough to convince me to put my child there and some places are really old and doesn’t look ‘clean’. So far the best one I’ve seen is the one at Serangoon North Ave 1, it’s one of the premium PCFs (anyway there’re only 3 in s’pore). They’re more academically inclined compared to the rest. Spelling and tingxie started in K1 and they’ve extra speech & drama classes from Julia Gabriels…I’m quite happy with the environment too, they’re clean and new. Will bring my son there tomorrow to see the place, hope he likes it!

Hi all


Can anyone recommand a good PCF at serangoon area? How do I find out which one is a ‘premium’ PCF? My son is in K2 and is currently with a childcare center…but the school is not very academically inclined, so far, they have no plans to let the children have spelling or tingxie. Guess their focus is ‘teach less, learn more’. But I must say that the children are very well exposed to current affairs and environmental issues, in fact, they have bi-weekly projects to submit based on different topics. Well, guess you can’t have the best of both worlds, due to budget constraint, need to pull him out and put him into a kindergarden.