foreverj:ponyo:Hi foreverj,
honestly, when I was choosing a school for my kid, I had some fears too if I was making the right choice. Thank God I knew some mums in church whose kids were already in the school and when I spoke to the kids, they told me they loved school. One even cried when she had to miss school when she was sick. How's that for a testimony? :lol: . Even my kid's kindy teacher who was an alumni herself shared it was a good environment to grow up in. Now that my kid is in the school, I can see that she is in good hands. The teachers are generally very caring and know their charges well. There are many activities to encourage learning (they have a library corner in class so that those who arrive early can read there or if they finish their work earlier they can read the books there). They have a maths room to encourage hands-on learning and a small insectarium in school too. They also have a very good library. Very well stocked and they have parent volunteers (?) to conduct story telling sessions during recess. In terms of challenges, the teachers have also printed their own assessments for the girls. Seriously, I would rather have my kid enjoying school and having caring teachers who will encourage them throughout their learning journey than teachers who just care about grades. I have a good friend whose DS is in a SAP school. The kid was scoring average marks in school due to the many bright sparks around. When my friend attended the PTM, firstly the FT couldn't even remember the poor boy and apologised that she had too many kids. :? :stupid: And then after looking at the report book, she commented that the boy is doing so-so and asked my friend to send him to tuition class. :!: :shock:
Am not trying to sell ko-yote about the school. The decision is ultimately yours. There is much more to learning than just academics. We need to let our kids have a chance to learn through play and enjoy their childhood too...
thank you ponyo for such a brilliant and honest sharing! many of my church mates have daughters in SMPS too so i know many SMPS girls who love going to school :love: but knowing many people also means there r people who didn't have such good experiences too. one of my church mates transferred the girl out to st nich eventually cos she kept complaining. abt what - am not too sure abt that. the girl flourished under st nich envt. another fren of mine who has a granddaughter in the sch told me the teacher didnt even identify learning difficulties in the girl. eventually becos my fren herself was in the education industry recognised something wrong and was able to advise accordingly, then the granddaughter was able to get some prof help.
i!
Yes….i rather go for a well rounded school than one that emphasizes of mainly academics. We will never be able to tell our child’s motivation and academic ability at a young age and if she goes to one of those “top” popular school, she will surely suffer if she is not from the top range calibre. She will be pushed so hard to keep up with the school’s academic objective. Not only her self esteem is affected but also her enjoyment of the learning experience. I know also of children from top schools (including St.Nicks, RGS etc) who queued for transfer into St.Marg) and got in eventually and are much happier now. Therefore it really depends on an individual child’s character and competitive nature for the type of school that suits her. As for the case whereby the teacher from St.Marg who was not able to detect the learning issue of that particular child, can you really blame her? She is handling probably 35-40 kids, how much personal attention can there be? My cousin K2 child was in an “elite” kindergarten, the kind that need to pay four figure monthly sum and the teacher ratio was 1: 8 (or 1 :6) max. That child was eventually diagnosed with learning issue in Primary 1 and surprisingly even with supposedly special attention in K2, the boy escaped detection of his learning issue then! Mom was pissed. It was the parent’s own observation that the child was sent for diagnosis in P1. So we should not expect a Primary school teacher to detect learning issue…