MOE says Native English teachers needed!

[jpatokal]

Folks, this is the Strictly Speaking forum -- please stay on topic and limit verbal attacks to others' opinions, not other posters. I've moved some cruft to Rubbish.

[sundaymorningstaple]

You missed JP. You split it but you didn't move it. You left it in the Strictly Speaking Forum. I will go ahead and move it the rest of the way to the Rubbish Forum.

sms

[ksl]

Well this is a good thread! HELP!!!

My daughter started primary 1 this week and my wife and I are having a great deal of trouble understanding my daughters class time table.

what is: LIMML, P1MT, CME, PAMEL, SS, HARJ, P1CME we are totally blown away

I must admit, we are having problems, my wife is educated in American English and myself being British find it all quite amusing, discussing how one pronounces (a) (A) after all these years. THE CAT SAT ON THE MAT This is a dog! Not err dog, I say to the wife!

JP made some interesting remarks on grammar, although I would believe out of the UK population, the statistics for grammar and understanding of grammatical terminology in British English is probably at the lower end of the scale in terms of A and B passes, meaning that the majority of brits are pretty poor to their own langauge, with a C+ perhaps, although this is only my assumption.

I actually missed out on the fundamentals of education, although in my late 30's I studied and passed 3 A levels and 2 'O' levels.

I was totally lost on grammatical terminology, so I was under the impression by doing 'A' level English I could improve, unknown to me at the time, the 'A' level was more English literature, so that didn't help me very much.

Although the night time studies in Danish was vey helpful, it wasn't until i studied a foreign language, that I realised how bad, I was in my own language, and quite often I meet foreigners, with sound fundamentals of language, that have specialised at student level in languages, who continue to study towards linguistic, studies or teachers, so they should be the elite in their studies.

The majority of students however do not follow the same route, some take the maths route, and are not that great at languages. looking at populations like Singapore, I would believe one must be rather privileged to attain a very good standard of English and be very motivated to achieve the results.


I have difficulty understanding my 6 year old, when she talks Singlish, and having been to the neighbourhood schools and childcare, feel the task of teaching her good English, is going to be a difficult one, while here in Singapore, and feel that i have to support her, with additional English tuition. to see any real benefit.

Singlish, well, what can i say, other than I would be intersted to know about the lah! where did it originate and when, becuase in certain areas of Manchester, Lancashire, like Moss side, it has been around a very long time.

Well hope someone knows the abbreviations above on the school time table what a start to the year, I thought life was supposed to get easier with age.

[saint73]

Well this is a good thread! HELP!!!

My daughter started primary 1 this week and my wife and I are having a great deal of trouble understanding my daughters class time table.

what is: LIMML, P1MT, CME, PAMEL, SS, HARJ, P1CME we are totally blown away

I must admit, we are having problems, my wife is educated in American English and myself being British find it all quite amusing, discussing how one pronounces (a) (A) after all these years. THE CAT SAT ON THE MAT This is a dog! Not err dog, I say to the wife!

JP made some interesting remarks on grammar, although I would believe out of the UK population, the statistics for grammar and understanding of grammatical terminology in British English is probably at the lower end of the scale in terms of A and B passes, meaning that the majority of brits are pretty poor to their own langauge, with a C+ perhaps, although this is only my assumption.

I actually missed out on the fundamentals of education, although in my late 30's I studied and passed 3 A levels and 2 'O' levels.

I was totally lost on grammatical terminology, so I was under the impression by doing 'A' level English I could improve, unknown to me at the time, the 'A' level was more English literature, so that didn't help me very much.

Although the night time studies in Danish was vey helpful, it wasn't until i studied a foreign language, that I realised how bad, I was in my own language, and quite often I meet foreigners, with sound fundamentals of language, that have specialised at student level in languages, who continue to study towards linguistic, studies or teachers, so they should be the elite in their studies.

The majority of students however do not follow the same route, some take the maths route, and are not that great at languages. looking at populations like Singapore, I would believe one must be rather privileged to attain a very good standard of English and be very motivated to achieve the results.


I have difficulty understanding my 6 year old, when she talks Singlish, and having been to the neighbourhood schools and childcare, feel the task of teaching her good English, is going to be a difficult one, while here in Singapore, and feel that i have to support her, with additional English tuition. to see any real benefit.

Singlish, well, what can i say, other than I would be intersted to know about the lah! where did it originate and when, becuase in certain areas of Manchester, Lancashire, like Moss side, it has been around a very long time.

Well hope someone knows the abbreviations above on the school time table what a start to the year, I thought life was supposed to get easier with age.

Ksl.


what is: LIMML, P1MT, CME, PAMEL, SS, HARJ, P1CME we are totally blown away

Ask their form teacher I also did not know this short form meaning...

Let your kid study at Singapore American school...
http://www.sas.edu.sg/
Solve your problems

[ksl]

Let your kid study at Singapore American school...

Yes maybe i will after she's passed her exams in Singlish!, I was just helping her with her English and then realised the Singlish.

The heading on the paper says" Cloze Passage" Fill in each blank with a suitable word from the box.

The ------ go the park very often. insert child, children (to) is missing.

Mary, Lucy and I ----- a tree and some bences under it Insert: draw, paint, tall, huge,

This is not good at all, primary 1. Although she's 6 years old, she, says Daddy what is bences. I said I think it could be Singlish for benches.
I said to her, can you correct your teacher tomorrow!

She's only 6 and i would rather she mixes with the locals, kids are so adaptable, she can also speak a little Malay and Indian, I personally find the local schools more culturally rewarding, which is more important, than her language at this point in time.

Although she is Mandarin first language and not English, they will not accept Mandarin on the grounds she is holding a British Passport, and must take English first, then Mandarin.

Totally nuts, So it looks like Singlish is the first language, then Mandarin, then I'll have to pay extra for English. Joke of course

Still don't have a clue on the abbreviations, yet!

[saint73]

Let your kid study at Singapore American school...

Yes maybe i will after she's passed her exams in Singlish!, I was just helping her with her English and then realised the Singlish.

The heading on the paper says" Cloze Passage" Fill in each blank with a suitable word from the box.

The ------ go the park very often. insert child, children (to) is missing.

Mary, Lucy and I ----- a tree and some bences under it Insert: draw, paint, tall, huge,

This is not good at all, primary 1. Although she's 6 years old, she, says Daddy what is bences. I said I think it could be Singlish for benches.
I said to her, can you correct your teacher tomorrow!

You should complain the problem to the school.This is a serious mistake...MOE will take action on that...this is not singlish is English mistake....

[ksl]

Let your kid study at Singapore American school...

Yes maybe i will after she's passed her exams in Singlish!, I was just helping her with her English and then realised the Singlish.

The heading on the paper says" Cloze Passage" Fill in each blank with a suitable word from the box.

The ------ go the park very often. insert child, children (to) is missing.

Mary, Lucy and I ----- a tree and some bences under it Insert: draw, paint, tall, huge,

This is not good at all, primary 1. Although she's 6 years old, she, says Daddy what is bences. I said I think it could be Singlish for benches.
I said to her, can you correct your teacher tomorrow!

You should complain the problem to the school.This is a serious mistake...MOE will take action on that...this is not singlish is English mistake....

Yes I know, I was being a little sarcastic.

I would hate her to lose her job over it! I'll just correct her for the time being.

[sundaymorningstaple]

You should complain the problem to the school.This is a serious mistake...MOE will take action on that...this is not singlish is English mistake....

Don't want to seem antagonistic but I'm afraid complaining to MOE is like pissing into the wind. It's self defeating.

ksl,

My kids (both of 'em) studied "Singlish" as Mother Tongue at 1st language level. and took Mandarin at 2nd language level. In order to do this I had to do battle with MOE (but in this instance I won). They tried to make my daughter take Tamil as her 2nd language BUT by virtue of having a Caucasian father her "Mother Tongue" is English! (Is that Singlish/Singaporean logic or what?) Why not call it the Father Tongue? MOE's problem was that they didn't like the fact that it's their rules that state that "if you take your "mother tongue" at 1st language level you have "your choice" of 2nd language. As my kids have dual citizenship it didn't make sense to have them take Tamil and possibly end up in the US - total waste of learning effort. Mandarin made much more logical sense. Anyway, I won and of course when my son started school the precedence had already been set.

My daughter went to CHIJ Toa Payoh so her English & Mandarin are pretty good as the standards there are still quite high. As she is heading to a career in Journalism this is good. Unfortunately, my son when to local neighbourhood schools so speaks excellent Singlish as well as rotten chinese as well. "How now?"

[saint73]

You should complain the problem to the school.This is a serious mistake...MOE will take action on that...this is not singlish is English mistake....

Don't want to seem antagonistic but I'm afraid complaining to MOE is like pissing into the wind. It's self defeating.

ksl,

My kids (both of 'em) studied "Singlish" as Mother Tongue at 1st language level. and took Mandarin at 2nd language level. In order to do this I had to do battle with MOE (but in this instance I won). They tried to make my daughter take Tamil as her 2nd language BUT by virtue of having a Caucasian father her "Mother Tongue" is English! (Is that Singlish/Singaporean logic or what?) Why not call it the Father Tongue? MOE's problem was that they didn't like the fact that it's their rules that state that "if you take your "mother tongue" at 1st language level you have "your choice" of 2nd language. As my kids have dual citizenship it didn't make sense to have them take Tamil and possibly end up in the US - total waste of learning effort. Mandarin made much more logical sense. Anyway, I won and of course when my son started school the precedence had already been set.

My daughter went to CHIJ Toa Payoh so her English & Mandarin are pretty good as the standards there are still quite high. As she is heading to a career in Journalism this is good. Unfortunately, my son when to local neighbourhood schools so speaks excellent Singlish as well as rotten chinese as well. "How now?"

Send your son to the top 10 primary school (No singlish)
ANGLO-CHINESE SCHOOL (PRIMARY)
英华学校(小学）
50 BARKER ROAD
SINGAPORE 309918 P : MR LIM CHEW HIONG RICHARD
林秋雄
VP : MDM GRACE TAN GEOK PEK
Tel: 62501633
Fax: 63531366
[email protected]

ST. ANDREW'S JUNIOR SCHOOL
圣安德烈小学
2 FRANCIS THOMAS DRIVE
SINGAPORE 359337 P : MRS WAI YIN PRYKE
伍慧贤
VP : MR MATTHEW OU
欧恩典
VP : MR THAM KINE CHUEN THOMAS
Tel: 62884303
Fax: 62895242
[email protected]



Tamil as 2nd langauge ,I think is good bcos learn tamil can speak well...
Maybe your son will marry tamil gal in future...Hard to say.. dnt't you think so...tamil is difficult to master....

[ksl]

Thanks SMS & Saint73

This information is light at the end of the tunnel. My daugter was born in Taiwan, and automatically gets British citizenship, with stepping in the Country. Mandarin should be her first language, because she went through Childcare also in Taiwan, and all Family are Taiwanese.

I will try to insist on Mandarin first, also because that was my plan, even before she was born.

She will hopefully go to Paya Lebar Methodist, although at present she is in Haig. We will move actually to a couple of hundre meters from the methodist school.

Not sure but i thought I heard on the news tonight, that CHIJ and Paya Lebar Methodist came in top for the most A' passes. But there again does it statistically prove anything. They may have been fortunate to just have good students, that study hard.

We have paid alot of money out already on additional English reading, lessons, so, I will have to do something about the teacher, unfortunately I'll have to have a talk with her, because I don't want my daughter going backwards. Thanks all!