getting my sec 2 students to settle down at the parade square. i am the sec 2 Year Manager, ie all sec 2 discipline cases will be handled by me. getting students settled down and sitting down obediently in 2 straight rows per class is also part of regimentation and discipline. thanks to my portfolio as the Year Manager, just for this 8 months, the number of phone calls i had made to parents, and the number of Parent Teacher Conferences that i had sat in, is more than the phone calls and parent teacher conferences that i had clocked at the previous workplace. current workplace - 8 months. previous workplace - 6 years. you can imagine the difference if you are in the discipline committee.
miss nuriah, the choreographer of the aces day mass dance, recapping the steps with the whole school population. she has done very well in building a mass dance culture in the current workplace. 95% of the whole school really dance with the music. i had never achieve that before in my previous workplace. kudos to miss nuriah!
here's my demonstrators! the parade square is divided into two halves. miss nuriah took the front half, with the sec 1s and sec 3s. i took the back half, with the sec 2s and sec 4s. we chose 4 representatives from each level to stand on the tables. the 4 representatives are the most enthusiastic and energetic during the PE lessons when learning the mass dance, that's why they were chosen.
see! the kids are all enjoying themselves!
even my colleague is also enjoying himself. he is mr steven neo, who also came in to the current workplace together with me in january 2016. he was previously from fairfield methodist. another thick skinned guy who dances with alot of expressions. hahahahaha.
the other thick skinned guy is of course... myself. hahahahaha. kudos to my colleague who captured this priceless expression.
after ACES Day is the class party. every class is given a certain amount of budget to spend, and they have to submit a class party proposal to the year head for vetting. honestly i have minimum expectations because my partner FT told me last year the class did not prepare anything. they were just happily playing with their IPADs and some people were playing monopoly.
but i was really caught by surprise when i stepped into the classroom. the form class put in alot of effort for the class party. some of the girls even went to a classmate's house at 4 am to prepare the food and beverages.
thank you so much 2E2! the cake was baked by the malay boy in green pe tee, standing on my right. the lady in pink is my partner FT, who is a k drama fanatic. she recommended me to watch W, and it was a really good recommendation. she is totally in love with DOTS and you will get a shock when you see her table. her table is full of DOTS merchandise, for example song joong ki posters, song joong ki pillow. kua zhang TTM.
got photobooth some more! 10 out of 10 for their effort! here's the mischievous boys. the shortie on my left is super handsome. he is already a lady killer now and i am sure he will make many ladies go gaga when he reaches adulthood.
of course must take a pic with my partner FT. they prepared only one set of costume so i got no choice but to hold the bat. as you can tell, it is a halloween themed teacher's day party. my partner FT is 25 years old! 8 years younger than me. omg. i am in the education service for that long.
celebrating teacher's day year felt a bit empty because there's no alumni coming to visit me. hence i am thankful that the alumni from the previous workplace still msg-ed me to wish me happy teacher's day. and coincidentally, they are all from modern chinese dance. my show choir president and vice president also wish me on instagram. :)
hence i shall give special mention to this 4 ladies - who happen to be the lead dancer who graduated in 2012, and the presidents from 2013 to 2015.
i think there is no need to introduce her. she has been featured so many times in my blog. foo chun ying was not the president of her batch, but she is definitely the lead dancer. she had already graduated from her chinese dance syllabus at NAFA, and is now dancing actively with 新艺.
lee shermin, president 2012/2013. still dancing at her dance club in singapore poly. now doing intern at regent hotel.
audrey yong, president 2013/2014. also my official wedding videographer. has grown alot and her boyfriend is one of the flag bearers at NDP 2016.
estel chong, president 2014/2015, and also the lead dancer, because of her ballet background since primary school. now still dancing ballet and learning contemporary dance.
and my form class student last year posted a photo on instagram:
thankful to be still remembered by them. :)
happy teacher's day to all my teacher friends!!!
this morning we are blessed with good weather - no rain and no haze, and thus our ACES Day Mass Dance can be carried out at the parade square. this is my first time doing a mass dance at ADSS and omg, it is totally insane. insane in a good way. everyone are dancing and screaming their heights out. check out my facebook or instagram for short snippets of the video!
this is also my first year celebrating teacher's day at ADSS.
as per previous years, i shall now share the cards/letters that my students wrote for me. :)
"Thank you for being such an amazing Chemistry teacher. Your sense of humour, knowledge and dancing skills make chemistry extremely enjoyable. Thank you for always agreeing to my requests for practice papers. You are very efficient and have an extremely optimistic and enthusiastic vibe in class. Thank you for everything you have done for 3E1 and we will make sure to not let you down for our End-Of-Year. Happy Teacher's Day Mr Tan!" - from a cambodian chinese student, and my potential A1 student for Chem O Level
"It's been a pleasure to be in your class. Thank you for all the jokes and funny actions in class. You are one of the friendliest and most caring teachers I have met! Also, I really appreciate your caring and guidance in teaching us. Thank you for spending your time to help me mark worksheets and all the effort you have put in to teach us. I will continue to strive hard and will not disappoint you. I will do my very best to score A1 for chemistry in O-Level and continue to pursue my passion for chemistry in A-Level and uni. Thak you and Happy Teacher's Day!" - from a malaysian chinese student, my potential A1 student for Chem O Level, and also a potential top student of the cohort for O Level. she has the potential to get first class honours for uni.
"To the world, you may be just a teacher, but to your students you are a Hero. 老师，辛苦了! 教师节快乐!"
"It had been very interesting this year. I really dislike sports but you make it better. I hate volleyball at first but came to enjoy it. Napfa is the worst, but luckily it's over. Thanks for teaching me! Happy Teacher's Day!"
"Thank you for your support during CCA. Thank you for being so dedicated and funny! Happy Teacher's Day!"
"Happy Teacher's Day Mr Tan. You are very funny and a super fun PE teacher. Good luck for your future." (machiam I am leaving the school right after Teacher's Day hahahahaha)
"Happy Teacher's Day Mr Tan. Thank you for your dramatic presence in your class, making it more fun!"
"Happy Teacher's Day Mr Tan. Thank you for always giving the stern face during common test/exam."
"Hey Sup Mr Tan YY. My dance teacher in-charge and form teacher. You are both hilarious and strict! But still thanks Mr Tan." - she also wrote that she didn't want to write her name because she scared kena scolded BUT... there is only one dance student in my form class. HAHAHAHAHA.
will share the pics in the next post!
i watched Hull vs Man U at 1230 am, and it was a super frustrating match because Hull put in a very strong defensive display and Man U totally cannot do anything for 90 minutes.
it was until the 92nd minute that Marcus Rashford scored and OMG everyone was so happy, from the players on the field, the substitutes and coaches on the bench, the fans at the stadium, and the fans at home (me and some neighbours were yelling the moment the goal was scored).
as a depressed man u fan for 3 years, this is finally something exciting that we are looking forward to. we have great players and a great manager with a great winning mentality.
i actually signed up for this morning's 10 km army half marathon, but i decided that sleep is more important and the haze is not going to do any good to my lungs, so i slept until 8 am and missed the run. hahaha.
this week we finally finished watching the korean drama Doctors.
we are now watching W!
bizarre drama with a superb plot. you can never predict the storyline at each episode. so much suspense!
today is papa's 63rd birthday! i think he still look 50 to me. at the age of 63 he is still going to work everyday and shows no signs of retiring. he is my inspiration and my role model.
we brought him to Equinox at Swissotel for a buffet lunch, and Equinox also provided a complimentary slice of chocolate truffle cake as his birthday cake. thank you Equinox for the special afternoon!
both my parents and my aunt are flying to seattle tomorrow. this is dunno their nth time going for a holiday. the highlight of their trip is taking a cruise to Alaska to watch the ice glaciers. so cool! have a good trip papa and mama~
tonight was the advanced teacher's day dinner, held at chevrons. initially it was supposed to be on 1st sept, but the SAC (school advisory committee) members are not free on 1st sept, so the dinner was brought forward to 19 august. SAC members are the ones who sponsor the dinner every year. but this year's dinner we used the school funds, and the SAC members sponsor the lucky draw prizes.
two weeks ago the theme of the dinner was announced to all staff, and that is SUPERHEROES. because we teachers may seem to be ordinary human beings, but we are actually considered as SUPERHEROES. you can never imagine what we have to do everyday: subject teacher, form teacher, nanny, counsellor, data entry clerk, disciplinarian, motivator, etc etc etc.
my very onz PE dept decide to become power rangers! so last monday we went to costume shops for recce. the costume shops we went to don't have power rangers costumes. and if we want to rent other types of superheroes costumes, it is not cheap. each set of costume is at least $50.00. and so we decided to DIY. :)
100 marks for our effort!!
for the past two weeks, the staff are also playing the angel and mortal game. tonight during the dinner, our angels will be revealed!
here's what my angel got for me:
i can't wait to find out who my angel is! :D
and so the night had finally came. it's MORPHING TIME for the pe teachers!
we look really good isnt it?!
the female pe teachers
the male pe teachers
the incredibles! these are members of the Student Development Team. the guy in whtie shirt is our VP, Mr Chong. he won the President's Award for Teachers a few years ago. mai siao siao.
the pokemons! with Ash on the left! they go and buy the costumes! super effort.
it was really a fun teacher's day dinner. my first ever dinner with the workplace. the emcees (who are also teachers) were damn funny. laugh until my tears came out and my stomach super pain.
i won a pair of gv movie vouchers for the lucky draw. but can only use the vouchers on mon, tue and wed, and cannot use on public holidays. zzz...
AND... i won the best dressed male, entertained all the teachers with my typical wushu performance, drawing lots of cheers and applause, and i walked away with 50 dollars capitaland vouchers. what a memorable night! :D
of course, not forgetting my angel!
she's the maths hod, as well as the head of the workplace's assessment committee, ie all the internal exams and external exams are under her charge. so honoured to have such a 大咖 to be my angel!
the workplace's Lighthouse Productions (equivalent to AVA/info-comm) organised a photo exhibition.
and my colleague told me that my picture was featured inside. so off i went to the exhibition to take a look. hahahahahaha.
ta daaaaaaaaaaaa!!! the caption below it says 'Passionate Dancing'. :)
the original pic!
and when i was speaking to the teacher in-charge, i realised that they store all the school events' photos at google drive. no wonder i search through the workplace's shared folder for so long and cannot find any photos.
the typical derek seong move.
the dab. i seriously dunno why is this move so popular and so famous. and all the kids are doing it.
it was a historic moment this morning at 912 am, when all singaporeans are glued on to the okto channel, to watch Joseph Schooling, true blue singaporean, in the 100 m butterfly final, against the likes of michael phelps and other strong swimmers.
it was nerve wrecking watching him swim his life for 50.39 seconds and winning the coveted gold medal! #firstolympicgoldmedalforsingapore
and right after that instagram and facebook are flooded with all the congratulatory posts for him. i am one of the singaporeans who posted on instagram and facebook too.
let's relive the glory again! (photos taken from reuters, straits times and today)
wahhh sei so many 大咖 people in this pic. #tonytan #tanchuanjin #gracefu #ngsermiang #josephschoolingmother
this is my first time celebrating National Day at the new workplace.
at the previous workplace, we have the parade at the school field, combined together with the staff and students of the neighbour primary school.
over here, we are on our own. the sec 1s and sec 2s are seated at the parade square, whereas the upper sec students are on level 2 and 3 of the school building.
the parade started with the different UG contingents marching into the parade square, followed by the national anthem, that was being played LIVE by the school band.
after that our VP lead us in reciting the pledge, and honestly speaking, this was the loudest pledge that i ever heard from the whole school, throughout my 6 years of teaching. my VP is a very charismatic person and he really recite the pledge with pride and gusto, and all of us followed suit with the same pride and gusto.
and we had the national day concert in the school hall. something special about the concert is... there is a special performance by a few teachers. and yes you guessed correctly, i am one of the teachers. hahahahaha. i finally clocked my first performance in the new workplace. :)
the boys!!
the performance crew! it all started when Ms Chin, the lower sec Year Head, approached me a few weeks ago and asked me whether am i ok to dance with some teachers for the upcoming national day concert. this group of teachers have different races of chinese, malay and indian, so we want to showcase different genres of dance (chinese, malay and indian) and made it into a fusion item, to showcase ethnic diversity.
we also had a few dancers among us. gadis and terence were in NIE DanzFusion. shi da was a float dancer in sheares hall. suba performed indian dance for her sister's wedding. so gadis was in malay dance when she was in primary school. we used the Lion King soundtrack, because gadis did a fusion item using song, and this song is apt because singapore is a lion city and so we are the lions in this performance. HAHAHAHA.
gadis choreo-ed the malay dance and hip hop dance. suba choreo-ed the indian dance. and i choreo-ed the chinese dance. actually i did not choreo. i simply used derek's dance steps from the shadow item in 2012. his steps totally blend in with the lion king soundtrack!
actually i was very worried that i will not be able to perform today because my asthma got triggered again on saturday night. it was worse on sunday and darling can hear my loud wheezing in the car. i used my ventolin inhaler like 10 times on sunday and darling found out that it had expired on july 2016. -.-'''
so i decided not to take the risk on my health and i went to see the doctor. and the bill cost me $56!!! darling said sunday go see doctor 比较贵. shag man...
luckily i felt much better on monday morning but before the performance i took two puffs again on the ventolin, just to make myself feel more assured.
pictures with the beloved ADSS pe department after the concert!
and right after that i went back to my previous workplace to play netball with my ex students and ex colleagues. #YOLO
saturday was filled with aesthetics related activities.
in the afternoon i brought my dance club to esplanade theatre to watch 'Sleeping Beauty'. for free! the workplace is offered this thingy known as the Keppel Nights Scheme and we get to watch certain performances for free. so for 'Sleeping Beauty', we get to bring 40 students and 3 teachers.
before the performance, i bumped into yoke kay, my nuscd junior. after the performance, i bumped into ong yuying, who happened to be seated at the same level as me but right at the other end. it is always nice to see dance friends and i had a short catch up with both of them.
the performance was super long. 2 hours and 10 min, including a 20 min intermission. after the performance i was super hungry, and i am so glad to have kay lee roast duck and char siew for dinner, together with very nice peng kueh. and then i rushed to sembawang cc to support my workplace's band and drama performance. they are performing for the national day dinner. honestly i dun like performing for national day dinners. the people will focus more on the food instead of the performance. after i done it once in 2013 with my show choir, i tell myself, NO MORE PERFORMANCE for national day dinners.
this morning i went to fooshin house with darling and my parents in law. foo shin's house need some adjustments in the electricity wiring, and he engaged my father in law, who is an electrician. before going to his house we had this very good white kway teow at a kopitiam near fooshin's house. ahhhhh~~ talk about life's simple pleasures.
after that we went to bugis to buy 630 dollars worth of health tonics for darling. the boss provide us value added service by sending her kah gia to help us bring the bags of health tonics to bugis+ carpark where i parked my car. so thankful for the kah gia's help. there was really too many health tonics.
tomorrow is my first time being involved in national day celebrations at my workplace! and there is something special happening! will update on the blog once it is over! :)
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his morning i went to singapore conference hall with darling to support my workplace's band at a national band competition.
they are supposed to perform at 915 am. we reach the CBD area at around 905 am. only to discover that today is car-free day for CBD, so alot of roads are being blocked, and i made detours and detours. darling later found out that singapore conference hall carpark is also under renovation, and drivers are advised to park at international plaza...
finally i parked the car at international plaza, and we walked to singapore conference hall and we reach singapore conference hall at 945 am. and of course the band students have finished performing. HAIYAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA.
i apologised to the kids for missing their performance, and i promised to turn up for their next performance.
i was here 5 years ago, for the previous workplace's 25th anniversary celebration. OMG i look so slim and so... youthful.
5 YEARS LATER... ...
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多一份男人的成熟与沧桑. HAHAHAHAHA.
