Day 1: Adult Learning Symposium 2014

Here I am attending the biennial Adult Learning Symposium 2014. This year's theme " Innovation in Workplace Practices and Learning" places emphasis leveraging technology to innovate local CET practices. The Singapore Workforce Development Agency (WDA) had also announced plans to insitute technology platforms and pro-technology learning initiatives to cement and sustain the growth of the overall CET landscape and to keep abreast of disruptive technology or like what my colleague says, "To be ahead of the curve". Some key initiatives in the pipeline include the Learning Space - an online repository which supposedly houses e-elarning content made accessible to the public; a national-level Learning Management System (LMS) [Think Moodle, Blackboard etc.] I thought that this was a good attempt to emulate the success (or failure - some may argue) of the Massic Online Open Courses (MOOC) that took the education scene by storm. To date, close to 40 e-learning courseware have been developed and uploaded to the "e-CET LMS" rendering it operational. Another initiative which I find was rather similar to that of MOE's EduLab was the Innovation Lab (In. Lab) where practitioners, researchers could congregate to ideate, share best practices and to innovate and sustain adult learning best practices and pedagogical models.

I can't help but to draw a parallel between the application of technology in the education sector and in adult workplace learning. As a former school teacher, my embodiment and experiences have always prompted me to redefine my understanding, perceptions and perspectives in learning in the world of adult learning. To begin with, different camps exist, arguing for and against the universal relevance of pedagogy - the art and science of teaching and learning - to both PET (pre-employment) and CET (continuing education) learning. A relative well-known advocate on adult learning principles, Malcolm Knowles (Andragogy) argued that adults learn differently from that of school children, citing that adults need compelling reasons to learn; require learning to be situated to meet their immediate needs and for transference of competencies and that they assimilate new knowledge/skills best when prior experiences are being built on.

Having said all these, the question would really be "Can similar learning technology practices and initiatives that have exhibited some form of success in schools be adopted by the CET to reap the same benefits?". Yes and no, depending on the intent, educator, coupled with the affordances of these tools. Notice I deliberately ranked the enablers in order beginning with the intent or rather the purpose of innovating the way educators design instructions, follow by the pedagogical capability of the educator and lastly, the technology tool as a static piece of, tool. To delve a little deeper, I think many have conjured a technology-biased connotation on what "innovation" means. According to Dictionary.com, "innovation" refers to "something new or introduced". Nowhere can you see the word "technology". To me, "innovation" can even simply refer to revising or transforming current processes or even reinvent an existing model and situate it to current context. It's about adaptation and evolution, not necessary creation.

Back to the earlier question, I definitely welcome the slew of new initatives in the pipeline to scale the CET landscape. However, I thought we would probably need to approach the subject of applying e-learning in adult learning setting with caution. At the very least, I think as adult educators, we need to be fully aware of whether there's a need to do something differently and not just having another novelty. 

iCTLT: Day 2 - To Flip or not to Flip? That is the Question.

First, I would like to qualify that I'm not an existing practitioner. Back in those days when I was teaching, I could vividly remembered the mad rush to complete the syllabus in time for the 'O' levels Cambridge. Countless nights were spent drilling content and concepts into the students who survived the sessions by subsisting on a meagre diet of khong Guan biscuits (proudly sponsored by moi). 

Looking back, Web 2.0 social media tools were in existence then and I had also humbly attempted to use the Facebook to create a class community to augment formal class lessons as well. A selection of carefully curated Youtube videos delivering content and 3D modelling of human organs were uploaded to the social learning space. Furthermore, I also remembered using Camtasia, a presentation recording software to record my lectures and Powerpoint sequence flow. These videos, coupled with scaffolding e-worksheets were bundled and delivered via our ver own FB community. Suddenly, there's this deja vu feeling that starts to swell from within - Am I not "flipping" my classroom?

Flipped Classroom, or as Mr Aaron Sams - one of the most dedicated and innovative teacher I've every seen- prefers, Flipped Learning is not an ingenius creation. It's intriguing to know that we've all been practising it or have done it at a moment in time. The astonishing thing is that, flipped learning could be dated back as far as 200 years back - at Westpoint (USMA). Officer cadets at Wespoint undergo a rigorous learning path devised based on the Thayer's method. The Thayer's method stipulates the dissemination of course learning objectives and supplementary reading materials to cadets prior to them attending face-to-face lessons. Keller's Personalised System of Instruction (PSI) in the 1960s also emphasises self-paced learning and mastery of units i.e. progress to the next level when one has master the current set of contents. Keller further suggests that lectures are means of motivational devices that help to augment learning. Flipped learning works along similar principles articulated by these earlier theories. 

I was particularly drawn to Sams' use of the Universal Design Learning (UDL) guidelines to further reinforce flipped learning. One of the objectives of flipping is to hopefully provide opportunities for differentiated learning and UDL has articulated a set of guidelines to enable educators to explore means and ways in delivering the knowledge, accept students' variety of ways in demonstrating competence in a subject matter and in motivating students' learning. Another team of teachers from Bowen Secondary School also presented refreshing idea of using gamification of game-based rules to define their flipped lessons. As opposed to popular conception of gamification, the term doesn't necessary refer to a gaming e-courseware for learning. It just simply means the employment of game-based rules and mechanics i.e. scoreboard, points, badges, levels, tokens etc. to augment a lesson.

"To flip or not to flip?" I guess the motivation behind flipping varies with different educators. One thing is consistent though - flipping a lesson requires tremendous amount of hard work, dedication and conviction by the educator and of course - flipping doesn't guarantee good results or outcomes, but one thing for sure, it could almost certainly guarantee an unforgettable learning process for the students.

iCTLT: Day 1 - Creativity & Entreprenuership? A New Paradigm for Education?

“Harnessing the power of technology tools to enhance pedagogy, enable action, empower learners and to engage learning” seems like a mouthful. In fact, we all know that the digital revolution has spared no one from the formidable effects of pervasive change. Change in almost every area. However, we must remain grounded and true to the way we perceive the core of education. Like how Dr. Yong Zhao aptly puts it, “Technology cannot replace paper, just like how it can’t replace your toilet roll!”. As educators or educationists, we are all guided by fundamental beliefs on the guiding principles of learning, regardless of the means to elicit the process. As long as the learner achieves deep and meaningful learning, we have fulfilled our mission.

I’m going to talk about Dr. Yong Zhao who not only has a wicked sense of humour but also has a creative and ingenious perspective of what education means to the digital natives. Dr. Yong Zhao from University of Oregon, likens the formal school system to a ‘sausage-making machine’ where homogeneous “sausages” or the learners are being “churned” out of the school system. The highly formalised structure was the order of the day back in the industrial revolution period where there was only a single outcome prescribed for school leavers – to enter into the workforce as employees. Back then, millions of jobs were created by a few powerful figures and hence, the nature and volume of jobs were pretty much predictable. Children were hence, whipped into shape to conform to a standard mould of delivering an exacted outcome with a known expectation in their life – basic survival.

In today’s context especially under the dominion of technology, conformity is nearing its demise. The much celebrated order of the day is creativity and entrepreneurship and for schools to be able to realign themselves to the new social trend is to first, stop killing and stifling creativity in our children. With the abundance of information comes the power of having choices. Whether a choice is good or bad, it is still a choice sought after by a group of consumers. A very good example provided was on the element of attraction exuded by a celebrity who in actual fact, has yet to do anything great or have any special talent. And yet, legions of fans celebrate the ‘nothingness’ of this person! The idea is, the fact that ‘nothingness’ i.e. no special talents, no exceptionally high intelligence could be even be worth celebrating simply tells us that choices are created by the creatives for the purpose of satisfying consumers' behaviours today. 

Contrasting the United States, Australia, the United Kingdom (the western powers) with East Asia countries such as Singapore, Japan and Hongkong, Dr. Yong Zhao pointedly 'rebuked' the western states for doing a 'bad job' in killing creativity and hence, their 'sausage-making machines' had inadvertently produced other kinds of 'hybridized meat products' other than the standardised 'sausages' prescribed by a certain receipe. The outcome is clear. These western powers are still economic powerhouses, driven by an incessant spirit of entrepreneurism of its people, despite the long history of poor performance in standardised test scoring. 

In Dr. Yong Zhao's lastest release, "World Class Learners", he had echoed the World Economic Forum's (2007, 2011) view to emphasise on the importance of entreprenuership as the key driver to grow and sustain the economic landscape in the coming century before the current system of employeeship stagnates. On this note, school systems should allow creativity space to blossom and sincerely embrace the concept of multiple intelligences of human. "To create and to engineer is human" (Zhao, 2012) and this is so true.

Reflections on Problem-based Learning: More than a Learning Methodology

I was particularly drawn to this year's PBL seminar organised by the Republic Polytechnic which places special emphasis on operationalising PBL in the context of the workplace. Apart from inviting Prof. Kolmos, who is the Unesco Chair for PBL from Aalsbrough University, another keynote speaker who touched specifically on workplace PBL was Ms Sabrina Koh from Jurong Health. I was pretty excited to hear from Ms Koh, who was a formal healthcare practitioner and is currently one of the faculty members implementing the PBL approach in healthcare simulation training. Educational and learning principles and practices could not be be purely derived from theories and researches; hence, nothing beats hearing from a practitioner-researcher who not only understands the theoretical groundings of learning and sees the application issues in actual implementation on the ground.

Of course, the first keynote which underscored  macro perspectives and trends of PBL on a global level could not be ignored totally. Typically, educators viewed PBL as yet another pedagogical approach or methodology that aims to accentuate the learning process in helping learners gain awareness of their cognitive dispositions, work effectively in teams and develop an epistemic appreciation that knowledge and or solution to the problem is not absolute and subjected to the pressure of groups opinions, changing contextual influences and governed by personal judgement and decision-making predispositions. 

I would like to agree with the general understanding to a certain extent. While PBL is indeed an approach coined earlier by Barrows (1980) in medical school training, I would purport that it has far reaching impacts on organisations' learning and development as a whole in terms of workplace learning. PBL, if implemented carefully at all the system levels within an organisation, not only changes the way learning takes place in he organisation, but collectively at an organisational level, it could radicalise the way organisations tackle and perform its core functions. All these are possible based on a simple condition: the use of problems as triggers to the learning process. How do we then define 'problems'? I will provide a simple answer to this - Any situation that arises could be a potential problem, be it a practical, theoretical or hypothetical problem. Hence, it follows that employees in organisations are trained to mitigate 'problems'. A problem need not necessary be linked with negative connotation; it could simply be a situation that disrupts the norm, or hypothetical issue that has yet to happen (in the case of strategic planning) etc. Henceforth, the effects of adopting PBL in fact, permeates all levels of functions and influences the organisational culture and beliefs as well. Scaling this hypothesis down a little, one could imagine how the attitudes and beliefs of employees could be shaped by PBL. Employees attuned to PBL would approach issues with a fundamental believe that there's more than one correct and absolute way to solivng an issue and that sometimes even the experts don't have the answers. They will be forced to thoroughly examine he situation, source for relevant information, make sense of them and apply the most plausible solution to the issue. Often times, a resolution could not even be reached. Employees are required then to deal with the tentative nature and fluidity and even complexity of the situation and adapt possible resolutions along the way.

In any case, I thought that PBL is the way forward to prepare learners to face the challenging and complex world and I am glad that RP has realise this.                   

Codifying Educational Language - Passing it on...

I dread preparing lesson plans. Yet, it's an important step to verbalise the contextualisation of learning to unique audiences. With different batches of learners with disparate learning needs, barriers to learning, learning styles, socio-economical background etc., one could imagine the countless number of lesson plans that would be churned out to support all the learning! Think about this - how wonderful and efficient it would be to be able to share and re-use all these lesson plans without having to modify them heavily for adaptation?

Unfortunately, a lesson plan is no more than a record of the type and sequence of learning activities that occur in a classroom. This could not be readily replicated to other learner groups and even if replicated, the outcomes may not be reproducible as well. Faced with all the variables, how could we then, formulate a common educational language for sharing as most importantly, for educators to be able to re-use and apply the learning activities and the underpinning pedagogies almost instantaneously and effectively?

The answer could be found in Learning Design. Last year, an assembly of learning design experts congregate at Larnaca, Cyprus to collectively concur and produce the 'Larnaca Declaration', a super-long piece of document aimed at defining the crux of Learning Design and on the explicit manifestation of a common and definitive set of 'educational notation' to guide Learning Design and most importantly, to ensure that the design products are poliferated with ease. I briefly skimmed through the document and what really stopped me in my track was the use of music notation as an analogy to suggest the need for development of a similar language to guide the codifcation of implicit knowledge of how teachers teach, the types of actvities chosen, how learners learn etc. and the genrational transfer of such knowledge. I am in full agreement with this sophisicated idea though I do acknowledge that this is an arduous task. 

The document went on to expound the use of LAMS as an effective Learning Design Software system to attempt to capture and make explicit the learning activities and its associated pedagogical approaches. I won't talk about IMS or EML for now but using a LAMS for learning design work enables the user to appreciate the entire architectural flow of design decisions, sequencing and control of learning activities etc. In other words, the system helps one to think aloud a learning design concept. In contrast, a LMS merely serves as a repository where learning activities and resources are simply "parked" and confined to individual classes with minimal opportunities for replication. Will, one could argue that most modern LMS boast the capability of replicating course templates, but really, the course template does not really exhibit any trace of learning design. For instance, learners could easily access all the learning activities such as viewing course lectures, partipating in forum discussions etc. ALL AT THE SAME TIME and hence, there doesn't seem to be a need for extensive design in the course learning. 

I'm not sure if the Larnaca makes mention of this, but in my opinion, I thought that we should also leverage on knowledge management principles, techniques and tools as well to help establish some form of data semantics in the course of harvesting learning design outputs.

Whatever the case is, I thought that the efforts in pushing for a more inclusive and common platform for educational language to take flight were laudable and I really look forward to its fruition one day!

XoXo

Augmented Reality - How Real can we get?

Attended a very interesting session today at ICEM. A senior lecturer from MacQuarie University presented the possibilites of leveraging Augmented Reality technology or simply termed as 'AR' for education. For the skeptics out there, I was once like you where I loathed the idea of flashing sexy technology for learning. Not until today when I am totally wowed over by AR's affordances to immerse learners in an unprecedented learning environment beyond what the human minds could ever imagine!

Before you begin to dish out on the exorbitant cost involved, the time investment and not to mention about the level of technical expertise required to pull this educational stunt, I would like to assure you that the AR technology has evolved since and has permeated the masses. For those of you who aren't exactly sure what AR is, allow me to provide you with a simple definition. As the term 'Augmented Reality' suggests, the technology aims to fuse or merge virtual and real-life elements to produce rich media resources for learning and visualisation. How the fusion occur is really simply building overlayers of virtual elements over physical elements i.e. a physical location. AR is not as tech-intensive as Augment Virtuality and of course, Virtual Reality which really lay at the other end of the spectrum.

It's really invigorating to know that we could optimise technology to enhance learning and this could play to our advantage if we know how to harness its potential well. Of course at the othe end of the pendulum speaks of the possible cyber threats that may potentially undrmine the use of technology for learning. Common threats such as cyber-bullying and even getting to users to observe cyber-etiquette are challenges that we need to overcome. 

Before embarking on the integration of technology to classroom learning, a trainer or a teacher has to first deal with a wider set of what I would term as 'first order barriers'. Taking reference from the TPACK framework, we need to recognise that the mastery of technological skill sets is not a given and yet, is a crucial component driving the successful implementation of digital learning endeavours. Teachers and students alike have to be comfortable in manipulating and navigating the technological aspects of the learning above and beyond any other things. Similarly, like what I've mentioned earlier - teachers have to be aware and address cyber behaviours. There could possibly be a disparity in behaviours when someone hides behind the facade of a digital identity as compared to real-life interactions.

Fortunately, the experts had taken cognizance to these pertinent issues in the form of advocating digital literacies. The set of digital literacy skills is well-defined under the 21st Century Learning Framework and you may want to consider them in your learning design. 

Well, time for me to rush off for the morning keynote for Day 3! Hope that the day's sessions would be jam-packed with more refreshing and though-provoking ideas!

ICEM 2013 : We-learning? - Day 1

What exactly is "We-learning"? By now, we are well aware that the education paradigm had shifted to embrace collaboration, communication and constructivism. The primary underlying idea of 'We-learning' is not only focussed on catapulting the learner in the centre and be contented with learner-centricism, but to now enlarge the focal point to include learner-learner sharing and co-teaching. A lot of new ideas could be generated and harnessed out of this very collaboratve linkages established between learners when they get together and communicate!

It's the 63rd year that ICEM is organising the conference in Singapore and I'm pretty excited to be part of this learning fiesta! Running concurrently is a LAMS conference as well. For those of you who are not familiar with LAMS, it actually stands for Learning Activity Management System. The fundamental design purpose of this system is different from the LMS and based on my limited understanding, an enterprise or IHL would acquire a LAMS if the management really wants to focus on the effective management and deployment of learning events, sequences, sharable and re-usable content such as OER. Whatever the case is, these heavy weights are here to stay and they are no longer seen as peripheral tools playing second fiddle in supporting learning. In fact, the LMS has been lurking around since the '90s and in recent years, has penetrated the education landscape as a core engine driving and impacting organisational or instituitional learning.

Moving on, I would like to share an interesting presumption put forth by one of the presenters. The poor fella was trying his level best to put together the presentation though he misses out on what he's supposed to say! Nonetheless, he challenged the fixated frame of belief that people have on learning and how the belief is guided by norm-referencing how institutions are organised. To put it simply, he asked " why should there even be discrete blocks of audience and roles in a learning context, especially against the backdrop of a collaborative setting?" For instance, why can't teachers and students learn together, especially in common topics such as digital literacy. A further question was thrown to the floor, " Why does students 'learn' and teachers 'develop themselves professionally'?" On the outset, the idea to 'break down the 2nd order barrier' seems seductive to me but on closer examination, I thought the proper functioning of any processes or structures should be anchored on some form of legitimacy? Surely, some form of structure should be in place to power and steer the entire learning process with certain rules of engagement embedded in it. Yes, some of you may argue that as long as the frames are built in, the targets shall then be able to operate within the parameters to achieve the desired outcomes. Unfortunately, I do not think this would be true for our social construct where a 'figurehead' needs to be established to sheperd or worse still, to 'whip them into shape'!

Anyway, I have sumed up the day's programme... Let's hope that Day 2 will be packed with more interesting stuffs!

XoXo

"Funtastic" Week at JGC!

If you are deterred by the exorbitant fees by Julia Gabriel Center, I strongly urge you to consider the quality of its programme; the thoughtfulness and commitment of its teaching staff. I'm totally wooed over by the tremendous effort that were invested to make the day for each and every child who attended the 1-week long holiday programme.

The 'legendary' JGC is touted to be the go-to center if you want your child to excel in speech and drama and to exude confidence in communication skills. While some begrudged parents saw this as yet another over-hyped marketing gimmick amidst the buffet of endless cram school choices in Singapore, I would like to be on the 'yay' side to attest to JGC's quality. Let me share a little on how JGC indeed, does live up to its name.

Firstly, I thought the teachers are an enthusiastic bunch, not to mention that they spout the standard English language. Their expressive persona were so vibrant, together with the catchy tunes sang to make the little ones' heads turn! The entire atmosphere was contagiously exciting with giggles and jiggles, kids and adults alike! A lesson would typically began with free exploration time where the kids get to play with toys, instruments, read a book etc. before the scheduled class activities begin. The rest of the lesson would be filled with puppetry shows, sing-a-longs, art and craft activities etc. There was also a break in between where the kids were delightfully treated to some healthy snacks distributed by "Sally the Snack Lady"! Culminating towards the end of the day's lesson would be a series of songs led by the "Three amigos" clowns who would appear decked  in colourful  jester costume. These clowns in fact, formed  the small 3-man band that plays live music for the sing-a-long sessions. 

On the last day of the programme, the JGC staff painstakingly put together a carnival galore as a grand finale to the programme.This was the first time ever for them to stage such a carnival event and I must commend them for the effort put in! There were a couple of "carnival booths" with interesting activities for the kids. Each kid was given a carnival card which he or she is supposed to get it stamped at every booth visited. I personally liked the 'music jukebox" booth where kids get to choose their favourite tune performed "live" by a clown! The clown basically hid behind a makeshift structure with curtains and when the performance starts, the curtains would be drawn and he would begin singing while strumming his guitar! 

I thought that most of the booth ideas were rather novel and the teachers had to design and create the booths' items and materials from scratch using simple materials! My boy, hubby and myself really enjoyed every single bit of the carnival and we were rather emotional when the carnival ended and when it was time for us to depart. Just before we left, I checked with one of the teachers if the regular enrichment programme follows the same lesson structure and activities as the holiday sampler programme. The teacher told me that everything remains except for the characters i.e. the snack lady and the clowns whom were inserted as part of the holiday programme. I thought they should include these characters as well in their regular programmes! As we stepped out of the centre, each child was given a "ice-cream balloon" as a souvenir gift. I thought it was a really innovative idea to secure an inflated balloon to a paper cone and to pass it off as an 'ice-cream'! As a momento, we also received a photograph of our family which was earlier taken at a 'photo booth' (one of the carnival booths).

To sum up, I would be going back to JGC, only if there's a regular once a week session available for ILT, who's currently hitting a year old!

** Again, above are based on my own personal opinion on JGC. Do share if you have any experiences with the centre as well :)

Rethinking the Way we Think

;This year's Redesigning Pedagogy Conference held at the National Institute of Singapore (NIE) is back with a bang, centering on the theme of "Thinking: Time for a Rethink". The Conference has since made its debut back in 2009 and for every year, had successfully achieved its mission of congregating the greatest minds in current pedagogical research trends and practices and diffusing these invaluable knowledge to the rest.

It's unlike most conferences where you would expect keynoters to dwell on rocket science - the selection of papers are mainly focussed on the research-practice nexus. I think this is the main selling point - To apply pedagogical researches in educational pyschology, behavioural sciences, teaching and learning environments, cutting-edge ICT tools into teh context of the Singapore classroom. The volume and quality of discourse really reframed my thinking and perception of education, in particular, the process of learning and what it means for someone to "learn".

Apart from gleaning best practices for transfer to my area of work, as a concerned parent, I pounced on this opportunity to harvest insights to guide ILT's development as well. As one would expect, the Conference saw the recapitulation of a couple of well established themes dominating the educational landscape such as digital learning, flipped classroom concept and collaborative groupthink. A couple of educational luminaries' works i.e. Vygotsky, Piaget etc. were also revisited to rethink how some of these classical theories/principles may be re-applied to the 21st Century classroom.

In the opening speech delivered by Ms Indranee Rajah, Guest-of-Honour for the event, three tenets of this year's Conference theme were highlighted. Firstly, educators must genuinely believe that all students can think. Extending from this fundamental belief, proper structure and conducive environment scaffolds must be developed to  facilitate thinking. Of course, it would be rather superfluous to make the former comment and leave the students to exercise their own thinking. Without proper scaffolding, most of the students are not able to elicit and reflect on the quality of their own thinking. Henceforth, the last tenet emphasised on getting educators to model the thinking process i.e. to teach students "thinking aloud" or to verbalise their thoughts. Having said all these, it's definitely an uphill task that all educators are facing. If you would have noticed, gone are the days where educators focus on domain-specific teaching i.e. teaching of Mathematics/ languages/ Sciences etc. Instead, there is a phenomena shift to focus  on teaching and assessing pedagogical process skills such as meta-cognitive thinking in the form of self-assessment/reflections; design thinking and even reasoning skills i.e. using Paul's Reasoning Model.

Indeed, my mind was invigorated by the intellectual discourse throughout the 3-day conference. Radical research findings were surfaced amidst a pro-conservative educational setting. For instance, someone shared the notion of playfulness as a character trait correlating to better learning and consequently, better academic achievements. Another speaker also highlighted the importance of language as the key to unlocking our minds to participate in 'interthinking'. In a nutshell, language acquisition has a great impact on how human thinks in a group. When an individual conceives an idea, he or she would have to effectively communicate the idea to someone else and that person must understand what is being conveyed before the idea becomes "knowledge".  Building against this backdrop, the speaker then emphasised on the importance of "exploratory talk" or the quantity and quality of "talk" that goes on in a group discussion.  Someone else even suggested that conformity to school system leads to the demise of creativity in our students.

This is a lengthy post. Yet, I would like to encourage parents to rethink the entire notion of learning. Learning is not synonymous to education. Having a stellar education record doesn't necessary means that a child can learn effectively, make sense of the complex world and grapple with the reality. The only way is to teach your child to learn about learning and to think about thinking. These will almost guarantee his or path to success in life  and to remain resilient in the face of adversities.

P/S: This blog post reflects my humble opinions and they are in no way, affiliated to any other sources.

Refreshing the Fundamentals

I'm not sure if anyone of you have heard of the newly-minted Early Childhood Development Agency (ECDA), but I have. A couple of days ago, while scouring the internet for some information on training frameworks, I happened to stumble upon the new agency, launched apparently to wield the spectrum of early childhood education and development matters. Indeed, I must say that this is a laudable attempt to integrate childhood learning principles and outcomes with the more social aspect of provision of childcare services.

Early childhood education landscape and the childcare scene had recently hoarded the limelight at the "Our Singapore" conversation. Concerned parents fervently shared and prayed that their two cents worth would be somehow heeded by the authorities. As part of the panel, I too, would like to weigh in on this issue.

Personally, I thought that we should probably start to reflect upon our own expectations for our children and cut the government some slack. Yes, things may not be all together rosy yet, but at least the authorities came out to address the issues plaguing the childhood education system upfront where they could have swept all the dust under the carpet. I think we must admit that the policy view point, it is no mean feat to unfix the damages done and to mitigate the situation right away. I thought at least the authorities have the fortitude to pick up the pieces and run with them from now on.

The refreshed Kindergarten Curriculum Framework (KCF) is another notable attempt by the authorities to delineate and promulgate the desired outcomes of learning for the pre-schoolers, coupled with key support structures and learning environments to support their holistic growth and development. I'm especially thankful for the parents guide that was published to inform us of the guidelines. My only qualm is that while the concept of the frame was well-conceived, I'm not exactly certain how this piece of document could be operationalised. Nothwithstanding, I'm sure this has put us on the right footing to a certain extent.

Another point to highlight, I must consider myself fortunate as I'm literate and I'm in the business of training and education and hence, I can better appreciate the policy nuances surrounding this entire issue. Think about others who may not really understand the impact of providing quality learning environment and education to their children at a young age, they would never be informed of the promulgated framework. They might not even know the existence of the ECDA! I thought that the authorities should reach out to this segment to educate them via other means than expecting parents to access the information by downloading the parents' guide on MOE's website. I suspect some parents may not be well-informed of the changes. Go on, reach out to them so that we deprive no child.

Above are purely my personal opinions. Please feel free to share yours too if you happened to stumble in!

The 'A's and the 'E's!

It's the time of the year again for the Annual Learning and Teaching Seminar held in NTU. This year's theme is on assessment and feedback.

So, is it "assessment FOR learning" or "assessment OF learning"? Well, I guess Singaporeans are attuned to the idea of learning for the sake of clearing the examinations. The outcomes of learning encapsulated in the form of a paper qualification is very much coveted and hence, little emphasis has been placed on the quality of learning processes to get people to that end. I'm not suggesting that we should disregard the learning outcomes in any way; but we should discern the true meaning of of these outcomes. Graduating with a degree does not qualify the internalization of knowledge and practices in the field of study. Often so, the availability of opportunities to scale professional experience and development in different work contexts greatly impact and shape job performances and employability.

The Guest-of-Honour just unveiled a new concept as I was typing away - "Assessment AS learning". Here, the assessment component is embedded as part of the learning process. A very good assessment tool to exemplify this concept would be project - based assessment. This mode of assessment is pretty much formative in nature and as members of a project team, you get to concurrently learn and to be assessed. In addition, teachers, who are the project supervisors, serve as "knowledge source" pertaining to the project discipline(s). Apart from assimilating knowledge from the teachers, the students themselves are great knowledge pool for interdependent learning when they tap on one another's "expertise" and prior knowledge to synthesize or construct meaningful knowledge to address the issue at hand.

I would like to coin this new concept as the "3-in-1 mix" where you would find the three tenets of education namely, "teach, learn, assess" - all rolled into one! Well, guess I would stop here for now. Do take some time to mull over this if you are a parent... And please expire your views...I would be glad to hear from you!

When you lose that mobility...

Ever since the jolting announcement by MAS to impose cut-throat restrictions on car loan amount and tenure, I've learnt to appreciate and savour every single moment of convenience brought along by my car. The mobility which I've enjoyed thus far has buttressed itself in my daily life and dissociating it from my life is almost close to impossible.

We are well aware that the current COE prices have skyrocketed to astronomical figures and that the current land infrastructural system may not be able to support the burgeoning volume of vehicles plying the roads. Furthermore, the quality and reliability of public transport system remains yet another contentious topic often raised in kopitiam talks. I am not dismissing these issues lightly. Transport woes are closely tied to societal dynamics and I thought that there may be a host of confounding factors contributing to the current state of affairs. In my humble opinion, a suite of policies addressing different factors may be developed and introduced to target the issues. In addition, each policy may assume a more gentler tone and when collectively implemented, would achieve similar desired outcomes too.

Anyway, my car will be due in 4 years time. Initially, I still harbour the slightest hope of getting another car after the deadline, albeit a 2nd hand one. My slightest hope was extinguished by the abrupt motion put forth to bring a halting stop to the fleet from flying off the car showrooms. I can almost imagine our poor fellas swatting flies over at the showroom! Having a car for me is never a luxury; it's a convenience, especially when you have a little one-cum-a stroller in tow. But I must also agree that convenience sometimes breeds indolence and I'm guilty of that too! So, I'm not sure how I would snap back to the good o' times of squeezing into jam-packed public transport entities. Ironically, it seems as though I may be regressing vis-a-vis a developed and robustly advancing nation state!

Well, the only consolation that I have is that ILT would be 5 years old by then and hence, our circumstance then would not necessitate the ownership of a car. At press time, I am still cracking my head to think of an ingenious way to circumvent this ruling. Do share with me if you have a trick or two up your sleeves!

P/S: Please note that I am sharing my views and opinions in my own capacity as a concerned citizen ;)

New Year New You

We say this almost every year without fail. A brand new year always comes with fresh resolutions, new tasks and goals to achieve and for some of us, a new wardrobe :) Yet, there's always a tinge of self-denial to excuse ourselves from failure to fulfill these resolutions year after year. A new year brings with it the very prospect of starting everything on a clean slate, albeit sweeping the unfulfilled ones under the carpet, sometimes, for good. Gradually, the act of committing new resolutions on a new year has eroded to a state of no more than mere lip service. How often do we reflect upon our journey for the entire year? How do you rate your journey for 2012? Did you achieve what you are supposed to achieve? Did the experiences in 2012 surpass your expectations for the year and bring your life to a whole new level?

We are just an hour and 10 mins away from crossing over to 2013 and I'm thinking about my resolution for the coming year. Often so, we resolve to striving with sheer human efforts I.e. intensifying exercise regimes or shrinking the waist pouch just to indulge in that long overdue holiday in Europe. While I do agree that goal setting does have both therapeutic and motivational effects to propel and help refocus your life, setting unrealistic goals or setting goals for the sake of setting them just doesn't get you anywhere or would even cause your life to regress!

As for me, I just wish for wisdom to be bestowed upon my pea brain:p Now is a good opportunity to reflect upon my life, face and conquer my fears, revisit the hidden desires and dreams, redirect my priorities and savour the little pleasures and cherish the moments that life offers. Also, don't let guilt or regrets catch up with you. They are part and parcel of life and they can only make you more resilient! Alright! Let me throw myself back on the sofa now to receive 2013 with thanksgiving for the people around me and the things that I have and are going to possess :)

Happy 2013.

FTWM: Rid yourself of the Guilt!

The day finally came for me to report back to work. I have assumed a new identity for almost five months ( and counting...) and have pretty much enjoyed the role thus far of being a pseudo-SAHM. Perhaps I have crossed the line. As the days draw nearer for the parting, the struggle to detach myself from my current role grows more intense than ever. Every FTWM goes through this "rite of passage" - experiencing the joy of labour and basking in the newfound moments of motherhood to the eventual and inevitable separation from that little bundle who could barely flip yet. Of course, you can always choose to extend your time with your little one but the end is always in sight.

Transitioning into motherhood has had a huge impact in my life. It has transformed my perspectives and redefined my worth and values. But all these didn't occur with a snap of the fingers. Certainly, there were episodic outbursts of resistance- resistance to change. My hubby and I struggled to keep our sanity by setting a routine to systemise things. Even with the skeletal routine in place to frame and guide our actions, there were still room for uncertainty and nothing was cast in stone! The constant actions and reactions really threw us off balance as we struggled against the inertia of caring for a newborn.

We only began to see brighter days when we were more accustomed to the rules of the game. Only then were we able to enjoy the company of the little one, and not be bogged down by the mundane chores. Caring for a little one is no easy feat. There are times when I just want to go on an escapade and reminisce the good old days. I just want to go back to work and now that my workplace is finally beckoning me back!

For those FTWMs out there, I can totally empathize with your reluctance to go back to work. We probably feel consumed by the guilt of not spending enough time with our kids and not witnessing their milestones. I have this to say: set your sight farther and look at the larger picture. Jump out of the mindset of creating limiting blocks of " five days work week" and " weekends" and compartmentalising the activities that can be carried out or ought to be carried out on weekdays and weekends. Most of us dread Mondays and embrace the Fridays. We tend to narrow our perceptions and think that our time with our kids is finite because of work commitments. Why don't we start seeing our days in continuity where weekdays and weekends hold equal importance for us to spend quality time with the kids? Notice I mentioned "quality" time. It can be as short as five minutes to say a prayer with your kid. SAHMs may be the objects of envy to many, but some of them may not be spending time wisely with their kid. Consider a SAHM who only does household chores all day, just chauffeuring the kids around and letting them watch TV on their own. There is no value-add in any way. So, instead of devising ways and means to work less or to not work at all, why not look at things in a different perspective. See that you are just going away to work for the benefit of the family and that ultimately, will be back every single day to put your kid to sleep or to merely see them. See life with your kids as a continuum; you don't have to limit time with them only to the weekends and to lament about going back to work the next day on Sundays. The bottom line: don't let work monopolize your situation and free yourself from this seemingly bondage.

Right-brain Training: Need or Want?

To many parents' delight, one of Japan's renowned and critically acclaimed right-brain training centre, Heguru is finally setting foot on our sunny island. Never mind that Shichida has been the big bro claiming a chunk of the market share for years, parents are still enthusing and flocking to the new establishment. Well, I must admit that I'm one of them:p

It all started with right-brain cardinals such as Glenn Doman and Prof. Makoto Shichida vehemently advocating the theory of right brain activation at a tender age. Their claim was supported by years of solid research on brain-based learning which makes sense to me. The frenzy of sending kids to such centers really began when the Shichida Method School extended its franchise here. Since then, other right-brain training schools ( wannabes or unorthodox or hybrid ones) started springing out at various locales.

I attended a briefing session conducted by one of the three Heguru centres. Turns out that the centres are run by different franchisees. However, the fees are fixed across the centres and is the only constant variable. The quality of teachers and materials are very much under the mercy of the respective managements. Since the brand is making its debut and with such inconsistency, I was not comfortable in giving it a go at this moment. Furthermore, the credentials of the trainers are somewhat unconvincing. Some of them were ex-MOE teachers with a few teaching in the Secondary level while the rest are from the corporate sector. Being an ex MOE teacher myself, I cannot really agree that we have a strong grounding and ample experiences in educating very young children, let alone administering right brain activities. The exposure is very different - these trainers may be accustomed to mainstream and domain specific teaching. Perhaps it's just myself, I am not really comfortable... Oh, the exorbitant fees further justified and reinforced my decision not to join in the bandwagon. I guess I will just wait out until the establishment matures before I decide to enrol ILT.

Meanwhile, I will probably find out more about right brain training and its merits. I need to ascertain its benefits vis-a-vis the hype. For now, I'm inclined to the idea for I would rather teach my son how to fish than to give him the fish. This is akin to seizing teachable moments to inculcate lifelong values as opposed to sending him to expensive mathematics or phonics classes. Similarly, the idea of right brain activation sounds logical and why not? I should probably give it a try because I cannot afford to miss this window of learning.

Oh... What I have just shared are merely my humble opinions. You are free to have yours too! Do also feel free to enlighten me...

Forget about the nail parlours!

Make way for the much raved about nail stickers/strips! I've recently purchased a set online from Sally Hansen with much apprehension. Uncertain about its quality, I had a hard time justifying the disparity between the price and the nature of the product before convincing myself to give it a try. My doubts were unfounded and dissipated the moment I received the much- anticipated parcel. The colors were so vibrant, coupled with its superb quality. Upon closer examination, the strips were in fact manufactured by using nail varnish paints! Hence, they closely resemble the end product from a professional manicure session at a nail bar. I've attached a pic depicting the nail strips and how they look on my nails. FYI, the design is "Tattoo" if you're interested:)

Learning begins Now?

Blame it on our social culture, kiasuism has indeed percolated all aspects of our lives. At the tender age of just 2 months, ILT will be introduced to a variety of learning materials such as flashcards, educational toys etc. Perhaps, I should offer a fresh perspective on learning. The term 'learning' often send young kids and adults alike running for cover. I've seen cohorts of individuals - students and adults lamenting over the need to learn throughout my last 8 years of work in the educational/training field. It is only during the recent years that the educational arena was given a facelift and both the terms 'teaching' and 'learning' were redefined vis-a-vis the 21st Century construct.

Firstly, the ultimate value of learning should centre on the experiences garnered as opposed to the final assessment outcomes. Notwithstanding the value of learning outcomes, the successes and pitfalls that one experiences before arriving at the final destination culminate towards the shaping of how the individual perceives, internalises and applies the knowledge and skills.Beyond the application phase, the construction of new and meaningful knowledge is also envisaged. Now that we've identified experiential learning as the key to enable deep-level learning, we should then focus our intentions to educate our child by introducing the 'fun' element in all their learning. Always focus on the experiences that we want them to go through and ensure that these experiences are fun. Unlike adult learners who need to learn things that are relevant, little children just want to have fun and learn subtly. Regardless the relevancy, they will ultimately arrive on the intended outcome after having fun in the learning process and they will form an association between their experiences and the outcome. Perhaps, this 'cause and effect' type of learning works well with them! Of course, as the child gets older and is able to comprehend things at a higher level and to apply critical thinking processes; the same piece of knowledge then has to be reinforced by other learning processes such as inquiry-based or problem-based learning. To cut the long story short, there are other considerations in learning such as the social context of learning i.e. learner-centered approach, collaborative learning etc. which I won't elaborate now 'lest they bore you!

On the premise that learning should be fun, I would conciously avoid using the term 'learn' whenever I want ILT to learn something. Instead, I would say, 'Let's play flashcards!' One may argue that at such a young age, the child cannot decipher the meanings of both 'play' and 'learn'; however, adults do, and will subconciously impart the negative notion of learning to the child as we dread to learn. By the same token, we all love to play and using the word has such a therapeutic and positive impact on the things we do! Just a disclaimer, as the child enters into formal education where structured learning occurs, we have to help them differentiate between learning and playing. Essentially what I'm doing now is to impress upon ILT that learning is fun, just like playing!

Mumpreneur: Yay or Nay?

That's the question. We all want the easy way out - more time with kids, less work, more money etc. But, are we cut out to be a mumpreneur? This is not an easy question to tackle. While on the surface, it may seem like a rosy proposition to quit your full-time job and to start dabbling in something from home that hopefully, helps to bring back some dough for the family. Yes, we may all have grandeur plans in mind, ( "hmm...perhaps I could transform my hobby of jewerly-making into a multi-million dollar empire!") and starting up a business may be a piece of cake for those of you who are loaded and are able to pump in the capital. However, blinded by the initial enthusiasm, the enticing "bailing-out" from full-time work and of course, erm, a pair of eyes that unrelentlessly peeps over your shoulder, many made the grave mistake of delving into the abyss without considering the crux of the matter: sustainability.
I was reading through an article on mumpreneur, featured in the Young Parents magazine, Jan 2013 issue. The practical advices and experiences shared by the interviewees resonated with my thoughts on venturing into setting up a business amidst the competitors. Creating a strong market demand and presence are keys to sustanining your business and of course, sacrificing time with your loved ones and parting with your finances are also part of the deal. Unless you could identify and determine a niche for your plan; has a good network of clientele, understands the market forces to make them work in your favour, is prepared to sacrifice most of your time with your loved ones and has a surplus for the investment, then you may be ready to take the plunge.
Consider and weigh your options carefully. The idea of owning a blogshop selling kids products may be all too enticing for most mums and thinking that the set-up should be hassle-free since you are familiarised with online shopping anyway may be too simplistic for serious mumpreneurs. Remember, there is no free lunch in this world. You have to earn it.