I sent my children to learning lab for their english maths science tuition.
Last year it cost me tens of k for both of them.
The consolation was that my children's grades improved after that.
?will their grades actually be the same if no tuition
?will their grades actually be the same if they had gone to a cheap neighbourhood tuition centre
Perhaps. Perhaps not.
The sum i could have invested into a blue chip to yield 4%pa
I guess kids education thing is something which is same yet different from investments. (Haha..i myself getting confused)
To add,
When i pick my children up from the tuition centre, i see so many smaller children perhaps as young as 7, wearing glasses already.
Hmm..no wonder myopia is such an epidemic here.
Last year it cost me tens of k for both of them.
The consolation was that my children's grades improved after that.
?will their grades actually be the same if no tuition
?will their grades actually be the same if they had gone to a cheap neighbourhood tuition centre
Perhaps. Perhaps not.
The sum i could have invested into a blue chip to yield 4%pa
I guess kids education thing is something which is same yet different from investments. (Haha..i myself getting confused)
To add,
When i pick my children up from the tuition centre, i see so many smaller children perhaps as young as 7, wearing glasses already.
Hmm..no wonder myopia is such an epidemic here.
Hi hi, I dont have children yet, but I always wonder, can't we tutor pri sch children and help them with their homework ourselves? Is the tutors' quality really that different?
ReplyDeleteI tutored my children when they were in primary school. When they got into secondary school, I help them in maths (not giving tuition, but helped them solve problem when they could do it themselves), but got them a tutor for Chinese.
DeleteOne fine day, the Chinese tutor, who is a fine lady from Beijing, asked me, Mr. Sanye, through our conversation and judging from the Chinese book collection you have, your Chinese is good enough to teach your children. Why did you engage me to teach? To this I said to her: "First, I have no time to teach them due to my work commitment. Then, when I tried to sit down with my kids to learn, they would play monkey with me. The same experience I had teaching them swimming when they were younger."
Hi
ReplyDeletetimes are different. I did well in school in my. Yet when i teach my son maths, he said the method different. They draw diagrams to solve some problems which i din gave that in my time. Science is more conceptual now. Questions are more difficult n involvess higher level thinking.
Yes, the method of modelling. I had to learn it and became an expert in it. I help some children in my church with these kind of problems, and they called me Under maths expert.
DeleteAnd nowadays the marks of good students are very close. Every mark difference might mean a lot of difference in position.
ReplyDeletesuch is the competitiveness.
imo studying is a lot more stressful now.
not v healthy
Are you pursuing position in class and school, and ultimately academic results which may not lead to a excellent jobs and life time of income?
DeleteOr should be pursuing life skills that can teach them to fish for life, or have alternate fishes and other food on the table?
Living in the 21st century is all about multiple skillsets, networks, connections, life skills, not just academic results, which should be all about understanding and application, rather than A or A+.
Unfortunately, spore is all abt paper qualifications. Though its not healthy, but which parent would want to see their child fail in life.
Deletei think its similar in all the big cities in the world.
Education, be it academic or financial, is somewhat similar.
DeleteFollowing the crowd is like the "untrained" or "uneducated" retail investors where 90% lose money, and only 10% of the "trained" or "educated" makes money.
So the same goes for academic education, it is the 10% who goes for a more holistic education, trained in a more tangible ways like life skills, multiple skillsets, or other areas that can give the kids more choices or ability to adapt and grow in the real world rather than simply As or A+, will outperform the academic ones in the long term.
In today's and the future world, it is about having connections, networks, multiple skillsets, and creating multiple sources of income that gives security and assurance for life, not academic results which may inthe short term gets you a job, which may or may not last.
I guess u have a point.
Deletebut i got a feeling that nowadays a degree is a bare minium. Even rich towkays would like their children to have a degree, singapore or overseas U. Young n no degree bosses sometimes hard to command respect from their subordinates who all havd degrees.
Moreover most agreements n meetings nowadays need to have some level of educational background for these to be smooth n successful.
gone are those days where a bo tak cheh towkay establish n set up a successful company..rare now.
I am not saying degree is bad, or not good to have a degree. It all depends on the motivation and ability of the kids to pursue to their best ability and interest. Then there are some who are late bloomers as well.
DeleteWhat is probably more important in this age is a more holistic focus and learning, rather than the outdated and pressuring pursuit of academic excellence, which many parents are still doing, and probably take another 10 years or more to change. If the child has the motivation and ability to get excellent results, fine and good. But if the child is simply average, or below average, then focus more on what they can be good or excellent in like sports, arts, or some other skill sets.
For example, many schools nowadays have programs like entrepreneurship, innovation, creativity, music, arts, financial literacy and many more programs that educates the children in schools in different life skills, and varied aspect of learning, which is beneficial for the kids. Also the right values and upbringing can't be neglected.
I agree.
DeleteWith that, esp ur last point, comes with much greater commitment n sacrifice on the part of the parents.
eg meet the teacher sessions, nature walk, outings, ccas...parents need to make time off, much more than i feel my time as a young child had taken. Thats on top of work commitments. With result grandparents have to get involved in this, otherwise how to cope? Good or bad...i dont know.
I agree.
DeleteWith that, esp ur last point, comes with much greater commitment n sacrifice on the part of the parents.
eg meet the teacher sessions, nature walk, outings, ccas...parents need to make time off, much more than i feel my time as a young child had taken. Thats on top of work commitments. With result grandparents have to get involved in this, otherwise how to cope? Good or bad...i dont know.
Hi Low paul,
ReplyDeletePrimary school is crazy...it's really hard and when I looked at the math sums, it's really hard to imagine a pri school kid doing those. I think it'll really be hard for parents to teach their kids themselves. I'm a tutor, and I think I'll have difficulty teaching the pri sch part!
Look at the % of shortsighted pupils at such young age. Its alarmimgly n very sad.
ReplyDeleteso young yet wear thick glasses n still reading n studying all the time.
Paul,
ReplyDeleteU went to atas tuition center la.
That center did have a reputation of producing results but my sense is that your kids' results are not that poor but it's a race to the top.
But when money is no object. Most parents would give the children the best.
That is one of the best around. For Chinese, u have tianxia.
U started at Primary. There are others that started pre-school.
Heard shinchida?
Heard Baker Kindergarten?
All the best from 3 onwards, you be ready to pay for local university fees twice before getting into university
Hi SI,
ReplyDeleteYeah. I saw some children so small already wearing thick glasses. So ke lian.
shinchida baker kindergarten never heard of.
My impression was that the teachers at learning lab got some way of getting the children to learn new stuff. My daughter was struggling in maths in p4 but now seems ok.
my son went for the gep prep course n told me that he saw similar questions in the gep part 2!!! N he passed that difficult gep test. A neighbour who was top in school did not attend any such. He din clear the gep test.
i got a feeling that it's of some help.
but damn costly.
Hi Pardon me, Paul
ReplyDeleteSo your son in P5? Or just got into GeP
How is he coping?
He is p4 now. Used to score 95 average. Now become 80plus average. He says everyone there very expert. Very different from last time.
ReplyDeleteI see. Thanks Paul.
ReplyDeleteI now see things better from more perspectives.
He rightfully deserved his place in GEP given the scores u told me. The learning lab provided the slight edge. Sigh ... Rat race at primary level is no lesser than the adult world
i told him " son, no choice, u got to study. after u graduate, then i teach u about investments. but if u become high flier and earn big money, then maybe no need investments"
ReplyDeleteCool Paul,
ReplyDeleteAt least u got te confidence to pass him your investmeny knowledge.
I just hope he earn his keep. I myself boy confident about my inveatment skills, especially I stop learning for a while already