River Valley High School [*IP]

[justsay]

dad_of_the_bride:

daisyt, from your dd's experience, how is the standard of discipline in RV? Do the students generally behave well and carry themselves well? And how abt the teachers? I heard feedback that one of the Chinese teacher ( a lady) for Sec 1 is a \"terror \" and will throw students' bag out of the classroom at the slightest provocation and is very eccentric. Sound familar to you?

Good and bad teachers are everywhere. My elder girl in a school in Yishun had a very good English teacher in Sec 1. Unfortunately, he has been asked to transfer to another school the year after. Even though he has been transferred, he met up with my DD and some of her classmates to revise and coach them English weeks before their SA1 and SA2, all the way from Sec 2 to Sec 4. Where to find such teacher ?

[daisyt]

justsay:

Well Done RV!!! Your girl in the team ? :congrats:

No she is not and \"heng arh\". You cannot imagine how tough the prepration is ..... :lol:

i not video auntie

[Fairy]

daisyt:

This year FLL there are two champion teams. One is RVHS and the other is SCGS, both teams would be representing singapore in the upcoming world FLL in Atlanta on April.

Hi daisyt,

I notice that RV's quite strong in Robotics. During last year's NJRC, I was quite impressed with some of the teams' robots - looks sophisticated. Any ides what's the contributing factor to the student's performance for RV at competitions?

Is it due to
- good coach/mentor (I think this is very important)?
- schools's investment in good hardware ie. parts (also very important as it is difficult to do well if the parts are old/dated/inadequate)?
- the cohort(s) capability in programming (some have natural talent, some extra training outside school or from school)?

I'm aware of someone who was a member of a team representing our country in a FLL competition in the past but could not contribute much when joined another team in other similar competitions. So, teaming with the right mates also plays a part in competitions.

RV is one of the schools which send many teams for such competitions. Just curious, are they financed by the school? Or do the participants need to pay for their competitions and mentorship fees?

I encouraged my daughter to sign up for robotics but she's not interested. In her school, priority will be given to those with experience & a string of awards behind them. But I thought she should at least try to apply for it. Too bad, she's not interested.

[Fairy]

justsay:

Verh xiong to take 2 CCAs. Jia Lak. Hope your girl hear wrongly...

Hi justsay,

Don't worry lah. Both my kids have been taking more than 1 CCAs since they were in primary school. No doubt I would rather prefer they spend more time on their study, that's provided they will spend more time on their study if they are not busy with thier CCAs. Mine won't. In CCAs the child get to learn new skills and expand their network of friends, a plus point.

[small]

justsay:

small:

Why laugh? is that you har ?

Of course not me...
I'm laughing at Daisyt, she made a nice video clip and now well known as video aunty liao.... :rotflmao:

Aiyo justsay, you so bad... Daisyt not a video aunty lar, she is the video pro.. :celebrate: :udawoman:

[dad_of_the_bride]

How a teacher behaves has a strong impact on our children. We are all for strict teachers who have a genuine interests of our children at their hearts.


What would be unsettling is to have a teacher who has some eccentric idiosyncray and is emotionally unstable. Coments from the PSLs on the particular Chinese teacher seemed to suggest this was the case.

I agree with the posted comments that there are good and bad teachers in every school. I told my dd that we can never change people, let alone teachers. But we should to take things in our stride.

Glad to hear that discipline will be better with the new principal on board.

[daisyt]

dad_of_the_bride:

What would be unsettling is to have a teacher who has some eccentric idiosyncray and is emotionally unstable. Coments from the PSLs on the particular Chinese teacher seemed to suggest this was the case.

hi dad_of_the_bride, sometimes, kids can be quite exaggerated on their comments. Just get your dd to observe herself and see how things go.

[daisyt]

Fairy:

Hi daisyt,

I notice that RV's quite strong in Robotics. During last year's NJRC, I was quite impressed with some of the teams' robots - looks sophisticated. Any ides what's the contributing factor to the student's performance for RV at competitions?

Is it due to
- good coach/mentor (I think this is very important)?
- schools's investment in good hardware ie. parts (also very important as it is difficult to do well if the parts are old/dated/inadequate)?
- the cohort(s) capability in programming (some have natural talent, some extra training outside school or from school)?

I'm aware of someone who was a member of a team representing our country in a FLL competition in the past but could not contribute much when joined another team in other similar competitions. So, teaming with the right mates also plays a part in competitions.

RV is one of the schools which send many teams for such competitions. Just curious, are they financed by the school? Or do the participants need to pay for their competitions and mentorship fees?

I encouraged my daughter to sign up for robotics but she's not interested. In her school, priority will be given to those with experience & a string of awards behind them. But I thought she should at least try to apply for it. Too bad, she's not interested.

Hi Fairy, one of the most important factors is COMMITMENT. There are many other qualities they look at when selecting the students to join those major competitions, eg. able to work as a team, willing to work hard ... Sometimes, I would also argue with dd, yes, full commitment to your CCA is important but don't forget, you also have other commitments too.

To answer your questions, I actually ask dd to read your post and get her opinions.
- good coach/mentor (I think this is very important)? - their mentors and coaches are their seniors. Some seniors who have graduated and seniors who are in the higher level, used to be in infocomm club would still drop by to give them advices.

- schools's investment in good hardware ie. parts (also very important as it is difficult to do well if the parts are old/dated/inadequate)? - In general of infocomm club, yes. They have many NXT sets, good video cameras and I heard investing in more sophiscated cameras.

- the cohort(s) capability in programming (some have natural talent, some extra training outside school or from school)? - I have heard of a couple of them were DSA in with robotics skill but majority of them are normal students. Just like my dd, she never had any contact with robotics before and it was a struggle for her in the beginning. Some of their seniors used to be in robotics when in primary school time.

For joining of competitions, the school pays for everything. I heard the registration fees for FLL per team is $600.

I always tell dd, interest can be cultivated and if you don't give yourself a chance to try before saying not interested, this is very unfair to me and to yourself. Thats how she got into infocomm, followed by robotics, with no interest in the beginning but now, with lots of passion. One mum in this forum also mentioned before, her dd discovered her other talent and interest after getting into a CCA never tried before.

Actually, working with those boys in infocomm, esp robotics where the males are generally strong and dominate in this area, is not easy for the girls. So far, from NRJC and FLL, she gains many life experiences.

[justsay]

First day of school , HMT starts with book 1B and were asked to bring money to buy Sec 2 HMT textbook. :!:

[daisyt]

justsay:

First day of school , HMT starts with book 1B and were asked to bring money to buy Sec 2 HMT textbook. :!:

Oh yes, for HCL, they jump around, not according to sequence.