Adam Khoo: The expats will rule Singapore

[Cheval]

skunk:

I rather have moderately adequate true-blue Singaporeans running our own Motherland, than highly capable foreigners ruling our own homes. The guest, no matter how highly qualified, remains a guest, and can only sleep in the guest room, not beside my wife.

What do you mean by 'true-blue' Singaporeans? Do you consider expats' kids grown up or even born here as Singaporean? If not, I'd rather find you narrow-minded. LKY is patiently waiting for the 2nd generation of the expats to serve Singapore. He is a genuine far-seeing leader.

[Cheval]

Parent1:

I tend to agree with this view.


Many Ang Moh parents are rather patient with and supportive of their kids. They would treat them with respect & try to draw out their kids' view. We Asian tend to think parents know best & would expect our kids to obey us or be reprimanded. Some even expect their children to be perfect super-beings.

We've got more & more modern school buidings and state-of-art facilities. But the teacher to students ratio remain ~1:40 for each class from primary school to JC. How to expect our teachers to actively engage each student?

Also the focus is to get the students to memorise & regurgitate as much knowledge & info as possible, instead of teaching them analytical & problem-solving skills thru' critical thinking (which is GP in JC?).

While international schools, where the class size is ~20+, may not be as rigorous as ours, the students are expected to speak up, particiapte in the class and make presention. They learn to be confident and articulate.

I hope our MOE would find a way to strike a balance between teaching our kids the hard and soft skills.

I agree with you. PSLE is virtually hell to kids. My son (P6) suffers a lot; he is basically an obedient boy, curious and willing to study. Still ...

Another day, when discussing the Singapore education system, a friend said here it's about talent selection, but not talent development. By 'selection', a mold is provided first (by gvmt) and parents (are forced to) push their kids to fit into it. By 'development', the kids are left the freedom to develop their talents. How much I hope we adopt the latter way in Singapore.

C'est une merde, ce systeme. (Don't look further, just want to voice out my anger).

[skunk]

Cheval:

What do you mean by 'true-blue' Singaporeans? Do you consider expats' kids grown up or even born here as Singaporean? If not, I'd rather find you narrow-minded. LKY is patiently waiting for the 2nd generation of the expats to serve Singapore. He is a genuine far-seeing leader.

kindly read carefully before commenting n think carefully before calling someone narrow minded.

Of course anyone with a pink IC n is fully patriotic n loyal to the country is a true Singaporean. Why does it matter if their parents r expats? Ridiculous question.

Adam Khoo said FOREIGNERS aka expats will one day rule Singapore,he didn't say naturalized children of expats. Totally different idea.

[csc]

Parent1:

Also the focus is to get the students to memorise & regurgitate as much knowledge & info as possible, instead of teaching them analytical & problem-solving skills thru' critical thinking (which is GP in JC?).


While international schools, where the class size is ~20+, may not be as rigorous as ours, the students are expected to speak up, particiapte in the class and make presention. They learn to be confident and articulate.

I hope our MOE would find a way to strike a balance between teaching our kids the hard and soft skills.

I agree that the international school students maybe more confident and articulate but can't say the same for their written language. :lol:

[Cheval]

csc:

I agree that the international school students maybe more confident and articulate but can't say the same for their written language. :lol:

I am not sure local students perform better in written English. People I meet in my work are all university graduates at least. In 80% of the cases, their writing is full of errors, mostly grammatical, but also in usage and logic. How many are those who write a simple letter/message in this way: \"I am please to inform you that ...\"? Just 2 weeks ago, I heard an English teacher saying: \"I don't want the kids to ... and I also don't want them to ...\"

When Jimmy Rogers said his family members and friends in HK and US could not understand his daughter's Singlish (at all), I find him exaggerating a bit. But there's some truth in what he said. It's not a simple question of pronunciation. I myself often wonder why teachers do not correct basic errors in the kids' homework from the very start such that the errors will gradually disappear.

I do find that most parents here have a good level. So I feel blessed to be able to learn from them.

[foreverj]

sometimes it could be a matter of training. people who work under people who r more lax with their writing end up sending emails with abbreviations (ie. read like a text msg) and conversational english. people who work under bosses who r particular with grammer, sentence structure etc end up drafting beautiful and complete emails which takes care of context, clarity of answer as well.

[tree nymph]

Parent1:

People tend to discover a sense of purpose & direction in life when they are uprooted form their comfort zone. They also need to work harder & smarter than the locals in order to survive. No more hotel papamama, laundry, meals & pick-up on demand.


Look at our ancestors who migrated to SE Asia from China & India. Many of them started as hard labour. Look at the Singaporeans who venture overseas. Many were average students or school dropouts in Singapore. But many of them have found the hunger & passion to make the best of a second chance.

So, may be this is one solution. Young Singaporeans, go abroad, get a sense of insecurity as a foreigner and rebuild your life.

and get singapore gah-men lamenting that we are losing talents overseas??/

[tree nymph]

Parent1:

I tend to agree with this view.


Many Ang Moh parents are rather patient with and supportive of their kids. They would treat them with respect & try to draw out their kids' view. We Asian tend to think parents know best & would expect our kids to obey us or be reprimanded. Some even expect their children to be perfect super-beings.

We've got more & more modern school buidings and state-of-art facilities. But the teacher to students ratio remain ~1:40 for each class from primary school to JC. How to expect our teachers to actively engage each student?

Also the focus is to get the students to memorise & regurgitate as much knowledge & info as possible, instead of teaching them analytical & problem-solving skills thru' critical thinking (which is GP in JC?).

While international schools, where the class size is ~20+, may not be as rigorous as ours, the students are expected to speak up, particiapte in the class and make presention. They learn to be confident and articulate.

I hope our MOE would find a way to strike a balance between teaching our kids the hard and soft skills.

I agree with you on this. cos i've got friend's kids who are in international schools overseas (cos friends posted overseas and so their kids get to go international schools) and they are different from our kids. Their kids are more outspoken, speaks better and confident of themselves. Their curriculum is different too - and they are more exposed and their general knowledge is prob better...

[Cheval]

foreverj:

sometimes it could be a matter of training. people who work under people who r more lax with their writing end up sending emails with abbreviations (ie. read like a text msg) and conversational english. people who work under bosses who r particular with grammer, sentence structure etc end up drafting beautiful and complete emails which takes care of context, clarity of answer as well.

Personally, I have not problem with 'simplified' English in conversations. But I do think people should know how to write correct English when needed.

[foreverj]

Cheval:

Personally, I have not problem with 'simplified' English in conversations. But I do think people should know how to write correct English when needed.

pls dun misunderstand me. i have no issues with simplified english in conversations. what i mean is i've seen certain mgt level people sending emails written like conversational english (with obvious grammatical errors and all) addressed to quite a big group of people.