Pat's Schoolhouse

[zeezzen]

okay okay... chill chill...

so where are your kids studying at? praying hard there's vacancy for us at buckley / halifax / claymore.....

[LOLMum]

mine already passed that stage - phew -


it was easy to get dd into a school but for ds who is 7 now, the waiting list was a :yikes: . now if i know a friend has a bun in the oven, my first advice is look for a school now. dont wait.

pat's was on our list too but decided to stick to another that put more emphasis on chinese.

all the best.

better start looking at primary school too. very kiasu.............

[zeezzen]

Oh, I know where I want to put him liao. I will need to do voluntary work at Nanyang Pri when he turns 4 years old… kiasu kiasu… haha! but no guarantee a place.

[Un-Kiasu Singaporean]

As Singaporeans would say "Wah-Lau" you all damn kiasu sia." What’s next do volunteer work at Pat’s Schoolhouse before you fall pregnant to guarantee ourselves a place. Talk about money can’t buy us everything. National pastime…queueing and complaining.


(Quoting Pink Floyd’s Song Another Brick In The Wall)

You, Yes You, Stand Still Laddie!
When we grew up and went to school, there were certain teachers who would hurt the children anyway they could by pouring their derision upon anything we did
exposing every weakness however carefully hidden by the kids.
But in the town it was well known that when they got home at night
their fat and psychopathic wives
Would thrash them within inches of their lives!
We don’t need no education
We don’t need no thought control
No dark sarcasm in the classroom
Teachers leave them kids alone
Hey! Teacher! Leave them kids alone!
All in all it’s just another brick in the wall.
Wrong, Guess again!
If you don’t eat yer meat, you can’t have any pudding.
How can you have any pudding if you don’t eat yer meat?
You! Yes, you behind the bikesheds, stand still laddie!"

C’mon guys we didn’t have the posh, luxury strollers and boutique preschool education in our generation and we didn’t turn out so bad did we? The education system nowadays has turned our kids into book-smart but not life-smart kids with no resilience to handle daily life. So what if we’re number 1 in mandarin? Local kids can’t think outside the box and it’s a trait we continue our spoon-feeding and mugging through to our uni days.

If you can show me a local preschool that can rival the international systems I would like to see for myself. Finland for example is the No.1 in the World in Education. They value the importance of early childhood education and their early childhood educators have Masters degrees not O/A Level students on holiday jobs. Teaching is a noble profession that truly requires a calling. Get it right!!

[Kabby]

Un-kiasu, you seem very creative though. You can write like that, but you were also a product of the Sg system. So that's not too bad isn't it?

So, what I see is that our kids have it better than us. They have more creative projects and assessments. They have more hands on learning and role play and exciting learn through exploration stuff. I look at the kids around me and they are truly more precocious than us during our time. They think out of the box more too.
Finland has a much longer history than us. Every country needs time to be developed. Singapore just reached \"developed\" status not too long ago. And every education system needs time to be fine-tuned and time to churn out generations of creative, critical thinking kids.

So give Singapore some time. And if there are more like-minded people like you and I, you can be an ambassador, spread the message to be less caught up in the stressful rat race, but allow kids to learn through play, there is lots of hope yet that we can be like Finland.

Already, Singapore is regarded highly. Finland, South Korea, Singapore have appeared in the international reports as having great education systems that value the teachers. We can do much more for the teachers indeed, and slowly and steadily we are moving towards having better qualified teachers across the board, isn't it?

In the past, our Primary school teachers need not have degrees but now all of them do.

And, I placed my child in Pat's because I didn't want him to be spoon fed and I don't want him to be a mugger. I want him to acquire concepts through hands on \"doing\" and hopefully he will be a more creative and critical thinker than me and Dh are!

[2boysmother]

what is the fees in pat school house

[Un-Kiasu Singaporean]

@Kabalevsky Thanks for the compliment about my writing. Doesn’t sound like that of sarcasm. About your point of being a product of the SG system, I only studied up to Secondary 3 here and then I completed the rest of my education overseas…hence I have a different mindset to the usual Singaporeans. I agree that the majority of local kids may have better literacy and numeracy skills compared to other Western countries but the majority of local kids here are unable to think out of the box or problem solve on their own. They are excellent at regurgitation but struggle to search for knowledge independently. I really believe in thematic units of work which incorporate the different subject areas of maths, science, literacy, technology, visual- arts etc… and the whole language experience thing the kids engage in during the process of cookery/baking.


Pat’s TCML Music Program is very well-written and thought out. It’s not like the usual boring theory/ ta-taa ti-ti-taa nonsense that is just too over the top. It’s really interesting coz’ the kids are exposed to very varied and different genres of music and really have the sensory experience in music creation. Who knows maybe next they will start composing their own songs on the computer with some advanced music-editing software or something. There are ways to further improve on the current Pat’s programs for sure…but that’s what their curriculum team is for isn’t it…Haha…

Speaking of countries that value early childhood educators, the realisation has only just dawned on ours that it is an area of uttmost importance. We can judge the importance placed of ECE by looking at the salaries we pay our childcare / kindergarten teachers. Come on it’s time to be realistic…We leave our children in their hands almost all day. Surely we want satisfied not disgruntled teachers. We want the younger Gen Y to choose teaching as a profession because there’s less of a generation gap and because we need new blood in every profession.

Everyone cares about how smart their children should become but no one really plans for their child to become a teacher. Especially in SG we associate brains and wealth with doctors, lawyers, accountants, finance, IT etc… It’s time to make it a first-rate profession that commands prestige and a high rate of pay. It’s really ironic…we worry about what school what Pat’s branch we must get into and how early we must start registering but what we don’t give enough importance to are our children’s teachers. They are the ones that really matter…the defining reason that we trust them with our children’s development.

@ 2BoysMother - With regards to your question about Pat’s fees all I can say is an arm and a leg so it’s up to each individual family to decide if it’s really worth your dollar. As they say good things don’t come cheap…The kiasu parents pay for the new house within the radius of those prestigious schools to ensure that the kids get in, luxury cars, posh birthday parties. For me, Pat’s joins the elite, luxury brand of childcare…Just quoting my friend on her description of Pat’s when I was deciding on preschools for my kids. Woah! Pat’s Schoolhouse…Isn’t that the Atas school in the Bukit Timah area. So depends how you wanna look at it.

[Kabby]

haha... unkiasu, i was definitely not being sarcastic, so yeah, it was a compliment.

childhood is when the foundations are laid. so up to sec 3, it is still an important foundation. i still have faith in the education system here.

you sound like my Dh, who rants about early childhood trs' salaries all the time. i need to check with him tmr if that's his username on KSP. (he's asleep now though, and i think you just posted, so oops..)

not just the music program. I like the influence of Orff and Kodaly in the music program but I do lament that they kept changing the music teachers for a while in my son's center. High turnover rate. (probably due to salary too)

I love the emphasis on Chinese. I love their teachers. I like the way they learn Chinese in fun ways rather than rote. I like the Letterland stories. I myself did not know about Letterland till my ds2 learnt about it and I enjoy the stories so much! That said, in language there are so many exceptions, we can't use a single system to guide us in pronouncing all words, but anyway.

I won't have a problem if my kids want to be teachers. Dh and I used to be teachers. I am still on no pay leave but yeah, when I return, I'd still be a teacher. Wonder if I'd get less respect from you after revealing this fact, than say, if I were a surgeon.

Pat's fees. Yes, very high. I use my Baby Bonus acct to pay though, so I treat it as 50% paid by govt. Then I get MCYS subsidy too. Though I don't work now, so I get much less than working moms. It's still much higher than the PCF downstairs though, and I did enquire downstairs before putting my child in Pat's cos they were full, actually.

But after having him in Pat's, I found I love the teachers so much, I don't regret it.

I do try not to reveal his school unless asked point blank though, because I am not wealthy and I dislike people to react in a strong manner when they hear he is in Pat's. They sometimes even look suspicious, lol.

So 2boysmother, if you are rich, it's ok, or if you don't mind the reactions.
And hey, I've got 2 boys too! hi-five!

[empressplace]

Hi I would like to provide a different view here. Actually in the course of my work, I have found Singaporeans to be of international standard and in many cases better than foreigners. I am talking about the professional context. I can’t say that I agree that "the majority of local kids here are unable to think out of the box or problem solve on their own." But of course, I have limited exposure to children besides my own so I don’t know.


Creativity is also linked to our economic reality and resources. Singaporeans do not see creative expression as a means to a good living although that may change. And grades are the basic stepping stone to a good job. Entrepreneurship is not strong here as our domestic market is small. Hence most Singaporeans are still planning for employment rather than entrepreneurship.

Given our economic environment, where we are located, the rise of China and cultural factors, I cannot see Kiasu-ism ever waning. People of North Asian descent, especially Chinese, Koreans and Japanese people, would be kiasu wherever they are - Amy Chua of Tiger Mother fame being case in point. I think it is better to focus on being intelligently kiasu. Focusing on creativity at the expense of acquiring basic foundational skills is not wise. But over focusing on academic grades without developing the soft skills/ maturity/ cultural sensitivity or creativity is just going to put the kids in severe disadvantage in the long run. A state school system is never going to achieve everything for everybody. Hence parents are ultimately responsible for making the best choices for their own kids as they see fit.

[Kabby]

empressplace:

I have found Singaporeans to be of international standard and in many cases better than foreigners.


A state school system is never going to achieve everything for everybody. Hence parents are ultimately responsible for making the best choices for their own kids as they see fit.

yup, agree! :hi5:

I have many students (from the local school system) who go on to Ivy League unis and they hold their own or do even better than the Americans. But that's not to say they are bookworms only. They also join activities with a fervour and often do community work too. A lot of them also stay on to work there (either in Uk, US or Australia) if they don't have scholarships and have to rush back to serve their bonds. They report very good work performance too, so I don't think they are rigid, or not creative, else they can't survive in a competitive job market there too.

True, there'll always be some who do CIP in the Sg system just to clock the hours and get the points, but hopefully for enough students, it becomes a good habit inculcated in them.

For the exam-smart people, there'll always be some of these too, who can't think out of the box, but as long as the proportion is normal compared to the rest of the world, I don't think there's anything very wrong.

The last part is very true, empressplace. In the end, the parents are still the most important people who will influence the kids. And the most responsible too.

The load on our shoulders is a heavy one indeed. I hope I manage it well enough!