The Alternative Story (TAS) - Discussion

[mrschan]

I am sorry but what and where is TAS?

[Kissgurami]

mrschan:

I am sorry but what and where is TAS?

TAS - The Alternative Story, It is an English Enrichment Centre.

You can check more about it at this link: http://www.kiasuparents.com/kiasu/forum/viewtopic.php?f=35&t=7586

[kitty2]

sleepy:

Tried TAS too. Not effective. Already withdrawn.


It's precisely because of the positive feedback on KSP that I decided to give TAS a try. But I think too much hype la, like learning lab

TAS asked students to memorise the essay. I don't see any value add in this case. I have tonnes of model essays & award winning books at home. Good essays with personifications, tension building, etc. If I want my dd to learn creative writing through memorising essays, I do not need to send her to classes, right? I expect more than this from TAS.

And I noticed TAS took a long time to cover one theme. Sometimes as long as 4 to 5 weeks on one theme, basically memorise over & over again. I'm not impressed la.

Compre is not satisfactory either. Usually only the first few questions were covered in class, the rest as homework. I am fine with homework if they went through the compre thoroughly and were taught the technique to tackle compre questions. I don't see that le. End up I need to sit with my dd to coach her how to answer every single question. Frankly speaking, if I have to go through every question with her, how is it different from asking her to do assessment books at home? I also sit with her

I heard from my friend that her kids homework was not being marked and no answer sheet given too :? My friend was saying is a waste of time doing it as there's no answer and can't revise too.

[hquek]

Actually I do like negative reviews, becos then I can temper my expectations and better able to make (what I feel) a more balanced judgement. There is no perfect place - esp when we’re talking about group classes; so parents can only go with what we feel comfy with. I can’t teach my kid and can only think to outsource this.


Things I don’t like about tas:
1) squeezy classrooms. Since my kid joined, the number of kids getting more and more - I think it’s reached max size so they can’t take in more kids (unless someone sits in the toilet).

2) Compo. there was a whole load of memorisation going on initially until my kid also got a bit sick. I feedback to teacher and now they are only memorising sentences. This is much better for my kid becos there is less memorisation needed (we usually start on Friday night/sat morning…and his class is on Sat morning). So out of that, something positive I note, ie they take in feedback.

3) Compo. Sometimes I feel parts of a compo don’t make sense. In such case, I’ll ask my son to ask the teacher - train his query skills a bit; and on my part, I’ll enlighten him why I feel this part of compo is absurd and how I feel we can make it more believable. But such occasions are rare, so I take this in my stride.

What I like:
1) they teach according to ability. I think my P1 will be bored stiff if he’s only limited to doing P1 work.
2) I’m amazed how most of the teachers (at least the ‘old birds’) know kids’ names and all - even if they are not teaching the child, they can call each kid by name!
3) the efforts teachers make in explaining and clarifying. On an adhoc basis, I will ‘xiao xiao’ go ask his teacher if my kid’s alright and she’ll go into a whole spiel of what they have covered, where his weaknesses are, or what he did in class. Much appreciate the effort put in.
4) participation. Usually when I wait for class to be over, I can hear kids noises of participation in the classes. I take it to be positive becos I would hate to be in a class where silence reigns - for me personally, during silence, zzz monster comes a knocking.

[sleepy]

jasmineong:

Hi sleepy,

I asked the teacher about it she said at first everyone did not have much vocabulary or knew how to write well so that was more memorisation and then also she took more time with one theme as the children took longer to learn

That high ability class even had a couple of kids from GEP. Don't think anyone in that class is lacking in vocab?
Anyway, student's turnover is very high. From brand new class till the time we withdrawn, not a single 'original' student left, all replaced by newbies. Similar observation from 'original' batch of parents too hence withdrawal one after another

Just sharing my personal experience. Glad yours is better

[sleepy]

kitty2:

I heard from my friend that her kids homework was not being marked and no answer sheet given too :? My friend was saying is a waste of time doing it as there's no answer and can't revise too.

True, no answer sheets & homework not marked or gone through in next lesson.

[jasmineong]

sleepy:

jasmineong:

Hi sleepy,

I asked the teacher about it she said at first everyone did not have much vocabulary or knew how to write well so that was more memorisation and then also she took more time with one theme as the children took longer to learn

That high ability class even had a couple of kids from GEP. Don't think anyone in that class is lacking in vocab?
Anyway, student's turnover is very high. From brand new class till the time we withdrawn, not a single 'original' student left, all replaced by newbies. Similar observation from 'original' batch of parents too hence withdrawal one after another

Just sharing my personal experience. Glad yours is better

Yes, glad that my experience is a good one, from my experience the old birds like myself and other parents are still in the same class. Hope you have better luck in other centres.

[ccgoh]

My kids do not have much homework. I think in TAS, not much homework is given. Like hquek says, it is good to hear negative feedback so I also know have a realistic expectation. However, I must still say although i wish classrooms are not so packed, I find that overall experience a good one. I think finding a good centre is a painstaking one. It is not enough to take in someone’s good feedback and join. Need to monitor, need to feedback, need to know what is going on. The moment i find certain things I do not understand, I will check with the teacher and so far the teacher from TAS is always able to explain things clearly to me. And my children love going and learning there and there is improvement.


And when I went for the TAS parents workshop, I also understand more of their methods and can work better with my children at home to help them improve.

[lostlostmom]

one question, it as shared in some post previously they have a reading program where kids is allowed to borrow a book weekly. Is it happening?


Understand from my friend tat there are worksheet with only a few question done and the kids are told that they will go through the rest in other lesson, but never happen

[hquek]

they used to have the book borrowing; but it’s been discontinued for some time already. i half suspect it’s becos there are so many kids and not as many books to spread around.