Personally, this song is one of my favourite songs as I feel that its lyrics are very meaningful especially the chorus. The line "because with every passing second comes a second chance" has left a lasting impact on me as I feel that it is a very effective hyperbole to show that there are many more opportunities for redemption. Additionally, I feel that I relate to the lyrics of this song and listening to this song when things are not going so smoothly has encouraged me to persevere and not give up after all, "there's hope for every fallen man to pick themselves up when they think they can".

OK now time for the "fun" part, analysing the literary form of the lyrics. (yay!)

The general tone of this song is a combination of an optimistic tone and a pessimistic tone and sometimes in between. The first stanza starts off in a rather discriminatory tone with the persona telling somebody that he will never trust him again. However, the tone gradually turns indifferent in the next stanza and gradually transforms into a optimistic tone as the persona tells the person he was talking to not give up. The rest of the song follows the same pattern.

This song utilizes some imagery throughout. For example, in stanza 1, a symbolism of resurrection is used, "as you push it up through the soil, I will shake your filthy hand". Another such example is the personification of a person's heart, "as long as your heart is not too far gone".

Enjoy the song

image taken from: http://www.leasingnews.org/CartoonBank3/Lecture.gif

As all of you have known, there is a new lesson of the subject, Language Arts, in the timetable dubbed "Language Arts Lecture". Basically, it is a lesson which consists of a university style lecture conducted by a teacher to 3 classes at any one time and they have selected our cohort and the secondary 1 cohort to be guinea pigs and test this new procedure on us.

In my opinion, this new way of teaching has helped cater to the needs of students as some students might learn faster and more effectively when learning independently at his own pace instead of being guided step by step as in the case of the traditional "classroom teaching" method. Secondly, I think that this method of teaching has made us better prepared for higher level education such as university and junior college level education as most of the lessons conducted are lectures similar to those that we are having. Additionally, I feel that this method will be able to bring the 4 consortiums together as the lectures are usually conducted with 3 classes, each from a different consortium and here, they are able to share their views and opinions with each other. Furthermore, I feel that these lectures are more interesting than the usual lessons as the lecturer would usually make use of multimedia such as video clips and PowerPoint presentations. Last but not least, the environment is better than the conventional classroom, after all, who can resist having lessons in a nice cool air-conditioned spacious lecture hall?

However, all coins have heads and tails and there are a few disadvantage of this new way of teaching. First and foremost, I feel that some classes are not participating actively enough in these lectures. For example, during the lesson last Thursday, only our class was participating orally and the other classes remained silent throughout. This could be because of the teacher who is conducting the lecture as the one who was doing so was our language arts teacher only and was nothing but just another average teacher whom they do not know for the other classes and therefore were shy to speak up. Secondly, I feel that this method of teaching is unsuitable for some students who could not learn independently and needs someone to guide him through every step or are just plain lazy as only the tip of the iceberg is touched on in a lecture and the rest of it would require a student to further research on the topic to fully comprehend it.

Overall, I feel that this radical teaching style's pros outweigh its cons and is more effective than traditional styles for me. However, one man's meat might be another man's poison and other students might not feel the same way for this.

So, what are your thoughts of this new way of teaching? I would like to hear them. Please comment via the comment link below of through the tagboard although the former is preferred. Alright, time to go, goodbye all.




As you all have known and experienced, school has recently just opened a week ago and I'm sure most of you have a rather dreaded feeling about it, after all, suddenly deprived of the freedom you had for 6 weeks and having it replaced with mundane school does cause one to be slightly unaccustomed to life. However, we should all try to maintain a positive attitude and look forward to the new academic year and the first week of school was not that bad either, and I feel that our lessons were quite fun.

A new academic year also meant a year of changes and metamorphosis. Firstly, I was separated from the majority of my Secondary 1 class to join the Pilot Programme class, 2A3. This meant that I will gradually lose most of my previous friends and make new ones in the class and although currently I am not ready to do so and am sitting in the back corner of the class and still continue to maintain my ties with my Secondary 1 classmates, I believe I will do so soon as everything must change and those who are not ready to do so will be left behind in the past.

Secondly, there are a few different teachers who would be teaching me now, such as Ms Loh, the English teacher and Mr Kong, the chemistry teacher and my opinions about them are currently neutral, they will change as the year progresses.
Finally, about my blog. Please do comment on the layout, design and etc of my blog and I would like to hear all your thoughts and improve on whatever areas which can be improved on. Many thanks in advance.

That's all for today, goodbye all




Hi all so this is my new school blog, and for my friends, please link it ASAP.
As this blog would be mainly use for educational purposes (getting ACE points), please do not post any obsceneties or vulgarities.
The first posts will be up soon
-Han Yang :)