La online lesson: : intrapersonal task- write a diary entry for a major character of the novel

Character: Jem

Timeline: after the Tom Robinson trial

Dear Diary,

I don't understand anymore. Adult life is such a paradox to me. I attended the Tom Robinson trial today and instead of being just and impartial in its judgement, the courtroom was enveloped by prejudice. The evidence had clearly proved that Tom Robinson is innocent and yet, the jury's final verdict was that he was guilty. How could this happen? Ain't all man created equal in our courts like what Atticus had said? Are they not? Is our town so discriminatory that even the ideal of justice has been corrupted? It ain't right. It just ain't right. I don't know this town anymore. Perhaps the next minute, even Calpurnia might be framed and persecuted. The idea of merely walking on the streets with a negro was beginning to scare me. I don't want to live in Maycomb anymore.

Still, I admired Atticus' courage. Now I fully understand what he meant when he said "Courage is when you know you're licked before you begin, but you begin anyway and you see it through no matter what" . Even though he knew that he would never win and Tom Robinson will never be acquitted, he continued to defend him anyway. I would always look up to this trial not only as a symbolism of the prejudice and racism in our land but as a manifestation of Atticus' courage and I hope that one day, his courage will be appreciated and racial discrimination will finally be lifted from Maycomb.

Alright I have to go now. Bye!




In my opinion, I feel that these multi-intelligence tests are quite accurate but lack specificity. For example, how much is "a bit" in the choice "this is a bit like me" and the questions lack depth and I feel that some of them are too superficial for example, there was a question which asked if I could solve puzzle questions and I do not feel that the question relates directly to how far can one think logically.

I feel that this tests can be rather useful as it can be used to identify our strengths and weaknesses. In this case, I found out that I am not very naturalistic and musical and thus I would know that these areas of my intelligence have to put in more effort in. Furthermore, teachers could use the information given by the results to teach students more effectively. For example. if a student is a spatial person, teachers could teach such students with the use of pictures and it would be more efficient this way as these students could remember pictures very well.




It has been 6 weeks since the new academic system has been implemented. 6 weeks of hell. 6 weeks of futile attempts to adapt to the new system. Now, you may ask why I am so pessimistic about the new academic system. And my answer is, I am not. This, is the truth.

Firstly, what exactly is the new academic system? As many of you would have already known, it is a new grading system of students which would be effective as of the academic year of 2010. So, what are the differences between this system and the old one? Let me just briefly explain the points:

- ACE points are now counted as a separate subjects and are computed in a different mean subject grade.
yes, that means your projects can no longer help you pull your grades up
- Students would have to choose from different subjects each term to do ACE projects on
- Oral Participation points are now counted as a separate subject, Oral communication and are computed in a different mean subject grade.
like ace points, do not help in improving your academic grade
-Projects done for the projects day competition are graded and counted in a separate subject, Independent Studies which consists of it and ACE points.
yes, its now as useless as ACE points in improving your mean subject grade.
-The 2 new subjects, Independent Studies and Oral Communication are computed into a separate MSG, Scholastic MSG.
Yes, you know what this means...
-A higher weighage of tests and exams (30% and 70%)

So, now that you have fully understood the changes made to the academic system, let me express my views. The new academic system is useless in improving the quality of students' lives or maybe even does more harm than good. Now that ACE and Oral Communication are counted separately, students could no longer depend on the 2 to improve their grades and therefore have to concentrate more on studying according to the syllables. This makes school life dull and boring for the students after all, we tend to learn more efficiently and absorb more information when working beyond the classroom, as in ACE projects. Furthermore, it increases the burden of the students as they are more stressed to achieve good results in tests and exams as they could no longer depend on ACE and Oral Communication points.

Although the 2 subjects are still as crucial as before as they are required for students to enrol in various courses such as the CSE program, the importance of academic results still outweigh the importance of these 2 subjects. After all, nobody would allow a student which achieved a academic MSG of 3.00 and a Scholastic MSG of 1.00 to enter the CSE program.

However, that was just the tip of the iceberg, to top it up, there are logistic glitches in the new academic system. As students have to select 3 subjects each term to do ACE projects on and they have to do so via an online selection system in the Parents portal, I was no exception and I logged in to do so, only to find various appalling flaws. Firstly, Integrated Mathematics was excluded from the list and that meant that there were only 4 subjects left to choose from as Chinese was compulsory. Of the four subjects, Infocomm Studies was ongoing and therefore had to be picked, I decided to leave English out of the list as I had already done it in term 1 and so, eventually, there were only 2 subjects to choose from to fill in the last 2 slots. Not much of a choice if you ask me. I hope that this is only a technical error and that it will be corrected soon. However, the chances of that happening are marginal as the system has already been confirmed.

To conclude, I would like to say that the new academic system is pointless and should not have replaced the old one. What are your thoughts about this issue? Tell me about them and leave a comment through the comment link below this post. Thanks in advance.








image taken from: https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpYM-ErhBpAdlbPvaBegnw98L1cR7y5SnEyBbzbrhcixlB55l7GjTbsSr8K5ndohP0WKKCF_TgbQvlXMEbxirhxJVBqF6DwZ5GHC3Fu5Mf3sQbYUtLTXyiYK5fIOk9wLCAsclgYJUJSwrl/s320/friday25.gif

It has always been said that Friday was the best day of the week, it was the end of a hectic week at work or at school, it was the start of the relaxing weekends, it was the time for everyone to unwind. Some people has become such big fans of Friday that they have even created a fan page on Facebook for that particular day of the week and you can check it out here. However, I beg to differ sometimes as some Fridays turned out to be ironically the worst day of the week. Take yesterday for example:

Yesterday was the worst Friday of the year ( not that there are many Fridays in 2010 yet). To begin with, I had forgotten to do my maths homework and arrived in school late that day and therefore could not complete it in the morning before the flag raising ceremony but I could still complete it during recces. However, there was insufficient time and in the end, I handed it in incomplete, which was enough of a reason for the maths teacher to give me a lecture on punctuality and a punishment of either cleaning up the staffroom or copying the two conduct songs 10 times each.

Furthermore, I realised that I have not completed my NYAA (national youth achievement award) application form yet and I was unsure of some details such as my postal code. Eventually, I managed to complete and hand in the form after school but it was in poor condition and thus it might be rejected. Right now, there is nothing I can do to help but pray fervently.

Finally school ended and I reached home at around 7pm after my CCA and immediately, I rushed to the computer, not to access Facebook or MSN or play computer games but to revise for my Infocomn Studies test on C++ next Monday. As C++ was one of my weaker Infocomn studies sub-topics, I encountered numerous problems and did not understand half the things I was looking at. Thus, I began searching for answers on the Internet and by the time I had done finding all of them, it was already well into midnight and I was as exhausted and collapsed into bed.

Still, every cloud has a silver lining and yesterday was not all that bad. It has been confirmed that I will be representing the school in the inter-school wushu competition this year! Finally, months of hard work and training has finally paid off.

Well I guess Fridays can be both enjoyable and not and whether it is the former or the latter, it totally depends on the person. After all, the obstacles I met with yesterday were all due to my absent-mindedness. So, what are your thoughts of Fridays? Leave them as a comment on this post and I would love to hear them.

Have a great weekend ahead!




As of those who were present today, I am sure many of you enjoyed the concert and performances thoroughly today but even if you did not, its still fine because Chinese New Year begins tomorrow! I would like to reemphasise on the fact:

CHINESE NEW YEAR BEGINS TOMORROW!

Anyway, back to the topic. I too, enjoyed myself today at the concert, be it socialising with my friends or enjoying the performances. The teachers, organising team and the various EP3s involved has been putting in a lot of effort into rehearsing and preparing for this day and their effort has not gone to waste as seen from the school's ecstatic cheers and the thunderous rounds of applause. It has been hard on the people involved in preparing this event and I would like to express my gratitude to them for organising such a great concert.

However I feel that there were a few of logistics errors here and there. For example, the speaker's stand was so heavily and flamboyantly decorated that it blocked some parts of the stage, causing some of us to be unable to view the whole performance. However, there were only a few such glitches and generally, the performance went through smoothly.

Before I end off, I would like all of you who are reading this post to leave a comment via the comment link below telling me how do you intend to spend this festive season, be it visiting your friends' or relatives' house or simply just relaxing. Your comments will be greatly appreciated.

OK that's all for today. Have fun during the Luna New Year, but just remember, do not exercise self-control and do not stuff yourself with too much goodies, I do not want to sit with another 34 obese people in class once school reopens!

HAPPY YEAR OF THE TIGER EVERYONE!!



image taken from: http://www.theholidayspot.com/chinese_new_year/images/tiger.jpg




As all of you would have known, a 7.0 magnitude earthquake struck Haiti on the 12 of January 2010, causing serious damage to the country and destroying the capital, creating a mass grave of at least a 17000 and a living hell for those has been injured. 20 days have passed since the disaster strike and needless to say, Haiti has received numerous humanitarian aid from other country. However,the damage to the infrastructure impeded the progress as the airport has been completely razed to the ground and many roads have been made inaccessible and thus, although it seems that country is receiving a lot of help, it has been slow to reach the victims due to the above factor. The progress has been slowed down by so much that a UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs even called this the "worst disaster the UN has ever confronted"

First of all, I would like to express my sympathy for the Haitians. Come to think of it, the country has already suffered a lot and despite this, being the poorest nation in the Western hemisphere, suffering from various natural disasters and being occupied by various countries for the past 5 centuries, was just not enough and another disastrous earthquake has to devastate the country again. Many Haitians had already lost their family, homes and all that mattered and have sustained some serious injuries. One such example is this boy in the picture below:

image src:http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7d/Boy_receiving_treatment_after_Haiti_earthquake.jpg
Furthermore, many of them have been further traumatised by the post-disaster violence of looting and killing for necessities. A majority of them are currently staying in temporary shanty town built of what they could salvage from the collapsed buildings and have to fight to receive even the most basic daily necessities such as food and potable water. Here is a video displaying conditions of the aftermath of the disaster:



Although I could not do anything much to help the Haitians overcome this situation, I feel that I should at least donate, no matter how meagre the sum, some money to the organisations helping Haiti. Despite not having done so, I believe that this is a cause we should all support and I would donate some money to Haiti the next time I come across such an organisation.

What are your thoughts of the calamity? I would love to hear them. Please leave a comment in the comment link below.