Return To Schools Worldwide - What is Happening?

New Zealand schools opened. Pioneers. Showed the world it can be done.

Now Singapore Schools are preparing to reopen. I have friends who work as teachers in schools such as the American School.

The teachers go back four days before the pupils. Why? To prepare themselves with knowledge of the new regulations and systems to cope. And prepare the environment for the returning pupils - moving desks and chairs and so on.

What happens to the pupils to safe distance? It is not just marking out spaces in queues for meals. In fact the cafeterias are closed. Each pupil brings their own snacks and drinks, including water.

The pupils are taught in bubbles or separated groups, marked by colours for easy identification by the pupil members and the teachers. At play time the pupils stay in the same group.

Advantages Of School Bubbles

Previous exclusive cliques can be broken up. Large groups bullying somebody can be separated. 

Friendships

Everyone can choose a best friend.

Lifelong friendships may be formed. Increased co-operation. After two weeks, teachers can change the people in a bubble.

Streaming Helping Teachers & Pupils

In Singapore the bubbles are streamed so the teachers can set the level of teaching to the ability of the whole group.

A British male former university lecturer comments: "Very Singaporean, streaming."

A British female teacher says, "That used to be the case in the UK - until comprehensives came in."

The British males says: "Social anthropologists will love this. It could have a lasting impact, friends for life. Is the sex balanced in co-ed schools. Or separated by sex and at playtime for different play styles?  Are the bubbles structured to take into account bubble size, gender balance, intelligence .... It is a classic optimisation problems. There are algorithms in applied mathematics for this type of problem solving."

Useful Websites

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8584803/Victoria-shuts-schools-brings-remote-learning-bid-control-coronavirus-outbreak.html?ns_mchannel=rss&ico=taboola_feed

https://www.moe.gov.sg/education/school-terms-and-important-dates

About the Author

Angela Lansbury is British born and educated, trained as a teacher in the UK, and has taught children and adults as a home tutor and in schools in the UK and Singapore.

She is a language evaluator and grammarian at clubs of Toastmasters International and a member of five clubs, one in the UK, three based in Singapore (now in August 20220 online) and one purely only club, Singapore International Online toastmasters.

She is immediate past president of Braddell Heights Advanced Toastmasters, based in Singapore and now online. Please join BHA on the first Wednesday of every month (6.30 for 7 pm until 9.30 pm Singapore time. Also the third Saturday afternoon each month. Meetings this year Wednesday August 5th evening 6.30 for 7 pm (same time in Malaysia and China) and include Saturday August 15th Thomas Chen on Rhetorical Devices.

Record Your Full Name and Date On Awards

An Undated Ribbon NEEDS DATE AND A NAME
I just won another ribbon at Toastmasters. I immediately wrote the date and place on the back. I noted in my diary that I had won a ribbon. I had noted in my diary the club which I was visiting. Add the country, if you travel to other countries. On the day you know where you are. Six months or years later you will be looking at awards and wondering, where was that from?

TEACHER'S CREDENTIALS

TRAVEL WRITERS

 I went to a travel writing course at Writers' Holiday in Fishguard, Wales. The course leader proudly said that she had published more than 100 travel articles. I wondered how many I had had published. At about ten a year for ten years that would be at least a hundred, probably more. But I had no record. Her statistics gave her confidence and enabled her to inspire confidence in the audience.

SPEAKER INTRODUCTIONS

What roles have you done as a speaker?

As an evaluator or judge?

We are often told at Toastmasters International speakers' meetings that the audience won't warm to you if you start by boasting of your achievements. Also they may feel discouraged. How can they compete?

You have to show them that you started from zero and ended up a hero. (Over what time span?)

At that point I had no record.

PUPILS AND PARENTS SEEK CREDENTIALS
 On the other hand, parents looking for a teacher for their children are impressed by qualifications.

EMPLOYERS SEEK CREDENTIALS & EXPERIENCE
You need credentials when you are competing for attention in an advertisement offering a jo to candidates, or as a service provider or teacher. You also need to present your credentials in a CV (resume) when you apply for a job and at the job interview when there is only one position but several candidates.

LOSING COUNT
I started winning ribbons at Toastmasters for the best Topics speaker (impromptu speaker) best speaker and best evaluator. After I won fifty ribbons I started to lose count. I put them up in pictures frames around the house and ran around counting them. I made a list. I wrote large in my diary: I WON A RIBBON FOR ... AT  ...

 I wrote a white label on the back of the label.

PHOTO RECORD
One speaker did not keep a count of his trophies but showed a photo of himself surrounded by trophies. He told me, "I showed that photo to reassure the audience that they had not wasted their time and money. They were listening to an award-winning expert."

Add Your Names
Looking at my ribbons, which had the date and place, I realised an essential was missing. I knew it was my ribbon. But if I were to keep it all my life, I needed to note my name on it for my descendants, executors and others. I had inherited many items which had no name, wedding photos, even poems.

 Finally I remembered to add my own surname (family name). I initially wrote merely my first name, Angela.Then I added my surname. If I ever get a grandchild or daughter-in-law named Angela, other people will be confused. If I were to drop the item or lose it on a plane, nobody would be able to track me down and return it.

If you found awards in the family of a relative who had died with no name attached, you would not know whether this was an award to granny, her father, her husband, her emigrated son or daughter or a pretty or historic item she had bought in a shop.

Story Of A Delayed Funeral Due To Unlabelled Medals
My friend 'B' was in Korea in his early days and when he died his family found Korean war awards. At his funeral we had a delay because his son thought father had won awards in the Korean war and  displayed the medals on the coffin and wrote about them in the funeral speech.

However, an irate aunt said they were not the deceased man's medals because he was in a commercial service, the merchant navy, not the military. She suspected the medals were merely sentimental souvenirs probably bought from a shop or on line.

She told me, "It would be an insult to my father, who was awarded medals in the war, denigrating his achievement and honour, to display the medals as if somebody not in the war had won them!"

The moral is, label everything.

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker. 

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