Tag Archives: school

The school that Nyan currently attends, Chatsworth East, is closing down at the end of this school year in June, relocating to a new campus on the other side of the island. We decided that we didn’t want to send him there — it’s too far to commute each day, and we didn’t want to move house — so we went back to the market for a new school.

One possibility was a brand-new school, opening this summer for the first time. It’s run by a company that operates several other schools across Singapore, and has a good reputation. So when we heard there was an open house at the new place one Saturday, we decided to go.

The building isn’t huge, but it’s been nicely done up inside. Here are some of the new classrooms:

Nyan was understandably most interested in the specialty rooms, like this music room.

They also have a science lab!

And a room full of tools for cutting, sawing, pounding and 3D-printing.

It was hard to pull Nyan away from this room, frankly.

There was also one of those wall-displays where you put pipes and shelves and whatnot and try to get marbles to roll down. Nyan loved that as well.

Finally, he had a blast exploring the gymnasium area, full of ropes and balls and hockey sticks and other fun things.

It was an impressive school, though it felt a bit small and lacked any outdoor space. Most crucially, it was still pretty far from our place and would have called for a long bus ride every morning and every afternoon. In the end, we chose another school, much closer to home, that he’ll enroll at starting in August. More on that later in the summer.

As we’ve reported, Nyan has taken quite well to his new school. Let’s take a quick look at some recent activities.

Here is an assignment he did for class: the children were to come up with a scenario that presented a problem, and then use this certain system (the “T.A.G. system”) to solve the problem. Nyan’s illustrations are pretty awesome.

Another day, they took a quick field trip to the nearby post office. As part of the trip, the kids wrote letters to their parents and addressed an envelope, then mailed them off. The next day, this lovely letter was in our mailbox:

One of Nyan’s extracurricular courses this fall was called “Race car engineering.” Kind of like the old-fashioned soap box derby, it involved the kids building plastic race cars that they would then race around a track. Here are some pictures of Nyan and Jayden working on their cars (these are photos of photos that were on display at school, hence the weird quality), plus a video of Nyan in deep concentration.

Let’s see a couple of random pictures: heading home after school on a rainy day, all dressed in his uniform and reading a bit before school.

And last but not least: a goofy video of a goofy boy, full of high spirits when he arrives home after a fun school day.

Nyan, of course, has been attending his primary school for a few months now. His old preschool, Modern Montessori International, is on a different annual schedule, so the kids who are going on to local schools (rather than the “international” school that Nyan goes to) have still been going to MMI, ahead of their new school year that starts in January (rather than the August school year start for Nyan’s school). Got all that?

The upshot is that in November, MMI threw its annual graduation ceremony for all the kids who are leaving. Nyan and several other kids who left in August came back and joined their classmates for the festivities.

Here’s the procession into the auditorium.

All the graduates, standing on the stage. So serious!

And the main event (for us anyway): Nyan bravely marching across the stage to get his diploma from Uncle Jimmy.

Before the ceremony, there was lots of hugging as all the kids got together. But there were also some nerves, methinks.

We’ve surely said this before, but MMI was such a great experience – great teachers and fantastic kids whom we really hope Nyan can stay in touch with.

Nyan goes to what’s known here in Singapore as an international school. It basically means it’s a private school that’s intended for kids of ex-pats (as opposed to the local school system, which is quite difficult for ex-pat kids to get into, unfortunately). Among the benefits of an international school:  your kid will certainly make friends from all over the world. The kids in Nyan’s class hail from places including Vietnam, Netherlands, Australia, South Korea, the U.K., the U.S., India, New Zealand, China and many more. It’s a great mix.

To celebrate all that diversity, the school held “UN Day” in mid-October. Everyone wore clothes representing their heritage; Nyan could have chosen the U.S., U.K. or Myanmar. He chose the latter, and wore his Burmese soccer shirt.

Here’s his class, parading around the school grounds

The highlight was a performance of a few songs that Nyan’s class had been practicing. It certainly attracted the attention of photographer-parents.

Here they are, taking the stage:

Here are the songs. A lovely piece about diversity etc. called Under One Sky, which Nyan had been practicing around the house for weeks:

And another one about all the different ways to say Hello in different languages. No mention of “mingalaba,” which of course is “hello” in Burmese, though:

Afterwards, the class posed for a group shot. Nyan had to be a goof, of course.