Any experienced MOE Teachers arnd to give advice?

Hi May,

haha...I guess you happened to meet someone conservative then haha...not all teachers are like that. I know of colleagues who drink till they drop dead kind at pubs and even did scandalous things there. It's crazy, I can tell you.

Scope, yea...the kids start early nowadays. My first date was actually after A levels man! Anyway I was more desirable 7 years ago when I kenna that from the Sec 3 kid. Now older and less desirable, safer and will be more wary hehe

Career, you can move on because of push factors but to enter teaching, make sure you can identify the pull factors (like passion in teaching) for yourself...sometimes passion must match ability too..think of a class of naughty students - do you think you're up to it? If yes, go for it. If not, you may want to try relief teaching for a start.
 


scandalous? woah ...

denise - one feedback from me .... the morals of our young are in decay ... we were born in the same year right? 1980? back in our days we had HAO GONG MIN to teach us about moral values.

do they have this nowadays? why are so many kids so rude these days?
 
denise80

Bingo! I have a teacher relative who's a few years older. She often talks to the rest of us like we're her primary school kids. We brush it off and take it as occupational hazard for her.

Thank goodness my other teacher friends and relatives don't act that way. lol
 
Denise80,

LOL~ I was in a primary school, a girl kind of fell in love with me. LOL~ But I was also the type who 'suppressed' in-house gangsters. I was the infamous super strict terror, autocratic and no-nosense that other teachers used my name to silence the rowdy types.

LOL~

I also know... many teachers went to KTVs for sex and such, and many also had wives. And strangly, they complained money not enough to the government. LOL~

If you teach in a sec school environment... God bless you lah~ Mine was a primary environment. I love the kids, I hate those petty thinking peers and those silly office politics.

May Ong is talking about morals... It seems that she doesn't know that Parents are Emperors! Who can discipline their kids without so many arrows from parents? LOL~

But I fvck care. My version of education is both character and critical thinking. You talked about critical thinking... It's rubbish to me because most teachers I came across can't even think straight. And schools still were after grades. That sells.

Protect yourself, you need a body-guard? I'm on it... if you can pay. LOL~
 
stereotypes like...
1. Teachers good ah...have holidays - two months - june and dec plus 1 week each in march and sept
2. Teachers are boring people...mostly nerdy, quiet and plain

but frankly, I'm beginning to hear more of ppl who 'sympathise' with my job these days hahaha so No. 1 stereotype is slowly fading away
 
may,

You want to interview me?

As for teachers, some of my siblings or their wives/husbands are teachers - so I know teachers well.

And kids rudeness more of reflection of their parents than their teachers.
 
Kids are rude because they learn from their parents' behaviours and actions. In fact, telling kids what to do is not enough. Parents have to show and lead by example. Children watch and pick up very quickly.

Unfortunately the race for us to become more 'productive' has probably a counter-effect on the courtesy campaign.

I have, however, met a number of gracious children though. So there is hope
happy.gif
 
career,

Not only the push factor but also the pull factor of being a teacher. What you see as being attractive being a teacher.. as the teachers painted it, it is not all rosy and you won't necessary have more time.
 
SM,

not only do i want to interview all of you on your occupations, i also want to audit your financial status for YA 2010 to ensure you paid all your tax dues.

just kidding ...

you work in IT field but not as salesman or engineer what ... you said in the last thread already ... unless you would like to share more about why you use email so much in your work, haha ...
 
If you teach in a sec school environment... God bless you lah~ Mine was a primary environment. I love the kids

==============================================

scope, you had been a primary school teacher?

now you are also a movie investor-cum-coffee retailer-cum-cafe proprietor?

and women also attempt to pay you to be their boyfriend?

in addition to being Messiah to mankind, Rebuker and Redeemer of Womenfolk, and full-time lecturer at SG Brides MOH forum?

while living in a HDB flat and riding MRT and giving up seats to pregnant women?

and in the meantime also not using any credit cards, and berating the rising property price as a symptom of the wickedness of mortals?


what are you next? are you an astronaut and you just came back from the moon? did you see Chang-er and her rabbit when you were there?

amazing!

i love this forum, get to encounter all sorts of people here
 
May Ong,

Yeah~ Tomorrow I become MOE minister. LOL~
Why so funny?
Nothing funny. Life experience full full is nice thing.

It's nothing funnier than your explanation for having a 'millionaire' thread there for the many ladies having problem due to finance when you started out telling everyone you want to know how you can throw money at your in-laws... LOL~

This world is pretty funny, anyway. LOL~
 
yea, talking about life experiences....

i just got back from Silverstone two wkends ago... Far-la-lee actually wanted me to stay for the next race in Germany, but....

i had to fly to Dubai that following day to sign a contract for a large-scale water treatment project with the officials... but still in the midst to sort out some important details.
come on people, it's not only passion. Social responsiblity is part of my priorities as well. Speaking of which....

i've been discussing with Dr. Ng and we decided to derive a more critical grading system - only meant for Ps and VPs, who 'un-holistified' the education for our children whereby it should be a holistic one. No more just grades, grades and grades.

damn, where's my frap? looks like i really need to invest in their delivery system.
 
didn't know this thread ended up so "HOT" after my last post yesterday...

anyway career, since now is already july and more than half of the yr has gone by, why don't u stay and wait for yr bonus? at the same time, see whether your boss really did what he promised u...if nothing from him, move on next yr.
 
it takes my bf a while to make a carrer switch during that time this is becos the pay cut is about 30% or more. for me I find that if that is your passion Y think so hard?? Just go for it and give it a try. This is a meaningful job. True enough this job had change his life he had lesser headache compare with the previous job. He no longer feel stressful or dragging himself to work. Not becos the job is less stressful is becos he loves this job. finding a job which is your passion really make a diff. So far so good with his job
 
what an active night it was!

Career, actually both my siblings were working in the private sector before switching careers. My bro was a designer in a media IT company and he switched after his company went bust by in the asian financial crisis. While my sis was in procurement in an electronics manufacturing firm. They had just expanded the Batam branch and her boss brought the team down to entertain customers. She wasn't comfortable with all the sleazy way biz are done with her married colleagues 'joining in the fun' right infront of all the lady colleages. She tendered the very next day.

Denise, the thing about prez skills... not everyone needs to be a natural. I would say my prez knowledge is purely self-trained. If you have read about my past sharing. I used to startle and mummer a lot. No one even knew what I was speaking. Even during my 1st perm job, I was still struggling with that. The pressure of being in a room presenting to an audience freezes me. And makes me want to cry. My boss gave that feedback to me during my appraisal.

But, I have progressed significantly from there. For almost 2 yrs, I was a deployment leader in my current company. Flying to various regional teams to conduct skills transfer and deployment support for our product. My bosses now believe my prez skill is one of my strengths. Presenting to customers instead of colleagues now. 3 yrs back, when I interviewed for the ITE job, the very 1st interview was to deliver a mock lecture in the field of our expertise. And I had the group all interested in my 'lecture'.

I agree its the passion. The other skills, one can progress with practice, and experience. To me, the most important part of a prez is the preparation. You need know your stuffs so well that you can be totally flexible in your lecture. All the planning and rehearsal is going to be quite different with the lesson itself. We need to adapt reactively to capture the class attention and be effective in the training.

My earlier teaching experience was a part-time tuition teacher at Parkway Education. I taught K2, P2, Sec 2 and Sec 4 class. I enjoyed preferred the young growing teens than kids. K2 & P2 was literally childcare. Sec 2 class were all too shy and quiet. But, with the Sec 4 class, I went off the scope and gave them challenging math discussion. Something, they enjoyed thoroughly.

That's my true life experience unlike some avatar simulation once again.
happy.gif
 
can i assume, presentations for customers and students are about the same?

for myself - other than preparations, it boils down to the level of confidence? some pax i know stutttttter all the way, despite having the knowledge and some decent amt of experience. so yep, not all of us are cut out to be a natural presenter.

damn it, my frap's still not here yet.
 
vios, with customers we 'lie' haha....
not really deceive them but we present the best impression. With teaching, its imparting the completely knowledge in the most interactive and interesting manner. I don't think its exactly the same.

Probably less political with students.
 
not exactly the same, in terms of audiences... but still, it requires the sort of confidence to be able to impart knowledge or 'smoke customers'.

haha.

btw, how did you counter the most surprisingly-interesting questions from students that caught you totally off-guard?
 
not right mah.... how can teacher teach the wrong thing. But, being the marketing guy is different. I'm suppose to mkt my product.
happy.gif
 
Vios, here's a solution my lecturer-friend told me:

"That's a very good question! Why don't all of you go and research about it and we'll discuss it tomorrow."

Then you can go home and research it too.
 
Hi milo and all,

Oh, when it comes to presentations, it can be trained but what is difficult to overcome is one's personality. If someone is shy and afraid of crowds, it's really quite difficult to train them to step out of their comfort zone. I speak from my personal experience when guiding new teachers. I can teach and guide them everything...from pedagogies of teaching to other classroom management procedures etc but the hardest part is how to present yourself and how to deliver a good presentation everyday that captures students and others' attention. It's really both an acquired skill and something innate. But sure, personalities can change. I am one example. From someone who dared not even put up my hand in class to ask a qns when I was a student to a teacher who manoevres the classroom as my daily playground. Now during presentations, not only I speak without fright, I deliver aggressively because I want others to listen to me. But then again, I gradually improved as I age...even before I joined teaching, I was quite alright already. So when these teachers who are naturally shy or have stage / audience fright, it's not easy to overcome at their age. Hopefully through more exposure and experience, they'll be better.
 
SM,

as teachers, how can we throw smoke bombs? In fact, as teachers, we are the most honest lot with our pupils. If I don't understand something or couldn't solve something in class due to my ill preparation or insufficient knowledge, I'll jsut admit it's my fault and promise my students that I'll return with an answer the next lesson. I'll tell them I'm not a walking encyclopedia and they understand as long as we're reasonable.

Our students are smart these days. You can't deceive them. With internet, information is at their fingertips unlike our time, SM. I'm surprised you made that comment that with students, we can throw smoke bombs. This comment, in my opinion, undermines our professionalism you know? One-to-one, maybe with your client you can smoke a bit...exaggerate your marketing plan or whatever. With a class of 40 or even to a sch population of 1000 where you have to deliver factual information, you can show me how you throw smoke bombs and get away without someone raising his/her hand to query you. Our students of today are also more inquisitive than students of our or your generation too. Perhaps you're not in this line so you don't quite understand.
 
Vios,

presentations to clients and to students are both similar and disimilar...the main differences being we usually have to pitch our lessons to the students' understanding and make it more interesting and relevant to their lives.
With clients, unless they have zero knowledge about your product, you usually don't have to talk down to their level. Then the interesting part about teaching is...after we talk down to students' level, we then speak to them at an adult level later on the same topic - why? This is to cater to the diverse needs of pupils. These days, we consider differentiated instructions and teaching for pupils. Not sure if you all understand what I'm talking about.
 
Hi Career, you have to first ask yourself why teaching? Even if you don't like an engineering job or your current job (due to other factors), you can always join another company or make a career switch within the private sector. Don't treat teaching as the escape career route.
 
doLL, I guess the reason I was considering going into teaching was that I was uncertain of my capabilities as an engineer prior to the recent boss' feedback.

And as such, I have been teaching lower primary class in church almost every other week and I must say that I enjoy interacting with the inquisitive kids. And when they move on to upper primary, I feel a sense of satisfaction when they still acknowledge me as teacher.

The thing I dont like abt being an engineer is that everyone expects us to solve their problems and we end up doing a lot of other ppl's jobs [procurement, maintenance,HR, marketing] (covering their butts), coupled w urgency.
 
Frankly, the WL of teachers is not really the key of the problem. If you would to ask around and explore various positions. Even in most other positions, the work can never be completed. This isn't unique to teaching at all.

The key difference I see are a few parts :-
1) The leadership has a significant part to influence to the culture. As Denise and few of us have brought up, the culture for different schools can be significantly different. MOE gives a lot of authority and free play to the sch management to function independently. When under a good leadership, the culture would be positive and constructive. Most of the teachers complaining have poor leaders that pinalize them on policies than be reasonable with their expectations and recognize their efforts.
2) Next, the Singaporean kiasu competitive mindset. They react to the ranking and high WL by OT to try and complete everything and out do their competition at the expense of losing their quality and balance in life. This continued behavior encourages the management to continue squeezing their staffs and it becomes a vicious cycle.
3) Nature of the work. Teachers are tasked with many stuffs that needs to be clear daily. This calls for the ability to multi-task and prioritize. But, sadly, the school don't value efficiency. So, people just continue to be burdened daily to work through the hours to complete EVERYTHING daily.
4) Lack of individual time management skill. It will not enable you to have less work. The list will be equally long but you can workaround any system when you prioritize and understand when to do what. In the long run, you would be more effective and your bosses will not need to monitor and chase you for things as they are done in time always.

Lastly, you need the call and passion in it because when you are faced with a bad management. Do you join in the vicious cycle of competing and backstabbing or stay true to your mission to mould and educate the young? It could go unrecognized and even pinalized by a lousy boss. Recognition and rewards are not guaranteed in the form of financial and career. Unlike the private sector, you just leave the lousy company and join another you find more suitable. The red tape and P approval prevents that for teaching.
 
Hi Career

Three years as an engineer should give you a good feel of whether you want to continue in this career path going forward. You should also have a good idea by now if you would excel in this field if you persist. What is your feel?

As for solving other people's problems, don't we all do that, and helping our companies make big money? You can still take ownership of your job at the end of the day.

I don't know exactly but I am guessing the reason why so many teachers complain about being bolt down by non-teaching duties could be because they think it isn't their job to do that or this. They compare what they have to do today as a teacher, with what their primary school teachers did 20 years ago. But all jobs have evolved, no matter what job we are at we are expected to do more in less time.
 
denise80, got ya.

it's just very unlike our times... the current batch requires some Customization from the teachers.

hey! these kids' parents are customers in a way and the Ps are customer service officers :P
 
Hi May,

In response to what you ask me, purely from my own perspective:

What personality attributes make one suitable to become a teacher?
From what I've seen, it's a myraid of personalities and characters out in the teaching field. But mostly, they are one of the sincerest people I've ever seen. Usually helpful, warm, friendly and comparatively unpolitical (comparing with the people working in the private sector). I've been to four schools and I must say there are 'cold' teachers around, but it really depends on the school culture. The principal makes a hell lot of diff!

How can one succeed as a teacher?
It depends on your definition of 'success'. I know of teachers who just want success with the kids ie. help them to succeed in their academics or create a fun learning environment.

However, most measure 'success' in teaching as climbing up the ladder ie. the leadership track (teacher, HOD, principal, superintendant ...). To do that, you need to be very driven to win awards for the school. Be pally with the management of course and be seen at different school events as prominent person and lead committees, have various successful projects (which preferably win awards of course) on your well-written work review.

What is the salary scale of a teacher?
I'm not sure about now, but ten years ago, an 'A' leveler started from $1.2k while a degree holder started from $1.8k (normal degree) to $2.7k (first class hons) I think. You go google for MOE website lah. They will have the updated info.

They have different salary scale for people who switch career though. And those who do mid-career change are promoted faster and have more frequent increments to make up for the gap.

What are the occupational hazards of being a teacher?
Like what's mentioned: high blood pressure, heart problems.
Another common one is depression.
A friend called MOE to ask to change school as the school already know about her depression history. But MOE told her,"Depression is a very common thing among teachers. Not to worry."
I've heard about others: miscarriage (becos of the frequent walking and standing) and a condition linked to the neck muscle (also becos of the long hours of standing and walking).

Do you ultimately enjoy your job? How long have you been a teacher?
I once read that if you've been in a job for half a year, a job become just that: a job. I won't say I 'enjoy' my job. I mean, how much can you like creating powerpoint slides for every lesson, worksheets, lesson plans to the minutes, printing worksheets, counting worksheets to distribute to the teachers, typing minutes afer meetings, filling out surveys after surveys, attending workshops and courses for 100 hours after school, do assignments for the courses you attend (which don't do anything to help you in your promotion) and looking for paper evidences every half a year for the sake of documenting items for the sake of some VIP visits? But so far, it hasn't bore me like my previous jobs had. I probably have a restless spirit that cannot be bored. But I find it irritating that work is created for the sake of making teachers work. An eg: lesson plan and resources for the same lesson are created already, but next year, must have a NEW lesson plan for the same lesson, with new teaching resources. NEW worksheets must be created year after year, for the same purpose.

How long ah? If you're asking about the trained teaching, it's just five years. If you're asking about when I signed on the dotted line, it's ten years.
 
denise,
I've heard and seen backstabbing in teaching. Probably I've been backstabbed too, except that I'm too dense to know it. So ignorance can be bliss.

I think school culture is the key to the backstabbing issue. A new teacher who just joined my school wanted to backstab me. We were sharing workload on some topics and I did the first few chapters. I emailed the teachers my share. But when it came to her turn, knowing what I did (just emailed), she printed out hard copies for every teacher and put them on their tables. And she spoke to my HOD in their common language to complain to her that I didn't know how to do this and that when instructions were given to her to complete tasks. But she would still smile at me when she met me.

But I'd heard her exasperated conversation with the HOD and I stopped smiling or being friendly with her. Eventually, there was a communication breakdown in one of the jobs we had to do and a senior teacher stepped in. She was very nice about it and led me to start talking to the new teacher again.

From there, we rebuilt our colleague relationship, although it's never the same again.

The new teacher was from a school which she claimed to be very political and many bad things were done to her, so she probably thought she needed to do the same thing in the new school. But the culture of the school is such that there is no need for politics as most people are content with their lot. So eventually, she is not so political now.

Have you thought of changing to another school?
 
hi rains,

i remember a Chinese teacher in my sec sch who was a spinster. she was very disgruntled with her life to the extent that she would even complain to us during her lesson, how teaching has 'robbed' her of her personal life. she described how her schedules would be in conflict with her friends' and eventually, she stopped being asked out because she was never free. then there was another incident when she complained about the same thing to another teacher while they invigilating an exam, and spoke in very audible volumes. even at 15 yo, i knew it was terribly wrong of her to behave in this way.

all the more, because we hold teachers to a higher standard of behaviour. we know that teachers are human, but somehow we would still be surprised when they fall short of exemplary. i have a friend who is supporting a gigolo, who is an upper-secondary teacher. i cant help but judge her thinking how her lack of good sense in one area could overspill into her life at work.

so, could we also say that spinsterhood/ bachelorhood is one occupational hazard? back when i was in school there were always those spinster-type teachers who only got worse when they approach menopause. does this phenomenon still continue to this day?

anyway, i remember most of my teachers with utmost fondness because most of them have imparted good values to us through their conduct, and they have taught me things that i never forgot. i can still remember a chinese teacher from my primary school who taught us that strokes to a character must be written in the right sequence or else the character would look jumbled and skewed. this impacted me so much that to this day when i see small children around me writing chinese characters in the wrong order i get rather pissed. this is wrong! shouldn't be like that! this is what people mean when they say that teachers impart knowledge and values that form the foundation of their pupils' lives. you did not mention it, but making a memorable, positive impact in young people's lives must be one of the rewards of the job?
 
workwise - i always believe that there are certain responsibilities we ought to accomplish fully, but there are certain sub-parts of it in which we shouldn't expend energies unnecessarily - such that we could also concentrate on personal stuffs.

i do believe the same should apply to the teachers since we're at it.

ultimately, i don't regard spinsterhood/bachelorhood as an occupational hazard, even though we do hear about it. i find that it's sort-of a lack of balance in other life aspects that lead to stuffs such as "Not enough time to socialise" etc..
 
i wonder statistically whether there is evidence of a higher concentration of spinsters/ bachelors in the teaching profession.

just like there was one statistic that dentists have the highest suicide rate.

but what is so horrifying about the mouth that dentists would want to commit suicide? there are other more macabre jobs like being an undertaker.

i have digressed
 
hahaha, May,

Yeah, spinsterhood could be an occupational hazards. Yes, there're still such teachers around. So it's better to get attached or married before entering teaching. Most teachers I know are attached before they become teachers, or they look for partners within the same school, quickly.

Actually, most teachers I know, if not all, have only friends who are also teachers. Come to think of it, I only have one long-time friend who is not a teacher, and I meet her up just once or twice per year.

You're so cute!

Making positive impact on kids is definitely a reward in the job, but I guess the irrelevant outweighs the relevant in this job.
 
Haha.. It's the same for engineering. Lot of nice single guys in my company. They also find no luck with the ladies. Perhaps there should be a gathering for teachers to meet engineers.
 
Actually, MOE did work with a govt agency to provide opportunities for teachers to meet guys from another govt ministry. I can't remember which one but it was a male dominant department. But it didn't work out.
 
not all teachers are without sex appeal leh.

i remember i had a teacher in JC. she was the epitome of late 1990s sexy stylishness. her dresses were all covered up but soooo slinky and tapered. and she was sassy too. once she walked past a group of students being punished and called out, "Obigood".

what a sexy woman. she made Econs cool. i wonder how she is doing now.
 
yeah it's cool to the students and male colleagues, isn't it?

however with certain schools, those ladies with more-fashionable dress code do get singled out for flamboyance and showiness when they dress in style and with good taste.
 
not quite the same in the daily office environment whereby dress-code is the exact opposite?

anyway it makes classroom life less dull for the students, provided that the teacher is not pompous...
 
ya still office-ish, but based on my observations between teachers and my colleagues/customers, the former generally dresses more casually...
 


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