Eve Of Alycia's Exam - 8 March 2015

Alycia stuck this note on her room door today to tell her 2 sisters NOT TO DISTURB her. She stayed in her room to revise on her own and later, she timed herself when she did a past year UPSR Math test paper that I printed for her. For BM, we went through the Tatabahasa on Slideshare together on the computer.



This year is Alycia's final year in primary school. It's the year that she will be sitting for her UPSR exam in September. Alycia will have to sit for 7 exams  this year (6 school-based exams and 1 government exam) with the first exam being in March and subsequently a test every month until September 2015! I get stressed out each time I think about her monthly exams and that of Sherilyn's and Cass' (they have exams three times a year). I get even more frazzled thinking about chauffeuring Alycia to and from school even on Saturdays for extra lessons, beginning April until the UPSR exam is over!! There goes my beauty sleep for half a year :(

Sometimes I have thoughts of getting hubs to hire a driver to ease our driving woes, I kid you not!

Pizza delivered to our home is something that the girls only get to eat on the eve of exams... my treat for them only during exams :D   I am no fan of pizza but since the girl sitting for her exam craved for pizza today, her wish was my command.




Eleventh hour revision, as usual *roll eyes and shake head*




Playing 'one two jus' to see who gets the last piece of chicken drummet... the cili padi played referee as usual.

Alycia's Class Teachers

I am very thankful that since Standard 2, Alycia has been assigned very dedicated class teachers.  Ms L was Alycia's class teacher from Standard 2 through Standard 4.  She was one of the best teachers in the school.   Towards the end of last year, Alycia was telling me that she really hoped that Ms L would continue to be her class teacher.  Though Ms L is a very firm and strict teacher, she is nonetheless very caring and has all the qualities of a 5-star teacher.

I was really disappointed when Alycia told me at the start of the school term this year that Ms L is now teaching another elite class.   Her new class teacher is  Ms Y, who was the class teacher of the first elite class  in Standard 6 last year. There are 2 elite classes for each standard in the school and if Ms Y was the teacher for the first elite class in Standard 6, she must really be the cream of the crop in that school.   On hearing that, my hope was raised and boy was I happy to know that Alycia has another 5-star class teacher, woohoo!

A few weeks ago, when I was at the night market with Alycia, we bumped into Ms Y, Alycia's class teacher.  We chatted a bit and I could gauge that she is another very dedicated and caring teacher.  And I was right!  Alycia can now do revisions on her own without my constant nagging and reminders!  There is a 'watchdog' helping me to monitor her all the time and she can't escape from her grips muahaha!

Ms Y would use her own money to buy 'expensive cakes' (that's what Alycia said LOL!) to treat her students in her class for celebrations.  She would also use her own money to buy gifts for her students as incentives.

Throughout Alycia's four years of primary schooling in this school, I have never seen how hardworking like she is now.  In the past, revisions done were a result of me  nagging her to no end. Now, revision is a daily routine for her, done without me telling her.    Before Alycia hits the sack, she will go through her books every night. I know that all these are  fueled by Ms Y, through lots of pep talks,  motivation as well as 'threats'.

Ms Y would throw surprise mini tests to her class several times in a week.  In Alycia's note pad last night, I saw a handwritten note on some marks -- 80% - 85% along with some Chinese words.   I asked her what it was and she told me that this is just one of Ms Y's goals for her class.  Should anyone in the class get below 80% - 85% in any of the subjects that Ms Y teaches, which includes Math and Science in Chinese, the unlucky one would get 2 'gifts' from Ms Y, which is 2 work books on that said subject.  The student would have to complete the 2 workbooks before the next quarterly exam! 

I know that some of you may think that this 'Tiger Teacher' method of instilling fear in kids is not appropriate but I am ALL for it, 100% for it.    This teacher has been producing straight As students and ASEAN scholarship recipients too.  I am not placing hope that Alycia would get an ASEAN scholarship for I know her limits.  All I am hoping is for Alycia to get a dedicated, responsible and caring teacher to nurture my child and to propel her to achieve good results.  Don't get me wrong. Alycia is not terrified of her teacher. She loves this teacher and Ms L, her previous class teacher. She loves to attend school.  I think she has been blessed with the right teachers :)

Post-School Trip Illness

I thought Alycia was the second kid in her group who had fallen ill after the school's day-trip to Sekinchan on Saturday. What do I know? Yesterday, Alycia told me that almost everyone who went on the school trip in her class had fallen ill and were absent from school. With so much walking under the killer hot sun in the afternoon in the paddy field, fishing pond, kampung and visits to other places that were exposed to the scorching hot sun, who could have gone unscathed by the sun-grilling aftermath? I know I will never be able to survive a trip where I will be exposed to the hot sun. My destiny is such that I will either have a massive migraine, a fever, throat infection or general feeling of malaise if I am exposed to prolonged hours under the scorching hot sun. I shudder to think of what's going to happen to the girls and me next month as we will be making a trip to Legoland - the land of long queues under hot sun, waiting for rides! After Legoland, we will be heading to Universal Studio in Singapore - another land of grilling humans under the hot sun. I am going to arm myself with huge brollies and bottles of water. My duty as the kids' slave will soon begin and I am dreading it!

Yesterday, after Alycia returned from school, she looked really jaded and her body was still slightly warm. After a lunch of chicken porridge, she lay down on the floor of the walk-in wardrobe and dozed off. I woke her up and asked her to shower. After her shower, I blew dry her hair with the hairdryer. As I was blowing her hair with the hairdryer, I realized how much grown up my precious baby was. I cannot even remember when the last time was that I helped her to dry her hair. I think it was before Cass was born and that was over 5 years ago, gawd!! As I was helping her with the hairdryer, she started to chat with me and told me all that had transpired in her school yesterday. All of a sudden, I felt like I missed this big baby, who has grown up to be so independent as a 'tai kar cheh' (big sister) figure, yet would sometimes go hungry for my attention and TLC, just like what I am giving to Cass now.

Did I tell you that on a few occasions recently, Alycia insisted on sleeping with me on the bed in my bedroom and refused to sleep in her own bed? She argued that if Cass could do so occasionally, why couldn't she do it too? And the hubs and I had to allow her to be wedged between us the entire night, just so to please our very precious first born, the baby whom we yearned to have for years and wanted so much to share our bed with.

Alycia's First Primary School Field Trip

The day that I dread to let go of my 'precious baby' to go on a school field trip finally arrived today. Many people asked me why I am so paranoid of allowing my girls to go on school trips, especially relatives who live overseas. Firstly, as I have just mentioned, Alycia is my 'previous baby', the baby whom I went to great lengths to get. Secondly, if you live in Malaysia, especially in the Klang Valley, you would already know how unsafe it is to live in this city where cases of kidnap, murder, rape and robbery happen every single day. Just yesterday, a toddler was kidnapped in the affluent Bangsar residential area. Thirdly, who trusts express bus drivers now after umpteen incidences of horrific fatal bus crashes? Tell me, if you were me, would you feel at ease letting go of your soon-to-be 10-year old daughter to go on a school trip?

Alycia was pretty excited over this trip that she had been waiting for, for almost 2 months. This morning she woke up at 5:45am on her own without me jolting her up. By 6:30am, she had left the house with her daddy. Initially, she told us that she should be back in school by 4:30pm but later she told us that the bus was only expected to reach the school at 6pm. At about 6pm today, I received a call on my mobile phone. It was Alycia and she told me that they were still in Sekinchan, the place of visit and the return journey would only begin at around 6:15pm. I was told that they would reach their school by 7:15pm. By the time she reached home safely to me, it was already almost 8pm. The moment she stepped into the house, I saw that her cheeks and neck were as red as a lobster! She was grilled under the hot sun! My heart ached as this forgetful mummy had forgotten to give her sun block lotion and a cap, BUMMMER! How could I have been so forgetful?! This is a lesson to learn for me, that for my daughters' future school field trips, I should always apply sun block on their face, neck and hands!

I had been thinking and worrying about Alycia the whole of today, wondering what she was doing, wondering if she would be left behind by her teachers or the school bus, wondering if she had drank enough water, if she had peed, if she had eaten a proper lunch and if she was safe. The hubs knew that I was worried and he brought Sherilyn, Cass and me to Mid Valley Megamall for lunch and shopping. Honestly, I am still paranoia of letting go of my daughters to attend future school trips. If Alycia wants to attend her next school trip, I will make sure that the hubs and I tail the bus from behind and join in the trip discreetly, kekeke...

Bahasa Malaysia Test Papers

Alycia got back her BM test papers for the third term exam yesterday.  When I asked her how she fared, she said "there's good and there's bad.  No matter what marks I get, you MUST sign on my test papers OK?"  I knew the bad must be really bad but oh well, what's done cannot be undone. There is no point crying over spilled milk or as the Malays say "nasi sudah jadi bubur" (rice has turned into porridge).

Well, she got 92/100 for her BM Pemahaman paper and it is the highest score in her class.  As for her BM Penulisan, the marks were  shocking to me as I did not expect her to get such low marks. According to her, the highest score for BM Penulisan in her class (which is the 2nd Elite class) is 65/100.  I was even more shocked to hear that!  Even more shocking was that the highest score in the 1st Elite class was a B (79 and below). For Karangan, many of her classmates got a below-10 mark over a 30-mark score. 

So, does that mean that 1) either the BM teachers have not been doing a good job  or 2) the Pemahaman paper was too hard?  3) Most of the students did not read enough of books in BM nor read sample Karangan topics.  Whatever it is, I have made Alycia promise me that she has to do remedial work now, i.e. by reading a Karangan (composition in BM) topic at least 3 times a week.  The only way she can improve on her Karangan is to READ the Karangan books on sample topics.  She has always hated reading the Karangan books and would throw tantrums each time she is asked to read it.  Now, her only choice to improve on her marks is to read her Karangan books.  And I shall start from today to get her to read a Karangan topic.

As for other test papers, Alycia has done pretty well with an A for all the subjects. This girl can excel in her studies with some pushing  from the Tiger Mum ;)

A Bag Of SURPRISE from Alycia's School

A week before the school holidays started, Alycia gave me a shock when she brought home a heavy bag of curtains from school! Her teacher had asked her to bring the dirty curtains home for a spin in the washing machine! Oh my, what a big pack of end-of-school term surprise her teacher had given me! Her school involves all the students in the cleaning up of the school. Each student has to bring his/her own cloth to wipe the windows every week. Students are also compelled to bring old newspapers to the school for their recycling project. Now, they even rope in the kids to bring home the curtains for a wash LOL! This is the first time in my life that I have seen a school getting the pupils to bring home curtains for cleaning. Well, I think this is better than hanging a dust-covered dirty curtain in the classroom eh?

Kids Nap The Weirdest Ways

Alycia and Sherilyn are tops when it comes to napping. They can nap anywhere, anytime and in any position.

As usual, Alycia was so jaded after coming back from school that she dozed off while doing her homework. Life for a Chinese-ed student is pretty tough eh?

Of Alycia And Her Progress In School

Lately, Alycia hasn't been getting enough sleep. When my mil is around, she will ensure that the 2 older girls hit the sack by 9-9:30pm. She helps me to 'force' them to bed by the stipulated curfew hour. Now that she's away in Hong Kong for a few months, the girls are like rats when the big cat is away LOL! I force them to go to bed by the curfew hour too but when I am busy with Baby, they tend to take advantage of the situation and stay up late, sometimes only going to bed at 10-10:30pm. Consequently, Alycia feels sleepy during the day. She can even fall asleep while having her lunch, in her school uniform!



On another note, yesterday we went to Alycia's school to collect her report card. I did not expect to see the kind of results in her report card. It was beyond my expectation. She did very well! Her position was among the top 10 in her class of 32 students and she scored As in all her subjects except for Pendidikan Seni and BM Lisan which she scored B. She got 99% for her BM paper. The 1% deduction was from a careless mistake - she left out the letter 'h' in the word 'tujuh'. I did not expect outstanding results from her as I must admit I did not do much revision with her. The most I did was 1-2 hours of quick revision with her on the eve of her exam. The teachers had favourable comments on her. I am so very proud of my precious baby!

Alycia's Science Experiment

This is one of Alycia first few Science experiments for Primary 1 kids in school. It was mine too exactly 30 years ago! I still remember very clearly seeing the bean start growing a white spot and then I saw the white spot sprouted into a stem and then leaves. Pretty exciting. I'm sure she will love Science but learning it in Mandarin? Freaks me out to the max as I know none of the terms in Mandarin, yikes!

Preparing Alycia For Primary 1

Today marks the last day of the 6-week long school holidays. Tomorrow marks a brand new chapter in Alycia's life as well as mine. She will be going to Primary 1 at a Chinese school. My precious baby has to wake up at 6am to get ready for school and a private car will pick her up before 7am. I hope she will get used to this brand new routine. I am glad that she enjoyed herself during the 2-day orientation at her school last week.

Last night, I gave her a short lecture of what she is not supposed to do in school, in particular NOT following any Tom, Dick and Harry that is not known to her, in the pretext of picking her up from school. I petrified her a wee bit with exaggerated stories and told her that she will never see mummy again if she ever follows a 'bad person' home. I also told her about accepting candies and food from stranger is like Snow White accepting and eating a poisoned apple. I think I'd sent the message to her and she was almost in tears :S



Here's my precious baby in school uniform. Her hair is still a wee bit too long according to her school's rules and we are supposed to bring her to the hair saloon again to have it trimmed. Else, I'd have to tie it up in a bun O_o!! I also have to get her another pair of shoes as spare.

Happy end of school holidays everyone and here's wishing everyone a great week ahead!