I think I will blog a little more about college life, now that I had experienced about 2-3 weeks of it.
First of all, it is really hectic and as I may have said to you, you come to school before the sun is up and only go home after the sun is down. In other words, you are practically spending your whole day there, even if your lessons ended early like say in the early afternoon. The truth is there’s so many activities organized each day that you will be unable to find any “slack days” on your calendar. For instance, there may be Faculty Dance session on one day or say DramaFeste or whatever… I guess while you may not find college life fulfilling, it will at least be “filling”.
Another thing I noticed is that the pace of lessons is much faster than in the high school side. If a person is slacking for a day or two by not doing tutorial, he or she will probably be behind schedule already. For me, I am trying to catch up with the mole tutorial as well as 1C. To cope with this increased workload, some had resorted to “mugging whenever there’s time”, so you can see them working on tutorial during breaks or even before the morning flag-raising. For some, they will either be copying wholesales, or photocopy the whole tutorial like what Kian Yang did.
Another indicator of the workload is the much thicker notes for each of the subjects. For the first 2 stacks of Economics notes, which I think will last for one term, has a total of 88 pages albeit with some useless crap inside. In contrast, year four 4 biology only has 100 pages of notes FOR ONE YEAR. With so many notes to be printed over the term, the class fund has been rising by an extraordinary rate. I estimate that I had been paying about $10 each week. This high expenditure reminds me of what ngmy said about textbooks. If you buy textbooks, it will be in one go and will feel less costly, supposedly and in perception, than if you were to be pay the class fund every other day. She said that the total sum will actually be about the same. I’m not sure about her theory, but I can at least confirm that my pocket money always run out before the week does.
Saturday, January 27, 2007
Huang Cheng
Well, Huang Cheng is getting more and more imba. Now everyday I need to go there at 4pm and do work till like 840, so I can only reached home at around 9++. So there's no time to do any work liao so I can only mug during the breaks. Even so, I'm now officially behind schedule.
Will talk more soon
Will talk more soon
Friday, January 19, 2007
07S61
Well I finally did get my first choice subject combination of “CCME”, though there will not be any 4J people in my class as my now ex-classmates all decided to choose something different from me. For instance, Kian Yang wanted to take biology instead of economics and Lim Yi actually reversed his “final” decision to take CCME to switch back to PCME!
Amazingly, I am in the same class as Zheng Hang because S61 is a combined class with people taking either CCME or PCME. Well, that’s quite a pleasant surprise. And we actually go back to the CT allocation list to double-check to make sure either of us did not make this mistake.
For that week, we need to do the class flag and prepare the class item. Dian Jun actually provided some sort of pictures for us to choose, and so we voted to see which will be the final design. When I first cringed at the idea of a “rainbow dolphin”, it actually turned out to be quite nice in the end with skilful blending. As for the class item, we decided to have a “4K item” whereby we acted out some lame actions/MTV parody of some songs. Thus we went to the SALT centre for practice, which is actually captured in yet another montage.
However on the actual day itself, we somehow switched songs totally to “wu ding” and some “my girl” thing, so I guess the class had to start all over again. Ivan was leading the class superbly and for a moment I thought maybe he can be the dancing king of the class.
Yet as “Judgment Day” dawns, somehow the Tania (with Ying Yue?) asked Zheng Hang and I to do some random *ahem* stuff as the class sang “wu ding”. Since that’s impromptu, so we were like doing anything that came up on our mind and eventually we ran out of things to do, I guess. Ironically, there seem to be hotter audience reception towards our random antics than the rehearsed “my girl” dance, which is well rather ironic. Well, our flag was and still IS totally outstanding on that day, and truth be told, there’s not much opposition and so we are the class flag champion!
Amazingly, I am in the same class as Zheng Hang because S61 is a combined class with people taking either CCME or PCME. Well, that’s quite a pleasant surprise. And we actually go back to the CT allocation list to double-check to make sure either of us did not make this mistake.
For that week, we need to do the class flag and prepare the class item. Dian Jun actually provided some sort of pictures for us to choose, and so we voted to see which will be the final design. When I first cringed at the idea of a “rainbow dolphin”, it actually turned out to be quite nice in the end with skilful blending. As for the class item, we decided to have a “4K item” whereby we acted out some lame actions/MTV parody of some songs. Thus we went to the SALT centre for practice, which is actually captured in yet another montage.
However on the actual day itself, we somehow switched songs totally to “wu ding” and some “my girl” thing, so I guess the class had to start all over again. Ivan was leading the class superbly and for a moment I thought maybe he can be the dancing king of the class.
Yet as “Judgment Day” dawns, somehow the Tania (with Ying Yue?) asked Zheng Hang and I to do some random *ahem* stuff as the class sang “wu ding”. Since that’s impromptu, so we were like doing anything that came up on our mind and eventually we ran out of things to do, I guess. Ironically, there seem to be hotter audience reception towards our random antics than the rehearsed “my girl” dance, which is well rather ironic. Well, our flag was and still IS totally outstanding on that day, and truth be told, there’s not much opposition and so we are the class flag champion!
Saturday, January 06, 2007
Term 1 Week 1
Well, think I will blog about this fast, else I will forget whatever that goes on during this period.
Talks
For the high school students, more than half of the talks were, well, rather boring since we already gone through those in assembly. Moreover with everyone using PowerPoint, no stunning background could help you get attention from us. It is a bit like stoning at PD judging full of lousy projects.
Yet amazingly, on Friday, we had 4 interesting talks in a row. First of all, the deputy principal (I think he’s called Mr. Chan) talking about his high school experience. Apparently he only got 35 for his first college math test before becoming a math teacher. Wow, that’s cool. And there’s this talk about history of hwachong which is rather insightful as the speaker talked about how the school had developed and the original positions of certain building and our moves from woodlands, bukit batok…. rather than wasting our time repeating the school values. Same goes for the sexuality education and the “MRT” talk. Haha.
Station Games, Dance, Songs
First and foremost, I’m okay with most of the songs maybe except for the college anthem as it’s particularly high and it’s of a very large range so it’s hard to sing. In contrast, I think our school song is rather low, just right for boys.
The dances are disastrous. Enough said (Read on to find out what I did to escape from the torture).
The station games are obviously designed by students to students but are they are for students? After the entire ordeal, the only people having “fun” seem to be all those councilors.
Subject combination and KI fiasco
As you may had read from my previous post, I had actually decided on “ccme” quite a long time ago. However after listening to so many talks and from effective persuasion from your friends, your resolve seems to be wavering.
Actually I’m quite undecided whether to take the KI selection test, such that I arrange my holiday so that it will not clash. However, though I’m interested in the subject and willing to try it out, I’m not sure which combinations should I be taking with it. Therefore my mind is in some sort of stalemate whether to take the test “for fun” so that I may opt for it later on should I change my mind.
What eventually overcame the stalemate, of whether or not to take the KI test, turned out to be the disastrous dance session. Seeing that I can miss the dance session if I take the KI test, I promptly asked Kian Yang to go as well (or is it the other way round?).
The test turned out to be quite okay. You need to write an essay not more than 500 words on “in your opinion, what makes a piece of knowledge certain”. I was actually quite taken aback at first since I’m not prepared for such kinds of question. However, after some planning, I promptly write the essay. Basically I argued that you can prove or disprove a hypothesis, thus validating the piece of knowledge or otherwise, through repeated experiment and intellectual debate based on logic and actual observation, which will remove possible fallacies and or loopholes.
Then obviously I waited for the test result. And guess what, amazingly, I actually made it! Lol. Then there’s some people who are really serious but did not made it. Then here comes a guy who had gotten in partly just to miss the dance.
Although I’m still uncertain at that point whether to really take the subject, I decided not to tell the school I do not want to take it as I want to put as 2nd choice (only), with ccme still being the first of course. Thus, imagine my horror, when the isp said I can only register for combination with KI! After fallen into panic as I froze on the deeper implication of my failure to decline KI, Chuan Xin came to the rescue! Somehow I can choose ccme again.
:) Thanks, lcx!
KI test’s new point
(Btw, it’s ok if you don’t understand the following para. It’s normal)
I had thought of a new point which should be quite suitable for the above question as well. See if you agree with this following paragraph (I had broken it down into several big chunk for easier reading).
“In some cases however, there may be insufficient evidence as to prove or disprove a particular hypothesis, thereby resulting in a stalemate.
One example will be the question on whether god had really existed, which had eluded humanity. Proposition or opposition for such a hypothesis, even after a rigorous debate, will be unable to reach a satisfactory conclusion for one side or the other based on the available evidence.
Another example may be that some people proposed that the world may not be real, but merely the stimulation of a “matrix”, like in the movie. Obviously, there are absolutely no signs or evidence of this being so, but proponent of “matrix world” may propose further that such was the intricacy of the matrix’s construction, that it is impossible to detect any signs. Though this sounds absurd and unlikely, this is obviously logical and entirely possible.
Fortunately, we can still resolve the above 2 hypothesizes even though we never reached a conclusion. For the former, the existence of god is a religious issue and can be treated as a personal choice. Therefore, some people may continue to believe in god while others do not. As for the latter, we can resolve the issues mathematically, by ranking all possibilities in order of likeliness. In that case, the possibility of this “false real world”, so to speak, to be “real” is very high. The existence of a “matrix world”, though possible, is too unlikely for it to be considered and so should be ignored.
However, the above methods of resolving hypothesizes have a deeper implication. By resolving them without conclusive evidence for one side or the other, it leaves a chance for the other side, though already deemed unlikely mathematically, to be actually true. Therefore, strictly speaking, these pieces of knowledge are not really “certain”, but only “near certain”. However, in a normal situation in a normal context, such “near certainty” is “certain” enough for most of us to validate a piece of knowledge.”
It follows that my new conclusion, incorporating my new point, may be something like this.
“In cases whereby the process of validating a piece of knowledge can be done through observation, repeated experiments should be conducted. As humanity progresses, sometimes entire new body of knowledge can be created and perfected by abstract intellectual debate and discussion. However, even if such new theories are perfectly logical in our mind, they need to agree with the laws of nature before it should be accepted. As for cases whereby there are insufficient evidences, we can only take the likeliest possibility, and accept this “near certainty” as “certainty”.”
Wow, I’m impressed by myself. But then this point is edited in my head over these 1-2 days and way beyond the 1 hour test duration. In any case, this point can be a stand-alone essay even without conclusion, with about 400 words. Lol. Lastly, please comment whether you agree with my new point. Thanks. Maybe I will email the KI teachers on what they thought about my new point.
So to all those who think I'm just laming and crapping all day, I won't mind if you start thinking that I have a good mind. :)
Talks
For the high school students, more than half of the talks were, well, rather boring since we already gone through those in assembly. Moreover with everyone using PowerPoint, no stunning background could help you get attention from us. It is a bit like stoning at PD judging full of lousy projects.
Yet amazingly, on Friday, we had 4 interesting talks in a row. First of all, the deputy principal (I think he’s called Mr. Chan) talking about his high school experience. Apparently he only got 35 for his first college math test before becoming a math teacher. Wow, that’s cool. And there’s this talk about history of hwachong which is rather insightful as the speaker talked about how the school had developed and the original positions of certain building and our moves from woodlands, bukit batok…. rather than wasting our time repeating the school values. Same goes for the sexuality education and the “MRT” talk. Haha.
Station Games, Dance, Songs
First and foremost, I’m okay with most of the songs maybe except for the college anthem as it’s particularly high and it’s of a very large range so it’s hard to sing. In contrast, I think our school song is rather low, just right for boys.
The dances are disastrous. Enough said (Read on to find out what I did to escape from the torture).
The station games are obviously designed by students to students but are they are for students? After the entire ordeal, the only people having “fun” seem to be all those councilors.
Subject combination and KI fiasco
As you may had read from my previous post, I had actually decided on “ccme” quite a long time ago. However after listening to so many talks and from effective persuasion from your friends, your resolve seems to be wavering.
Actually I’m quite undecided whether to take the KI selection test, such that I arrange my holiday so that it will not clash. However, though I’m interested in the subject and willing to try it out, I’m not sure which combinations should I be taking with it. Therefore my mind is in some sort of stalemate whether to take the test “for fun” so that I may opt for it later on should I change my mind.
What eventually overcame the stalemate, of whether or not to take the KI test, turned out to be the disastrous dance session. Seeing that I can miss the dance session if I take the KI test, I promptly asked Kian Yang to go as well (or is it the other way round?).
The test turned out to be quite okay. You need to write an essay not more than 500 words on “in your opinion, what makes a piece of knowledge certain”. I was actually quite taken aback at first since I’m not prepared for such kinds of question. However, after some planning, I promptly write the essay. Basically I argued that you can prove or disprove a hypothesis, thus validating the piece of knowledge or otherwise, through repeated experiment and intellectual debate based on logic and actual observation, which will remove possible fallacies and or loopholes.
Then obviously I waited for the test result. And guess what, amazingly, I actually made it! Lol. Then there’s some people who are really serious but did not made it. Then here comes a guy who had gotten in partly just to miss the dance.
Although I’m still uncertain at that point whether to really take the subject, I decided not to tell the school I do not want to take it as I want to put as 2nd choice (only), with ccme still being the first of course. Thus, imagine my horror, when the isp said I can only register for combination with KI! After fallen into panic as I froze on the deeper implication of my failure to decline KI, Chuan Xin came to the rescue! Somehow I can choose ccme again.
:) Thanks, lcx!
KI test’s new point
(Btw, it’s ok if you don’t understand the following para. It’s normal)
I had thought of a new point which should be quite suitable for the above question as well. See if you agree with this following paragraph (I had broken it down into several big chunk for easier reading).
“In some cases however, there may be insufficient evidence as to prove or disprove a particular hypothesis, thereby resulting in a stalemate.
One example will be the question on whether god had really existed, which had eluded humanity. Proposition or opposition for such a hypothesis, even after a rigorous debate, will be unable to reach a satisfactory conclusion for one side or the other based on the available evidence.
Another example may be that some people proposed that the world may not be real, but merely the stimulation of a “matrix”, like in the movie. Obviously, there are absolutely no signs or evidence of this being so, but proponent of “matrix world” may propose further that such was the intricacy of the matrix’s construction, that it is impossible to detect any signs. Though this sounds absurd and unlikely, this is obviously logical and entirely possible.
Fortunately, we can still resolve the above 2 hypothesizes even though we never reached a conclusion. For the former, the existence of god is a religious issue and can be treated as a personal choice. Therefore, some people may continue to believe in god while others do not. As for the latter, we can resolve the issues mathematically, by ranking all possibilities in order of likeliness. In that case, the possibility of this “false real world”, so to speak, to be “real” is very high. The existence of a “matrix world”, though possible, is too unlikely for it to be considered and so should be ignored.
However, the above methods of resolving hypothesizes have a deeper implication. By resolving them without conclusive evidence for one side or the other, it leaves a chance for the other side, though already deemed unlikely mathematically, to be actually true. Therefore, strictly speaking, these pieces of knowledge are not really “certain”, but only “near certain”. However, in a normal situation in a normal context, such “near certainty” is “certain” enough for most of us to validate a piece of knowledge.”
It follows that my new conclusion, incorporating my new point, may be something like this.
“In cases whereby the process of validating a piece of knowledge can be done through observation, repeated experiments should be conducted. As humanity progresses, sometimes entire new body of knowledge can be created and perfected by abstract intellectual debate and discussion. However, even if such new theories are perfectly logical in our mind, they need to agree with the laws of nature before it should be accepted. As for cases whereby there are insufficient evidences, we can only take the likeliest possibility, and accept this “near certainty” as “certainty”.”
Wow, I’m impressed by myself. But then this point is edited in my head over these 1-2 days and way beyond the 1 hour test duration. In any case, this point can be a stand-alone essay even without conclusion, with about 400 words. Lol. Lastly, please comment whether you agree with my new point. Thanks. Maybe I will email the KI teachers on what they thought about my new point.
So to all those who think I'm just laming and crapping all day, I won't mind if you start thinking that I have a good mind. :)
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