July

July

Bicentennial Experience for Secondary 1

As part of the school’s efforts to enhance students’ learning experiences in Character and Citizenship Education (CCE), all Secondary 1 students were given the opportunity to be a part of the Bicentennial Experience on Friday 5 July 2019. The Singapore Bicentennial is a commemoration of the arrival of Stamford Raffles in Singapore. It is a prequel to SG50, and an opportunity for us to look at our longer history.

The Bicentennial Experience comprises two parts:

• Time Traveller – a timed and guided immersive guided audio-visual show within the Fort Canning Centre that presents a unique and powerful experience of Singapore’s 700-year history.
• Pathfinder – an interactive, thought-provoking set of pavilions situated within the greenery of Fort Gate that allows for free and easy explorations.

Here are some students’ sharings.

“My biggest takeaway is that Singapore’s history started way back to 1299 and not 1819, like what most people think.”
— Bibloisca 1E1

“Singapore went through a lot of hardship to become what it is today, and our ancestors have put in a lot of hard work, to help build up Singapore. I learnt more about the hardships during the Japanese Occupation, of how the people constantly lived in fear, but they were resilient and lived through that horrifying ordeal.”
— Angela 1E1

“I enjoyed Act 1 : Beginnings. Act 1 covers the dynamic period of early Singapura, taking visitors on an adrenaline rush through 300 years, starting with Sang Nila Utama’s arrival in the 13th Century. It made me realise how powerful asian civilisations fought to gain dominance over Southeast Asia’s maritime routes, well aware of how important port cities like Singapore were.”
— Huang Ting 1E3

“I enjoyed Act 5 because we got to experience the rain in real life and got to understand that rain actually meant so much to Singapore.”
— Iman Abdul Rauf 1E3

Secondary 3 MOE-OBS Challenge Programme 2019

As part of the National Outdoor Adventure Education Masterplan, the MOE-OBS Challenge Programme seeks to develop ruggedness, resilience, and build cohesion amongst youths. The programme comprises a series of school-based Physical Education and Character and Citizenship Education lessons facilitated by teachers as well as a 5-day expeditionary course at Outward Bound Singapore (OBS).

Together with Paya Lebar Methodist Girls’ School and Tampines Secondary School, our school’s Secondary 3 cohort attended the camp from 01 July to 05 July 2019. Using the outdoors as the ‘classroom’ for learning and development, our students have a unique opportunity to work together with peers from two other schools and to overcome various outdoor challenges. The programme also incorporated innovative programming elements, such as new team-based challenges and expeditions around outdoor spaces within Singapore via park connectors and waterways, thereby helping our students gain a deeper appreciation for our natural environment.

Our non-OBS campers also had a meaningful week of learning. They visited the Bicentennial Experience at Fort Canning to learn more about Singapore’s past and also got the opportunity to hone their entrepreneurship skills back in school. With the guidance of our teachers, students set up small booths to sell items in order to raise funds for the school’s needy students. It was certainly a good opportunity for them to work together and put into practice what they have learnt in a real world context.

Marine and Offshore Challenge

The Marine and Offshore Challenge (MOC) is an annual competition co-organised by Ngee Ann Polytechnic and the Association of Singapore Marine Industries, supported by Singapore Maritime Foundation. It helps to introduce the exciting world of marine and offshore industry to secondary school students. In addition, it allows participants from the Co-Curricular Activity, Robotics Club, to learn and apply their understanding of science, technology, engineering, aesthetics and mathematics as a team when building the crafts, thus providing an enriching and yet fun-filled experience for them.

This year, MOC2019 was held on 10 July and required the teams to design and build a water craft model with good performance or innovation to solve real-world problems. Since 2013, our school has been recipients of various awards, including us being the defending champions for the Fastest Boat / Highest Score in Speed category.

Experience ITE Programme (EIP) 2019

Our Secondary 2 Normal Technical students took part in a two-day Experience ITE Programme (EIP), organised by the Institute of Technical Education (ITE) Central College and ITE College West, on 17 and 18 July 2019 respectively. The programme was designed to help the students experience and discover how a hands-on, minds-on and hearts-on ITE education can help to benefit them in their career aspirations. The visits also allowed our students to see for themselves the wide range of Co-curricular Activities (CCAs) and student facilities offered by the ITE Colleges.

PAssion Arts Festival: Hues in Tunes 2

A passion for singing brought a group of Secondary 3 Choir students and their teacher, Ms Jolene Khoo, together. When the opportunity to perform at PAssion Arts Festival presented itself, students and teachers got together to form an acapella group to perform as a contribution to the community. In line with commerating Racial Harmony Week, they decided to perform an ethnic song using a familiar tune from The Lion King musical, The Lion Sleeps Tonight, written in the style of Zulu music.

The experience was an enriching and memorable one for the acapella group. From being responsible in learning their parts independently to having to improve as a team during their rehearsals, the experience definitely created a stronger bond between them. As Eilis Lee (3E2) mentioned, “I really enjoyed being part of the acapella group. I hope we still get to sing together in the future. It was really fun and interesting.” A sentiment that is shared by the rest in the group too.

11th Innojoy Fest