Dear teachers,

Spelling Bee fever is upon us - and the Semi-finals will be held on 18 September.

We all know that soft skills are what gives us the edge in today’s AI-infused job market. Among these soft skills, emotion recognition and regulation will help our youth develop empathy and build bonds with other people.

We all intuitively know how to read emotions. Toddlers can tell angry faces apart from smiling ones in “Satoru Onishi”.

This week’s book recommendation is “How are you peeling?” by Saxton Freymann and Joost Elffers. Fruits and vegetables are craved to resemble human faces displaying a variety of emotions. Students can admire the ingenuity of these art pieces and read well-worded captions that help them beef up their vocabulary to describe their feelings. The vivid visual images of these fruits and vegetables might just help them remember certain feeling words.

Additionally, the English Department has come up with five word clines that aim to help students express the full spectrum of their emotions. We hope that by knowing how to accurately label how they are feeling, they will find it easier to come to terms and cope with their dynamic well of myriad emotions. 💪