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21 Jan 2026 2 minute read 0 comments cryotosensei
@Bell_curve asked me what keeps me going to serve in my flawed education system. Okay, he didn’t exactly say that the Singapore educational system is flawed, but being entrenched in the system makes me susceptible to its shortcomings. The most glarin...
13 Jan 2026 1 minute read 0 comments cryotosensei
I just received a message from a parent. She told me that her son had been admitted into the Institute of Technical Education. Now, this might seem like a normal notification, but her son who was in my form class during his lower secondary years gave...
3 Jan 2026 1 minute read 0 comments cryotosensei
So what was it like working at NorthLight, I hear you ask. You know the cardinal rule of teaching: never initiate a power struggle with students. No one wins. I found myself flouting this golden rule then. Specifically, I had shouting matches with a...
30 Nov 2025 1 minute read 0 comments cryotosensei
A few people who have observed my lesson comment that I tend to overuse "okay" while I teach. "Your students may be secretly counting the number of times you utter the word 'okay', " my mentor Mrs Emily Teo once cautioned. But in all honesty, I have...
24 Nov 2025 2 minute read 0 comments cryotosensei
1. Lesson preparation is killing me. Gone are the days when I can swagger into a classroom with a comprehension passage. But it's nice to be able to show videos and organise mini debates in class. I'm quite impressed with the way today's teens are ju...
21 Nov 2025 2 minute read 0 comments cryotosensei
I have come to a stage in life where I think blogging is self-indulgent and lack the motivation to blog because nothing exciting enough happens anyway but I was looking at an ex-student's reflection for 2009 and his conviction behind his smooth-flowi...
20 Nov 2025 3 minute read 0 comments cryotosensei
I never had the appetite for business.To be honest, I don't think male teachers get a lot of respect in Singapore, if I can generalise what my student once uttered to be a sentiment held commonly: "Like you meh. Still teach in YJC". I never did let h...
19 Nov 2025 1 minute read 0 comments cryotosensei
Yet another distinctive day! The girl whom I had trouble collecting homework from wrote me a book. Okay, strictly speaking, she ran out of steam by the fourth page, but Sensei won’t begrudge her efforts, considering her lackluster attitude towards ho...
17 Nov 2025 1 minute read 0 comments cryotosensei
Teaching is a calling, or so they say. I’m not so sure if I regard my profession as a vocation. After all, there is more to life than my job, even if it involves something as groundbreaking and earth-shaking as impacting lives. But one thing’s for su...
14 Nov 2025 1 minute read 0 comments cryotosensei
I took Urgent Private Affairs leave yesterday to attend my son’s orientation, which meant that I had to forgo the Year 4s’ graduation today. Amidst this group of students whom I went toe to toe with was a young man who recently came back to school af...
