Grassroots with passion 09
can be added pressure to the child and deprives him of the break he deserves. Work-play balance Ten-year-old Isaac Wee has English and Math tuition and like many kids his age, he isn’t a fan of reaching for the books during the holidays. “I will not be able to do the things I want to do, like visiting Universal Studios Singapore,” he said. Recognising the need to strike a balance between work and play, his mother, Mrs Valerie Wee, chose to only give Isaac one session of tuition during the upcoming June holidays. “We decided to have only one lesson, precisely because he needs a good break. Isaac has a three-day school camp, two four-day church camps with the family, swimming and piano lessons, which would already occupy his time,” she said. She also arranged for that one tuition session to be held during the last week of the June holidays, as a refresher to prepare Isaac for the next semester.
According to a survey published by The Straits Times in July 2015, seven in 10 parents send their children for tuition. While the published results do not carry any mention of tuition during the holidays, there are bound to be students whose semester breaks are not an excuse for them to shun the textbooks. Mr Rum Tan of SmileTutor Tuition Agency continues to bear witness to this trend. “Holidays are where parents try to pack their child's schedules with lots of tuition, to push their grades up,” he said. “This happens both during the June holidays after the mid-year exams, to gain an edge or to catch up for final exams, and the December holidays, to cover the year's syllabus and prepare for the next year.” There is no clear answer whether tuition or more tuition during holidays is good for the kid. On one hand, the spare time affords weaker students the chance to catch up with their peers, especially in today’s competitive environment and unforgiving pace of learning. On the other, some students might already be on or comfortably above the performance curve, yet parents strive to push them further either to push them to outdo themselves or to ensure their grades are maintained. This
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