Awakeri School

Visit to Singapore 2010

A few select photos

Following Mr Fitzgerald's sabbatical last year, Awakeri decided to send more staff to see how Singapore is so successful at teaching maths and their use of technology. Singapore is so different to New Zealand. In every sq. kilometre here, we have 16 people. In Singapore there are 7000! Here are some typical housing buildings.
I was lucky enough to be part of the group - Barrie Hawkes.....		 The Shuqun staff, three of whom visited here last year, were fabulous hosts. Before we went to their school, they showed us around. Selve took us to Little India. The teachers were keen to do some shopping!
Rozi and her son showed us around too. Here is the group eating at a banana leaf restaurant. Note the banana leaf plates!
Here is the principal, Mr Gary Tsu, talking about his school. There are 2100 students at Shuqun School, so they have to have a morning and an afternoon shift! Here is a typical Shuqun classroom. This class had 43 students in it. Note the open windows to let the breeze go through.
Here is a Year 2 teacher getting her class to do some adding practice.

We shared some of our ideas too. Here is Miss Taggart and Mr Sheather showing what Awakeri School is like. Only two age groups could fit in the hall at a time, so there were about 700 students there. They were especially impressed with pictures of our students swimming, and having Ag Day.
Then Mrs Wardell, Mrs Purches and Miss Taggart taught them how to do a jump jam! Who Let The Dogs Out! The Shuqun students talked to us about a number of things. Here is Yu Si Yue (centre) telling us about science. She was a very enthusiastic speaker. She is also leader of their student council.
On our way home from Singapore we stopped at Brunei, a fascinating place to visit. Here are some of us about to get on a water taxi to view the river village. There are ten schools out on the water!!
Lots of big mangroves, we saw some amazing proboscis monkeys in there too. Luckily we didn't meet the crocodiles or snakes! They have a police station, fire station and even a petrol station out on the water! We had a great trip and learned a lot!

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