Mrs De Silva awarded Life Member of Royal Academy of Dance (England)

Congratulations to our beloved Mrs De Silva for being awarded the Life Membership of the Royal Academy of Dance (RAD), England. RAD is one of the world's most influential dance education and training organisations. Its classical ballet examintion syllabus is regarded as the best.

We are always proud of her being a dedicated and honourable Teacher for more than half of her life. As we all know, it is a big honour to pass the examinations of the Royal Academy of Dance (England). She did it decades ago and had also become a Teaching Member of the RAD more than 20 years!

Being a talented lady since young, she excels in ballet, creative Modern Dance, European Folk Dancing and Artistic & Rhythmic Gymnastics. She is also a Physical Education specialist who specialises in Labau Movement Training and Coaching Swimming and Life Saving skills.

Her vast talents and teaching experience have brought her students to different heights during their training with her.

She is now teaching at our Clover Learning Centre, focusing in teaching Ballet (4 years old to adults) during weekends, training the students to qualify for cerification in the Royal Academy of Dance (England). She is also teaching Fun Dancing to boys and girls of age 3.5 to 6 years old on every Monday.

Ballet at Clover

Happy Chinese New Year!

As an annual lesson plan, we told the story about the origin of Chinese New Year (CNY). It all began with the Monster "Nian" (年). It seemed that the children are never tired of this story even though we tell it every year.

We had very busy weeks before the CNY this year. We did the History of the Earth, and we also needed to cover the story and talkabouts of CNY. The Aunties were exhausted but as excited as ever.

Story-telling about the Origin of the Chinese New Year.

We did Food Tasting as usual. The children were all eager to try the various types of food. Some even attempted the spicy crackers.

We also borrowed the mini Lion Dance prop and drum from Zhi Hui and Zhi Jean. Auntie Margaret did a very fun demonstration on how to dance the Lion (we now see her talent in Kung Fu). Auntie Liew played the Chinese Drum. The children then had their turn to dance the Lion. Everyone had a good laugh. They were so funny and cute!

The History of the Earth (Part 1) - The Big Bang Theory & Black Timeline

The Big Bang Theory

"It all started as small as a pin-head and it expanded --- getting bigger, bigger, bigger, and...pop! Then the stars started to appear and wind came about."

The children listened and watched the balloon which Auntie Latifah blew up, while enduring the darkness and heat in the room. We tried to simulate the condition before the Big Bang, only switching on the fan when it started to have wind after the Big Bang (well, after the Balloon burst), which was the start of the Universe. Meanwhile, Auntie Shirin also played the mp3 sound of what was supposed to be heard right after the Big Bang.

Wow, what a great effort all Aunties had put in, ensuring the kids get all the right stimulation to learn about the Big Bang Theory (Visual, Auditory, Thermic senses are all covered here).

We did the Big Bang craft the following week (see collage below), didn't expect the children found it hard to break an egg.

Picture below: Children throwing eggshells filled with various colours on black paper to create a burst effect (The Big Bang theory)

The Black Timeline

Well, lots of things happened after the Big Bang. To give the children an overview, we used the Black ribbon to represent the Eras before human appeared on Earth. With the short little red ribbon at the end of the timeline (represents the time Human Beings exist) as compared to the long black ribbon -- It was a very good visual representation of how little time we as Human Beings have existed.

In order to let the children get the idea of the various Eras (from the Azoic "Black" era, to the Mesozoic "Dinosaurs" era, to the Cenozoic "Ice Age" era), the story needed to be told well. The narrator role fell on Auntie Chaz Yee, the Drama Queen. The children listened so attentively that, one of the 4-year-olds (Bong Yi) even shivered when A. Chaz Yee talked about the Ice Age. He looked cold despite us not even switching on the air-conditioner!

Pictures below: Children holding the black ribbon, which represents the Black Timeline after Big Bang and before the Human Beings exist. The Black ribbon was unrolled as the story was told.



We repeated this exercise the next day, and to our surprise a 2.5-year-old (Ze Ming) responded with the most accurate answer "Jellyfish started to appear" for the era when ocean was formed!



WOW, this is so amazing. Once again, we take our hats off Dr. Maria Montessori. She really knows the children so well that the children still benefit greatly from her learning plan after more than 100 years!

Give the Poor a Chance in Education

I always have a mission of my own to help the less fortunate, especially in Health and Education. This led me to read Psychology to learn more about human's mental health during my undergraduate days. Education has always been my passion. To provide education to others went a long way when I was a student, saving each penny overseas to pay for living expenses and also sponsoring kids in the third world. It lasted for a few years though, I had to stop and start pursuing my dream using the pennies saved.

Life goes on for me pretty well although stressful. I am happy now that I have two beautiful kids of my own, but I never stop thinking about those kids in the third world. With the birth of my second child, I am contented to have a good team as a family. It is also time to continue the mission of extending Education to the needies.

Hence, I have applied to sponsor two kids with World Vision, one for Clover, one for my husband and I. We shall continue to work towards sponsoring more kids in the future, locally or overseas, whenever help is needed.

It is not difficult to sponsor kids in the third world, we hope more people will join in to make the world a better place.

Pre-Holiday Kindermusik Program for 1.5 to 3 Year-Olds

Click here for more information

Another Inspiration - Bali Green School

This is another inspirational school that inspires me. It was reported on BBC, CNN, ABC and also on Malaysia Star newspaper. Bringing the children out in the nature for a lesson is a common thing to do at Bali Green School.

I have always been a dreamer since young, fantasizing various things that I can do in life. Most of the visions have been realised. For this, I have to thank my parents who created a business out of nothing but pure hardwork and humble attitudes towards life in order to provide for all the children in the family. Hence, I have developed empathy towards the less fortunate with my down-to-earth and humble background. At the same time, I have been exposed to various cultures when I did volunteer jobs at hospitals, schools and summer camps in Singapore, U.K. and the U.S.A. respectively.

After founding this Clover school, my principle is to provide something for the children to give back to the society. Yes, I want to provide the best education that I think for preschoolers and kindergarteners, and at the same time giving something back without monetary return. This is why our "ABC Music & Me" program for the 2 to 4-year-olds comes F.O.C. for parents.

However, this is definitely not enough to reach out to those less fortunate students who cannot afford good education. I have time and energy constraint. I hope one day I can do like what the Bali Green School is doing - giving out bursaries to the needies. This needs a good team of people to work together, I still need to find the ropes to do that.

In Bali Green School, the curriculum works towards the cambridge examinations. This does not hinder any of the curriculum which includes learning about the nature, hands-on with everything and anything, including eating plants and fruits everyday that the children are taught to plant and harvest. This is a dream school that I yearn to work in. I don't mind working for others again because I can do my part to help in contributing to the world.

Many parents told me I have done a lot for their child(ren), they are lucky to have found this little Clover land. However, I know it is still a long way to go to reach out to more, especially those who are less fortunate. Researching on Bali Green School will definitely give a light to my vision for Clover. My next step is to visit them, the people who make this "miracle" happen, to help me help those in need.

For information regarding the Bali Green School, please visit http://www.greenschool.org/.

Excursion to Malay Cultural Village (31 July 2010)

This trip was planned to link to the Cultural theme that we are working on this year -- Malaysia Project.

The weather on the day before the excursion was real bad - stormy rain and greyish sky. I prayed on that night before going to bed for a nice weather, wishing hard for a good head start for the children at least in the next morning. I think my prayer was heard, thank you.

Our children looked smart wearing the Clover T-shirts. This design has been on my mind for a long time, wanting to make it simple without any advertisement (like the phone numbers or address) printed on the T. The children looked smart, and easy to be spotted on. Should have done this a long time ago.

Each child was also assigned a "buddy" to take care of, so that they were given a responsibility and would not run wild. They are all obedient kids, who were sensible to take care of themselves and at the same time keeping an eye on their "buddy".

One of the highlights was Batik Painting. The children were given a presentation of the materials used to make Batik, and how it was done. The interesting part was it was not difficult to paint Batik at all. We only needed to follow 3 simple steps -- Paint with water first, then the colour, then water again. That was it!

The children went off painting their Batik after the demonstration. It was quite an experience for them!

After the Batik painting, we visited the plantation. Lots of fruits were "missing". Some due to not harvesting, some due to the storm on the day before. What a disappointment. Nevertheless, it was fun to see the pewter-making demonstration. The manual peeling of the coconut husk was also very interesting. Strength and technique were the key-words. We were also shown the rubber-tapping procedure. Our tour guide (the lady in the orange T-shirt) asked the children to answer her quiz -- "Name three products made of rubber." Some of our older children gave the answers quickly, we were very proud of them.

We also made small tiny rubber balls using the latex from the rubber tree. However, most of our children's rubber balls were grey in colour, rather than the usual white. Guess their habit of touching things around them collected the dust on their little hands. If I could remember, only Tristan's rubber ball was white and bouncy.

The Malay Cultural dance was also very entertaining. The children were shown the ang klongs before the performance started.


They were also asked to sing Rasa Sayang. Luckily we had trained them to sing this song in school for the upcoming Parents Morning. We were very proud (really proud) of our children when they could sing this traditional Malay song loud and clear.

It was a very fulfilling trip. We, as teachers, enjoyed it as much as the children.

There are many more photos of this trip. CLICK HERE to view them.