The Central Fire Station: 23rd Jan'16

This term topic: Community Helper

We were asked to bring them to the fire station or library for their show and tell. 

I then know fire station open house is held on every Saturday from 9 to 11am. Free admission to all. There's a list of fire stations in the website listed below this post.

His buddy's mom and I chose Central Fire Station as it is located next to the Civil Defence Heritage Gallery. Admission to both premise was free of charge!

Mr Tan who actively, passionately encouraging visitors to sign up to volunteer with the Civil
Defence. "Training is provided" he says.

Trying out the equipment for continuous resuscitation. IZ says "painful".
That's how strong. You need to press 5cm into the chest, even if it means breaking a few ribs.
Maintain the right size. Too skinny, this equipment will not work for you.

The brave girl volunteered to be wheeled into the ambulance.

Family member to touch the end of the stretcher. For comfort I supposed.

Introducing some common gears..

how to carry the hose..

how to activate..

How to put on their uniform..

in split seconds!

Thermal gauge

Kiddos' idol!

While we were there for a mere 1.5 hours, there were already 2 ambulances and 4 fire engines off to rescue.
That's how busy the fire station is..

Demonstrating how firemen gets to fire engines real quick when they are upstairs.

Stacking

The RT111 - unfortunately automatic equipment were not available for demo

Showtime at 10am

Live demo

Once done at the fire station, we moved next door to the heritage gallery.

We could see how fire fighting / rescue work evolve from 1800s to today. Not that the kids cared, but it was a learning experience for all of us.

It is really interesting that they have interactive activities there for the children to learn more in a fun way.

Then I asked Teacher Xinyi if she could guide IZ to draw something for his Chinese show and tell.

I was really impressed that she actually prepared something in advance.

But she said IZ already had an idea in his mind on what he wanted to draw.

Colouring in progress..

The morning of the Chinese show and tell

Related information:

1) http://www.scdf.gov.sg/content/scdf_internet/en/scdf_247/others/visit_our_fire_stations.html

2) http://www.scdf.gov.sg/content/scdf_internet/en/general/about-us/cd-heritage-gallery/introduction.html

The Art People

IZ went to InnoArt for drawing close to a year ago. I don't know when, the teacher changed. And then he started to dread going to class. For a class that he would want to go despite running temperature, we were surprised.

We didn't receive notification that the teacher changed. No proper introduction either. We thought new teacher was an intern/assistant.

Later on, IZ completely give up going to class and told us he didn't want to go the class anymore.

I learnt from a fellow parent that the new teacher didn't have the patience with young kids. Maybe that's why IZ didn't want to go. We also didn't like that IZ learnt to draw by looking at tablet, on top of teacher's sketches. That's not what we want.

Our take is simple. We send him to art/drawing class because he loves it. Period.

If he detests going to the class, we'll not force him. So we were about to give up the remaining 3 lessons credits, but InnoArt agreed to let us pass on the credits to another friend.

To be honest, after a year of class, I didn't see there's any improvement on IZ's drawing other than the ability to copy things from iPad.

So, I had to search for another school so he can continue to learn and do more with his passion. And I found one that is really near us, and what's even better, the class is on weekday afternoon. Yippie!

On the assessment day
At first when he was given the blank piece of fish, he couldn't draw anything, but once he started, he could add a little details to it

Happy at 1st lesson
For his portfolio cover

2nd lesson
Teacher commented he got tired at the end
But we were more than amazed at the work

Something really different after 2 lessons.
This is the first time his robots actually look nice after colouring. 

I hope the lernen-reise here will be beneficial for him..

Fingers crossed for now..

Updated on 16th Dec'15:

3rd lesson