Taiwan trip briefing

Date: 28.6.2008

Venue: HML

Members: Yi Wen, Jia Jie.

Hi today, me, Jia Jie and jing Yuan were supposed to meet Mrs Yap, the other boys going for the Taiwan trip, and the RGS people going for the trip. However, Jing Yuan couldn’t make it because of second needs analysis.

So, me and Jia Jie went to the library together for the meeting. I shall not go into details, but mainly, we met the teacher in charge of the RGS group, and got to know the RGS girls going for the trip. We started the meeting with some ice breakers, followed by a briefing and some discussion about the trip, including a Q and A session. After all these, we had another ice breaker and the teachers left us to discuss about what we wanted to get for Taiwan people as well as discuss the performance for the trip. We decided that we should do some personalised postcard thingy with RI and RGS badges pinned to it for the gifts. For the performance, it was to be some song and dance thingy..

Jing Yuan is to cheorograph the dance.

Ok.. done

Yi Wen

Day 14

Date: 25.6.08

Venue: Library, Physics Lab

Members present: Jia Jie, Jing Yuan, Charles, Yi Wen

Hi.

Today, me, Jia Jie, and Jing Yuan were to meet Mrs Yap at the library at the start of RE period for some briefing about the Taiwan trip that we were going for. After the briefing, Jing Yuan decided that we were going to make the bones for skeleton for SSVH today. Therefore, while Charles was filling up the report template in the library, the rest of us went to J8 to buy kitchen towels as well as PVA glue.

When the materials were finally brought, we headed to the physics lab to make the bones. So heres a little tutorial to teach you how to make bones from newspapers, PVA glue, kitchen towels and water. First you deep some newspaper in water, then you start wrapping that newspaper with small strips of other wet newspaper.  Wrap until you get your desired size and shape, then you  leave it to dry, when it is dry,  mix some PVA glue in water, then use the same process but now with the kitchen towels and glue water to wrap your newspaper structure. Done.

However, this was not as simple as it seems. After all, this is the HUMAN SKELETON. So, in my opinion, it is impossible. But, given our optimistic outlook of life, we decided to try it out anyway. I shall not describe the process because it is too long. But heres the results. We had two Dog bones (completed the wrapping of kitchen towels but not dry yet), two random newspaper sticks (Supposedly the calf bones + the heels attached), and two flippers (supposedly the feet bones). Therefore, i declare the bones a failure. But Jing Yuan begs to differ, he seems to be living in denial and claims that they look nice.

Anyway, all out remaining newspapers and the kitchen towels and the PVA glue, and the funny bones are now kept in the staff room with Mrs Lim.

Thats all from me.

Yi Wen

Day 13

Hies..

This blog appears to be inactive for quite some time, so finally, i am posting!

Date: not sure… sometime in the June Hols

Venue: School -  Raja Block

Members Present: Yi Wen, Jia JIe, Charles, Jing Yuan

Today, the group met up for one main purpose, to make a larger version of the lung model that we had made the last time. This time, we would be using the water container used for water dispensers that Charles got from the swimming pool he goes to for training. He had already got one before the holidays and Jing Yuan had brought it home to cut the hole (To save the trouble of using GIANT pen knifes and scissors to cut the holes in school).

After meeting, up we headed to the Raja Block foyer and started… Jing Yuan and Jia Jie were busy fixing up the lungs..using balloons ans straws like we did the other time. Charles apparently was able to get a few more of those giant bottles and said that he should try cutting another one up and doing it in a different way in case the first one failed. Surprisingly,, it was quite easy to cut with a pen knife…(Must be Jia’s pen knife too Noob the last time)…. Soon, jing yuan and jia jie were done with the cutting and they proceeded to line the top hole with a plastic sheet and poked holes to stick on the rubber glove. next.. they worked on the balloons by stretching them and blowing them up and deflating them repeatedly to make the balloons more elastic. When that was done, they poked another hole and attached the straw plus balloon next to the glove.

Meanwhile, Charles was done with his alternative.. Instead, it only used 1 balloon due to lack of supply and that it didn’t use a glove but it had a supposedly air tight hole that you can stick your hand through to feel the balloon. However, things did not go as well as Charles had planned and the container wasn’t air tight.. Charles failed miserably….

Back to Jia Jie and Jing Yuan… Now for the main part… the Diaphragm.. As they ran out of bags that were big enough to cover the container hole. They made used of an NTUC plastic bag and covered the hole. After securing it, it is finally time for testing.

Jia Jie put his hand in (because his is the smallest). Then jing yuan pulled the plastic bag… Of course the balloon hardly blew up… most likely due to the lack of force. But Jia Jie tried to feel the balloon and said that he could feel that it was blown up a bit. So i declare this as a success. Just as the gang was rejoicing.. They discovered a hole in an NTUC plastic bag… The bag was removed and it was decided that a zip lock bag would be used instead because it is stronger.. The zip lock bag would be brought during the next meeting.

Ok…. Did you notice something? Where was YI WEN throughout the entire process? DUH! he was there helping.. For example, the NTUC plastic bag came from him, the one who discovered the hole was also him, and the zip lock bag idea was also from him. Obviously Yi Wen can’t ponn because… Look who is writing this blog entry?!?!?

After all this was done Charles left for whatever activity he had next. Jia Jie sat around.. Yi Wen looked at Jing Yuan’s drama feste script and was helpfully trying to help to edit it.

That all from me..XD

Yi Wen

Day 12

Date: 21.5.2008

Members: Yi Wen, Jia Jie, Jing Yuan, Charles

Venue: Library and Physics lab

Today, our main goal was to try making a model of the lungs thing that we discussed last week. First we met up Mrs Lim to discuss with us about our Taiwan trip for the SSVH. It appears that only Yi Wen, Jia Jie and Jing Yuan were able to go because Charles has swimming. (even though he still can’t out swim a shark).

Anyway, after that, we headed bishan area to get some materials we needed for the lung, like straws from bubble tea shop, and balloons from popular. We also got some rubber gloves from the science labs. Then, we went to a classroom to try making our model. However, the container that jing yuan brought was too thick to cut with a normal pen knife, therefore, we went to the physics lab for better tools. At the lab, we managed to find bigger pen knifes and scissors. While attempting to cut the container, Mrs Lim joined us in the lab. She took some photos of us at work (including Jia’s successful attempt in cutting the container with a scissors). After cutting the container, we proceeded to doing the straws, sticking straws to balloon to represent the wind pipe or trachea (Sorry i can’t really remember my Bio from last year). Mrs Lim chipped in by helping us to cut the straws to make it easier to stick. She left a while later, leaving us to finish up. When we were done, we discovered that we were unable to put the glove in as the container was too small. So we decided that we will do the actual thing another time when charles managed to get a bigger container. (OMG forgot about charles, he left for some massage thing after we got our materials). When we were done, we passed our remaining materials and the finished “lungs” to Mrs Lim to keep in the staff room.

This marks the end of my post.

Yi Wen

Day 11

Date: 14.05.2008

Members present: Yi Wen, Jia Jie, Jing Yuan, Charles

Venue: 4P Classroom and library

Okay. hihi, sorry for the late post, I apparently forgot to post last week.

Anyway, today we were to meet up with Mrs Lim again for a discussion on what we want to do for the SSVH students in the mainstream class. But, before that, the group met up in the 4P classroom, to come up with a list of items that can help the teaching of science. Mainly, we focused on the 5 different systems of the human body. We also came up with some ways in which we can make them. For the respiratory system, we planned to use the classic balloon model just that it has a special rubber thing for you to fit your hand through to feel the balloon sizes. The digestive system would be made with tubes and balloons. For the skeletal system, Jia Jie said that we could use paper mache to make it, but it would be quite hard. (sorry, i kind of forgot the rest and the systems part was mainly done by jia jie, jing yuan and yi wen, charles was doing our interview transcript). Anyway, after that, we left for the library to meet up with Mrs Lim.

After meeting up, we started our discussion. Firstly, Charles shows off the research that he had done about schools overseas that use some kind of rubber material to help the visually impaired to draw. Apparently, instead of embossing, they create and indent on the rubber instead. Although it may be slightly harder to feel, it should work for these students who have advanced touch receptors. Next. we showed our different methods of making the models to Mrs Lim. She wasn’t sure if we were able to do all these, however, jing yuan assured her about it and said that we could finish it by the end of the june hols. After that, we went to the science lab to take a look at some of the models that they had to see how we could do up the skeletal system. (wait, was this before or after we met Mrs Lim? Im not sure too XD)

Anyway, this marks the end of another post by me.

Yi Wen

Day 10

Date: 7.5.2008

Members Present: Yi Wen, Jie Jie, Jing Yuan, Charles

Venue: Library

Last week, we had a very interesting and informative experience through our interviews at SSVH. So, today, we report our findings to Mrs Lim. At the start of RE period, Jing Yuan, Charles and Jie Jie head straight to the library, Yi Wen turns up five minutes later. Apparently, Mrs Lim is already meeting up with another group, so we head to one of the HML’s comfortable sofas to wait for her. Jia Jie whips out his phone and plays “Zuma”. Soon, Mrs Lim arrives, and we go over to a table for discussion.

We tell her about the different responses from the teachers, about the Helen’s Life Skills class, and the mainstream class. The question now is: “Should we focus on the Helen’s Life Skills Class (Recreation) or the Mainstream class (Maths and Science)?” Jing Yuan and Yi Wen are for the mainstream class, meaning we focus on aiding the teachers with their teaching of more difficult to teach topics like recognising animals and fractions. Charles is for helping the Helen’s Life Skills class, meaning we focus on creating recreation for them (board games and stuff). After much debate, we discuss whether we should combine the 2 and create an educational game. But Yi Wen points out that educational games are not very popular as the learning is not really present since people only focus on playing the game. So, we decide to take a vote. 1 for science, 2 for both, 3 for recreation. It ends with a 2,1,1 vote. Thus, we go to the science lab to look for catalogues that can help us with our project. However, after much searching, we failed to find much useful stuff. This is probably because the secondary school syllabus is different from primary schools, thus the items that are bought are different. With that in mind, we decide to make use of the internet to look for the catalogue.

Mrs Lim then leaves for a S-L workshop and the rest go for lunch.

End of post

Yi Wen

Day 08 (The real Day 08)

We had cleanly forgotten about the “Lost Day”, up to the extent that its name was used by another day. And who might this forgotten “Lost Day” be? It is none other than our DAY 08! However, all was not lost. Yi Wen risked his life and entered the “Lost” Dimension just to rescue this day. The journey started as follows.

Date: 01.05.2008

Member: Yi Wen

YI Wen woke up on the 1st of May 2008, he switched on his computer and decided to access this blog. Charles, who was on medical leave for many weeks, had finally posted. However, after reading Charles’s post, Yi Wen started to have a funny sensation. He read the post again, and again, and again. The more he read the post, the stronger the sensation got. It was the feeling of nostalgia. He had to remember something, it was an important thing, but WHAT WAS IT? Yi Wen racked his brains, but couldn’t remember. He knew it was something so important that it was worth dying for. Therefore, he decided to risk his life, and enter the “Lost” Dimension, whereby everything “Lost” goes to, including memories, items, and random stuff.

The question was “HOW”, How to get to the “Lost” Dimension. Yi Wen had the answer straightaway, he would use the magic pouch that he got for his 6th birthday. It contained enough magic for him to travel to the “Lost” Dimension, however, it could only be used once. Yi Wen, felt that this “thing” was so important that he used it without hesitation. The magical portal opened, Yi Wen could see the dark, mysterious, vast, swirly image of the “Lost” dimension. Taking a deep breath, he stepped in.

Yi Wen knew where he had to go, the lake of memories, and he knew the exact way to get there. However, there was a problem: The “Lost” dimension, is full of dark, lost creatures as well as “Lost auras”, getting trapped in a mist of “Lost auras” and getting killed by lost creatures could end up in you being “lost” (trapped in the “lost” dimension forever). Yi Wen had to be careful, he dashed quickly in the direction of the lake. Just as the lake was visible in sight, a dark shadow loomed over him, shit, it was the “Lost Dragon”. Though not the strongest, it was one of the most feared creatures here. It was huge, had a diamond-hard scales, breathed fire, and worst of all, it could blast “Lost auras”. Therefore, the odds of becoming “Lost” when facing a “Lost dragon” are 10 000 to 1. Yi Wen, chose to fight, he felt that since the “forgotten thing” was worth dying for, he didn’t mind becoming “Lost” in the quest for it. He drew the metal pole that he brought, and……………….attacked!

THE BATTLE:

The dragon’s goal seemed to be trapping Yi Wen in the “Lost” dimension, thus, blasts of “Lost aura” shot towards Yi Wen. However, Yi Wen was quick, evading the blasts at 7.0 km/h (2 significant figures). Knowing that the dragon had diamond hard scales, Yi Wen figured that the best way for him to kill the soul of the dragon was to hit its eyes, which were the windows to its soul. While dodging the blasts of auras, Yi Wen sprinted up the dragon’s long tail, which was exactly 2.4 km long. “I’ll take 10 minutes to finish the tail”, Yi Wen thought. After nine minutes and fifty seven seconds, Yi Wen had finally reached the torso of the dragon. (He had broken his own 2.4 record). Now, it was quicker, the dragon’s body was hard, but it was interestingly bouncy. With each leap, Yi Wen could not cover three times the distance that he could in the past. Within a record time of 7 seconds and 52 mili-seconds, Yi Wen had reached the dragon’s head. He aimed his pole at the eyes and started a sprint up the dragon’s noes. However, the dragon shot out 2 unavoidable blasts of “Lost Auras”. Yi Wen shut his eyes, he thought that he was going to become “Lost”. 5 seconds later he opened his eyes. The dragon was gone, “Am I at the gates of the “lost” dimension?”, Yi wen thought and glanced around. He had not moved an inch. By a stroke of luck, the wind had changed direction and blew the “lost” aura back at the dragon, therefore, teleporting him to a random place in the “lost” dimension. Yi Wen dashed towards the lake and retrieve the memory, the memory of “Day 08″.

Heading back the way he came from, he returned to his room and started to write this entry. Thanks for listening attentively to my story, but I regret to inform you that you have just wasted 5 minutes of your time reading a real-life story that doesn’t exists in the real world but may exists in the “lost” dimension.

Therefore, Charles entry should have been Day 09 instead of day 08.

Date: 23.04.2008

Members: Yi Wen, Jia JIe, Charles.

Oops forgot Jing Yuan.

Venue: Library

Today, we had an appointment with Mrs Lim again. We had done our preparations, armed with countless reflections of articles and information that was to be used for our literature review, we went to meet her at the library. Charles (who only joined our group this year) was amazed at the amount of work we had done, the reflections and articles. “Don’t underestimate the power of this group!” – Jing Yuan 23.04.2008. Mrs Lim browsed through our reflections and commented on a few of them. She also asked us about our interview with Ms Juwita, and Charles was tasked to call up SSVH to ask about the interview. However, Ms Juwita had a meeting and was unable to meet up with us. Therefore, we arranged an interview for next week and Mrs Lim continued to discuss our reflections with us. She saw a poem done by Jia Jie and “Jing Yuan” and commented that it was well written. Soon, Yi Wen presented his master piece, the drawing of the “drawing tool for the blind”. We started to discuss about the feasibility of it and how it could made. After the discussion, Mrs Lim said that we could go for our lunch and off we went.

Sorry if this is not comprehensive enough, the remaining part of the memory was left in the lake of memories in the “lost” dimension.

Another entry written by Pang Yi Wen

Day 08: Our correspondent, Charles, is back to report

CHARLES IS REALLY ANGRY BECAUSE THE POST HE HAS BEEN WORKING ON FOR THE LAST HALF HOUR HAS DISAPPEARED AMONGST THE INTERNET DEBRIS ALL BECAUSE HE WAS TYPING “INCOMPETENT GROUP LEADER AKA JING YUAN” AND EVERYTHING GOT DELETED SOMEHOW. THEREFORE, IT CAN BE CONCLUDED THAT IT SHOULD NOW READ AS “INCOMPETENT GROUP LEADER AKA JING YUAN” WITH NO CANCELLING OUT(:

————————————————————————————-

300408

The trusty trio of Charles, Jia Jie and Yiwen meet up today to go down to SSVH. Oops. I missed out the fourth character of our story, Tan Jing Yuan. (Incompetent group leader) The meeting has been previously arranged during the last RE session on 230408 when Ms. Juwita was unable to meet us. Fortunately, she is free today, thus the four go down to SSVH. The interview questions and planning for the interview has taken place two RE sessions ago.

Charles will now recount the story that he has recounted just previously and lost it all because Ctrl + Z does not work. He will recount it in second-person POV and it will be as detailed as it can possibly be after his frustration.

So the story begins..

When the school bell rings at 11.25PM, Jing Yuan, Charles and Jia Jie are still stuck in class. The three valiant knights are being assaulted by the evil monstrosity known as the English essay but are soon about to overcome it. Sir Yiwen the Other Knight arrives promptly. Charles and Jing Yuan realise that they are running late and Jing Yuan issues a verdict: the four will cab down to SSVH although it is only a few bus stops away. Charles, ever the money-minded treasurer, accosts Jing Yuan and demands to know where the funding for such an expensive means of transport will come from, only to be met by some less-than-desirable remarks. Hurhur. The time is approximately 11.40PM.

The four brisk walk to the bus stop (No, were strolling.) and their faces contort in anguish and despair as they watch the fabled bus No. 156 slip away from their outstretched fingers, just seconds away, missing the chance to catch a quick ride to SSVH. That was an exaggeration. In actual fact, the four were crossing the overhead walkway and the bus was just leaving the bus stop but Charles has to spice up the story abit lest it become dreary.

The four reach the BUS STOP and as per Jing Yuan’s previous instructions, they were to wait for a TAXI. Charles notices the fallacy of waiting for a TAXI at a BUS STOP but decides not to unleash his overwhelming intelligence over the undiscerning trio. Due to the inability to acquire a TAXI at a BUS STOP, the four then decided to wait for the next bus No. 156, which was reported to be 10 minutes away. The time is approximately 11.51PM. The four are running VERY VERY LATE for their appointment.

At exactly 12.51PM, bus No. 156 arrives, much to the pleasure and pride of Charles at Singapore’s wonderful transport system and infrastructure. wow. The four reach SSVH’s nearest bus stop in 8 minutes. (All times are recorded as per Charles’ timekeeping device aka the phone.)

The four now brisk walk (really brisk walk now) to SSVH as they are running VERY VERY VERY LATE for their appointment . Along the short uphill trek to SSVH, Jing Yuan attempts to deceive Charles into jaywalking and “accidentally” intersecting with the path of an oncoming cement-mixer. (We suspect that this action was an attempt to remove the smartest and most handsome group member of the group, however, further research has to be done into this matter.) Charles easily overcomes this deception.

Soon enough, the four reach SSVH to meet Ms. Juwita. She tells the four that since she is not exactly a teacher, she will not be able to answer approximately half the interview questions that had been sent to her the night before by Jia Jie for her perusal as the questions pertain to the school’s curriculum. The four are disappointed and dejected; all appears lost. All of a sudden, Ms. Juwita offers to introduce the team to some of the teachers to interview them instead! The team is unbelieveably happy and ecstatic at this new development. Ms. Juwita does not seem to mind their lateness. (We regret to inform you that Jia Jie forgot to bring the interview questions but the day was saved by incompetent group leader Jing Yuan who actually brought it instead.)

Kudos to the team! Lol.

Jing Yuan and Charles ask most of the questions while Jia Jie takes minutes and Yiwen interacts with the children. Charles also takes as much recording as he can of the two interviews. (As much as his phone memory allows, of course.)

The team interview two teachers, Ms. Punitha and Mrs. Chua. Ms. Punitha is a teacher in the “Helen Life Skills Class” while Mrs. Chua is a teacher of Mathematics and Science. The team learn alot from these interviews, with Jing Yuan and Charles asking more of the questions while Jia Jie takes minutes and Yiwen interacts with the students. Charles also records as much as he can of both interviews with his phone camera, unfortunately, he is unable to record the last part of Mrs. Chua’s interview due to lack of memory space in his phone. Still a good job done team!

The team find out that these less-privileged students require more intensive care and attention from the teachers because every student is unique and special; they all have their special talents and difficulties that have to be handled individually by the teachers, thus each class is small. Ms. Punitha’s class has two teachers including herself teaching 12 students. Mrs. Chua teaches 4 students. We find that the teachers are here to teach the students because they find it a challenge and that it is extremely rewarding to teach this students, and to watch them gain something from their lessons.

However, they also lament that not many people, including the examination authorities understand the predicament of the children, furthermore, the materials for teaching are hard to procure and the children have difficulty comprehending concepts either due to their lack of vision, lower intelligence of sometimes, both. The teachers have to rely very much on their ability to improvise to let the children learn to the fullest of their capability.

The Team also learn that the students are better off learning basic skills that we take for granted, for example, brushing their teeth and feeding themselves, etc. It is better to teach them the skills they need to survive than spend their time on educational purposes. Moreover these students do not have many other job opportunities besides working in vocational camps or sheltered workshops. They also need more ways for leisure as they are currently only able to do a few things during the abundance of time they have – listening to the tv, radio or music, for example.

So then that’s all for now. I’m sure that there’s more to garner from the recording the Charles had made and taken about 600MB in his memory card. Oh, what sacrifice..

Thank You to SSVH, Mr. Juwita, Ms. Punitha and Mrs. Chua for giving us such an enlightening experience today!

(YES. CHARLES STANDS TRIUMPHANT AS HE FINISHES HIS BLOG ENTRY IN NOTEPAD AND UPLOADS IT LATER. HE HAS DEFEATED THE EVIL CREATURE KNOWN AS THE INTERNET CRASH!!!!!)

Day 07

Date:16/04/2008

Member’s present: Yi Wen, Jia Jie, Jing Yuan, Charles

Venue: 4Q classroom and library

We started the RE period by going to the 4Q classroom to draft our interview questions for Ms Juwita, the visually handicapped children, and the children’s parents. The workload was given out as such: Charles and Jia jie were to do the interview questions for Ms Juwita (Do take note that the interview with Ms Juwita is an informal one while the interview with the children and their parents will be a more formal one) while Yi Wen does the interview questions for the children and Jing Yuan does the interview questions for the children’s parents. Yi Wen imagination left the maths and science part and wandered off into the world of the arts. He then came up with an interesting idea about how we could create something for the children to do art. It was a simple, magnetic board set with magnets that can be used to “create the image”. The magnets would then have a chop feature which can imprint the child’s picture onto paper. Jing Yuan commented that this idea was “COOL”. Soon we finished our work at about 1.45 and we left for lunch at 2. At 2.15, we were already done and we waited at the library for Mrs Lim who was as usual, very busy.

Soon we managed to meet her at 2.45. We then further discussed our interview questions. Mrs Lim commented that we should include “PASSION” and we should find out about what they do for leisure. We then talked about another group that previously did a project with SSVH who took the visually handicapped to the zoo. The children may be told that there was a hippo there or the sign says that there is a hippo there, but in actual fact, they will be all blur because they CANNOT SEE THE HIPPO! Yi Wen shared his research about braille printers with the rest. Mrs Lim then suggested that we find an eye doctor or specialist to for an interview to find out more about the medical aspect of blindness. Anyway, Yi Wen finally showed his idea to Mrs Lim and we discussed about how we could do it and the feasibility of it (Doing this is much more feasible than the “Embosser” that was discussed in the earlier meeting). Yi Wen said that doing something like this could be the “leisure” that Mrs Lim mentioned earlier and this also gives the children a chance to express their feelings. Mrs Lim then allocated work to everybody. Jing Yuan was in charge of research, Yi Wen was to find our more about his “Art”, Jia Jie was to finalize the interview questions and Charles was to try to get a contact from an eye specialist or doctor to ask for an interview. Mrs Lim ended the session with a few famous quotes.

Another entry by me, or I, who wrote this entry which was written by me, Yi Wen.

A short reflection

Even though we may be behind several RE S-L groups in terms of work and progress since we don’t even have a defined goal yet, I believe that we are still on track. After all, I believe that S-L is not about meeting deadlines and rushing to complete stuff. We should be thinking to see what is the best thing that we as students can do for our VWOs. So, if we feel that we are not doing enough, we should voice that out and not keep quiet so that we can just meet the deadline. So, thats what we did and now we are looking at new goals and bringing in new ideas for SSVH. Even though that brings us back to square one, I think that it is still best as we do not want to end our last year of RE by saying we did nothing but embossing stuff at SSVH.

Yi Wen

Day 06

Date: 09/04/2008

Members present: Yi Wen, Charles, Jing Yuan, Jie Jie

Today, we decided not to go to SSVH again as we felt that we should continue the discussion from last week about our future plans. Mrs Lim was very busy and was unable to see us until a while later, so in the mean time, we passed time by playing handphone games, and Jie Jie was doing his “gong han”. Of course, before that we had came up with a list of primary school mathematics topics that we feel we could help the visually handicapped students in (even though we could have just used the internet and go to the MOE website to check the PSLE syllabus, we did not as we were unable to get a laptop.)

Soon Mrs Lim arrived and we started our discussion. We talked about how else we could extend our research. Yi Wen (Me) pointed out that diagrams and graphs not only applies to mathematics, but it also applies to science as well, so when doing this project, we can focus on both maths and science. Jing Yuan got emo as he felt that our project was going nowhere, he hopes that through this project, we would be able to come up with some kind of product or result that we can showcase. However, Charles pointed out that S-L is not only about coming up with something, but we should also try to “gan chu” (understand, feel for) the visually handicapped. Mrs Lim strongly agreed with Charles point. Yi Wen, then gave the idea of an embosser, a tool which can make the embossing of pictures very easily. However, we soon discovered that there were many difficulties in coming up with something like that as we did not have the proper tools, resources, and equipment to do so. We also talked about getting a grant if we needed funding for creating our tools.

So thats all for today.

Adding on, i went back and did a bit of research and: http://www.ulva.com/Online-Store/Braille-Embossers/emprint.htm

I have managed to find out the existence of Braille picture printers. These printers can print out the embossed form of pictures and words. But the question now is: Is the braille printer in SSVH able to print pictures? But as you can see, the price of these braille printers soar up to a few thousand dollars, from our little meeting with the principal of SSVH, we know that they are quite poor, and should not be able to buy themselves a new braille printer like that. So, our “embosser” hasn’t been kicked out from our ideas list. Speaking of embossing, I have also managed to find something about it. http://www.papercraftz.com/techniqu.shtml

This methods (dry embossing and heat embossing) are used in arts and crafts, so I’m not sure if it applies to braille embossing.

So that all from me.

Yi Wen