This is how SiewPeng used the Crystal Ball. One is for Colin, and one is for SiewPeng.

Instead of using the crytal ball as a medium for plants, it can be used to make something that is decorative.

I have shown you the crystal soil in purple colour before, now I am going to show you the Tiger Tail Plants in yellow crystal soil. Please tell me which one you think looks better. Or do you think that they look nicer if you put the plants with yellow and purple crystal soil next to each other?

Yellow-purple is a set of colours that have 100% colour contrast with each other, just like Red-Green and Orange-Blue.

I still remember one of my art lessons in secondary school. We first learned to identify 3 basic colour (Red, Yellow, and Blue) and the product of their mixture (green, purple, and orange) using watercolour, next we have to know different sets of contrast colours. I used a method to memorize which colour is contrast with the other. “From the 3 basic colours, each of them is contrast with the mixture of another 2 bacis colours.” - this is the rule that I memorized. For example, red colour will contrast with the mixture of yellow and blue, which is green. It is even easier by looking at the colour chart. If you use watercolour to mix up a set of contrast colour, you actually mix up 3 basic colours, which will produce grey or black colour.

Do you know where did I get the tall container from? It is the container of Nescafé.

Close-up view of the plant in Yellow Crystal Soil.

Different colours of the crystal soil may give us different feeling. One of the most important factor is the container must be transparent.

More different colour of crystal soil is coming soon. I have prepared the red colour crystal soil.

These are some of Teacher Santhi’s and her students’ works.

A school of fish. This activity is not only to learn how to describe fish in groups but is also a writing activity. The fish can be flipped open and inside you’ll find a story written by the children. Children can always come out with amazing ideas and fantastic contents with their imagination and creativity. The activity also brings writing alive by having colours and interactive pictures to help children with their story creation.

Teacher Santhi’s display showing students about the life cycle of acorns.

The character in the display is called Trig. This activity teaches children the usage of “can” and “can’t / cannot” to talk about ability.

Alright, I’m really excited about this one. I borrowed the Dinoland background from Teacher Santhi and did a simple project on dinosaurs with the kids.

The project turned out well and they loved it.

They also learned quite a few things about dinosaurs.

“Ahem…alright, our lesson for today is writing. Let’s write about…Myths and Legends.”

“What?!? No…not wr…wri…writing…arghhhhhhhhh”

Writing has always been nightmares to many students. Some said that they don’t have any idea how to write. Some said they are afraid to make mistakes. Some said they don’t know how to start or what to write. Some even dislike writing at all. Well, actually the markers of writing work are not doing so well either. Depending on the writing work, markers have to crack their heads to correct them.

Today, I would like to share an experience about writing. This idea was provided by Teacher Santhi. She is a very creative teacher. I love to talk to her about techniques in delivering lessons because she always has something up her sleeves to brighten up the whole class. I often get extraordinary ideas from her and this is one of them.

First of all, we can let the students look at a piece of article. Let’s say, picnic, as shown above. Make sure they read and understand the article well.

Then, we break the article down into four parts. First, the title. Second, the orientation, which means, when, who, where and why. Third, the events. In this part, the events are further broken down into four small sections. Each section describe what happened in the story. This is an important part of the process because it is the part that makes the writing interesting. Students also have the alternative to draw pictures as their description. And the forth part is the conclusion.

After that process, students now have a clearer and better idea about a picnic. So now it’s their turn to write about their own picnic. Using the same method, only this time, students have to plan their own story.

But I think students will feel less stress rather than throwing them with a topic and ask them to write on the spot. This method provides a structure that guides student through the process and makes writing fun and exciting!

Below is one of the writing works of Teacher Santhi’s student.

The Legend of Captain Gorbia

The End…

Thanks again, Teacher Santhi! Hope the sharing of this experience will benefit the people all around the world!