JC Immersion

It has been one week since we finished our JC Immersion program. For me, I really cherish the memory of the week I spent with my buddy in Hwa Chong Institution school. This experience gives me much understanding of the local students and education system   in Singapore.

At first, we had a small meeting with our buddies. We watched a video about Hwa Chong and then played many games with our buddies. We had a lot of fun during that time. I met my buddy Amanda, a quiet and cute girl who accompanied me in the following days. After the first meeting, we followed our buddies to take classes. The realistic classes are slightly different from what I had imagined before. It actually surprised me that they had a fixed class bench instead of a classroom. They have to walk to different classrooms or lecture room to take lessons. Lecture class always combines many students from different classes together, just like college life. Lecture classes are serious than tutorial classes. Sometimes the lecture room was extremely quiet and students fixed themselves to what teachers have taught. The tutorial classes are totally different. When I first stepped into Amanda's chemistry tutorial class, I was shocked by the active atmosphere. Everyone was talking something about the questions and I nearly can't hear what they have said clearly. The teacher wrote the equations and answered students' questions patiently. This circumstance reminded me of the classes in China. We usually keep quiet and listen to what the teachers said carefully and record the questions that we feel uncertain about. After the class we will consult our teachers and get teachers' opinion about the questions. The way we did in China is really different from that of Singapore, we can't judge the two ways into good or bad because each way has its own advantages and disadvantages. Aside from the classes, they have CCAs after school. There are many kinds of CCAs for students to choose, some students learn Chinese kung fu, some learn dancing and some learn instruments. These CCAs makes students' life colorful and meaningful. The most interesting part is communicating with local students in Chinese. Their Chinese is really good that they can communicate with me smoothly. Furthermore I taught them the accent of my hometown and they were interested in it.

After the immersion, our buddies arranged an activity for us on Saturday. The beautiful park and forest byways really surprised us and the fresh air let our walk become more comfortable. After the walk, we have a knowledge competition which is really funny. On the one hand we answered many questions about Singapore. On the other hand, they also answered some questions about China. Our connection ended up with a well known song that moved me a lot. With this song going on, I said goodbye to my buddy and hugged her tightly. The plenty of scenes with my buddy in these six days welled into my mind and I finally found this immersion a precious wealth to me.

The one-week immersion passes quickly, but it did give me much precious memory.