Famous Proverbs....

actions speak louder than words
- what you do is more important than what you say


all's well that ends well
- a successful outcome is worth the effort

all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy
- it is not healthy to spend all of your time working and never relaxing


better to be safe than sorry
- it is better to be careful than take chances to risk an accident/illness/or failure that you will regret


a bird in hand is worth two in the bush
- don't risk losing something that you have by trying to get something that is not certain


birds of a feather flock together
- people who are alike often become friends or spend time together


the blind leading the blind
- someone who has little ability or knowledge but is trying to help or teach someone else


blood is thicker than water
- family ties are stronger than other relationships


boys will be boys
- you shouldn't criticize boys/men for being adventurous, mischevious or noisy as that is how you expect them to behave


cleanliness is next to godliness
- being a clean person is next in importance in life to having good religious or moral principles


a cat has nine lives
- cats are very strong and can often survive many accidents or problems as can some people


curiosity killed the cat
- asking questions about something that is not your business is often not a good thing (often used jokingly)


the early bird catches the worm
- arriving early gives one an advantage


easier said than done
- suggesting something is much easier than actually doing it


easy come, easy go
- something that you easily acquire may be easily spent, lost or wasted

every cloud has a silver lining
- there is something good in every problem or bad event


an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth
- a crime or injury should be paid back equally


first come, first served
- the person who comes first will have his turn first or be served first

Conversing In English...

Some students are very weak in their usage of English language. This is because most of the time they converse by using their mother tongue ; be it Malay, Chinese, Indians or Javanese etc. This has resulted to a very weak performance of students communicating or conversing using English language. Some students can apply the language in their studies and manage to answer questions (usually objective (MCQ) questions)  quite successfully in their examinations, however they tend to fail in their speaking test. This usually happens to students from lower level which is primary schools.

Primary schools students  are exposed to daily conversations or greetings such as bidding Good morning, Good afternoon etc and they are even taught on how to reply to a questions on certain situation. This can be imply when the sections on greetings/conversations are inserted in the Primary School Evaluation Test (UPSR).  Pictures of the situations are given in form of a dialogue and students need to complete the dialogue. This could be quite easy as students usually memorise the answer according to what they are taught in schools. However, when students are asked on something which is unfamiliar to them they tend to be confused.

Conversing in English language is very important as students would use it in their future (when they go for secondary school, speaking will be graded and evaluated as a component to pass the subject). But how to encourage students to speak? From my experiment, the first stage that I take is to familiarise their tongue with English pronunciation. Therefore I would give the students short paragraph  for them to memorise. Most of the passages consists of dialogues for example:

The hare was once boasting of his speed before the other animals. "I have never yet been beaten," said he, "when I put forth my full speed. I challenge anyone here to race with me."

The tortoise said quietly, "I accept your challenge."

"That is a good joke," said the hare. "I could dance around you all the way."

"Keep your boasting until you've beaten," answered the tortoise. "Shall we race?"


The students would have to memorise the story and present it to me. This experiment does help those students to practice more English in their daily conversation. In fact this practise also exposes students to exciting story books for them to read.

Last Minutes Preparation For Paper 2 (Writing)

Some of my tuition students asked me, what is the fastest way to score in paper 2 which is the writing part. Most of my students either primary or secondary schools face less problem in paper 1; which test students on grammar, comprehension etc. This is because in paper 1, answers have been provided and students need only to choose the correct answer (multiple choice questions). In contrast, in paper 2 which is writing part, students need to generate their own ideas (but sometimes contents are given) and write in by using proper English language. This is where most students confront problems. This is also the part where most students did not acquire good grades even though they scored in paper 1.

My answer to the question earlier is quite direct. I asked them to read many samples of essays!Since failing to write essay can be resulted from lacking of ideas and lacking of ideas is surely resulted from lacking of reading, and reading is the most laziest thing that a Malaysian wants to do hence I simply asked them to read sample of examination essays. They can simply read the essays from compilation of samples of essay which they can buy from the nearest bookstore.

So this is the quickest way that a student can do in order to prepare himself for examinations. Through reading samples of essay they can practice their reading, familiarising themselves with the examination questions and in a way memorising the correct sentence structure! Well, from my observation, it does improve my students!