My Story - Create a niche, seize the opportunity

Posted to Facebook on 14/9/2019 at 8:37 AM

This post is more relevant than ever in the present climate

While fluency in English is paramount for people residing in Australia and many other English speaking countries, fluency in other languages including their non-English mother tongue should be regarded as a strength. If no one around speaks your language, then create a niche to teach others.

I am so glad that my Dad gave me the opportunity to study Mandarin / Potong Hua instead of English when I was young. Although I only studied Mandarin for six years in primary school, it gave me the foundation to pursue more even after I changed to an English medium school.

I never intended to adopt an Anglicised name, even after I touched down in Melbourne over 45 years ago. I never thought I had the chance to speak Cantonese and Mandarin again, but I continued to practise my Chinese writing, read Chinese books, and conversed whenever possible in both languages.

My persistence and perseverance paid off. Back in the early 90's, not many "Chinese" could speak Cantonese and Mandarin fluently. My Cantonese was so good that I did not have any trace of Malaysian Chinese accent. A lot of Cantonese thought that I was from Hong Kong.

What a strength I possessed! I was in a good position to sell Melbourne real estate properties to Hong Kong people and later to the early batch of mainland Chinese.

I have the best of both worlds - the Chinese and Western. I understood then that knowledge was power, so I read as much and as many subjects as I could. Although I am not Wikipedia, I do know a great deal of Chinese history as well as Chinese mythology.

Instead of keeping my knowledge in my head, I created a FB page on Chinese Customs and Festivities, written in English, for the enjoyment of Chinese and non-Chinese readers.

No matter where I go, I know I am a Chinese - not a Chinese national, but like what the Aussie says, "a true blue Chinese" with an equal touch of Western/Oz. I am an Australian, born in Malaysia of Chinese descent.

Thank you for reading.

Communication and Communication Skill

Posted to Facebook on 9/9/2019 at 11:39 PM
Communication and Communication Skill

I was given 10 minutes only to present to an audience about Communication and Communication Skill.

The audience was a group of job seekers who had just finished a hands-on session in writing a job application conducted by Michelle Yau-James. Due to this reason, I designed the content of my presentation to stay relevant to what they had been doing.

The following is an outline of my presentation:

• Concept of communication
• Relevance of communication in job application
• Different modes of communication
• Two keywords for successful communication
• 1-on-1 communication versus presentation to a group
• Method to overcome stage fright
• Application of communication technique in writing job application and handling interview

Three attendees stayed back and had further discussion with me. They were very pleased with how I used simple examples to explain the concept and application of communication.

I also answered some of their questions not related to the presentation. In addition, I gave them a good lesson on how to obtain information from someone without asking for it directly.

My parting message to them was “Change your mindset!”

Thank you for reading.

My Story - Sharing my life experience so that others can benefit from it

Posted to Facebook on 8/9/2019 at 1:00 PM
Sharing my life experience so that others can benefit from it

Do not keep your valuable life experience to yourself. Share it. Someone out there may benefit from that experience one day.

On 19/8/19, I mentored 2 migrant job seekers and one of them wrote to the project coordinator her feedback. The following is a transcript:

"Yes meeting went really well with Sin Fong. He shared his experience with me. I was really motivated by his tips and experience so, It will definitely help me with my job hunt in future.

Please say big thanks to Sin Fong on behalf of me. And yeah I think we covered most of the things which I wanted to know. So I don’t think I need to meet him for second time.

Appreciated your help too. It’s a wonderful program for migrants who are really struggling here during their job hunt.

Thanks to u for helping.”

Thank you for reading.

A failure is one who is not prepared to fix their problems themselves

Posted to Facebook on 4/9/2019 at 12:25 PM
A failure is one who is not prepared to fix their problems

Each week, the Year 4 class teacher allocates me groups of students who have learning or understanding difficulty in mathematics. I mean I tackle one group at a time.

I explain the question or problem in the simplest possible way and show them examples in order to make them understand or realise their mistakes. They have to fix the mistakes themselves without further clue.

A week ago, I had a student who cried and kept saying she was a failure because she could not do the question correctly. The student cries whenever she is under stress, not only in mathematics class, but also in other subjects too.

After calming her down, helping her understand, and watching her corrected her mistake, I said to her she had to remember for good what I said. I wanted her to repeat exactly what I said:

”Mr Chan says:
I am not going to cry in class again
I am not a failure
I WILL succeed!”

A failure is one who is not prepared to fix their problems themselves or seeks help/advice from others to have the problem solved.

Thank you for reading.

Victoria's TAFE course completion rate the worst in Australia

Posted to Facebook on 3/9/2019 at 10:16 PM
Victoria's TAFE course completion rate the worst in Australia
https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/victoria-s-tafe-course-completion-rate-the-worst-in-australia-20190829-p52m5l.html

Numeracy and literacy problems do not start at TAFEs, or tertiary institutions, but at the early days of schooling.

My current voluntary service in a primary school gives me the opportunity to have first hand contact with very young school children, ranging from Prep to Year 5. I am patiently waiting for the right time to get in touch with the education authority to suggest my education reform strategies.

High TAFE student drop out rate is not unexpected. It is not about employability, but the quality of students.

Most of the students join TAFEs after VCE examinations in Year 12. These are normally not the top performers, and many are likely to be at the bottom of the academic ladder. Some students attend TAFE courses under duress; they either take up a course or face their Centrelink money cut off. Students of mature age are better in general. They attend TAFE for retraining or learning a new skill after being retrenched or out of work force for sometime due to personal reasons. TAFEs can to be blamed for offering courses of no real value. Students are at times given high hope of gaining employment after the course, only to find out that the course content bears no relevance to the real world employment.

A course once known as Office Admistration has been renamed and promoted as Business Adminstraion. Unfortunately, this is a con.

Many students attending a Management course have the misconception that after their graduation, they will be able to land themselves in a managerial position. They do not realise these are not available for someone straight out of TAFE or college.

Hospitality courses conducted by TAFEs are better than those offered by private colleges. Many TAFEs have their own kitchens onsite, and food hygiene is monitored with greater stringency.

Thank you for reading.

Victoria's TAFE course completion rate the worst in Australia