Study smart, not hard

The title is admittedly a little misleading. After all, if one mentions using tech to get past language barriers, the more tech-savvy among you would likely think about using Google Translate.

What you see in the photo on the left however, is a little different.

Some context: Isaac had his mid-year assessments recently, which included a Chinese language test. Unfortunately for Isaac, his father (a.k.a. me) barely has serviceable conversational skills in Chinese, much less the ability to read and write what is supposed to be my mother tongue.

How then do I make sure that he has some form of serviceable preparation and revision prior to his Chinese assessment?

Thankfully, my Father-In-Law, a former schoolteacher, used to teach Chinese.

What’s more, there are numerous online resources for revision papers from other schools, kindly scanned and uploaded for all desperate parents in Singapore (thank you, SgTestPaper.com!).

So we had test resources, and a teacher. Problem was, the teacher was all the way up north in Kajang (a little town about 45 minutes drive from Kuala Lumpur).

Thanks to the magic of broadband internet, a couple of iPads, and FaceTime, Isaac could work on the revision papers under the watchful (digital) eye of his Grandfather, sitting in his living room a couple of hundred kilometers away.

Technology really is awesome.