Got my spectacles back today with the lenses changed. Told myself that I would never play badminton with those spectacles on again but I doubt those words.

Watched "Finding Forrester" on TV just now. As usual, it was just coincidence that I stepped out of my room for something when the Channal 5 was showing "The Simple Life". I thought that it would be nice to see 2 very rich girls pretending to do all sorts of stuff that they would snoff at for the sake of publicity for starring in their very own reality series. Aw heck, stayed awhile longer before I was rewarded with Finding Forrester. And its the Tv premiere! How cool was that? A show old enough that even I forgot its year of production was making it debut on TV! How bad was it? I guess I could understand why it never made it big time even though it had Sean Connery aka legendary actor at the helm. Finding Forrester lacked the drama, the humour, the seriousness and the controversies that makes a show big. But I liked it. Alot. I don't have to say why and I won't dwell on this show any longer.

My niece (yes, my niece) came over for tuition today without her pencil case, without her textbook and without one of her assessment books. Its like telling a coach that I forgot to bring my racket, my shoes and my shorts for training. I faced the options before me. I could just laugh it off as an honest mistake or I could grill her and make her wake up her idea. Rather than spoil her whole day (and mine), I laughed it off and taught her using the only assessment book she had. But I'm now writing it down here in firmly so that I can be firm with myself about it. Tutoring my niece in science has always been an experience in itself. She was my first student and I didn't know the first thing about being a tutor. So I asked myself what I hated about tuition back when I was young. I Hated homework. I hated scoldings and I hated spending 1.5 hours straight pouring over stupid subjects. I chose not to give her homework, chose to reason with her rather than to scold her and chose to end tuition whenever she finished the work expected of her. It was obvious she didn't like science. Maybe it was me who made it boring for her. But I couldn't find a damned way to make the fishes and the birds and the properties of matter interesting. Whats worse, her exam questions were simply ridiculous. Not a single answer could be found from within her textbooks. She got a Band 2 last year for science which I attributed to her intelligence since I conceded that I didn't help her much at all. Truth was I was disappointed with myself for not teaching her better and hoped that I would do a better job this year. I chose difficult assessments for her in the hope that she would start to learn to think about how to answer questions with what she knows rather than memorise the answers. So far, it didn't go well. Initially, more than half the assessment was filled with blanks and mistakes. I told myself that an introduction to properties of matter was a challenging new concept to anyone who first learnt it. A month passed and last week, she gave me some serious crap. Apparently re-introducing homework and making her write her own notes were not working. The assessment she gave me contained errors that simply were not acceptable! Its like she didn't even read the question before answering. I spotted 3 similar patterns of mistakes within one single assessment. So now, what was I to do? I raised my voice a little and explained to her that the work she gave me was absolutely unacceptable. Told her that if she doesn't understand, she would ask me. Told her that if she doesn't improve by her first CA, I would call it quits. If I really am a lousy tutor, I do not wish to waste her time and I do not wish to waste my time. I told her that I wasn't financially obligated to teach her. I volunteered. But if it doesn't work out, then I'm sorry. That was last week. And yet this week, she comes in with no sign of improvement. Am I really that bad? Or does she really want me to show her how angry I can be before she improves. I really don't know. Anyone wants to advice? I am open to anything. Even critisms.