A parent's perspective: Life in SOTA
Shannon's life as a secondary school student just started this year, and she's really been thrown into the deep-end in terms of long school hours, tiring days.
One of the most common questions people ask is "how late do her days end and how many days a week does she have to dance?". The answers are late (earliest 2.30pm and latest 6.30pm) and 4 days out of 5. Actually, compared to primary school, her days are not significantly longer - maybe around 1 to 2 hours extra each day - which does bring up the point that even primary school kids these days are subject to rather long hours - good or bad? That's a separate topic of discussion which might cover topics like do children get enough rest, play and relaxation and so on. The society in which we live tries to extract the most out of each individual, regardless of age, it seems.
She was prepared, I think, for life in SOTA - we reminded her of the longer hours, constant dancing and also the time commitments of projects and homework. So it has not come as a shock to her and she has been coping fine. Then again, school has not gone into full swing yet and the teachers are still slowly easing the students into the curriculum.
She seems lively and happy though - and has easily made new friends. I think that's probably the most important thing at this stage.
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| Last year when she was still standing on the outside, looking in |
She was prepared, I think, for life in SOTA - we reminded her of the longer hours, constant dancing and also the time commitments of projects and homework. So it has not come as a shock to her and she has been coping fine. Then again, school has not gone into full swing yet and the teachers are still slowly easing the students into the curriculum.
She seems lively and happy though - and has easily made new friends. I think that's probably the most important thing at this stage.