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Young talents sing in the New Year
(L to R) Chetha Tantraporn,
director of Tantarak School, Jintana Wintana, competition committee, Alisa
Phanthusak, assistant MD of Tiffany Show Pattaya, Rungthip Suksrikarn,
managing director of Sunbeam Hotel Pattaya, and Buppha Noipasom, director of
Praw studio announce the contest.
Announcers and performers
gather for a group photo during the press conference for the Pattaya Young
Talent Competition 2009.
Pramote Channgam
Young talents in Pattaya wishing to start the New Year on bright and
winning notes can join the Tiffany Show Pattaya 2009 young talent
competition.
Application dates are from December 11 to 25 with the first-round selections
being judged on December 27 at Central Festival Center Pattaya.
 Youngsters
from Praw studio perform during the grand announcement press conference.
Prizes for solo singing are 5,000, 3,000 and 2,000 baht including gifts from
Siam Yamaha Music. Winning bands will receive 10,000, 7,000 and 5,000 baht
and gifts from the music shop.
Alisa Phanthusak, assistant managing director of Tiffany Show Pattaya and
head of the contest committee, gave a competition press conference on
December 11 at the Tiffany Show Pattaya Theatre.
She said the contest was held to encourage youth to express their talents in
singing, musical instruments, creativity and performance.
There are two age groups: under-12 and 12-18 and applicants need to be
residents of Banglamung or currently studying in Pattaya.
Two types of competition are solo singing and band. Bands should have no
fewer than four musicians and not exceed seven. Music played can be both
Thai and international and musical instruments used must include drum, bass
and guitar.
Anyone interested can pick up an application form at Tiffany Show Pattaya,
Tantarak School, or any academic institutions.
Applications can either be handed in with the forms themselves or mail to
Tiffany Show Pattaya Co. Ltd., 464 m.9 Pattaya Soi 2 Road, Nongprue,
Banglamung, Chonburi 20260.
Phone numbers are 0-3842-1700-5, 0-3842-9642 or download the application
form at http://www.pattayafahmai.com
Day to thank our teachers
From right: Thawatchai
Rattanyu, director of the Pattaya Education Department, Mayor Ittipol
Khunplome and Deputy Mayor Wattana Chantanawaranon.
Sawittree Namwiwatsuk
Students and parents will have a chance to properly thank our teachers
for their hard work in educating our children during Teachers’ Day
activities organized by the Pattaya Education Department for next
January 16.
The celebration will be held at the Eastern Indoor Sports Stadium, which
will begin with a religious ceremony in the morning. Then 10 plaques
will be presented to prominent teachers as directors, deputy directors,
employees, janitors and most-loved teachers.
The director awards are selected by Pattaya City administrators, and the
most-loved teachers and good janitors will be selected by teachers
themselves.
Then it will be over to sports in the afternoon including takraw,
football, volleyball, tug-of-war and rounding up with a teachers’ party
in the evening.
Pattaya school administrators including Thawatchai Rattanyu, director of
the Pattaya Education Department, Chanatpong Chuabmee, Pattaya’s deputy
city manager, directors of Pattaya Schools 1 - 10, and all heads of the
Pattaya Education Sector met with Mayor Ittipol Khunplome and Deputy
Mayor Wattana Chantanawaranon on December 16 at Pattaya School #2
(Charoenrat-Utit).
Wattana said the annual Teachers’ Day will recognize our teachers’
kindness and the professional teachers’ most important role in
motivating students to learn as well as help support the unity of
teachers.
Santa Claus drops in on Mercy Center
The Christmas spirit was
truly present for all at the Mercy Center and the PIGS.
Santa Claus paid an extra special visit to the
children at the Mercy Center on Saturday December 13. The Pattaya
International Gentlemen’s Society, otherwise known as the PIGS, with
their families came along with Santa.
This group of gentlemen usually meets once a month for a social activity
and in the process raises funds amongst themselves for charity. This
year they decided to make a donation of 40,000 to the Mercy Center and
each member of the group bought a Christmas gift for one child at the
Center.
After Santa made the presentation of the gifts, the room resembled a
typical Christmas morning with gift paper everywhere and the usual hunt
for batteries.
Head Hog, Craig Donnelly, then made the presentation of the donation to
international directors Fred and Dianne Doell.
Tri Stars - Improving the overall health and well-being of teachers
Sue Kukarja
Like in many Asian societies, Thai teachers, who are called
“khru” (from the Sanskrit word “guru”) are often not esteemed on account
of their professional abilities but because of their personality and
charisma.
 Pa
Sai inspires two young teachers.
In earlier times, teachers in Thailand were often monks. The temples
were schools where the students were educated. The monks were the
crucial authority for moral education and they decided subjectively what
should be considered as “good” and “evil”, as merit and sin.
Today students are generally educated by school teachers, and they hold
a very high status in Thai society while the students respect and owe
their teachers a lifelong gratitude for educating them.
However, along with gratitude, there are expectations.
Thais like using word-pairs beginning or ending with the term “heart”,
called “jai”. They very often are applied in situations of teaching and
learning and characterize the relationship between teachers and
students.
A teacher is expected to be kind hearted and have a cool heart, that
means they should not be impatient.
Teachers are expected to be broad-minded and to have cultivated manners
and consideration to win the hearts of her pupils.
Given the role as an extra parent, educators feel responsible to instill
morals and manners into the students, as well as guide them on how to
contribute to society as good citizens.
Additionally, cooperation with their colleagues and superiors to excel
in their job is also a constant pressure.
Most teaching environments do not help much. Most government school
classrooms are not air-conditioned, and with the number of students in
one class often exceeding 50, heat and exhaustion is a big factor that
contributes to the wear and tear of the physical and emotional
well-being, of both the students and teachers.
It is not an exaggeration to say that Thai government school teachers
are truly overworked and underpaid.
 Teachers
shape the future of our country.
Although teachers enjoy a good reputation and social status, government
teachers are not paid very well. Insufficient income to support the
family makes them face additional problems at home.
These accumulations of stress factors from all around often result in
exhaustion, depression, anger and resentment and even sickness that can
be unintentionally projected towards the direct receivers, the students,
in many ways, such as moodiness, impatience, harsh punishments, which
all contribute to an unhealthy teaching and learning environment.
Worse still, some teachers do not even realize that physical punishments
often leave a long lasting damage.
With lack of support and inadequate knowledge on how to take care of
themselves, it is difficult for the teachers to be cool hearted or open
hearted as they would like to be. In other words, a teacher’s heart and
body need to be maintained before they can take proper care of their
students. Unhappy teachers make unhappy students.
Much teacher training nowadays focuses on student centered learning, but
not often do we hear about training that takes teachers’ well-being as
their focal point.
Fortunately for the Pattaya City schools, an organization called The
Dwarapratheep has lent their hands to help.
Run by Pa Sai, or Khun Kasemsook Bhamornsatit, consultant and specialist
for the Board of Academic Education at Pattaya City, several seminars
called Tri Stars were held to educate and train teachers on how to take
care of themselves first before they can effectively help their
students.
The Tri Stars project is a continued project from the previous one
called Happiness for Kids through Teachers.
The objective was to enhance teachers’ image in the eyes of their
students and to enable the teachers and students to join in activities
that promote only positive attitude among them. That program showed very
good results, especially from the children.
After that program Pa Sai realized the students’ well being depends on
the teachers’ well being, so she initiated the second project called the
Tri Stars to promote strength and understanding in teachers.
“Teachers are parents of their own children as well as their students.
Students come to school carrying their own burden from home, while the
teachers also come to work with their own problems and stress.
“Unaware of each other’s needs, emotions and stress, the school may
easily turn into a war zone. Our objective is to create awareness for
teachers on how their physical and emotional stress can have an impact
on their students and how to solve it by first taking care of
themselves.”
Many teachers do not understand the long term damage on students caused
by physical punishment. Worse still is the emotional and verbal abuse by
the teachers that cause fear in the children. There are many additional
factors that contribute to each teacher’s temperament and lack of self
control. The teaching environment, the noise, the heat, all adds to the
internal stress that deteriorates the teacher’s health. The training
stresses on how to manage their given environments effectively, how to
take care of their health, and how to stay calm in times of stress.
“Students need much understanding from their teachers, who are
considered their second (set of) parents. Schools are like a second home
to them as they spend more time at school and with their teachers than
at home. So whatever you do, you are their teacher, parent, doctor,
judge and all the justice they look for when they come to you. This is
what I intend to work on with the teachers in the Tri Stars Project,” Pa
Sai said.
The objectives of a three day seminar called the Tri-Stars include the 3
focal points: To get better, to live better and to gain better:
1. To get better is to help teachers understand how the mind influences
the body and a person’s emotions, which helps the teachers to better
understand themselves and their students. It also trains the teachers on
how to take care of their physical well being including proper exercise
and meditation.
2. To live better is to help teachers to understand their personal
environment and how it impacts their health and emotions, and ways to
enhance the quality of living, including social etiquette training, of
which they can transfer this knowledge on to their students.
3. To gain better is to help teachers develop their own personal points
of view so they can control their own behaviors and emotional
challenges. This will improve their self image and respect for
themselves as well as their outlook in life and how to acquire a
leadership habit. They will then be able to be positive role models for
students.
The three day seminar also includes a boat trip to the surrounding sites
to participate in the cultural activities of the local people, such as
pottery, Thai desserts making, alms giving at temples, and making merit
by freeing lives back to freedom.
Each seminar accommodates 25 to 30 teachers and the net cost for each
group is about 90,000 baht, inclusive of training and activities,
documents, and all meals. Pa Sai provides her time for no charge.
With the help of Rotary Jomtien Pattaya donated funds in the past,
several courses have been conducted at the Ban Dwara Pratheep center in
Bangkok for teachers from Pattaya Schools 2, 3, 7, 8, 9, and 10.
Unfortunately, the support fund has been used up on several courses, and
Pa Sai herself has been shouldering most of the expenses in the past
couple of years. We feel that it is time again for the community of
Pattaya to step up and support an organization like this to help these
hard working teachers who desperately need and deserve training. The
benefit the teachers receive directly reflects and improves students’
well being, attitude and productivity.
When asked to tell of one clear improvement did she see after joining
the course, teacher Ramphueng Suparasri said, “Temper and Social
etiquette. I know that we are more patient with the students, my
personal behavior and self control.”
Khru Sornchai Khemkhaeng added, “From studies, 3% of the teachers in
every school have cancer, it has been proven, and my friend has it. It
is caused or triggered by stress. So if the teachers suffer from
unhealthy mind and body, how can they meet the expectations of teaching
and developing the students to achieve certain standards for the future
of our nation? However, with the helping hand by this external
organization to guide us and train us the right way to a sound body and
mind, positive results will come.”
Pa Sai invites those who would like to sponsor the project through
Rotary Jomtien-Pattaya to her home where the courses are held.
Baan Dvara Prateep is located on a river island called Koh Kred in
Nonthaburi near Bangkok.
It is a compound of wooden buildings erected on wooden stilts by the
river bank. Behind the compound is a vast area of fruit plantations. A
small village with its narrow walkways built on stilts lies further
inland. Accommodation is simple yet very comfortable.
The house has its own kitchen and the family members’ creativity in the
preparation of meals never ceased to amaze us. The participants are also
encouraged to take part in simple cooking.
A large meditation and exercise room and the multi-purpose living room
make up the rest of the quarters in the retreat. There are no television
sets and refrigerators in the bedrooms. Alcoholic drinks and smoking
cigarettes are strictly prohibited.
The total cleansing experience, as well as the proper guidance that some
teachers have received has enormously enhanced their physical and mental
well being.
Let’s give a chance to many other teachers who desperately need it.
After all, if teachers are well equipped with knowledge and
understanding, the benefactors will be the students.
Pa Sai asked for the public to understand the teachers as a group of
people who work very hard with very little compensation and time to even
relax. They are the same people that the country’s future depends on.
Let’s help them, and you will realize that by helping them you will feel
happier in a miraculous way.
“Long ago I had a teacher who told me that when I grew up, if I wanted
to help anyone, to help the teachers,” she concluded.
Meditation, cleansing the
soul.
YMCA treats Baan Chaknok students to school lunch
Students appreciate their
lunch.
Students wait patiently in
line for lunch.
Sawittree Namwiwatsuk
YWCA and Pattaya Sports Club bought lunch for the 261 students
at Baan Chaknok School as part of the associations’ routine to provide
lunch once a month to a different school chosen from the 48 public
schools in Chonburi Province.
The Pattaya Sports Club will also construct hand-washing basins for
students and a cooperative grocery shop for the local community.
 Ice
cream!
During the lunch a Christian unity group also sang songs and organized
games for the students.
Nittaya Patimasongkroh, chairwoman of YWCA Bangkok-Pattaya center,
association committee member Dujduan Ruangwettiwong and Bernie Tuppin,
Pattaya Sports Club charity chairman were welcomed by teacher Suttijit
Boran at the lunch on December 9.
Nittaya said that the lunch program for students is held every month and
the Baan Chaknok School had been chosen for this month. “It’s a good
opportunity for students to learn social skills,” she said.
The association pays for the food made by the school, such as kow na kai
(chicken and rice) and ice cream. It is also a chance for YWCA to meet
its seven scholarship students “whose grades are very impressive,” she
said.
Bernie Tuppin also came to prepare for the construction of hand-washing
basins for students. A cooperative shop will also be constructed for
students to be able to buy things at an affordable price.
Ban Chaknok School teaches students from kindergarten to 6th grade. Most
of its students are children of low-income working parents who have
moved here from other provinces.
During some academic terms there are a lot of students and some terms
very few.
Teacher Suttijit Boran
(left) welcomes the visitors.
Nittaya Patimasongkroh,
chairwoman of YWCA Bangkok-Pattaya center,
and association members meet with scholarship students.
Nittaya Patimasongkroh
enjoys a chat with
the young students during the school lunch.
The Christian unity
singers sing and organize games for the students.
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