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A Sneak Peek at ExCEL Fest

23 Jun 2008

ExCEL Fest 2007

ExCEL Fest – a chance for schools to showcase their innovative programmes.

Want to see what school life is like today, without having to step inside a school? Come to MOE’s annual ExCEL Fest on Saturday, 5 July, where there’ll be over 80 exhibition booths by schools showcasing their most creative teaching and learning activities. Classroom Experience activities will also allow visitors to sit in on simulated lessons, experiencing for themselves how innovative lessons are conducted today.

Here’s a sneak preview of what some schools will be presenting at ExCEL Fest 2008 at the Suntec International Convention and Exhibition Centre.

Kranji Secondary School

Students measuring the amount of ingredients to be used in making the soap.

Soap that’s anti-E. coli

At Kranji Secondary School, five budding young scientists embarked on a research project called Herbiotics and learned that some of the herbs found in their school garden have antibacterial properties. Under the guidance of their teacher Ms J. Vanitha, they subjected the herbs to numerous rounds of testing and found that one of them, Ruta graveolens, can prevent the growth of the E. coli bacteria.

This discovery gave another Science teacher, Ms Normala Binte Alias, the idea of infusing extracts from Ruta graveolens to make soap. She and the students tried different kinds of oil and refined the soap-making techniques, and finally manufactured their very own antibacterial soap. The soap was sold at community events, with the proceeds going towards the school’s Pupil Welfare Fund.

At ExCEL Fest: The students will explain to the public the antibacterial tests they conducted and demonstrate the soap-making process.

Rosyth School manga

A manga art piece drawn by Pri 6 pupil Phebe Lau Yun Lei of Rosyth Schoo

Riding the manga wave

Manga (Japanese comics) is increasingly popular among the young in Singapore. Capitalising on this trend, Rosyth School has come up with a unique Art curriculum that its students can’t stop raving about.

MangaArt@Rosyth is taught progressively to students, starting from Pri 3 to Pri 6. Students learn manga drawing and animation by using graphic tablets with patented pressure-sensitive pens. These pens enable the students to have brush-like control, so that their drawing and editing of images can be more detailed and refined.

The school has also set up the Ani’Manga Club to groom students with budding talent in digital animation and comic production. Club members get to use tools and software like Tablet PCs, Macromedia Fireworks and Florence Lightbox, a piece of equipment that comic artists use to overlay images on a page.

The Rosyth Enterprise Team takes that a step further by working with private enterprises on projects such as incorporating manga characters in restaurant design. This gives students not just the opportunity to showcase their talents but also see how their skills can be applied in real life.

At ExCEL Fest: Students will demonstrate manga drawing using Tablet PCs.

Keming Primary School

Students narrating the stories during the in-house production of the audio CD.

Creative writers in the making

At Keming Primary School, Pri 2 students have become authors, releasing their own versions of fairy tales as part of a reading package. The package includes an audio CD of the stories, narrated also by the students themselves.

The project started as an initiative to help students who are weak in reading. All Pri 2 students were involved and, working in groups, they were challenged to come up with stories based on familiar fairy tales but with a twist. The stories that resulted were so unusual and creative that the teachers decided to publish Our Book of Twisted Fairy Tales.

Besides penning the stories, students were also involved in designing the cover and coming up with illustrations for the book. To narrate the stories, students who were expressive readers with good enunciation were selected and the CD was produced in-house by the school. To make it a truly engaging literary journey, students even created puppets based on the characters in their stories and put up a performance before a large audience.

Now that the book and CD are available, the school hopes that weaker readers will be motivated to pick up the book and listen to the stories as read by their peers. Best of all, the package is designed to be self-contained, so that students can read and learn on their own if they wish to.

At ExCEL Fest: The reading package, including the audio CD, will be on show for visitors to read and listen to the “twisted” fairy tales.

Visit ExCEL Fest 2008!

Date: Saturday 5 July 2008
Time: 9 a.m. to 8 p.m.
Venue: Suntec International Convention and Exhibition Centre
Find out more at the ExCEL Fest 2008 website