Pastas Are Loved ♥

Dined at this restaurant , Italiannies at TripleOne (it's located behind 313 Somerset) quite some time ago.Would like to share with all of you my experience at that restaurant. =)) That particular restaurant was recommended to me by my close friend. Was told that it serves good pastas and pizzas. Since pastas has always been one of my favourite food, i did not hesitate to try that restaurant though I was told the price would be a little pricey.

I was very impressed by the interior furnishings and the design in the restaurant. I really like to dine at nice places once in a while and that recommendation  by my friend did not turn out to disappoint me.=))
I ordered spinach pasta with prawns (Something like that. I didn't take pictures of the menu as i feel that it wasn't a nice thing to do). The pasta! How to describe??!!! The look of it made my tummy rumble as I was pretty hungry that day. Well, there's a saying that goes: don't judge a book by it's cover. I hope that the pasta looks good AND taste good too! =)) I wasn't disappointed with the taste of it as well. Indeed, it is one of the better pastas i've tasted so far as for now.

My friend ordered Carbonara. Probably a must have pasta served in most places. But it turned out pretty good too! The sauce was not too thick nor was it too dry or runny. This is the fourth visit my friend made to that restaurant and every time she never fails to order the same dish back again. =))

 Oh! And they serve you warm bread with olive oil dressing too!

Just felt that my pasta was a little too oily. Felt that they could have cut down on the olive oil used and it would be good!

Web Review 5

Review on Web Resources

Web Resource 5 – Teens Health from Nemours

http://kidshealth.org/teen/index.jsp?tracking=T_Home

The last web review that I would like to talk about is this site called Teens Health from Nemours. It has three basic categories for “Parents, Kids and Teens”.

Shall click on the category on Food and Fitness to explore. =))

Decided to choose the topic on Fiber. It gives an introduction on what fiber is, where fiber is found, sources of fiber and how to include fiber in your daily diet for breakfast, lunch, dinner and even snack time! =))

Let’s explore another category on Hunger and Malnutrition.

It gives a background on what hunger is, what is hunger and malnutrition, what causes hunger and malnutrition and many other topics regarding hunger and malnutrition. This topic on hunger and malnutrition would be able to give students an idea on what malnutrition is and how it affects those suffering from it. This would be useful when students need to research on their coursework.

In the category, Disease and Conditions, let’s look on the topic on Hypertension. What is hypertension, what causes hypertension, how does it affect the body, how can it be treated and even prevention can be found in this small category on hypertension.

There is an interesting topic I would like to share with all of you on this website. It’s about how much sleep do we need.

It explains why teens are not getting enough of sleep, why is sleep important, how do you know if you are getting enough of sleep and ways to get more sleep.

I find that this website is very useful for students as well as teachers. The sentence structure and the content are not too in-depth nor is it too simple that it does not benefit the students. This website is filled with loads of information to enrich yourself for general knowledge or for research purposes. A very informative and useful website for ALL! =)

Web Review 4

Review on Web Resources

Web Resource 4 – Body and Mind!  

http://www.bam.gov/sub_foodnutrition/index.html

The fourth web review that I want to review on is also an interactive website called Body and Mind! My first impression when I saw this website was that it is so colourful and full of pictures! I’m very sure most of you would be attracted by its colourful outlook. =))

 There are six main categories in this website namely: Diseases, Food & Nutrition, Physical Activity, Your Safety, Your Life and Your Body. I shall click on the link on Food & Nutrition to find out more about it! In the category of Food & Nutrition there are other sub categories like: Cool Treats, Dining Decisions, Fuel Up For Fun and Power Packing. I shall try the category on Dining Decisions. =)) After you click the link on Dining Decisions, they will give you a short summary of what Dining Decisions is all about and you can there after play a game on this category.

 There will be a short story to start the game. This is a simple game on the food you choose to eat during break time in school. This is what I have chosen to eat.

There will be a feedback given at the end on the foods that you have chosen. =)

There is a category at the right hand side called Under the Microscope. It is about the nutrition facts label. It teaches you how to read the labels on food packaging.

You can also click on the link on what is the number of “servings”. There is a Q&A page about questions like What is a healthy diet?, What foods give my body what it needs for energy, muscles, and all that?, So, if I want to eat a healthy diet, are there foods I have to skip completely?, What about how MUCH food to eat? And Nutrition, Fruits and Vegetables, Calories, Fat... all over magazines, on the news, in school... Why is all of this such a big deal? Very useful for simple and easily understandable reading and helpful to show this site to your Secondary 1 class as an introduction to the topic you want to teach.

You can also click on the Xpert’s Opinion and they will have some tips there on breakfast, snacks and many more.

Let’s explore another category called: Your Body.

There’s a sub-category on Diabetes. Let’s explore that category!

On the Question & Answer page, there are simple questions like what is diabetes, what happens if you have diabetes, how do you know if you have diabetes and is there a cure of diabetes?

These questions would have answered some of the simple questions that students would ask about the topic.

There is even a category called test Your Smarts. It contains simple multiple choice questions , useful to test your students prior knowledge on the topic.

There are many other categories for you to explore on! =)) 

This site might be useful and interactive in a way but the information available is not very detailed and is not suitable for those who would like to know more in depth about the topic. This site would be useful as an introduction or a closing to the end off your topic. 

Do explore and learn more from it! =D

Web Review 3

Review on Web Resources

Web Resource 3 – BrainPOP

http://www.brainpop.com/

The third web review that I’m going to review on is this site called BrainPOP. I remember visiting this website when I was in upper primary and in my lower secondary days. This web is an animated educational site for kids but I feel that teenagers or even adults can learn simple facts that we do not know from it! =))

There are lots of sub-categories like Health, English, Science, Social Studies, Math and even Art and Music. I shall choose the Health category to review on. =))

Most of us would have drank coffee to keep ourselves awake at least once right? Let’s see what BrainPOP has to say about caffeine!

Before watching the video, there’s a short introduction about the topic on caffeine. It summarizes the information in the video in a short paragraph.

Oh, a point to note! You might need to create an account to watch the videos. A little troublesome but trust me, it’s going to be worth it! You’ll learn a lot from the videos.

The video even says that caffeine in it’s pure form is a bitter white powder!  It tells you that 300mg of caffeine is the most you should consume daily. It’s equivalent to 3 small cups of coffee. The video is quite informative. It is good to use such videos as an introduction or as a re-cap on what you would like to teach! 

There are some quizzes or activity that you can do it together with your students after watching the video. This helps in class participation and it makes the lesson more interactive. =)) The quiz at the end of the video can be a tool to test if your students are paying attention during lessons.

Let me show you some other videos that might be useful when it comes to teaching Home economics or just for your general knowledge. =)

Let’s look at the topic on FATS!

This videos is useful to give a simple introduction to the topic on Fats. It has simple animated scientific facts about what fats are made of. Scientific facts might just scare your students off but in this video it is put into a simple and interesting way that will capture your students’ attention.

It tells you what cholesterol is all about. Where is it from, the effects of too much cholesterol, what saturated and unsaturated fats are and even trans fats!

There are lots of interesting and informative videos found in this website! Do check it out and you might increase your knowledge from watching all those cute videos! =D

Just remember to create an account! It’s troublesome but totally worth it!

ENJOY!

Web Review 2

Review on Web Resources

Web Resource 2 -Jamie Oliver

http://www.jamieoliver.com/

The second web resource i want to review on is this site called "Jamie Oliver". I'm not sure if most of you know this person by the name of Jamie Oliver. Anyway, to cut the long story short he's a British celebrity chef most popularly known for his tv shows and his cook books. Some of his tv shows are The naked chef, Oliver's Twist, Jamie Olivier's Food Revolution and Jamie At Home. If you have cable tv they are shown on Discovery's Travel and Living Channel! =)) 

Home Econs teachers out there if you need recipes there’s lots of mouth watering recipes found in his site. To those who like to eat or cook this site is definitely for you! He categorized his recipes into:

Courses and drinks

By the main ingredients

By methods

By countries

Since I love pastas, I shall click onto the pasta recipes link. 

The pasta recipes itself has 8 pages. You can choose the one that you like from the sea of recipes out there. =)) I shall choose sausage carbonara! 

Some of his ingredients might not be widely available in Singapore. But you can always modify the recipe a little to suit the availability of ingredients here. =))

For example, his recipe states 4 good-quality organic Italian sausages. You can always buy those sausages from cold storage or NTUC that will suit this recipe. As Home econs teachers, I’m sure all of you will know how to modify them here and there. =))

There’s even video recipes for you to watch. 

This video gives you basic tips on cooking pasta. 

Basically his site has lots of recipes that might be useful for all of you now or in the future!  Do check it out! =))

Web Review 1

Review on Web Resources

Web Resource 1 – Health Promotion Board Website

http://www.hpb.gov.sg/

The first web resource that I want to review on is the Health Promotion Board’s (HPB) website. I’m sure most of you or if not all of you has at least entered the HPB website at least once (I hope). =))

Those who have taken F&N during O levels or N levels would most probably have used the most common and popular tool that all teachers want their students to use…. Can you guess what that tool is??

It’s the Food Intake Assessment tool from HPB! The Food Intake Assessment tool is used to analyse a persons’ diet over a period of a few days or just one day. It gives a detailed breakdown of the nutrients that you have consumed. A very very useful tool for students to use for the analysis of the food journal they have done during their coursework part A.

A rather user friendly tool. Let me give you a brief introduction on how you can use this tool to help your students and yourself in the future.

This picture shows you how you can follow the steps to use this Food Intake Assessment tool.

These are the steps on how we can analyse our meal. I’m using Day 1 breakfast as an example.

Let’s pretend that we are done with our analysis. You should select the ‘analyze’ icon.

This is what you will get after you are done with the analysis for the number of days that you want. It even calculates the percentage meeting the Recommended Daily Allowance (RDA).

A simple but useful tool isn’t it?

I personally like Food Intake Assessment tool it’s because your students will most probably be writing down more local foods found in Singapore in their food analysis. Food Intake Assessment tool is created in the Singapore context therefore, it has most of our local dishes like chicken rice, mee pok, kaya, nasi lemak and all those dishes that you might have difficulty looking for in the American food intake assessment software.

Hope this review on Food Intake Assessment has helped you! =))

Other than the Food Intake Assessment, you can also explore around HPB’s website to look for other interesting articles or tools.

For example, I came across this tab called ‘Health Topics’. There are a lot of information about all sorts of topics. I clicked on ‘Food for Health’.

Even on the topic of ‘Eat to win in your school canteen’ has a lot of useful information pertaining to our students and ourselves.

The points are all phrase in simple, easy to understand sentences and you will not have difficulty understanding what is written.

HPB's website has alot of useful information or tools that would most definately be useful to us in the near future or even now! =))

What Home Econs Means to Me

Shall start my story from about 4 or 5 years back.... 

I took home econs and F&N when i was in my sec school days.

It was actually during my N and O level period that i really loved F&N as a subject and as a whole. 

Maybe because of my character, i didnt like subjects that i cannot apply to life. I prefer to study things that relates to my daily life. I prefer to learn things that i can see rather than things that i cannot see. Maybe thats one of the reasons why i love this subject because it relates to my life in such a great way! =))

Because of my interest in this subject, i tend to put in more effort and therefore scoring better for my exams. I remember when i was doing my O level coursework i would often stay in school till late just to research or edit my coursework. It wasnt easy doing my O level coursework but i had a great time with my peers and most importantly my teacher. =)) 

In fact, my teacher was the source of my inspirtation to take up this course. Her love for this subject and her dedication to us as her very first batch of O Level students inspired me to be a teacher just like her. 

This path wasnt the one i wanted initially. After my O levels posting, i got into Early Childhood Education and the Diploma in Consumer Science & Technology by MOE and TP. 2 paths lay before me. Which to choose? After much considerations i decided to take the challenge to be a Teacher. A Home Economics teacher!

I remembered my interview in MOE. In fact I didnt even plan what to say during my interview. I just went there with an open heart about this course. I remembered one of my interviewers asking me this question: " Why do you want to be a Home Economics teacher?"

My reply was: "I loved this subject and while many people may feel that this subject is not important, it is an important life skill. I want to change their mindset that Home econs is not just about cooking and sewing! There's something more to it."

My interviewer just smiled! =) Maybe it's because of this that they decided to let me take up this course. 

The route wasn't easy for 3 years in Temasek Polytechnic. I lived in the west and TP is in the east. It was torturing to travel so far just to get to school every morning. It was even more torturing when lessons end late and you have to travel for 2 hours to get home when your friends just needed 30 mins or so. 

It's tiring! But i did it and so did most of my friends! We did it for 3 years. NIE is just a short period of about 6 months! All of you can do it too! =))

It was during my Student Internship Programme (SIP) that i experienced teaching a class on my own. It was stressful and frightening but it takes experiences to overcome them. After about 3 tries teaching on your own you wouldn't feel the pressure anymore. In fact my friend and I who were in the same school felt it was much simpler as time goes by. These students just needed you to guide them along. They're quite sweet too! One even brought kueh for us to eat! =))

Experiences in this path of my life is so fullfilling that i learn something new everyday. =))

Carrots!

A cute and nice picture of carrots!

I found this online.

They’re actually treats for small animals(rabbits, hamsters, mouse..).

Very eye-catching isnt it? =))

Welcome! =))

A warm welcome to all my new visitors here!

This shall be a new platform for me to share about my experiences in life, NIE and my future career as a Home Economics teacher and anything that is interesting (or might be interesting). =)

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