How to help every gifted child in Singapore.

It occurred to me, today, that Ainan has, unwittingly, helped every gifted child in Singapore. He has done so, by leaving the country. I shall explain.

The reason Ainan left Singapore was because Singapore was not supporting his education adequately: we were receiving a lot of delay tactics, and very little real support. By the time we left, there was no support in place at all. Now, obviously, given Ainan's relatively high profile internationally, it is very embarrassing for Singapore that he should leave. Indeed, even the front pages of the Wall Street Journal commented on the situation (even if the front pages of the Straits Times did not). There is considerable "loss of face" for Singapore, in the situation. Yet, this is actually good for Singapore's other gifted children - for it is likely that Singapore's educational institutions will think twice before being difficult and slow to respond to the needs of other gifted children. They will have, in the back of their minds (such as they are), the memory of one very public departure, because of their own previous failings to support a child, properly.

Thus, although it was not our intention to do so, Ainan's public departure from Singapore, for Malaysia (a much more open country, as far as we have presently experienced), is of great help to all other gifted kids in Singapore. I would be very surprised if Singapore did not take greater measures, in future, to provide for its gifted children. Otherwise, it would lose others to Malaysia and other countries, too. Until Ainan's departure, perhaps they were labouring under the delusion that Singapore was so wonderful a place, that no gifted kid would ever think of leaving. Funny enough, though, we are aware of a mathemetically precocious boy, who was also displeased with Singapore's response to his gifts. He left, too, for the United States, long ago. However, his departure did not come to public attention, because he has a low profile, so his decision would have no effect on the way Singapore does things. Ainan's departure, though, is different and likely to have a beneficial effect for all gifted children remaining in Singapore. The MOE and GEP will not be keen to see Ainan's individual decision, become a flood of talented emigrants, turning their backs on a nation that had, in some way, turned its back on them.

Yet, even though it is likely that the MOE will take greater care of its gifted children in future, there are other possible effects of Ainan's departure. His decision to study at a private University in Malaysia, may inspire other Singaporeans to look at Malaysia as a possible source of education for their children. The private sector in Malaysia is, unlike its public counterpart, rather strong and able to offer a wide range of schooling options which are as good as anything Singapore has to offer in its private sector - though much, much cheaper.

Perhaps, therefore, even though Ainan may inspire a better response from the MOE in future, towards its gifted citizens, he may also inspire some of those citizens to head overseas, despite the MOE's best efforts, in search of alternative options.

I wonder, therefore, what effect, on balance, Ainan's educational decision will have? Will the MOE's renewed efforts to retain talent outdo the impulse to look elsewhere for an education? Will more stay as a result of a change in MOE's attitude? Or will more leave, having learnt from Ainan's example?

It is, at this stage, impossible to say what will happen. I will, however, watch the situation closely, for any clues as to what transpires. It occurs to me, though, that whatever the effect of Ainan's move that it does help every child in Singapore. You see, it will probably mean that MOE will make greater efforts for its charges - which is good for all concerned - but it also means that parents will realize that there is an alternative to Singapore's rigidities. So whether they stay or go, Singapore's talents will benefit. They now are aware of more choices and they are also likely to be helped more, (by the MOE). So, either way, the children win.


(If you would like to learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, 10, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, 6 and Tiarnan, 4, this month, please go to:
http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2006/10/scientific-child-prodigy-guide.html

I also write of gifted education, child prodigy, child genius, adult genius, savant, megasavant, HELP University College, the Irish, the Malays, Singapore, Malaysia, IQ, intelligence and creativity.

My Internet Movie Database listing is at: http://imdb.com/name/nm3438598/
Ainan's IMDB listing is at http://imdb.com/name/nm3305973/
Syahidah's IMDB listing is at http://imdb.com/name/nm3463926/

Our editing, proofreading and copywriting company, Genghis Can, is at http://www.genghiscan.com/

This blog is copyright Valentine Cawley. Unauthorized duplication is prohibited. Use only with permission. Thank you.)

A mathematical wit.

Yesterday, something happened that has never happened to me, before, in my life. It came upon me totally unexpectedly, and was something I could never have imagined happening, in my life. Indeed, even now that it has happened, I find it difficult to believe that such a thing is possible, yet know it was, because I witnessed it.

I was sitting, yesterday, talking to Ainan. Suddenly, as of some inner impulse, he picked up a pencil and started scrawling mathematical symbols, in a book.

It soon became clear that he was scribbling a mathematical proof. I looked carefully at what he wrote, to follow his line of reasoning. Finally, he scribbled his very last symbol and pulled his pencil back from the page. I read what he had written and then, I was ambushed, by an overwhelming sense of the absurdity of what he had done. I laughed explosively, for perhaps twenty long seconds. What he had written was so surprising, yet so obviously true, that I could not help but laugh. Ainan had done something I didn't know was possible: he had made a mathematical proof, HUMOUROUS. I could not have conceived that it was possible for maths to make me laugh - but he had done it. He had written a mathematical joke and proven, beyond doubt, what he had set out to prove, in a way that was outrageously funny.

Now, I know how some of you would like me to share his proof and join in the laughter - but I think I should leave it for him, to share, when he chooses to, in his own way. It was his creation...so I feel I should not write of it, but let him do so, in time.

It was an illuminating moment though. It showed me another side to his thinking. He is able to see humour even in maths. This expands his range of humour further still, since it became clear years ago, that he could make scientific jokes. Now, he had made a mathematical one.

For me, this means that he is thinking very fluidly and seeing possibilities that others might never do. He takes the possibilities and points to their unexpected presence and so creates a moment of insight and a burst of laughter, as one comes to see what he has seen. He is, if you like, a humourist of enlightenment.

My laughter had barely settled, from his mathematical joke, before he made another one: this time, it was the plot of a story he is writing that made me laugh. It was so wonderfully absurd - yet scientifically based - that prolonged laughter was the only viable choice - and I chose it.

I am coming to see that Ainan has a creative insight that opens up many potentials. It takes, I rather think, a significant degree of creativity, originality and insight, to see humour in what to most, are dry topics: science and mathematics. Yet, on Ainan's tongue, they become subject matters of a surreal wit. It is, I must say, quite a revelation.

I have always enjoyed my scientific chats with him. Now, however, I have something else to look forward to: the comic interludes, he sometimes chooses to turn them into.

(If you would like to learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, 10, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, 6 and Tiarnan, 4, this month, please go to:
http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2006/10/scientific-child-prodigy-guide.html

I also write of gifted education, child prodigy, child genius, adult genius, savant, megasavant, HELP University College, the Irish, the Malays, Singapore, Malaysia, IQ, intelligence and creativity.

My Internet Movie Database listing is at: http://imdb.com/name/nm3438598/
Ainan's IMDB listing is at http://imdb.com/name/nm3305973/
Syahidah's IMDB listing is at http://imdb.com/name/nm3463926/

Our editing, proofreading and copywriting company, Genghis Can, is at http://www.genghiscan.com/

This blog is copyright Valentine Cawley. Unauthorized duplication is prohibited. Use only with permission. Thank you.)

The new "average".

Today, I invited Ainan to read an online newspaper article about another child prodigy - this being one who had achieved much, at a very young age, in some cases breaking world records, but who was now a grown adult, living a successful life.

Ainan looked at the article, with, to my amazement, what seemed like growing puzzlement.

After he had read enough to know what it was about, he looked up at me, with a frown.

"Why are you asking me to read this?", he began.

It was not clear to me why he would not know.

"What is special about this person?", he continued, his puzzlement lending his tongue some momentum. "They sound perfectly average to me."

It hit me, then, in an instant. To Ainan, the life story of a child prodigy, filled with what, to others, are amazing feats, is a perfectly ordinary thing. To him, nothing could be more ordinary than growing up as a prodigious child. Nothing a child prodigy did - nothing no child prodigy has ever done - could possibly impress Ainan as being unusual because he, himself, has lived and is living such a life.

It was my turn to wonder. I saw then, how Ainan sees the world. For him, the extraordinary, is "perfectly average" and unworthy of remark or record. I wondered, too, what the ordinary person must seem like to him, when the most extraordinary prodigies, seem "perfectly average", to him. He must, at times, wonder at many of his fellow human beings, wondering why they are the way they are - and how it must be, to be like them. This is a matter, however, which I have never raised with him, since I think it a dangerous topic. But then, again, his little remark, today, told me much of what his perspective must be.

As he grows to adulthood, he will have to search far and wide, to find his intellectual counterparts. Hopefully, he will work in some area in which they are concentrated, then it will not be so difficult to find people who can satisfy any need he may have, for intellectual companionship. Yet, it might be a difficult task, in some ways, when the most prodigious are seen as "perfectly average".

There are many challenges for a young prodigy. Today, unknowingly, Ainan identified one of them. Now, of course, I have to think what to do about it. It won't be easy.

(If you would like to learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, 10, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, 6 and Tiarnan, 4, this month, please go to:
http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2006/10/scientific-child-prodigy-guide.html

I also write of gifted education, child prodigy, child genius, adult genius, savant, megasavant, HELP University College, the Irish, the Malays, Singapore, Malaysia, IQ, intelligence and creativity.

My Internet Movie Database listing is at: http://imdb.com/name/nm3438598/
Ainan's IMDB listing is at http://imdb.com/name/nm3305973/
Syahidah's IMDB listing is at http://imdb.com/name/nm3463926/

Our editing, proofreading and copywriting company, Genghis Can, is at http://www.genghiscan.com/

This blog is copyright Valentine Cawley. Unauthorized duplication is prohibited. Use only with permission. Thank you.)

A love of Art.

Popular Bookstore is a chain present in both Singapore and Malaysia. It tends to stock academic books for schoolchildren and a reasonable - though restricted - range of general reading material. Today, in a Popular Bookstore, in KL, I noted something most telling. I saw a book section I have never seen in the corresponding stores in Singapore. Now can you guess what it was? What kind of section could a Malaysian bookstore have, that its Singaporean counterparts don't have?

Have you had a good think? Well, to my astonishment, today, I saw a "Drawing" section, in the Malaysian Popular Bookstore. That gave me pause, for it was not a small section: it consisted of two whole bookshelves, perhaps three to four metres wide and one and a half metres high, in total, carrying nothing but books on the art of drawing: how to do it, what it is, and how you can learn. There were books on particular types of drawing: portraits, fantasy figures and so on. I was, in an instant, most impressed by what it said of the country I am now living in. It says, quite clearly, that there are enough people in KL interested in learning how to draw, for it to be profitable for a general bookstore like Popular, to carry such specialized titles.

Yet, and this was the most telling part of all, I had never seen a similar section in Singapore's Popular bookstores - though I have been in many of them, many times.

One can conclude from this that Malaysians are rather more artistically inclined, than their Singaporean counterparts, for no bookstore is going to waste shelf space on things which don't sell enough to justify it.

Perhaps, pragmatic Singaporeans don't see the value in art, so much, because they cannot see how it connects to their life value of accumulating money as rapidly as possible. Since art seems distant from this, they are less drawn to it...excuse the pun.

As for me: I like art and artists and think that it is an eminently worthy pursuit, even if it never results in great personal wealth, or even a decent living: it is the art itself that counts.

I find it refreshing that an ordinary bookstore would actually pay such heed to drawing. There is, I think, more depth to this nation, than one might first grasp. No doubt there are more clues out there, waiting to be seen.

I will let you know when I spot one.

(If you would like to learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, 10, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, 6 and Tiarnan, 4, this month, please go to:
http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2006/10/scientific-child-prodigy-guide.html

I also write of gifted education, child prodigy, child genius, adult genius, savant, megasavant, HELP University College, the Irish, the Malays, Singapore, Malaysia, IQ, intelligence and creativity.

My Internet Movie Database listing is at: http://imdb.com/name/nm3438598/
Ainan's IMDB listing is at http://imdb.com/name/nm3305973/
Syahidah's IMDB listing is at http://imdb.com/name/nm3463926/

Our editing, proofreading and copywriting company, Genghis Can, is at http://www.genghiscan.com/

This blog is copyright Valentine Cawley. Unauthorized duplication is prohibited. Use only with permission. Thank you.)

A need to understand art.

There is, I feel, a need to better understand art and the artist, in Malaysia. I have in mind one particular art - that of film-making. It is clear that, the powers that be, have an incomplete understanding of how this artform is created and what input the director makes. I shall explain.

Recently, Malaysia declared that it was going to change the law of censorship on film-making. In the future, films would no longer be subject to censorship after they were made - ie. which scenes would need to be cut, or altered in some way - no, soon films would be censored BEFORE they were made. I thought this both incredibly dangerous and motivated by a misunderstanding of how films are made.

Firstly, the danger is that films will be prevented from production, or have their scripts so forcibly altered that they lose some essential artistic or creative point that the director and writer were trying to make. This can weaken films considerably and push them over the edge into becoming failures as art, or even as items of commerce: it can destroy a film, to cut it, too much.

Secondly, this new initiative ignores the fact that the director has considerable input as to how a scene is rendered: something that seems offensive to sensitivities at the stage of the script (the new stage at which it would be cut), might, actually, once made, be done with taste and respect for the sensitivities of the public - it might, in actual fact, LOSE ITS OFFENSIVENESS, in the process of being filmed. It is impossible for the film censors to second guess the intention and viewpoint of the director. They cannot determine at the stage of the script whether a particular scene is going to offend or not, until it has actually been filmed and edited for viewing.

I understand why the censors might wish to edit at the stage of the script. They might feel it saves everyone time all around. A quick read of the script and they can prevent many days of film making time being wasted filming something which they would cut out, anyway. However, as I have pointed out, it is wrong-headed to jump to conclusions about what a film will look like, once shot, from the very preliminary stage of a script: much happens between script and cinema release, much that can completely change the character of what is seen.

I admit that I am somewhat puzzled that they wish to change a system of post filming, censorship, to one of pre-filming censorship. I am puzzled because it introduces an unnecessary inhibitory force into the film-making. It means that films will be stalled that would not have offended at all, had they actually been made - because the director would have made changes between script and film.

This failing of understanding about how films are made and how fluid the process is, is, no doubt, not restricted to Malaysia, but this is the first time I have personally noted this type of censorship in place. Perhaps it exists elsewhere, but, in reality, it should exist nowhere. It inhibits creativity and cannot be good for the nation of Malaysia, in any way. Yes, it will ensure that offensive films are never made - but, and this is a big but, it will also ensure that films that would NEVER HAVE BEEN offensive, once made, would have cuts made to them, that could be to the detriment of the artistic process and resultant films. This can only harm Malaysian film.

I do not know when these changes are to be implemented - but perhaps a rethink might be in order. Perhaps the fact that directors often make considerable changes from what is written on the page, should be taken into consideration and this new policy scrapped.

Then again, there is another reason why censorship should only come AFTER the film is made. That is because directors DO make considerable changes. Thus, a film which is NOT offensive on the page, could BECOME offensive, in the act of filming. Thus, censoring at the script stage makes NO SENSE AT ALL. It would mean that films that would have been inoffensive, get censored - and films that looked inoffensive on the page, get made and become offensive by the time they reach the screen.

The only time that makes logical sense to exert censorship is after the film has been shot and edited and is ready to present for screening. At this point, the film should be viewed and any sensitive scenes reviewed, cut or edited once more. Any other policy is built on a lack of insight into the film making process.

I hope, therefore, that those in charge of this new initiative will take heed and implement a censorship process that pays heed to the realities of film-making.


(If you would like to learn more of Ainan Celeste Cawley, 10, or his gifted brothers, Fintan, 6 and Tiarnan, 4, this month, please go to:
http://scientific-child-prodigy.blogspot.com/2006/10/scientific-child-prodigy-guide.html

I also write of gifted education, child prodigy, child genius, adult genius, savant, megasavant, HELP University College, the Irish, the Malays, Singapore, Malaysia, IQ, intelligence and creativity.

My Internet Movie Database listing is at: http://imdb.com/name/nm3438598/
Ainan's IMDB listing is at http://imdb.com/name/nm3305973/
Syahidah's IMDB listing is at http://imdb.com/name/nm3463926/

Our editing, proofreading and copywriting company, Genghis Can, is at http://www.genghiscan.com/

This blog is copyright Valentine Cawley. Unauthorized duplication is prohibited. Use only with permission. Thank you.)