Works

WORKS Teaching is not a lost art, but the regard for it is a lost tradition. ~Jacques Barzun 

//Once upon a time, a very long long time ago in a far off place//... to **Present** (Chung Wah Kung Fu)

My first time ever 'teaching' was part of a martial arts school. Their long term goal is the pass on the knowledge. The senior students would teach the junior student and new students. Every other class a senior student would be chosen to lead the class warm up. It didn't make sense at the time, I was scared, nervous and I had to lead by example. I did the warm up flawlessly, or else there was no incentive for my peers to follow my lead.

Summer of **Y2K** +1 **(2001)** (Markham Summer Camps)

The digital world didn't come to a spectacular end. I joined a teen summer camp leadership placement program. They call it //leader in training// (LIT). After the training session, I'm placed in a summer camp for two weeks as a volunteer. Little kids are cute, its like watching real life teletubbies running around doing all sorts of shenanigans. It was a race to see who can outlast the other in energy consumption. I survived and came out with a lot of tips and hints for future reference. Life is simple.

Summer of 03' (**2003**) (Hilltop Summer Camp)

This is thee quickest way to complete 40h of community service in order to graduate from High School. I applied for a one month volunteer position at a summer camp. It was an introduction to ResourceManagement101. "Mr. Wilfred, how come I only get two slices of pizza?", "I ran out of water.", "Can we (5 kids) go to the washroom?"...etc. Extra manpower was scarce but we managed to build up our of volunteer pride. I found my voice. I can project commands across the field without a megaphone or a whistle. Epiphany of the summer. //Ah, so that's how they do it.//

Spring of 05' (**2005** - **Present**) **- Promotion** (Chung Wah Kung Fu)

Remember that Kung Fu school I was talking about? I continued to partake in Kung Fu all these years and saw the number of assistant instructors dwindling. I stepped up and was given permission to began training the next generation of martial artists. What was taught to me, was taught to them. Here I learned silent instructions. If the hands are too low, move it up, if the hands are too high, move it down. If they are slacking, look their way. Body language is a very powerful tool of communication. //If looks could kill...//

Christmas of 05' (**2005** - **2009**) **- Career Change** (Costco Wholesale)

It was my last year of High School and decided to do a 180 and give retail a shot. I became really good at cashier. I began averaging 55-60 customers a minute at the checkout counter. Multitasking became second nature, chit-chat, scan, cash/debit/credit/check, change/sign, have a good day..etc. Cashing is awesome, interacting with people, and dealing with angry customers is always amusing. Angry customers are golden learning opportunities, a true test of wit and later on an epic bedtime story. Merchandising isn't that bad, just the graveyard shifts and the dust. Did marketing for awhile, selling Exec Costco cards and American express credit cards weren't my forte but I managed to get by. I'm not quite the sweet talker.

Summer of 07' (**2007**) (Abacus Brain Study)

A relaxing job that took up two hours a week and two days a week. I was the Kung Fu specialist teacher. I play around with my working knowledge of Kung Fu, building a nice two hour Kung Fu session for kids 6-13. This was the easy part. I had to work in a 4 by 7 meter room with support beam in the middle and an open folding table on the side. Till this day I'm still amazed at how I was able to fit 12 kids (at one point) and a volunteer in the room all doing Kung Fu without hitting each other. Lesson learned; I can work under extreme conditions.

Summer of 08' till now (**2008** - **Present**) (Smart Abacus Summer Camp) This is where my academic teaching started. Mornings I taught Math and English. In the afternoon I ran gym classes or Kung Fu. I taught from their curriculum adding my own sugar, spice and all that's nice to it. I eventually cracked the internet (found a way to access the school Wi-Fi) allowing our teaching to be full of awesome. Youtube, Wikipedia, KhanAcademy...etc are all undervalued academic resources.Even Facebook's Farmville teaches concepts in economic and resource management. The summer after (**09'**) I was the supervisor of the camp, performing the same role as last year except with a bit more responsibility. //Flashback//, remember the angry-customer-at-Costco experiences... I have to deal with angry-customers-at-Smart-Abacus. The difference is Costco is very black and white, its either I'm wrong (type wrong item), or they're not being reasonable (why is the line so long?). At a camp, I sit on the fence until I get facts and figure it out. I defend my councilors against unjust accusations (she isn't teaching my kid math) and direct confrontations, I will also address legitimate issues (how did my child get hurt?) and confront the councilor in charge as such. That is the basis of my added responsibilities a lot of extra paper work.

School Term of 08' till now (**2008** - **Present**) (Chinese Cultural Center) The expansion of my academic teaching. I begun running math classes for the organization. Working from their curriculum with addition of some personal works and creating my own exams for the students. I taught grades 6,7,8 and 11 throughout the past two years. In the process had to relearn grade 11 math and create harder material for the grade 8s. The challenge is learning to do math according to each student's methodology (multiple ways of performing long multiplication).