The First Two Days of IBDP Classes

I should get back to studying Econs, not that I have any homework but I've scanned through Psychology and since I now have a study guide of Econs, I want to read through quickly and decide whether it's really something interesting to me, because I'm taking it at HL, and we can switch anything in the first month or so (although I don't think I am, because I've thought this through.)

I think as the days go by I won't be posting very, very often because I have a feeling we're all going to be very, very busy, especially after the ECA recruitment drive today and I'm so overloaded with all the clubs. :/

But yeah, I've scheduled some posts written during those days before IB started for this whole month, so you should still see me pretty active here (even though not actually writing now).

Anyway, this is about the first two days (sorry! I know I should have written this earlier but seriously I'm just too sleepy after classes and I've still got to look for dinner and stuff.) of classes and even though I haven't met all of the lecturers yet (still have Biology and Malaysian Studies) but I think I'd better write this now because I'm worried that I might not have the time later.

On Day 1 (which is Thursday), I had only three classes in the morning, (which is also why it's my favourite day). Psychology and double English. Psych lecturer, Ms Priscilla, is nice and a little strict at the same time (stricter than the other lecturers, that is). I think all we have to do is not to get on her bad side, that's all. :)

We had an introduction game and slideshow of the syllabus that we're going to cover. Even though the whole Psych textbook is infinitely interesting, we have to choose options. For the sake of everyone's sanity, it was decided that Health Psych and Sport Psych will be done for HL students and one of them for SL. I so want to do Abnormal Psych (and even the other two options) but it's more complicated and well, all of us need a good grade. I might try doing Abnormal after I've covered everything and have the time to go through it. :)

We're not studying Hamlet though. We have Romeo and Juliet instead.

English Lit was interesting as well, with an experienced Ms Navina as our HL lecturer. The funny part is that everyone came asking us if she's fierce after the class. She was pretty chill during the class though, not fierce but serious about stuff. We had introductory slides, introduced ourselves, sorted out which books we're going to read first, which books are for internal assessments and which are for final exams, and pretty much had a discussion on English Lit.

And that's all for that day.

Day 2: I have five classes for Friday. TOK, French, Econs, Psychology and Maths.

TOK: Ms Loh, who is kinda funny but since it's the introduction + early morning, I was a bit sleepy. It'll be better when we start TOK discussions.

French: Mademoiselle Yong, who is really interesting. She conducted the class mostly in French and waving hands to carry the message across, so we had to sorta guess what she wanted (like to repeat, or to switch roles, etc).

Econs: Mr Lim. Very, very chill who made it clear that he didn't mind anything (which loosely translates to we're 100% responsible for our attitude and he's not going to scold/get angry etc). But he's nice during the first class. :)

We had our ECA recruitment drive then, since we had an accelerated timetable. I signed up for some clubs (will talk about that in another post) and perhaps went overboard with the number of clubs. :/

After that it was Psych, we watched videos on psychiatry (which are very disturbing but brutally honest) and had a discussion about it. To be honest I love studying that way, discussions about topics with everyone having a chance to say something about it and the lecturer explaining more about it. You don't get that back in high school. In high school, there were 40 students in a class and basically the teacher just talks, makes us copy notes and gives homework.

In my Psych class, there are just 8 students. LOL.

Went back to the condo to get my Math book, for the last class. I was pretty tired and very sleepy by then (I went to sleep right after I got back to my room) and wasn't very engaged during the class. The lecturer is Ms Jasmine and she's okay, but it is sorta hard to get a picture because there are seriously only 3 of us. =.=”””

Because it's Math SL and a lot of us are taking HL.

I am personally thinking that everyone underestimate Math HL. It's not as easy like Add Math in SPM. It's really tough like what most of the seniors and superseniors said. You have to love Math and is up for the challenge. Many of the HL students came out looking blank after the first class.

I'm not taking Math HL because you have to be capable of really understanding it. I'm not afraid, but I'd have to do a huge amount of practice questions because I'm not naturally inclined in Math, and in general I don't like Math (translating to I won't voluntarily do Math questions everyday, you'll have to point a gun at me to get me to do them regularly). Firstly, I don't want to get a bad grade at HL when I can get a much better one at SL, secondly, I don't want to focus too much on Math and stressing over it and causing me to ignore my other subjects which are equally important, and thirdly, most importantly, Math HL is not a pre-requisite for any of the degrees I'm considering.

I've asked around (lecturer, seniors, etc) and generally if you get an A+ for your SPM Add Math, you have no problem getting a good grade for Math SL. According to them, there isn't anything totally new in Math SL, and I would have studied much of everything in the syllabus and especially the basic stuff. So basically it's just refreshing on Add Math with perhaps more difficulty but no new alien concepts to learn. That is a very encouraging thing to hear because the same people have been scaring everyone with their Math-HL-Is-Very-Tough talk.

And which means I won't have to stress so much over Math (and I thought I'd have gotten rid of it after high school!) and can concentrate on other (more interesting) subjects and still have a good grade in view. :)

Maybe we'll see more classmates after a few weeks haha. ;)

That's all for now, I should get back to my book. 

(not a nerd but I seriously should start studying a bit before I am overloaded with activities, or else I won't be able to catch up.) :)

Love,