2008 Creative Workshop

March 17-18, 2008

Pathways is always finding ways of making the learning experience meaningful and yet fun. Recently, a Creative Workshop was conducted from March 17 to 18, 2008 at the centre itself. This is the first time Pathways is organizing an all-in-one package activity which comprises dancing, singing and speaking (sounds easy but actually it is not easy to speak in front of the public). That’s why we name it as ‘creative workshop’.

The workshop started with registration and briefing by Ms Peace, the person in-charge for this whole workshop. It was followed by an opening speech from Mr Allan Yong representing Pathways to welcome all the participants. A games session was led by Mr Jasper as an ice-breaker for all the participants.

The very first workshop of the day is ‘dancing’ led by a dancing enthusiasts, Khai Yih. He taught us the history of Hip Hop, where it started and how it started. ‘Street dancing’ actually came from Brooklyn near New York City. Most of the people there are blacks and Mexican. They are very poor, the only entertainment they have is strolling around the street. Naturally hip hop dance was created. I guess many of us do not know why hip hop dancers like to wear big t-shirt which does not fit the size of their body and baggy jeans. This is because they are very poor; they have no money to buy new clothes. So in order to save money, they will buy t-shirt with bigger size so that they can wear for a very long time to come. They will also give their clothes to their younger siblings so that they can wear too. Sooner or later this became a trend in the area and in the hip hop dance. Of which most of the hip hop dancers are born in this area. After all the theory, it is time to do some practical work; many of us were first timers to try out the hip hop dance. Khai Yih did lots of movements which were very complicated and not easy to learn up due to time and space limitation.

Another highlight of the workshop was a talk by a Disc Jockey (DJ) from 988 to give a talk on what DJ is all about. He is Jeff from FM988. In this section, everybody learns how to speak fluently assuming we are in the studio. We were also taught how to speak according to the nature of the song that’s going to be broadcast. A few games were played that aims to test our reaction to see how fast we can reply to what other people ask.

Last but not least, another section conducted by Mr Yee Weng Kim who is a music composer. He taught us how to sing correctly and beautifully. The day ended with each squad given a task to think of what to perform on the final day. On the second day, as usual the workshop started at 10am with games led by Ms Shirley, after games, all the squad were given 3 hours to prepare for their performance. Competition started at 2pm, the judges of the day were Yew Yen Teng, a Malaysian singer and Mr Yee Weng Kim, a music composer. The 1st squad performed a song named ‘You are a song in my heart’ followed by 2nd squad performing a live band with the song call ‘Chow Da Xia’ by Jay Chou. The last squad performed a dance; their theme song is ‘My Hump’ by Black Eyed Peas. At the end of it all, the judges gave their opinions to all the squads. The creative workshop ended with a prize giving ceremony with squad WSC emerging as the champion.