Switzerland, here I come

I'm at the airport now.
Destination Switzerland.
Will be there for 11 days.

Bon voyage,
Pei Yan

What I gave to my kids.

Today marks the end of my teaching practicum.
The 10 weeks passes so quickly.
To "thank" the students for their cooperations and fun times, some of the practicum teachers decided to do something for our students.
It was tough to think of what things to get or make for them as we do not want to have any repetition of gifts.

Since my sec 1 girls loved my cat images so much, I decided to print one for each of them.
Like wise, I thought that it would be an interesting gift to give them one of my photography works.
So...
My sec 1 got my pretty cat,
sec 2 received my silhouette taken at the top jejawi tower at chek jawa,
and sec 3 received a sunset image.

The set my sec 1s and 3s got looks like this.

It comprises of a name sticker and a photo.
Behind the photo is a little message written by me (thought it's standard wordings for all).

I'm sure the girls are touched by the little gesture from me, just like the little notes they wrote for me.
Similarly, I did the same thing for my two co-operating teachers (forgot to take pictures of them).
Thank you for making my practicum a memorable one.
Don't worry, I'm coming back.

Hugs,
Peiyan

What the kids gave me.

What do lovely kids do in class?
They write notes during my lessons and secretly place them in my marker box (thought I strongly disprove them of doing so).
Never thought that a simple post-it can be so useful under the creativity of my sec 3 math girls.
Most of the time when I walk back to change a marker, there will be a note place in my marker box.
Out of class, I enjoyed reading their little notes and they are so lovely and beautiful.


This is the very first piece that I got from my student.
Actually, she recycled a piece of paper that she has written wrongly on the other side.

These came in bits and pieces.
SInce most of them are post-it, I have decided to stick them onto a piece of paper and keep them in a plastic folder.

All of the "little" (some not so little) notes are pasted on my table's wall.

Lovely notes,
Peiyan

The 5 faces of cybercrime

While browsing through the newspaper in the staff lounge, I came across this headline on the front page of Straits Times' Digital Life.
Being curious of what the headline meant by "5 faces of cybercrime", I read through the Digital Life (my favourite section) and reach the article.
The article is presented in a form of illustration.


Each of the 5 kinds of cybercrime mentioned in the article is explained using drawings with a short description.
As you can see, the drawings tend to exaggerate each type of cybercrime face.

Here's the description of the 5 faces of cybercrime:

1. Phisherman:
He runs websites like those of banks which look genuine right down to the logos and graphics except that they are bogus. He lies in wait for his victims to come to his site to give their account details and passwords that are typed in. He is the master of imitation.
2. Bot Herder:
This Herder looks after no ordinary cattle. He is the master of a botnet - a network of computers hacked so that they can be controlled remotely by this person. See him as the mercenary general of a huge army of slave soldiers.
3. Businessman:
He is a middleman. He may not be a techie - he buys tools from the Writer and hires the services of the Bot Herder. He may use the Spammer and Phisherman. He may even be part of organised crime. Compared to traditional crime, cybercrime has low overheads - no tattooed thugs to maintain. It makes good profit.
4. Writer:
This hacker churns out new viruses, worms, spyware or trojans. Like good software firms, he offers support so that his malware will be updated to evade detection. The Writer creates for the Dark Side.
5. Spammer:
He works for the Phishermen and drives victims to phishing sites. He sends out masses of e-mail messages or instant messaging (spam). He monitors Google Trends and tailors his messages to the hottest topics. The Spammer appeals to your curiosity. Want to know more? Click this link. And - wham - you are on a phishing or malware-laden site.

The use of illustrations helps to drive the meaning across to the readers. However the drawings may portray a different degree of interpretation as compared to text as some are just literal translation of the types' heading.

This article brings the understanding level of cybercrime a notch higher. People usually relate cybercrime with spams, pornography, cyber harassment... etc. With this article, a deeper understanding of the spamming and cyber virus network is exposed.

Interesting article it is.

Understand cybercrime,

Peiyan

My work table (Update)

Here's an update of my table.
There are more things on my wall now after my students started to "secretly" place notes in my marker box.
I treasure these things and did not throw them away (they are beautiful too).


On the shelves side sits my books, files, papers, paper puncher and clips.
The little cupboard keeps my bag, plastic folders, thumbdrives, mobile broadband stick and mouse.
The table hold my students' homework, marker box, VGA cable and tissue box.


I love my table,
Peiyan