guyofthetower

These forecasts are unreliable vis a vis precise timings, but the gist is usually fairly accurate - check Sunday night

SaturdayMostly cloudy. Areas of fog early. High of 31°C and humid. Winds less than 5 km/h. Chance of rain 50% with rainfall amounts near 1 mm.

Saturday NightMostly cloudy with a chance of a thunderstorm in the evening and thunderstorms in the morning. Low of 23°C and humid. Winds less than 5 km/h. Chance of rain 60% with rainfall amounts near 6 mm.

SundayMostly cloudy with a chance of a thunderstorm. High of 30°C and humid. Winds less than 5 km/h. Chance of rain 80% with rainfall amounts near 6 mm.

Sunday NightMostly cloudy with thunderstorms in the evening and a chance of rain in the morning. Low of 22°C and humid. Winds from the NW at 10 km/h. Chance of rain 80% with rainfall amounts near 37 mm.

From:

http://www.wundergro...ions/48327.html

Water is now receding at my house - South of Mahidol in Sirriwattana, Nong Hoi. The river is now wel below 4.60m so I hope this means the general zone 7 area will start to drain off.

Had a call from a friend in Tha Sala, he's deep under water.

Good to here it! However, I have just done a recce: water at 89 Plaza more than yesterday and moving South ie increasing. This water is from back-flooding through drains. Likewise the water south of the inner ring road up to the west side of the old CM-Lamphun rd 106 - higher than yesterday still.

Also there is an emergency supplies checkpoint a couple of hundred meters south of 89 Plaza on the left (red flashing light), boxes of Pad Krapao, candles, water etc; anyone out there with a big truck and time on their hands who doesn't mind driving through floods would be more than welcome to help distribute stuff.

4.84 / 806.

Seems to be ramping up again...extra 10m3 per sec over last hour, 5ms previous hour.

Ignore that, flow's being rounded in 5m3 increments.

Are you sure? It looks like that for Nawarat, but not San Sai?

Mae Ping Villa / Imperial Sports Club: River has risen aabout 5cm over past 1.5 hrs. Very soon to break banks here.

You might just be OK, it's been going down at San Sai the last three hours.

Good Luck!

This is the next typhoon following Nesat. It's tracking farther south, and it sort of looks like about the same track as TS Haitang, whose remnants are causing the rain in northern Thailand now.

http://www.usno.navy...ings/wp2211.gif

Way back somewhere towards the beginning of this thread, someone (lightly) lampooned a high-ranking Thai Hydro official for saying that the water levels should return to normal/flood dangers be passed by around November 15th

This makes sense. Both this and Nesat could (I would hazard 'are likely to') dump a lot of water (around) here; weather systems like this are what cause most of our extreme (wet & windy) weather.

Why cant people - westerners? - simply take the advice of Thais who are almost certainly more knowledgeable and better educated in this field than they are?

(I apologise to any posting satirical western meteorologists out there)

BTW, as this thread is for info, my point is - expect turbulence till the 15th. The Thai MET said so, not me!

Water level rising again at Nawarat, still rising at San Sai (slowing)

To answer your actual question, no that certainly does not happen in BKK or Pattaya. Sure you buy the drink in lieu of her company and time of which she gets a cut from the bar, but have never heard of the bar charging an extra 40 baht for each drink. And 120 baht is about right in most places like that.

'in lieu' means 'instead of', I think you meant to say something like 'in exchange for'.

Did not realise mods were here to correct my poor use of the English language, I do apologise

It's French...

Point 1 is correct. Due to issues beyond the school's control, one member of staff left in September/October. This member of staff is being covered by another western teacher. Another teacher, with full US teaching credentials, will be joining the annexe in January to replace the teacher who left.

Point 2 is incorrect. No Thai teachers are stepping in for western teachers. Thai teachers teach Thai language (at native speaker level as well as beginner and intermediate level) and one and a half hours of Thai culture a week. This complies with the MoE requirements.

Point 3 is incorrect. The students study with a teacher for the full compliment of forty 50 minute periods a week. There are no study periods.

Goodness, CMGossip, what an axe you have to grind!

So, they are replacing one teacher, and have a stand in who doesn't have all the paperwork, but who has been carefully selected we would hope. So no big deal there? Actually, it does seem rather strange, and may raise questions about overall management; as I understand it there are a number of teachers in the EP and ESL programmes at Varee with Masters degrees in Education and/or QTS (qualified teacher status) in their own country. Surely they could be covering this position??

I have been very impressed by Varee and all the students I have met from there. The two children aged 10 and 12 next door speak ecellent English, seem well educated and are 100% Thai and learnt all their English at Varee.

It is also pretty much in Chiang Mai with excellent travel access.

Would Varee not be worth considering?

Iain

Yes, if you are happy with a bilingual curriculum which will be weak either in English or in Thai. Bilingual schools produce "hybrids" weak in the literature and language of one language or the other.

As well, yes, Varee does have some caring (and many, many uncertified farang teachers and a lovely physical plant), but the classes are very large and there are limited resources for children with special needs.

Bilingual schools are a "new" concept in town which probably won't be as successful educationally as one would wish.

In the end,it makes a huge difference what is done in the home regardless of the school!!

I realise that tis was posted over a year ago, but have noted Mapguy's dissing of bilingual education generally, and Varee particularly, on a number of threads. The claim that bilingual schools produce hybrids weak in one or other language is simply not supported by the peer-reviewed research reported in the relevant academic literature; indeed, there is much evidence that a bilingual education is beneficial to both languages and content subjects (don't take my word for it, check out Do Coyle or John Marsh for example. Of course that has to be a GOOD bilingual education.

As for teachers accredited in their own countries, you will only find anything close to 100% of these in the international schools: that is what you pay for! Varee probably has more than most bilingual/English Program schools such as Montfort, Wichai Wittayalai etc,, but you don't get many full QTS teachers working for B30,000 a month, which is what most of these schools pay. International schools pay double or more, and so their fees are double or more. Varee ESL programme is around B40K/year, EP around B90K/year, Prem is ...???

In the case of paper qualifications, you get what you pay for. In terms of quality education, not necessarily. Some of the worst teachers I have seen over here are highly experienced qualified teachers back in the States, but incapable of teaching kids in a second language - not a problem if you are American expats, but if you are looking for a good education for your look kreung or are not an English first language family, something to be very aware of.