A Tale of Two Brothers

Many years ago – and I am really talking about a long time ago – as in the Year 2007 to 2008 that kind of long time ago, I had the fortune (or misfortune) of tutoring two brothers in their home.

As a side note, I no longer do private tuition, so quit asking. I really can’t get used to the constant switching of environments. On top of that, students are in their own homes, which means ~ drum roll please ~ they are the kings of our “learning pods”, so to speak (it’s technically not a classroom, even if some homes come equipped with whiteboards and all that stuff). It’s hard to maintain control, and the tutor has been relegated to some kind of servant, catering to the whims and fancies of those who are supposed to learn.

Let’s Start with the Older Brother

The older brother was really smart. Smart in the sense that he was quick to comprehend, was able to remember and recall concepts taught, and capable of applying what was taught to him ~ in most cases. If you didn’t half suspect, he was good in his math and sciences, but English ~~~ he was far from hopeless, but he couldn’t replicate the successes which he could so easily achieve in the former two.

Being the smart and smarter one, he was full of angst against the perceived lack of a system in the English language.

That said, he was willing to try really hard, and always trying to crack that secret code to the holy grail to that A1 in O Level English.

To cut the long story short, he scored a B3 for the O Level English exam.

Nothing great, but not too bad either.

And he achieved an A1 for all his Math and Sciences. He was a triple-science student.

Now to the Younger Brother

The younger brother was a totally different story altogether.

Somehow, he just couldn’t get it.

No matter how hard I explained stuff, he had some kind of mental blockage against what I was teaching.

The lack of comprehension was obvious on his face, and when I checked his understanding, it was obvious that he couldn’t get me at all.

And the vicious cycle begins.

I would try another way to elaborate, and because this was a new form of elaboration, he couldn’t get the new elaboration, leading to further confusion, and I would try harder to explain, and we were on a perpetual downward spiral into the abyss of destruction.

It was frustrating, to say the least.

That frustration would be reflected in the tone of my voice, the kind of words that I utilised while interacting with him, and definitely in the way I viewed him in my mind.

To cut the long story short, I saw him as hopeless – at least in our English endeavours –  and I had every reason to believe it to be so.

To my readers out there, if you think that I am a heartless cad of any kind, you are probably right. In many ways, I believe in outright honesty. I don’t believe in false hope, and I definitely don’t believe in giving false hope. I am a product of my time, and in my time, we believe in calling a rose a rose, a spade a spade.

So what am I? I am a heartless cad, who’s inconsiderate towards others’ feelings. I am also a heartless cad, who’s inconsiderate towards my own feelings.

Laughing 30 Minutes Later

But one of those things I really found baffling was him laughing at my jokes about half an hour later.

Once again, I wasn’t too nice about it.

For quite a while, I actually thought he was out to irritate me. I mean, who laughs at a joke about 30 to 40 minutes later.

It was only much later that I realised he was only able to fully process my jokes about 30 minutes later.

And that was the crux of his learning problem.

The inability to process.

In computing language, we would say that his Central Processing Unit (CPU) had very limited powers. He couldn’t compute in time, and if I introduced another task, he would be overwhelmed, since his Random Access Memory (RAM) was probably 8MB (😂). To add the icing to the cake, he probably had no Hard Disk (NVMe SSDs are the latest at the point of writing, but we probably don’t have to talk about it, since he had no Hard Disk anyway) and couldn’t recall – for nuts – what I taught him just now, let’s not talk about last week.

“Your Boy is Slow.”

Whether as teachers or tutors, one of the suckiest jobs that we have to do is to break bad news to the parents.

I mean, we all know that teachers are harbingers of bad news.

Look back into your own life.

When the teachers called, what was it about?

It’s probably a complaint about the kid not doing his or her homework, fighting in school, being disrespectful, playing truant etc.

So when I had a talk with the boy’s mum, I had to break the bad news.

“Your boy is slow.”

“I have always known that.” the mum replied, as a matter of factly.

Mum knows best. Definitely true in this case.

Fish to the Rescue

Having been the editor of a (complementary)(not complimentary) health magazine (Now defunct. The age of printed magazines is over.), I have pored through tonnes and tonnes of articles about how fish – in general – is good for our intelligence.

The bulk of the research – at least at that point in time – was inconclusive, but the results were promising.

In addition to the research publications that I had read, I had also watched a documentary on the benefits of fish on children’s intelligence, by BBC Studios.

(Video is grainy because it’s a bit too old.)

The fish oil in fish is rich in omega-3 fatty acids, which are essential for brain health and function.

According to quite a few studies, omega-3 fatty acids can enhance learning and cognition.

How Omega-3 Fatty Acids Improve Learning and Retention

This next part is written with the help of AI. As a 52-year-old writing this, I am way too lazy to pore through the latest research in fish oil, so I will simply trust that my Microsoft Copilot is doing a good job amalgamating the best research done on fish oil.

Readers are advised to practise discretion reading the next section.

Several studies have shown that omega-3 fatty acids can improve cognitive abilities such as verbal memory, working memory, reasoning, and processing speed in adolescents.

Omega-3 fatty acids can also increase the levels of brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF), a protein that promotes the growth and survival of neurons and synapses in the brain. BDNF is important for learning and memory formation, and can also protect against neurodegeneration and cognitive decline.

The best part of omega-3 fatty acids is that it can improve your child’s mood and mental health. You know how your teenage child can become angsty and moody at times?

Well. No promises, but studies have shown that omega-3 fatty acids can help regulate mood and emotions by modulating the activity of neurotransmitters such as serotonin and dopamine, which are involved in happiness and motivation.

Omega-3 fatty acids can also reduce the symptoms of depression and anxiety by lowering the levels of cortisol, a stress hormone that can impair brain function and mood.

Some studies have even gone as far as to suggest that omega-3 fatty acids can prevent or treat psychiatric disorders such as bipolar disorder and schizophrenia in adolescents.

End of AI-influenced writing.

Let me repeat: no promises.

You can search online for the latest studies on the topic, and we all know the problem of research.

One study will say one thing, and another study will say the reverse.

I am only presenting what I have read.

Back to the Boy

With the information I had in my head at that point in time, I boldly suggested to the mum that she should perhaps try fish oil on her son.

She had some reservations at first, and was quick to refute my suggestion with her age–old wisdom about fish, which I rapidly addressed (aka rebutted), thanks to my extensive reading (at that point in time) about fish oil.

In 2008 – yes, that was the year when this occurred – the only brand of supplements that I knew about (or rather, the brand that I could most easily recall) was GNC.

So I (based on what I had read) told the mum to buy the 1000 mg version of fish oil from GNC, and to feed the boy just one capsule per day.

I didn’t think too much about this incident after that, since ~ well ~ it’s just one of the many conversations about children with their parents.

“You Actually Understand What I am Saying?”

A few months went by without much ado.

I was still cracking my inane jokes (yeah, my students know all about my inane jokes) when I realised, I was cracking jokes without much ado.

I wasn’t irritated anymore, because…the boy actually understood my jokes.

He was laughing hysterically instantly (Trust me, I can be quite funny.) and when I asked him what he was laughing about, he was able to paraphrase my jokes, identify the essence of the funny part and even suggest parallels to my jokes (yes, that’s how I check understanding).

And that was also when I realised, this boy could now recall stuff, something that was non-existent during the earlier days of our tutor- student relationship.

That was when I asked,

“You actually understand what I am saying?”

“Why not?” the boy replied, nonchalantly, an attitude he never really had, prior (he had been too stressed out to be nonchalant).

3 Capsules of 1000 mg of Fish Oil Every Day

Curious about what was going on, I asked the mum what she had done, since the boy was ostensibly showing improvement in his learning, recall and cognitive abilities.

I had totally forgotten about my fish oil-recommendation.

Because I talk too much. When I talk too much, I forget what I have said earlier.

That was when the mum said,

“You told me to feed him fish oil. I followed your suggestion and did just that. But since my boy is so stupid (she used the ‘s’ word; I didn’t), I feed him not one, but 3 capsules a day.”

3 capsules of fish oil, each containing 1000 mg of that fishy substance.

I definitely didn’t – and still won’t – recommend that.

At that point in time, in the late 2000s, and if I remember correctly, there was this fear of mercury-poisoning from consuming too much fish oil supplements, especially if it came from a low-quality manufacturer (yeah, that’s what I would call them).

Today, there’s still that risk of mercury-poisoning if we consume too much fish (not fish oil), since our oceans are badly polluted by our (yes, our) reckless behaviour.

Today, we also know that fish oil supplements typically do not contain mercury, and that our fears in the 2000s were hugely unfounded.

But consuming 3000 mg of fish oil every day?

I don’t know what you call this; I call this an overdose.

I tried to get the mum to chillax on the fish oil. But like a convert to a new religion, she was hardcore about this magic cure.

She continued with her 3x dosage.

The Devil Grows His Horns

About one or two months after the “overdose” revelation, the mum came up with a strange complaint.

The younger – and at one point in time slower – brother was getting nastier by the day.

He was cooking up ploys to irritate his mother and deriving undue satisfaction from his accomplishments.

And that was when the mum lamented.

At one point in time, she wondered how her two sons were so different.

The older brother was smart but nasty, and in every sense of the word, disrespectful towards the mum.

The younger one – though slower – was of a milder and more pleasant disposition, and so she comforted herself: God is fair and gives some, takes some.

Now that she had solved the problem of the younger one being slower, she was facing the problem of having to square off two devilish teenage sons at home.

She also had a depressing epiphany: the younger one was NEVER pleasant at all. He was just slower, which kept his nasty behaviour in check, since his brains couldn’t process fast enough to come up with an effective enough ploy to irritate his mother.

Now that his CPU had been upgraded (possibly his RAM too), he could easily – in today’s lingo – write a code to irritate his mum.

Which brings us to the old age: be careful of what you wish for, because you might just get it.

In this case, the mum got way more than what she had wished for.

And After All That’s Said and Done

The whole process of the boy starting on his fish oil to the point where he grew his horns took about three months in total.

What happened after that, I really don’t know, since the elder brother had finished his O-Levels while the younger one ~ well ~ he didn’t need me anymore since he believed – and the mum also did – that he could handle English on his own.

(I have a bugbear about how parents and students treat English as a disposable subject, but that’s cannon fodder for another topic that I will write about.)

So I wouldn’t know if the younger boy actually grew real horns and started on his evil plan to dominate the whole world.

But the older boy scored a B3 (not great, but not bad either, for someone who disputed almost everything I had to say about reading and writing) and went on to study at a premier junior college. (Hint: around Bukit Timah.)

Disclaimer

So will fish oil work as well for your child? Like how it worked for this younger boy, who probably had an overdose.

I am not sure.

The research seems to point to tangible benefits, even if such results are – by and large – inconclusive.

Fish oil – in general – seems to have multiple benefits for the heart, eyes and – (ahem!) for men concerned about their virility – sperm health.

As with everything we want to put into our mouths on a regular basis, it is best to consult a doctor before we even begin to venture into such unchartered territories.

And please use your common sense. If your child is allergic to fish (like me), fish oil is (of course) a no-no!

And please! Not 3000 mg. Follow the instructions on the bottle!

As with everything we want to put into our mouths on a regular basis, it is best to consult a doctor before we even begin to venture into such unchartered territories.

And please use your common sense. If your child is allergic to fish (like me), fish oil is (of course) a no-no!

Fish Oil and the O Levels – Where to Buy Fish Oil Supplements to Boost My Teen’s O Level English and Other Subjects

Other than your trusty pharmacies (especially for those who reside in Singapore) that carry a letter ‘W’ and ‘G’ in their names, you can acquire them through the links below.

I am sticking to the GNC brand, which has somehow been rebranded to LAC.

Lazada: https://s.lazada.sg/s.1yPUO?cc

Shopee: https://s.shopee.sg/8pSLi2gxZH

I am both a Lazada and Shopee affiliate.

Of the two, I prefer Lazada to Shopee, because the formal naturally offers a better deal, sans the bells and whistles i.e. without all the complications of vouchers and discount codes. 

Buying through my links won’t increase the prices of the products in any way, but will go a long way in keeping this site going.

I earn a small commission from qualifying purchases, which allows me to pay for the services necessary to keep this website up most of the time.

Once again, here are the links:

Thanks for reading this rather lengthy post.

Till the next time, stay healthy! And stay fishy!