If it is a bit too small to read my screen capture. Here is the email typed out

Dear Adam,

It has been a while since I graduated from IAG program in June 2006 in Jakarta, Indonesia. During the program, a lot of things happened and some of them have changed the way I think and behave. The program has shaped me into a better person. I forced myself to be more confident, more persistent, more friendly and also more hardworking. Since that time, I have taken so many actions as what you have told us to do in the camp. I set my goal to become an all-rounded person in the school, who is not known as a geek but can top the class at the same time.

In year 2007, I finished my year 10 as the 2nd best student in the class and was admitted to join the natural science class at SMAK 1 PENABUR Jakarta. In year 11, I found that everyone was very good academically and non-academically. I slipped off from the top of the class and moved out from the top 5 position in the class. This, however, didn’t put me off. I learned from my experience and climbed back in my year 12. I graduated from the high school with flying colours, 2nd best student in the class, top 5% of the batch, and scored high marks in my final exams.

Since secondary school, my dream is to become an engineer and therefore, I applied for engineering course in the university. Luckily, my parents are able to support me financially to study overseas. I applied to universities in the USA and Canada. However, none of the universities can change my goal to study in the UK. As an Indonesian scholar, I can’t enter the UK universities with my Indonesian High School certificate. I was required to take A-level or IB or foundation programme, which is basically redoing what I have done in high school. But of course, to achieve goals, we need to take action. I decided to take the bet of losing time (A level programme takes 2 years) and US/Canada university opportunities and flew to the UK to do my A level in one of the international school in Cambridge, UK.

After a while, I found that even though the course is equivalent with my high school, but I still learned a lot of new stuff here. We were never taught about how to write a proper essay in Indonesia. Here in the UK, I was taught and forced to write essay, making me more ready to enter the university life. I also decided not to miss anymore opportunities offered to me. I joined the Student Representative Committee, the College Newsletter team in the college and joined the Indonesian Student Society under the Indonesian Embassy in the UK. At the end of my 1st year in A Level, I was chosen by the college to receive a scholarship for my 2nd year course due to my outstanding A level results. When I graduated from the college, I was awarded the Student of the year award by the college by achieving 4A*s and 1A in my A level together with an offer from University of Cambridge to read engineering.

Now, here I am, currently studying engineering at one of the best university in the world and many thanks to the camp and the trainers, who actually shaped me into the person who I am right now. To look back, such achievements are amazing, yet I shouldn’t be contented with these achievements. I am now looking forward to become one of the leading engineer and businessman in the field of renewable energy and manufacturing. Please wish me luck!

I hope all AKLTG staffs are doing well and I miss their training. I wish I can join the training session again as a trainer in the future if there are opportunities.

Warmest regards,
Kevin S. Widjaja
IAG Alumni 2006

As a parent of two daughters myself, I can understand how stressful it can be when our children do not perform up to their highest potential. Deep down inside, we know that our kids are intelligent and have the potential to do so much better. The trouble is that sometimes, they may lack the self-confidence, motivation and right learning skills to score the distinctions that they deserve. It is truly amazing how much improvement children can make and how successful they can become once they learn the right mindsets and learning skills to make learning easy and fun.

Out of the many programmes that I teach (i.e. Leadership, Investing, business, NLP etc…), the one that I continue to enjoy the most is teaching students (aged 10-19) through my “I Am Gifted!” holiday programme and subsequently teaching their parents (through my Successful Parenting Workshops) to reinforce their learnings. The reason is because I have discovered that when children learn the powerful techniques of goal setting, time management, personal mastery, exam skills, speed reading etc…. at such a young age, it will give them a tremendous head start in life. It was these powerful ideas and super learning techniques that turned my life around 180 degrees 24 years ago when I was aged 13. For that, I will be forever indebted to my own mentor Ernest Wong.

I thought I would share with you some powerful ideas that I deliver to parents through my ‘I Am Gifted!’ Introductory Workshops in the videos below. A big thank you to my corporate parter OCBC bank for sponsoring this talk. You can watch the entire session on youtube as well. Enjoy my friends!

Ever since then, she has been taking A4 paper and writing her own very very very short books (4 pages) with pictures that illustrate her story. Of course, what she writes is not original. Basically, she is plagiarizing ideas from the many children’s books she has read (e.g. Snow White, Little Red Riding Hood etc…). She mixes and meshes the stories together. She may or may not become a writer in the future, but it makes me proud to see her having a passion for something and taking action towards. It is this attitude that I have always wished for my children.

However, what makes me the most proud is not their intellectual development but their character development. They have grown up to be extremely caring, loving, appreciative and polite children. Whatever my wife serves for dinner, they would say, ‘thank you mummy for cooking dinner for us’. They thank her and thank me for fetching them around, buying things for them and cooking for them.

Every few days, they would draw cards for us telling us how much they love us and thanking us for what we do for them. This are some of the cards and paintings they have made for me.

I was very touched when my eldest daughter Kelly drew a card for my maid to thank her and to say ‘I love you’ to her. She had tears in her eyes when my daughter hugged her and gave her the card. This is the card my daughter made for our maid ‘Jagung’.

My two kids have also become very independent and self-disciplined. Whenever they come home from school, they will start to finish their homework automatically without being told. Before dinner, they will help to setup the utensils and the carry the food. After dinner, they will carry their plates back to the kitchen.

However, I must point out that all these attitudes and behaviours did not happen by chance. It is the result of their mother spending countless hours to guide them and shaping their character. I am really lucky to have a wife like her. It is not uncommon nowadays to see children and teens acting in a selfish and ungrateful manner. Some of them take their parents love for granted, even shouting back at them at times. One of my friend’s wife was recently diagnosed with kidney failure. She had to stop work and has been resting at home for the last 3 months. The sad thing is that her teenage children have not volunteered to help their mother at all. Even though the oldest son can drive, he is too busy with his hobbies to fetch his mother for dialysis treatment. The poor old women has to take a bus by herself. They would rather spend the time going out with their friends and even resent the fact that they get less pocket money now that mum can no longer work.

It is not uncommon to see some children and teens acting in a selfish manner and taking the things they have for granted. While we often blame them, my wife believes that their parents have just as much to blame as well. Respectful, grateful and kind children do not come about my accident. It is up the parents to teach them good values and to shape their behaviours from the time they are young- when they are easily moulded. Children may not always listen to what we say, but they will always learn by observing our behaviours. I also believe that our children learn to treat us by observing the way we treat OUR OWN parents. If we shout at our parents, disrespect them and don’t bother to visit them, our children will do the same things to US when we grow old. It is a kind of ‘Karma’ that comes full circle.

” There is no such thing as a bad student. Only bad teacher”- Mr. Miyagi (from the Karate Kid Movie)

Let me share some of the things that my wife has done over the years to mould my children’s character and to teach them the right values.

1) Teaching Respect for Elders
Many mums will serve their children the first piece of cake on their birthday. They believe that this is the way to show their love. We believe that by serving the first piece of cake to the kid, it may be cultivating the wrong values and mindsets. By treating the child like a ‘prince’ or ‘princess’, they will grow up thinking that the world owes them a living and think only of themselves, and not for others.
In our family, we teach our children to serve cake to all the elders first before eating their share.

2) Teaching them Gratitude
Many parents complain that their children are ungrateful. That no matter what they do for their kids, their kids only complain. What my wife and I believe is that we need to teach them to be grateful. We teach our children to thank their teachers, the maids, their grandparents and their parents (us). When I am away working overseas, my wife will tell them how I must work to earn the money to pay for the house, their school fees and their food. Every time I come home, I get a big hug from them. They then say ‘thank you for working for us.’

We also use the Internet as a resource to show them and teach them how the millions of children in poor countries are suffering without food, shelter and a proper family. We then tell them how lucky they are to have a chance to live in Singapore and be able to go to school. THis is why my kids never complain about going to school camp or doing homework.

3) Teaching them Self-Discipline
Whenever my kids come home from school, mum will always ask them to check the homework they have and to finish it as soon as possible without delay. When they make mistakes on tests, she will go through each one with them to make sure they learn from it. After her ‘coaching’, they have now formed the habit of doing it themselves.

If my own mother was like my wife, then I would never have got kicked out of school in primary three and never have become the lazy, unmotivated underachiever that I was in the past. That is why I think my kids are so lucky to have a full time mum. It does make a big difference. Then again, if I was a disciplined, motivated child to begin with, maybe I could not have become such a success story and have written by book ‘I Am Gifted, So Are You!’ So I guess everything happens for a reason.

4) Teaching them Responsibility and Self-Confidence
Although we have maids in my house, my wife tells my children to set the table and help to carry dishes from the kitchen to the dining table. When they are finished, they carry their plates to the sink. If they spill something on the floor, they are the ones to clean it up and not the maids. When we go out, they carry their own water bottles and bags. Our maids do not do it. This may seem to some like cruel child labour, but we believe that it teaches them to be independent and responsible. It also builds in them the self confidence that they can do things themselves. The best part is that they find it fun to do!

If you are a parent of young children yourself, I do hope you find my sharings useful.

After my ‘IAG Junior’, ‘IAG Senior’ and ‘IAG Foundation’ programmes became the leading personal development and learning skills in Singapore, I was invited to bring this life-changing programme to Jakarta in 2006. My partner, Susan Hartawan told me that the children and teenagers in Indonesia would greatly benefit from my teachings of whole brain learning techniques, personal mastery and leaderships skills. Many youths aspire to win scholarships to top universities but lack the motivation and learning skills to bring out the best in themselves.

At that time, I had my apprehensions. I was not sure if I could replicate the same success in Indonesia. After all, the students there may learn different subjects, have different beliefs/values and have very different problems. Of course, the big obstacle was language. Most students are taught in Bahasa Indonesia and my camp was in English. Nevertheless, I decided to give it my very best!

When I conducted my very first camp, I was pleasantly surprised and very impressed with the response from the Indonesian students. They were so enthusiastic to learn and very driven to succeed. Although English was their second language, they did their best to understand what I was teaching and asked questions enthusiastically. They were really hungry to learn these new skills and to achieve their dreams.

After training them, I realized that students all over the world share the same challenges. They too, like Singaporean students, faced the same obstacles in achieving good grades:
a) Laziness and lack of motivation
b) Cannot concentrate and lack of focus
c) Poor memory
d) Inability to manage their time
e) Poor study habits
d) Difficulty in applying what is learnt in answering questions etc…

The Secret of Turning Underachievers into Top Students
Many people ask me how I am able to empower lazy, underachieving teens into highly motivated top students. Well, the first thing I tell people is that I do not change students’ mindsets and behaviours. They are the ones who change themselves. I do not give them any special powers. They already possess the great potential within themselves. I merely show them how to unlock their potential.

What I do is to open their minds to new ways of thinking and equip them with effective learning strategies that allow them to make learning easy and fun. I help them to develop within themselves a high level of self-esteem, empowering beliefs and a compelling set of goals for their future.

Empowering 5,600 Indonesian Youths in 4 Years
After 4 years of starting our Holiday Program Indonesia, I am very happy to report that we have trained over 5,600 students in Jakarta, Surabaya, Medan, Solo, Semarang and Bandung. The results that our students have produced have been truly inspiring. Not only have they improved their grades after the IAG camps, many of them have gone on to win sports competitions, ASEAN scholarships and scholarships to top schools in Singapore like ACS (independent), Nanyang Girls High and Hwa Chong Institute.

Here is little tribute I have put up for some of my students who I am truly proud of.

An inspiring example is that of Matthew Hartanto. This is his testimonial.

My name is Matthew and I am 15 years old this year. I joined the SuperKids programme on December 2007 when I am still 12 years old. Before I join the programme, I have no self-esteem at all, even talking to stranger. I do not know how to manage my time so I would just spend them on things that i thought would bring me fun.  Learning would just be done when exams are coming near.

After the programme, I felt myself with a higher self-esteem and now talking in front of the public was not a matter anymore. I know how to succeed not only in school, but also in my life. And now, i was able to achieve  the 2nd rank for UN examination for my whole school camp, always in top 5 in my secondary  and get a school-based scholarship to Anglo Chinese School Independent (ACS) for 4 years.

Besides Matthew, I would also like to honour some of my other students who have achieved significant success after attending the ‘I Am Gifted!’ Camp.

Also a big congratulations to Sharon and Sanzen who won the ASEAN scholarship and Melissa who won the Nanyang Girls High and Hwa Chong Scholarship. Well Done Guys!!!

The Holidays Are Here Again
Well, the year-end holidays are here again! Not only will I be conducting the ‘I Am Gifted!’ Holiday Camp in Singapore, but I will also be conducting the Malaysia Holiday Camp in KL and Penang as well as Indonesia Holiday Camp in Jakarta, Medan and Surabaya to help more students realize their fullest potential.

Here are my tour details for the coming ‘I Am Gifted!’ Holiday Programme for Students ….

Singapore (Phone: +65 62740105)
22-26 November (age 9-13)
27-30 November (age 14-20)

Malaysia
Kuala Lumpur, 23-25 November
Kuala Lumpur 13-16 December
Penang 3-5 December

Indonesia
Jakarta, 19-23 December (age 9-13)
Jakarta, 18-22 December (age 14-20)
Jakarta, 26-30 December (Age 10 onwards)
Surabaya, 27-30 December (Age 10 onwards)

As we are fast expanding the ˜I Am Gifted, So Are You“™ Programme around the world, we are looking for dynamic, passionate and committed individuals to join our team.

What does it take to join us? You have to be a role model (amazing academic results and be highly successful in your field) and have excellent leadership qualities and presentation skills. Most importantly, you must have a love for helping youth programs and making a difference in their lives.

Send your resumes to our Singapore Head Office:
10 Hoe Chiang Road #01-01 Keppel Towers, Singapore 089315.

May 2009 be awesome for you!

The ˜I Am Gifted!™ Programme was first created by Adam Khoo who was inspired to share with students the winning attitudes and learning strategies he had used to transform himself from an underachieving teenager to among the top 1% of academic achievers in the National University of Singapore.

As one of the pioneers in the ‘NUS’ Gifted Program (known as the Talent Development Programme- TDP), Adam realized that being gifted was not just an in-born trait reserved for a privileged few. By studying the habits of ˜gifted students’ and through his research in Neuroscience, Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) and Multiple Intelligence, Adam discovered that every child had the potential to achieve extraordinary results with the right encouragement, stimulation and learning methods.

˜I Am Gifted!™ reflects the belief that all children are born gifted. All children have within them god-given gifts of learning, self-expression, 21 century leadership, leadership youth, 21st century learning, youth development, creativity and so on. The ˜I Am Gifted!™ programme was specially designed to fully nurture these gifts within each child.

Although the ˜I Am Gifted!™’ was officially launched in 2002, the seeds for this life transformational programme were planted way back 18 years ago in 1990. At the age of 16, Adam started writing and distributing articles on memory building techniques, self-motivation, speed-reading and 21 century skills etc among his friends with eagerness to help them improve their grades. His articles were even published in Teenage Magazine. By the age of 23, he was already engaged by many top schools (including Raffles Institution, the former Chinese High School and Victoria Junior College) to prepare their students for the National Examinations.

A year later at the age of 24, Adam made news headlines when his first book “I Am Gifted, So Are You!™” topped the National Best Sellers list, beating international titles like ˜7 Habits of Highly Effective People’™. ˜ I Am Gifted, So Are You!’™ was also endorsed by learning expert Tony Buzan, the inventor of Mind Mappingâ„¢.

In 2002, Adam roped in NLP Trainer & Counselor, Stuart Tan to launch the ˜I Am Gifted!’™ Programme. Stuart, like Adam is one of the Singapore Educational System’s Success Stories. A Slow Starter, he was particularly a very shy boy and a weak student. However, through various personal development courses, he became a top student in his class at SJI and President of his Junior College’s student council.

Today, Stuart is an NUS graduate (majoring in psychology and linguistics), a Master NLP Trainer, a Certified Counselor, author of five books and a Champion Toast Master Speaker. The ˜I Am Gifted Team’™ was soon joined by Brain-Based Teaching expert Gary Lee with Gerald Lee. Gary was also another former average student who went on to top his class at St. Andrews School and graduated from the National University of Singapore, thereby becoming one of the few Asians to be certified in Brain-Based Teaching by leading brain researcher Eric Jensen.

In Adam’s own words, We realized that there were a lot of kids out there, who, like us had the potential to become successful but lacked role models who would give them the confidence, right mindsets and effective strategies to realize their gifts. Although there was june enrichment camp around, many were taught by foreigners who had little understanding of the Singapore educational system or were taught by ex-teachers who sometimes could not connect with average and underperforming students.

This is what inspired us to create the ultimate personal development programme and enrichment program was to address the needs of all kids of students: from the top achievers to the under performers.

Over the last seven years, the ˜I Am Gifted!’™ holiday program has gone on to empower the lives of over 330,000 students and 15,000 parents in Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, India, China, Hong Kong and Thailand.

We have also been proud to be constantly engaged by the Ministry of Education (MOE) in Singapore and Hong Kong, the Movement for the Intellectually Disabled (MINDS), Singapore Prison School, SINDA and the Chinese Development Assistance Council (CDAC). With such overwhelming support from the public, it has now become Asia;s Leading Academic and Life-Skills based Personal Development Programme.

In 2008, The ˜I Am Gifted!™’ programme will be launched for the very first time in Holland, reinforcing the fact that it truly is a Singaporean brand spreading across the globe, and to show that we have the best study program out there!

For more information, call:
Singapore (65) 62740105
Indonesia (+62)215747511
Malaysia: (603)77250212)

To watch videos about the I Am Gifted! Programme, click on the PLAY buttons below.

The reason is because I was once labeled as a slow learner, unmotivated, lazy underachiever myself. I was expelled from St. Stephens Primary in primary 3 (for fighting) and rejected from 6 secondary schools after my PSLE. Those were times when everyone looked down on me and I had extremely low confidence and self esteem. I really felt hopeless and useless at that time when I had friends and cousins scoring straights As in top schools while I was struggling to pass in a neighbourhood school. Who would have thought that I could become among the top students in NUS and 20 years later, be conferred the NSU Business School Eminent Alumni award for being the one of Singapore’s top business leaders.

I would never have turned my grades and my life around and be enjoying all the success that I have today if I did not have the right role models to help me change my limiting beliefs and giving me the right strategies to do well in my studies. To me, running Holiday Program Singapore is really not so much a business to me anymore, but really a mission. I feel that it is my mission to reach out to all those students out there would were told by parents and teachers that they are dumb, attention deficit, slow, hopeless and useless.

My mission is to tell them YOU ARE NOT YOUR PAST RESULTS. You have all the potential to achieve top grades and live the life you truly want. If I can do it, so can you! If I am gifted, so are you! I believe that every students need to be given the opportunity to realize and unleash the winner and genius within themselves.

What really keeps me going and doing what I do is the hundreds of emails I receive almost every week from students telling me how they have transformed their own lives and their own results. This post is dedicated to them and I will like to honour them by posting their achievements here. Let them be an inspiration to all the other students out there!

Adam Khoo Learning Centre has actually been operating in Su Zhou for the last 2 years already, conducting weekly English lessons through the ‘I Can Read’ Program (we are the Master Franchisees there). It was just last month that we decided to run our flagship life transformational kids camps. We are also running our first camp in Thailand this year! (yes, 100% in Thai…Sawardee Krap)

Just would like to share this email I received from Yong Chang. Congratulations on your awesome mid-year results!

From: Yong Chang Chin
Sent: Friday, May 23, 2008 11:39 AM
To: i-did-it@akltg.com
Subject: I did it! (Yong Chang of Singapore IAG 16-19 Nov 2007)

24/5/08
Dear Adam,

It has been a good long 6 months since your camp. I have finally began to see results. Thank you.

I can understand how busy your schedule is, so I will make this as brief as possible.

Before the camp, I was an average, under-performing secondary student in St. Joseph’s Institution. Before, I never really took my studies seriously, which was a miracle I came in second in my class in sec 1. Even though I topped my class, I was still very lousy as compared to the other students in the level. What’s more, I was happy with my results. What irony.

Anyway, now, in my latest exam, the Mid Years, I am very proud to say that I have done well. The results are as follows.

English Language 74 A2
Literature in English 78 A1 (highest in class)
History 78 A1
Mathematics 96 A1 (highest in class)
General Science 90 A1 (highest in class, highest in cohort)
Chinese Language 57 C5

Overall percentage: 78.83% (highest in class)

My teacher even said – “Yong Chang is a very bright boy who is mature and responsible. He is a gem to his classmates.”

The only big obstacle i have left is my chinese. I am actively looking for solutions to solve this obstacle. Before, I can honestly say that I have given up on Chinese. Now, even though I have not improved, I am not discouraged at all. Instead I am even more motivated to do well because everyone does not believe I can. =)

Another piece of good news is that I have applied for National Junior College Integrated Programme. I have passed the first stage in their selection, which is a General Ability Test (GAT). My NJC english and math test will be held on this coming Monday. I sincerely hope that I will do exceptionally well. However, I want your opinion on a matter. Is a normal secondary school education or an IP education better?

I hope you can reply soon. Thank you – for everything.

Yours sincerely,
Yong Chang

Why is it that 80% of companies that are able to survive the first five years of business will usually fail in the next five? Shouldn’t they know what to do after being in business for the first five years?

The reason is because markets and economies are changing so fast that what works in business today will not work in three to five years. If you have the mindset of constantly doing things the same way and maintaining the status quo, you will soon be out of business.

Successful entrepreneurs are engaged in constant and never-ending improvement. They are always finding ways to innovate and improve their business operations, marketing, products and services. They know that if their business is not improving and growing, it is dying. Bill Gates (founder of Microsoft) once remarked that the key to succeed in business is to innovate and make yourself obsolete. If you don’t make yourself obsolete, your competitors will make you obsolete.

This is why the moment a software like Windows is released, Microsoft is already working on the next version and upgrades like Windows 98, Windows 2000, Windows NT, Vista and so on. Bill Gates knows that the moment they stop innovation, another company will create an even better software and take over their customers.

This is exactly what has happened to companies that did not change fast enough. Back in the 1990s, the top selling mobile phone was Motorola. Motorola produced the best-designed and technologically advanced phones. Everyone, including me bought a Motorola phone. So, where is Motorola today? Last I heard, their mobile phone business has been losing so much money that Motorola is thinking of shutting down the whole mobile phone business altogether. What happened? Well, Nokia and Sony Ericsson happened to innovate even better designed and more user friendly handsets that captured all of their market shares and profits.

Do you know which is the first search engine on the Internet? Is it Google? Yahoo? MSN? The answer is none of them. The world’s first search engine is Alta Vista. Many of you may never have heard of this brand simply because it has it is an obscure site that very people go to. Needless to say, the company that was once a market pioneer and leader is now a business failure. Again, what happened was that the founders had the mindset that their search engine was good enough and there was no need to change what was working.

This left the door wide open for Yahoo! to come in and take away that leadership position. Then what happened next? Well, Yahoo! was too slow to extend their service range and innovate their advertising services such that Google (one of the newest Internet search engines) came along and took away 70% of the market share, leaving the remaining 30% to be fought over by the other search sites. In today’s ever-changing marketplace, a company that is the market leader today could be bankrupt five years later, if they stop innovated and finding new ways of doing things.

Instead of seeing this fact as a threat, see it as a fantastic opportunity. This means that your new company could take over the leadership position of the largest competitor today and even put them out of business! The key is to find a way to serve their customers even better then they can!

So, let me emphasize again that unless you keep innovating and changing the way you do business, you will be out of business soon enough. I can tell you that if I did not grow my business to enter new regional markets like Indonesia, China, Thailand, India and Malaysia, I will be bankrupt today! My company’s monthly overheads are about $500,000 and Singapore only accounts for 50% of my sales and profits. If I did not constantly focus on creating new programs (i.e. the Wealth Academy and Internet Marketing Academy series), writing new books (two a year) and changing my marketing and distribution strategy every day (i.e. entering the Singapore schools market), I wouldn’t still be the market leader in personal development training in Asia. Another competitor would have caught up and blasted me away to oblivion.

Today, it is impossible to maintain your position in the market by doing the same thing. The reason is because customer’s expectations change constantly, competitors improve constantly, employees work habits change constantly and so forth. So if you keep doing business the same way, you are actually going down, as everything around you is improving.