About
Regina is a seasoned theatre practitioner, educator, developer, and arts advocate whose foundational journey began at LASALLE College of the Arts, where she graduated with a Diploma in Theatre Arts in 2006.
Now graduating from LASALLE's MA Arts Pedagogy and Practice programme, her culminating thesis explores the development of a drama-based toolkit to help parents foster self-awareness and social awareness in their preschool-aged children through purposeful home-based interactions.
Her postgraduate research builds directly upon a comprehensive credential stack, including a specialist diploma in arts education, a certificate in teaching the arts in an early childhood environment, and an advanced certificate in learning and performance 2.0. Over her extensive career, Regina has designed and delivered more than 300 bespoke training and dramatic arts programmes spanning various government bodies, MOE institutions and corporate organisations.
Driven by the belief that drama nurtures essential 'heart skills', her artistic portfolio includes writing, directing and performing across commissioned stage productions, commercial projects, and television series.
As a champion for ecosystem development, she mentors young drama educators and serves the Singapore Drama Educators Association (SDEA) as vice-president (2023–2025) and treasurer (2025–2027)—always living by her personal motto to "Do what I love, love what I do."
Playing with Purpose: Supporting parents to foster social-emotional competencies in preschool-aged children through drama-based home interactions
Singapore’s national education policy identifies social and emotional competencies (SEC) as a developmental priority, yet parents receive little practical support for fostering them at home. This study asks how a drama-based toolkit can be developed to help parents foster self-awareness and social awareness in their preschool-aged children through purposeful home-based interactions.
Grounded in design-based research methodology, the study adopted an explanatory sequential mixed-method design. Phase 1 surveyed 32 parents of children aged three to six residing in Singapore, on their understanding of SEC, current drama-based practices, perceived confidence and barriers. Phase 2 comprised six semi-structured interviews with Phase 1 respondents. Findings from both phases informed the design of a prototype toolkit titled Purposeful Dramatic Play, drawing on Vygotsky, Kolb, Carroll and Heathcote.
Parents were already engaged in drama-based play, though rarely with the deliberate emotional coaching the literature associates with SEC gains. The gap was not motivation or values, but the absence of a practical framework connecting what parents already do to their children’s emotional and social learning.
Six barrier profiles emerged: emotional conditioning, fatigue and structural exclusion, technique gap despite sufficient confidence, vocabulary and framework gap, structured resource gap and feedback loop gap. The word “drama” itself emerged as a psychological barrier, reinforcing the toolkit’s deliberate use of activity-based language.
The study contributes an evidence-informed toolkit requiring no drama training and identifies intentionality rather than capability as the actionable gap in home-based SEC support. Its effectiveness remains untested and future research is required.
