Enjoy reading

I watched the movements of his eyeballs as he read a chapter book. I hounded him with queries like 'Are you reading? Word for word?'. I wanted him to read every word printed on the book and not skip or just browse through the pictures on the book. 

I came to this point because I realised every other book I gave him to read, he would complete it in a very short time. Once he finished reading a relatively thick book in 45 minutes. Although there were comic strips peppered across the book but there were also wordy chapters in that book. Still, to finish reading that book in 45 minutes to me, it's way too fast.

I get very suspicious whenever he tells me he has finished any book in such a short time. First thing that comes to my mind is that he didn't read but skip read or just browse through the limited animations. That's why I always question him, hound him like a criminal just to make sure he Really read the book. All of the time, he could very well summarize the book and tell me the ending. 

The next best thing I could do, I thought, was to watch his eyeballs as he read. If the eyeballs shift from side to side that means he is really reading. And at the same time, reminding him to read 'word for word!'. I think, but I can't quite confirm, he could be speed reading. 

But one day,  as I was about to hound  him again about reading word for word, I suddenly stopped myself. Something told me that the very essence of reading is to enjoy the book whether or not he skims through it or speed reads. What I was doing with the hounding and the eye hawking, I was in danger of killing his joy for reading. I told myself, so what if he speed reads? The boy is enjoying the book! Look at how he eagerly turns each page, the joyful expression on his face, chuckling to himself... he's clearly having loads of fun with the book! And I realised that's all that matters. Reading is all about enjoying the book. 

I think we have been told too many times by too many people about how we must make our children read to improve their English. We inadvertently become obsessed in forcing our kids to read and read and read all but for one purpose- to improve their vocabulary, grammar, comprehension and what nots which eventually improve their PSLE scores, we hope.  We have forgotten that reading is pleasurable, it's for leisure- anything more is added bonus. How short sighted we have become. 

Right now, I shall appreciate that Sonshine is enjoying reading. I LOVE to hear him chuckle and tickled to the bones when he reads a funny book. I LOVE how he shuts himself out from the outside world and dive deep into a book. I love to read purely for the enjoyment of it. I read not because I want to improve my English. Actually, I don't think reading help much in improving my English. I read but I don't concentrate much on the technicality of the language like grammar or vocabulary. I read to enjoy the plot. And I should let Sonshine do the same. Just read for leisure and pleasure.

I realise this should be the way for academic learning as well. The learning journey itself is actually very fun & interesting. But we become obsessed with the kids learning to get top PSLE scores that we rob them the joy of learning. Our ultimate goal shouldn't even be a degree certificate, it should be picking up skills & knowledge and enjoy doing what we do. We have limited life on this earth, why should we meaninglessly strive for paper and live miserably instead of living for enjoyment? 

Catching Mr 'Z'

Recently, this article has caused a little buzz amongst us parents of Primary school going kids.  It talks about how the majority of our Primary school kids are not clocking enough hours of bedtime a day. What was more surprising to me was the activities the kids are allowed to do just before their bedtime; watching television was listed as the top activity.

 

I am not here to judge. Everyone has their way of doing things. For us, having enough sleep is of utmost importance. Ever since I became a mother, my schedule and routine revolves around the kids' nap. When Sonshine was a toddler, I used to rush home for his naps or declined any meet ups with friends whenever it clashes with his nap time. Even up till today, I go straight home (unless he has other classes) after picking him up from school so that he can have his noon naps. Sometimes his classmates would hang out for lunch after school, but I usually turn down because of, well yes, nap.

 

Before the article was published, I wondered if all this was worth the hassle. I looked at the other families' routine and they seem to be more flexible and carefree. Whereas, here I am running a military schedule all because I want to adhere to their nap time. In order for them to nap, I give up time for other things like playdates, unscheduled outings and even outdoor time. It also can be very tiring, rushing about & making sure everyone is keeping to the clock. Friends also seem to frown upon me when they see me rushing home for their naps.  Of course, I am not so rigid and sometimes would make exceptions but only on special occasions. But in general, I do my best to ensure that they don't skip naps and they take naps at home, not outside. I do this by making sure we follow the same old routine day in day out.

 

I did think to put the kids earlier to bed so that they can clock their 'zzz's. But that means they either won't get to see their father or have to compete with each other for his attention within that short 30 minutes or less. I thought that would be too stressful and frustrating for everyone. Also, I do think it is better to give their bodies and minds a break in mid day then to stretch them till bedtime.

 

I am also very strict about the activities they do before bedtime. Electronic devices prior to that is a big big no no for me. I know it messes up our minds and disturbs our sleep if we allow screen time before we sleep. I am a living example. I used to watch movies just before my bedtime and I usually end up with intense dreams on those very nights. Needless to say, it robbed me of a good sleep and I even ended up clenching my teeth in my sleep. I am an adult, so what more the kids? I don't even allow the television to be switched even though is on sports channel or what nots. It is a strict no no. Don't even talk about ipads which is not allowed on weekdays.

 

Therefore, this article came just about the right time. It assures me that my daily military routine is quite necessary and that I am doing the right thing. I also realised that the children don't always appear to be sleepy even though they really are very tired. Doll for instance, can still be upbeat and fresh looking despite being extremely tired. How do i know? Because the next moment when I put her to bed, she's straight off to La La Land. Same goes for Sonshine. Sometimes, we need to swoop in and take control rather than wait for signs to show.

 

Birds and the bees

So, it has happened. Sonshine asked me how to make babies. He chose the perfect time to drop the bomb on me- while I was driving. 

I thought all I had to do was to make it simple, easy peasy! Here was how our conversation went (heads up! Lots of obscene but accurate words ahead).

Me: Well, every man has this 'thing' called the sperm in them. The man has to transfer the sperm to the woman. The sperm will grow in the woman and viola a baby is born!

Him: OH. How to put the sperm in the woman?

Me: Erm (thinking to myself, since we are on this topic, let's be specific) The man has to put his penis into the woman. 

Him: Oh. How to put the penis in the woman? 

Me: (what have I got myself into) There's a 'hole' in the woman's vagina and the man has to put his penis in the hole.

Him: oh. (In deep thoughts) Then can men put their penis in other men's hole (he was referring to the rear hole, ahem).

Me: WHAT! WHAT?!? Where did you get the idea from??!! 

Him: (calmly) You. 

Me: me? 

Him: you said the man can put in a woman's HOLE. 

Me: erm well, er... (Should I brush this off... Should I be honest)

Me: Yeeeeeees, some men do that. BUT! God doesn't approve of that and it's not normal. And don't you go round putting your penis in ANY woman. Only the woman you marry. OKAY??!

Him: okay

Him: How does the sperm come out? Can we see it?

Me: (without thinking) it's like when you pass urine. You can't see it. 

Him: oh okay. 

--------------

On another day, I wanted to know how much he understood me. So I asked

Me: So, how do you make babies? 

(I was expecting him to first say a man has to put penis in the woman)

Him: FIRST, I must get married!

Me: (Wow he GOT THAT right!)

Him: Then put the penis into her and pass urine. 

Me:...............

Assesment books

Like many Singaporean parents, I buy assessment books and assigned them to Sonshine to work on. In fact, I consider myself an assessment books warrior! My weekly pilgrimage is to walk into Popular book store and leave with an assessment book. Needless to say, I buy so many that there is no way he can finish them all by year end.

 

Over time, I wonder how effective assessment books are. The questions in the assessment books won't even appear in the school exams, so even if the child aces the assessment books, does it mean he will do well in school exams? I really doubt so.

 

Yet, most of us are still obsessed with assessment books. I have seen mothers like me scouring through the shelves for assessment books at Popular book store. I suppose, assessment books give that extra revision and practise that our child needs. That makes sense, 'practise makes perfect' doesn't it?

 

But I think most of us, me included, have lost focus on the role of the assessment books. We think number is the the key, the more they do the better. Really? I have heard of kids who do truck loads of assessment books but still get average results or still 'lose' out to others who did no or little extra work outside of school. Of course, there are also students who benefit from, and even enjoy, doing them. So are assessment books the magical formula to good grades?

 

I look at Sonshine and myself. I suspect with or without assessment books, he will do just the same. His standard would probably remain status quo even if I don't assign him extra work. Yet I do see that it helps him a little at times. For instance, when working on English assessment books, he sometimes come across new words that he is unaware of. I learn to see that as an opportunity for him to boost his vocabulary. Still, sometimes, it comes out to nothing. He would learn the new word there and then but completely forgets about it the next round. Days like these, I wonder 'what's the use?'. In general it doesn't seem to make him 'smarter', even so, it would be just a wee wee bit, negligible really.

Then it dawned on me it is not the assessment books that will help Sonshine. For him particularly, it is the quality of the teaching that helps him the most. Sonshine is attentive and absorbs well during lessons. When the teacher is very clear, concise and precise in her lessons, Sonshine will retain and know how to apply accurately in his work. For example, maths, I observed that all I have to do is to explain very clearly to him all the basic concepts of the topic. After which, he can fly solo and tackle the tedious & complicated questions on his own based on his understanding of the basics. But, first the teaching must be very clear and detailed. So ultimately, for Sonshine, it all boils down to the teacher, absolutely nothing to do with the number of assessment books he does.

So now, I've to change my mindset. That's not to say I have stop buying assessment books. I still do. But I try not to equate his grades with doing assessment books. My strategy now is to teach and then use the assessment books as a revision or practise. In the past, I would simply throw the assessment books to him and expect the books to teach him or that he would magically learn on his own by doing them. So now i choose assessment books that comes with some guidelines. It is more for me to use them as a 'textbook' to teach Sonshine especially for english where there is no school textbook for us to follow unlike mandarin.

Having said that, with the wide selection of assessment books here, it is very hard to ward off the temptation to buy. I hope to constantly remind myself that it is not about the amount of assessment books Sonshine does but it is how well he can understand from what he is taught. Hopefully that will help me stay on track!
 

Tray activities for Doll

Yesterday I prepared some tray activities for Doll. When she came home and saw the trays, she immediately wanted to work on them. That's the beauty of Montessori, it's invites the child to play and learn. No need for strict routines, it's a natural process. 

The activities I prepared weren't anything academic, it was more to remind her the beauty of 'work'.

Looping the rubber bands around the bottle to work on that fine motor skills. 

Using ice cream sticks to form shapes. Its a good way for them to learn the differences in each shape ie triangle has  sides while a square has four. 

Using an aided chopstick to transfer poms poms into ice cube tray. 

As usual I simple couldn't forgo counting activities. Since Doll has learn to count to 30, I wanted her to practise.  So I prepared her only two boxes (didn't want to overwhelm her) of buttons. She had to count each boxes.  One she had to count up to 26 and another 30. 

I love that she enjoyed herself and didn't see these as 'work'. I hope I can keep this up. These days taking care of two school going kids keeps my schedule very tight and exhausting. 

Write away!

This year doll is attending formal preschool. Which means, I'll have less time at home learning with her. Looking at the school's curriculum and hearing from other experienced parents, she's in good hands. Still, I try to teach her at home albeit that it would much lesser & more concise.

I try as much as I can but I'm also lowering my expectations. This year, I want her to learn to read, write and dabble a little on simple maths. 

For a while now, I've been letting her to trace alphabets on the iPad. Yesterday I let her to the dot a dot on the letter 'A'. I numbered each dot so that the order is the is in the proper way of writing 'A'. 

Coincidentally, her school is also teaching her to write the same letter. Out of curiosity, I asked her to write it out on her own. 

Yay! So delighted that she can write 'A' on her own. At least the practises she got on the iPad paid off. 

I have also allowed her to use the scissors. I printed the above from Confessions of a homeschooling mom. Doll is so into cutting that she's asking for the scissors everyday. 

*apologies for the horrorid alignment. Typed this on my iPhone app which gives me no room to tidy up this post 😑

Chat group for parents; curse or blessing?

So I joined a group chat that was specifically created for Sonshine's and his classmates parents. Like most, the purpose is so that we can quickly disseminate and share information to each other. I even went further & network with the other moms, building friendships with them. But after a year, I decided to exit the group chat and have less interaction with the other parents. 

I realised the group chat isn't helping me much. The questions and information exchanged aren't very useful, if anything, it made me very confused. Simple things like should the kids wear uniform or PE attire is made complicated. Most of the questions raised can be quite absurd and irrelevant. It annoys me much. This also became a source of gossip for my inner group of moms. Unhealthy!

The other reason is, this year I want to keep it simple and have all information about school to come from Sonshine and him alone. Last year, I had a lot of sources who would feed me with daily updates about his school day. Some of the kids reporting to their parents were so detailed to the point where I literally felt like I had sat in the classroom myself. Like most parents, I thought this was a fantastic thing. I get to know exactly what is going on in the class. However by end of the year, I felt that I was overloaded with TOO much information. 

I realized i started to use all that information to compare other kids with Sonshine. And when he seemingly fell short, I would scold him & demanded him to measure up. Or I would wonder why Sonshine didn't tell me the things other kids told their parents. That of course made me very annoyed. With all the additional information, my decisions about his school is marred. The whole process became very unnatural. 

This year, I want to keep things simple and pure. I want to hear about school from Sonshine and not from others. If he doesn't tell me stuff that others tell their parents then I should trust that he deems those information unimportant. He has shown me that he is able to tell me about the necessary stuff like school work very well. He updates me about his school work to the T but leaves out all the other frivolous stuff like who brought what bag or who did and say what in class. 

In addition, I'm also going for less play dates with the other parents. For one, I want to know less! Such play dates meant even more gossip and information being rendered to me. It always leaves me feeling depressed or wondering if something is wrong with my kid. 

More so, I realised there's no fit between this group of classmates and Sonshine. I'll be first to admit, Sonshine doesn't have those attractive personalities and can come across as annoying. It's just how he is. He's the sort who loved slapstick comedy. Not everyone finds it funny and some may get really annoyed (like yours truly). All the more, he needs friends who is tolerant and can accept his nonsense. His friends in this group are rather high strung and can get angry or easily irritated over small things that Sonshine does. So many times during play dates, I often hear these kids yelling at Sonshine over some small things or see them go to their moms to whine. I get very stress each time and would take it out on Sonshine. Sonshine on the other hand, has a super easy going character. Even if his classmates shoved him, grabbed his toys, say mean things to him, he lets it slide all the time. Rarely or never would we hear him yell at his friends to stop annoying him nor would he ever come to me and complained about being mistreated. He would just deal with it by himself. I reckon that because he's like that, he expects others to be as easy going as him. 

I did think that perhaps it's Sonshine who's plain annoying making his friends irritated. But I've seen him interact and play with other friends. These friends are more tolerant and accepting. When Sonshine annoys them, they either ignore or tolerate. They wouldn't whine or complain. But most of the time, they find him funny & they play well together. There are times when Sonshine annoys them but they get over it in a second.

That made me realised that there's a misfit between this group of classmates and Sonshine. It's not that the fault of anyone, more like all of them have faults that cause them to be incompatible. And that's really ok. We just have to seek elsewhere. 

Some may say I'm intervening too much. But I think I was emotionally drained from all this (although Sonshine is totally unaffected, I should really learn from him) and I need time to recover. So for now, I'll just detox for awhile, rest and recover! 

My aim this year is to keep things simple! 

Sometimes being exposed with too much knowledge is not a good thing. For someone like me who puts her emotions in everything she sees and hears, it can be quite unhealthy. I can't take things factually, I will let those things affect me emotionally. So for my sake and Sonshine, I'm so staying away from social networking for a while!