(2008/07) July 2008

Mich,
Ya. I just googled and saved the first pic I came across

Pb,
Haha. Initially you didnt mention plastic mah.

Youpi,
Eh, I feel stressed too. I think my kid is the only one who doesn't attend additional classes. I went into panic mode yesterday and kept asking myself if I'm doing too little!
 


Wah..
u all making me very stress....

I decided to delay putting Kayden into Berries.
Worry he cant cope. Not sure how his K1 is yet...

Anyway i don wan to stress him too much...
Im tryin to take it slowly..

Then again, maybe i shld be a popular member too..
then i can take a look at the books too.....
 
bbp,

Yah, Wuffy is in Kumon for Maths too..haha.. not that i am hot housing him but my parents just leave him be at home which means - watching TV, on Youtube, or going to KFC/MacDonalds... So I guess I better utilise his time elsewhere or he would probably just rot at home and get fat.

Thanks for the picture! i have to go pop by one of the populars to take a look liao... Chinese i have to teach, my parents cant read/speak mandarin.

No need to feel guilty. Your kids have you by their side. I feel guilty, not spending enough time with them to coach them or to play with them. By the time i get home, simply too tired to play with them. And with the little time i have with them now, have to use it to coach him in his K1 and Kumon homework. Now have to coach him Chinese as well. I think he rather mummy dun come home... haha
 
Hi everybody!! waves!! haven caught up with the forum for a lonnnnnggg time... sigh still doing year end closing.. Hope it ENDS!

Anyway u all scare me... eh xun gal started her K1 like its a breeze wor.. no homework, nothing. Hmmmm does not seem any different from nursery -_-"""
And all her extra lessons have nothing to do with academic! its just dance, music and art!

Ok we do maths with her... verbally haha.. we test her .. 30+ 5 is how much. And she could answer that using mental sum .. like putting 30 in her head and then start counting from 31 onwards. Eh is that considered enough? I was impressed though haha .. not sure what is the standard supposed to be..
Nothing is done for her language... and she likes to write letters, not words.. they are just letters lol.. dont think she can recognise anything .. *guilty.. i have never checked if she knows!*

Hmmmmm maybe should really do more
 
extra classes
poppy doesn't attend any either. i told you girls right? even my parents were worried haha. they even offered to pay a term of enrichment classes for poppy (and then we had to continue paying for the rest). so this year she attended holiday programmes in school, which was fun for her.

youpi
yes plastic bottle caps, those kind from mineral water bottles, or juice bottles, or medicine bottles
happy.gif


lol at drawing of car!

popular card
i am a proud member! have been for the longest time. i love stationery and books :D

batgirl
lol on 'rot at home and get fat'!!!

actually i just thought of something. for those of you whose kids are not interested to write, why not engage them in letter writing? poppy writes to a few penpals and is always excited when she gets letters addressed to her in the mailbox, and is always excited to write back. that could be a way to encourage them to write?

a tiny bit of a stressful thought hit me today: will my kids' abilities be curbed by mine/lack of mine?

i just thought of it cos i can't draw for nuts see, and when poppy asked me how to draw something, i tried, and she copied, and i thought gosh, poor kid, she's going to end up as lousy a drawer (i don't dare to use the word 'artist'!) as me. how ah, like that. are the rest of my desendants doomed for a life of bad drawing? am i limiting her creativity by imposing my own views too much?

hmm
 
you know, we talked about this some time ago, and i remember SY volunteered to do chinese storytelling for the kids once. maybe we could do something once a month or so, for the kids to play, and the parents all chip in to do something to contribute 'academically' or otherwise

like chinese storytelling for instance. i don't mind doing a craft. keen?
 
oh youpi ah youpi, I spending more time with eboy for him to catch up with his peers, not to do better. eboy's learning has been very much impeded by his speech and language delay. He still cant cope with proper sentence forming.
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so we have no choice but to buck up. however, this decision has made us realise how much quality time we have missed with him. the nightly hours we spend doing structured learning doesnt seem like tutor or work at all. he enjoyed them, we enjoyed them.. and I just love to see Mr Mich spending so much patience (he is an impatient person), care (he doesnt care much for others) and love for him. He showering that on eboy but I felt it too.. love love love! LOL.

we are now cutting down on his enrichment (left berries and tennis only) and taking over all the 1-1 teaching ah! *woot!*
 
cinbunny, nice to bump into you at legoland yesterday!
happy.gif
we left at 6.30pm, finished our dinner at the I love chicken place right outside at medina mall at 7.30, cleared sg customs by 8.10pm and was home by 8.35pm! woohoo!

but it suddenly dawned on me my life has changed forever when T1 went P1. I will need to wake up and rush around in the dark like a mad woman until *drum rolls* 2020 until T2 finishes Pri Sch. and sec sch still need to wake up early right? *faint*

By the time i reached the office at 9am, it feels like half a day has passed because i was up since 6 and have done so much things already! *sweat*

T2 also only has Berries classes only. I recently sent him to Rena's heart studio for a trial class and he loved it and wanted lessons. but all along he has told us he wanted music lessons actually. if i can't find anything suitable, may just let him join his jiejie for art classes.

mich and i are trying to arrange a playground/play session. either bishan park/east coast/amk playground heh! likely to be on a sat evening. time to gather the kids to let them play?
 
Ya! now that eboy doesn't have many enrichment, we have more time on weekends to play play play!!! I would love for him to learn to cycle at ECP or advernture park at bishan park... any one? anyone?
 
doggiebb - haha..you know, i was kinda looking out for you! actually was surprised and happy that there was so little crowd - bean managed to sit nearly every ride twice and she went on that big roller coaster like 3 times. are you talking about the chicken rice shop at the mall? we ended up tah -pauing herbal duck rice from the coffeeshops nearby for our dinner last night!

oh, we also did the trial art class at Rena's studio and Bean liked it a lot so decided to sign her up - figured if she really likes something and as long as no homework for me to do with her, it is ok
happy.gif
 
cinbunny. Yeah it was really nice yesterday. after we said bye bye to you and went in, it started raining. so we went shopping in the shop. after like 15 mins, it stopped and the whole day was cloudy and windy - fabulous weather. NO crowds at all. and we did everything twice too. that royal joust? they did 4 times! wahaha!

T1 has been the one bugging me for art lessons so there is no question about signing her up. But T2 has never been interested actually. he wanted music classes all along. but i guess he really enjoyed himself that day at the trial class!

mich, you mean the one at hello kitty town? i've been. the playgym is super nice i thought. apparently the kids lurve it. first level is Hello kitty. second level and 3rd level got rides and playgym etc.
 
Quick note on drawing.
PB,
Why don't you ask Poppy to find the stuff that she wants to draw from books and copy from there? Because I can't draw very well either (but I'm better than hubby at least). But surprisingly Dec can copy quite well! Not sure if you've seen the frog picture on FB that Dec was copying a few months back. So all is not lost!
Better they copy from nice illustrations than our horrible drawings!
happy.gif
 
PB, bbp, yah! Eboy will make me google the pics he want me to draw and then he copy from my drawing.. LOL!

I've been copying from pics so often that I think my drawing has improved a lot myself!

What does Rena has? intro intro!!!

one day, eboy came home from school and say wants to learn piano. i think they compare notes in school! peer pressure is very scary....
 
So envious of kids so willing to do 1-1 with parents. Mine always kanna caned, cos he is totally not focused. If my hubby repeat his instruction more than 3 times, the cane will just come out and wuffy gets whacked. But it is really tough to teach kids that are not interested at all! we really lack that patience!

If Wuffy is focussed, all the work can be done in 20 mins. but always we take up to 2 hrs... like he is challeging us to see who has more patience to wait it out.... hiaz..
 
batgirl,
Eh, same la. Dec also need to see mood. It's really frustrating when you see them dreaming away and you know that if they just focus, they can do it within the snap of the finger.
 
Mich,
Wah, then dunno whether I'm lucky or not cos he has never said he wants to learn this or that. And since he's not the most willing person to attend classes, I don't want to spend so much energy to convince him to attend something that he didn't even say he's interested in the first place.

SO..... WE PLAY ALL DAY!
 
and lately he's been waking up and coming up with places to go so he doesnt need to go to school. Mummy I want to take aeroplane tomorrow, mummy I want to go sea world tomorrow. Mummy I want to go legoland tomorrow... *I ALSO WANT!!!!*

We are very excited that we will be letting him join a tennis summer camp in chiangmai this year and both parents can chill in the resort.... looking forward!!!!!!!!
 
i think i am lucky then cos the jiejie always has hw and he has none so he wants SOME!

so i went to get mazes and kindy maths stuff for him to do. then he wants the same system. i colour the pages he needs to do and i must mark them later and award stars!

Jace

mine does the same maths method too. so as long as its adding within 10 (cos he only has 10 fingers) we can ask him anything from 1 to 100 added to 1 to 10. and this method was taught by the helper. i know i didn't teach him that!

the other day T1 was doing some maths assessment at home. i let her do a little bit everyday to get into the habit of doing hw and she was stumped by 2,?,6,?,10 for a little while. T2 took a peep and quipped, 2,4,6,8,10 lor!

i dunno i shld be scared T1 is too slow or be happy that T2 is advanced. *sweat*

mich

Rena has an art studio that teaches children art, located at upper thomson road. mine came back with really amazing art pieces and apparently they had fun producing that too!
 
Mich
That's why I say I am impressed by you and Mr Mich. Most parents farm out the teaching. You do it yourself, willingly, with an open heart and mind and such a positive attitude
happy.gif
Summer tennis camp sounds wonderful!!!

Doggie
Hehe mine also knows 2,4,6,8... but only up to there... because of the Thomas song! If he was as advanced as your T2, I can sit back and relac one corner...

Enrichment
We have swimming and Berries. The boy does not want to do anything else. I even brought him to Rena's studio last year to show him what he could do, and he refused. So like Bbp, we just play all day...
 
youpi

then i shld be worried that T1 is slow then! *sweat* seriously there is such a thomas song? maybe i shld let T1 start listening to some thomas songs? ><

really? july baby too for Will and kate? niceee!

is anyone going away to bi nian? nice leh this year! can go away for 4 days!
 
Doggie
Haha no need lah. T2 is definitely more advanced than Thomas!

Smiggle
Handmade or customised now ah... enough time? Maybe you could buy the one which are already out there and do your own alternations?
 
HELP!

I have problem teaching eboy how to write with spaces between words. His sentences all joined together. I've tried the finger spacing method according to internet but in the end it blocks the previous word and he got confused what was the previous word he wrote and cant move on!!

pls share how you teach!!!
 
Mich,
How does it block the previous word? I've used the finger spacing method and it works ok. Is he actually covering part of thr word?
 
Mich
Does Eboy type on the computer? If he does, let him write a word, then tell him to leave a space just like how he taps the spacebar on the computer keyboard, then write the next word.
 
Mich: draw imaginary lines using colour pencils, so he can differentiate.
Another way is to use the Chinese sq ex book(small square ones)to write eng, the spacing is good enough.
Can also use color dots in between words.
 
Quick one (wow this thread is alive again. It's alive!)

Mich
Poppy did that too. Then I said put some space in between so people will not think its one big word (then I would read what she wrote as one long word to illustrate). Then she would draw a line between the words (horizontal line) to show the space. Then one day she gave up the line and it's now just space. I decided not to worry and file up her writings instead to look back at in future

Wow will and Kate baby. They didn't waste any time!

Doggie
Hehe about T2 asking for hw and 2 4 6 8 10 lor. Super funny!

Lately I've become a tiny bit stressed out cos a fribd's 4 year old can read. Actually read by working out the phonics, and not sight read from memorising words. So I'm kinda consciously grouping our activities into phonetic groups. Like focusing on S activities this week, then A next week for instance.

Side track: remember reading those ladybird series of books? Don't you find that the new version is a tad cheena looking?

Smiggle
Welcome to the popular club! Make costumes? Don't scare me - The school say must ah?

Going places
Mine will say "how about tomorrow we go legoland? How about next week we go visit mamie in Canada". Biang. Made of money.
 
ok, i started drawing boxes between the words and now he got the spacing right. only complain now is, his spacing is not consistent, sometimes tooo wide.. but i guess that is alright for now.... thanks for the tips!!

there's been a flu bug going around and eboy's whole class was affected. he had fever from Friday and only today subsided... take care of your kids.. its very viral!!! shooooooo flu bugs!!
 
Michelle
When Ashley was about 4 she also seldom speaks, but trust me whatever things we taught her were actually inside the brain. She just doesn't like to speak out. Now she's fine. Emma didn't want to speak at first, but we started using flash cards with Chinese characters. Easy ones, one character per card. At first we gave 2 cards a day, then increase to another 2 daily. it seemed to work. The cards were actually optional to buy when Ashley was in primary one. We also pointed at some things at the supermarket like fruits and speak in chinese (my mom la not me hahaha).

Homework at K2
I was surprised to find a note from K1 teacher that starting this year the children will have homework!! What! K1 and already got homework?? TSK TSK

Berries and homework
YES apparently they are giving homework to!! *rolls eyes*

Jace
That's really good! Emma is not interested in math YET (I'm hopeful). whenever I gave her counting work she would run away hahaha

Enrichment classes
Emma is now going to berries and also just entered Nafa. So far so good. She's been trying to ballet so probably enrol her in one as well. There goes my weekend. I've been spending my sundays in BUGIS for the longest time and now continuing!! *bored*
 
SDchick
i remember poppy's school teachers telling me that in K1 there will be HW too but so far nothing leh. i hope nothing... i'm the kind of mum who forgets to look thru the kid's file until monday morning...

mich
speaking of falling ill. last week poppy was down with a 40.2degree fever! i was scared sh*tless! turned out to be from a throat infection. walau eh.
 
PB
Wow that is HIGH! Hope Poppy's better now. *HUGS* It's flu plus infection season, must take care... L coughing and sniffing for the longest time..
 
OMG, 40.2deg is high!!! must let the kiddos drink a lot of water.. the other day I was just telling hubby that ever since eboy been active playing tennis daily, it seems to have made him more resilient against flu.. then few days later... sigh. jinxed myself..

batgal, how does kumon work? eboy's teacher recommended us to consider kumon to help in his focus and concentration. I wonder if the programme does help them to be able to focus better.. can share?
 
PB,

Yah, both my kids were down with high virul fever which stemmed from a very nasty throat infection. Bad bug... terrible nitemare for us....

Michelle,

Kumon is a worksheet based teaching, ie no teacher standing in front of blackboard, instead the teacher will just sit with you to do worksheets. For the older kids (like P1), they are left to do the worksheets themselves and then hand in for teacher to mark. In a way it teaches independence. They will practise and practise and only when they are comfy then the teacher will move them on to newer stuff. For eg, Wufeng will keep practising writing 1 - 10 for about 2 weeks, then 11-20, then 21 to 30. Everyday they are supposed to do 1 set of worksheet. this is to instill a routine that they have to revise everyday. So it may seem to be a bit drilling. But from what I see from Wuffy, there is improvement. He is very resistent to homework, but we have to just keep pushing on.

My friend's therapist also encouraged to put her boy into Kumon to improve on his focus and concentration. However, she is hesitant as she is worried it may have adverse effect. But you can try and observe if eboy responds well.
 
Mich
I have seen kumon work books on sale at Isetan before. And other bookshops. From what batgirl has described, I'm sure you can be his kumon teacher!

Feverish poppy
Thanks. She got over it quick. Now fighting the tail end of it. The cough. We all have some form of it. For me I spent all evening with only one ear functioning
sad.gif
 
Mich,

Actually what PB says is true. You can do it yourself. Cos you have the patience. I dun have the patience and the time... we hit home ard 830pm each day.... not much time left to do anything...

PB,

Hope this bug will be blown away real soon! cNY is just round the corner! :D
 
batgirl,
You're very optimistic leh. I expect another bout to come after CNY, with all the goodies and the gatherings. More opportunities for virus passing.
 
wow many posts to catch up on!

PB
haha we can kick start. i can still do chinese story telling!
happy.gif


hope all the kids stay well!! it has been quite bad recently. i hear of a lot of kids falling sick!!

doggiebb
i can empathsize! nowadays i feel so tired by the time i reach office. mon is worse. i go to jx's cc, then walked jh to sch then swing over to student care to put stuff for jh that he needs for the week! then fight the jam to office....and this is life for the next dunno how many years!!!

and i find so little time to spend with them. the p1 is quite tricky to my surprise...and now teaching methods are also different. no longer using math textbook though we are told to buy! i actually wronged jh when i asked him to bring back his math tb and he told me he dunno what is math tb. then i found out teacher really din use.

but still not going to send him for enrichment classes! hopefully i can cope man. now also need to make sure jx is fine cos she has been so neglected. i realise she is lazy! she refuse to memorise things! haha. she was asked to memorise her memory verse for sunday sch and she refused! kept saying she can't. i went thru with her until even jh could memorise it haha.....need to work on her attitude.

PB
does poppy's sch do phonics? i find it very good to help them in the early years of reading. but i wouldn't be too worried about english. i m more concerned about chinese!
 
SY
If you are concerned about Chinese then I jialat loh. I suppose her school teaches phonics... I do some with her and she can tell me the sounds.

Speaking of which. Do any of you remember learning about planets / solar system in school? I never did. Poppy wanted to know more and I had to google!!! Finally I know all the names of the planets in order haha
 
found an online website to download kumon worksheets.. lalala... eboy loves to do it! every night very routine and discipline liao... do math, then chinese, then english then, mummy can i watch tennis PLS? my boy sooo sweet one you know.. LOL...

anyone wants the kumon english worksheet grade 1 (80 pages), SMS/whatsapp me!
 
PB,
I think if Poppy's school teaches phonics, she should come home singing some kind of phonics songs no? Cos Dec sings random phonic songs at home.
[Freddy's Five Friends, F F F...] x 3
F is the sound of F

Mich,
Got Chinese Kumon??
I'm curious to see what the level of the English worksheet is like.
Anyway, you're so lucky eboy loves to do. My boy just wants to play cars the whole day and his grandfather always asks him if he wants to play cars. So guess what they end up doing the whole day?

And when I say no playing of cars (due to various reasons), I feel like the wicked stepmother. DAMMIT!
 
i want to chill i want to chill.

C1 was slower than others in his gross motor skills... he took longer than his CC classmates in LSH to master the art of taking off his t-shirt by himself.

i m observing that his fine motor skills are also not great. he is audio and kinesthetic learner.... audio a bit diffcult to teach.... i m trying out penmanship (forming letters) with finger drawing in air, drawing in water in the shower, drawing in sand, drawing on the window... anything but pen and paper.

wish me luck! i need to have more faith, in God, in the process that practice makes perfect.
 
MIch
Could you email me the link please? I too am curious to find out what the level is like. Thank you!

Bbp
I shake your hands. Both hands. L too. Cars, trains, cars, trains the whole day.

Cellow
Why restricting pen/pencil and paper? Just let him trial and error using the actual tools lah. And just draw anything. L loves to draw. His early pieces were - frankly - crap. But creating all that crapola helped him to learn how to hold the pen/pencil properly etc etc etc.

I came across these handwriting sites and have printed out his name for L to go over when he deigns to do so. Can try for C1 too!

English: http://www.handwritingworksheets.com/
Chinese: http://www.hanzigrids.com/
 
cellow, fellow mummy. Don't compare your child against what other child can or cannot do. He takes longer to take off his shirt, so? other children could be taking off their shirt like 10 times a day so they are faster, so? C1 could master the controls of fan earlier than his peers!!!

I've come to realise that these yardsticks are put in by so called "professionals" to measure their KPIs when they need to "test their so called theory" to help kids do better. In my opinion, children learn in their pace and time. They learn faster when they are exposed to it more, and they practise more than others. you have no worries at all. Do it at his and your pace. draw randomly.. write randomly.. make them enjoy it at their pace!!
 
BUt having said that, it is our job to make sure our kids get exposure and help them acquire life skills as early as possible. playground, independence skill etc. Eboy could bathe himself, brush his own teeth, change his clothes, pack his bag and get ready for school and tennis all by himself. The reason why he could do it? we let him do it, and no one would help him. To avoid taking too much time in the morning, we make him pack his bag the day before, we let him choose what he wants to wear the night before, and he hangs it in his room so once he wakes up, he turns off the aircon himself, gets changed, and get downstairs for breakfast. I really think in this aspect, he is well ahead of his peers, BUT do professionals measure these that they cannot "see"? NAH! and then they judge my boy developmental is slow. BLEAH!
 
Btw, eboy could not button his clothes at all. he doesn't even know how to handle buttons. Reason being, he does not have a single piece of clothes that require buttons. he has been wearing shirts that goes in and out from his head. since day 1.

So he has never been exposed to it. naturally he can't button his shirt at this age. So there is a big red cross on the checklist.
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I don;t care.
happy.gif
 


Sorry I seem a bit grouchy today becuase I am very sick of Singapore's meritocracy education and social system that I am contemplating to leave this place for the benefit of my sanity and Eboy's future....
 
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