Friday, March 30, 2007

Mumblings

Things that Athena's been repeating and repeating lately

1) Recently she's been singing to the song "Do Your Ears hang low" with some mumbling behind (not sure of lyrics) and then she's been bugging me to sing it in French for her. And you think I can sing it well? I had problem pronouncing French! Even relying on the lyrics didn't help coz' I sound funny.

And recently she's been mumbling in her Japanese words too. When I asked her she can pronounce it well but once she starts singing - she ended up singing Russian.?!?! A simple song : Head & shoulders, knees & toes in Japanese turned out horrible. Duh! Better send her to language school.

When I put her in bed, she insists that I sing "This Old Man" to her. I've been singing this boring song for the whole week!

2) Boring too is her asking me for this story : The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle. Now I tell her the very Singaporean way with Singapore food; Athena as the caterpillar but instead of turning into a butterfly - she pangsai (to her laughter). And the thing is that during our trip to the Zoo, I showed her caterpillars and the life cycle. So when I read this book to her for the first time, she told me what happened to the caterpillar. And then she started bragging that she saw it in the Zoo and that I had explained to her about it and about insects camouflaging themselves.

Things I need to do with Athena :
1) Been wanting to do polymer clay with Athena but never got the chance to do it. However knowing my girl, before she can do anything, I'll die of heart attack. I mean, even with her Playdoh, I'm already nagging and screaming at her for doing it wrongly etc.. Too high expectations from this mummy huh?

2) I think her extra violin lesson is killing me. It not only takes up one day where I can't do much with her after she gets back home, but it also means that daily I'll have additional revision with her. And I'm always pressed for time. Doesn't help when you have a girl who don't understand the meaning of time constraints and keep dilly dallying around the house. And I scream at her everyday. Mom says I'm over- stressing myself. Nobody is as ON as me. Perhaps if I close both eyes to my children's education I'll live longer. But I still need to do her assesments books with her. Now I get so fed up with her, I promised her her drawing only after she's finished what I needed to do with her.

3) Was doing Maths with her and I was about to bang her head against the wall. She writes the mirror image of the number '5'. When I asked Ms Chan only then did I realise that the children haven't even done their writing for this year for Maths. What the heck are they doing in class? Worst still, told me "they're doing patterning." "What? Still doing patterning." Oh my! Am I too advance, and I was already doing addition and subtraction with her. Even let her do the multiplication. Too kiasu? Too slow curriculum in school? How are they going to prepare the children well for P1? Isn't it abit too late for me to put her in another school?
So, now I realise gotta get her to practice more numeral writings. Should I put a halt to what I'm doing? Heck lah! I'll go ahead since I have plenty of assesments books .

4) Her DIY rhyme cards was ready for a long time, but haven't got the chance to play it with her. Why? You see our busy schedule lah! Hubby either comes back home late or out of country, can't help to take care of children so KZ and me have to work hand-in-hand. If not, it'll be easier to have him to help take care of the younger one and I can put them both to bed earlier.

5) Her GD flashcards; assesment books; music lesson takes up the time. That...........I can only read one book for her bedtime. And I've totally forgotten about her Chinese 'I Can Read' books. Gotta remember to do that.

6) She hasn't been doing her CD-rom lately all thanks to her again. So before I die of heart attack from pressing her to hurry up, I better let her play her CD-roms.

7) Haven't even had the time to bake cookies with Athena over the weekends, she has those cute cookie cutters which she enjoys cutting her bread - so hopefully can make use of it in another way. Bake the cookies and she can do the colouring.

8) Didn't do the right-brain training with her when she was young. So, I hope with what I learn from Shichida with Aricia, I can do something with her. Dunno if it's too late to help nurture that side of her brain which is (I think) empty. So, gotta prepare flashcards and flashcards. Even more busy coz' I can only do it in the afternoons, and how much do I really have when I gotta spend time with Aricia? No need to sleep lor.. sometimes really gotta send the kids sleep in KZ's and our room while I do printing and things in Athena's room. Meant to keep my printer now, but looks like it's gonna stay here for dunno how long more. I hope whatever I'm doing with the kids are worth it man!

June school holiday programs:
1) Dunno whether I have the time or not, I'll like to invite Amanda, Eliz and Victoria over again for them to play. But must check with their mommies if they mind. Helen will be doing her confinement so maybe she'll be alone. Maybe I can manage?? Of course bearing in mind on their individual programs, must find a suitable day.

2) Elmo is coming to town again, Athena says she dowan to watch it again. So, can save money. But I'm really hoping for Hi5 to come.

3) Own activities with Athena. I have these cute chocolate molds of Pooh & gang, Hello Kitty, Sesame Street, Mickey Mouse & gang etc.. dunno what else can I do with it. She's done the chocolates a couple of times but you know I'm restricting her chocolate intake so it's like wasting the chocolates. Soap? Gotta figure out how to do. Or what else can I do with it?

4) Plan to pull her out from school a few days, so that I can bring her out on excursions. Been wanting to bring her to Science Centre but dunno if she's too young for it? But will be keen on bringing her to air-conditioned place.

My own mumblings (something which I can do very well)

1) I know I have been threatening her dunno how many times to throw away her toys and never to buy her toys again - I still bought her more toys. I think Athena knows which place has the best toys, she loves ELC and The Better Toy Store, and I can understand why - they really have the good toys. Even ToysRUs isn't that interesting to us.
I wanted to buy board games, but after the last board game - Bus Stop (which is supposedly to learn how to add & subtract) I was pek-chek when she uses it as a checker peg. It's meant to be a fun thing to play along with her but I've broken the rules myself! See lah, even if I try learn thru play, I can get frustrated with her.
End up I bought her Makili (which I read from Mel's blog & needed for Aricia's session next time)& Impossiblo (which I had problem doing it myself). Okay, not to bad.... her memory is good. But ask her to recite the story again, she can tell me but not in fluency. Ok, can't expect much from a 4yr old. She can join the pictures together for Impossiblo but seems to have problem with the last 3 cards. I always have problem with one last card.

2) Dr Ng said he overheard me teaching Athena Maths outside while waiting to see him, He mentioned how funny I sounded when I kept asking her to "tell me the equation. What is the equation? See properly.." So I explained that she was doing addition, and it's shown eg. 2 + 3 = , on the bottom they draw something so they can count. Without counting, she simply counted everything and said it's '5' and wrote down 5 without seeing the equation. Of course I pek-chek lah! She's suppose to learn what adds up to the number but she's counting it straightaway. I might as well bring her to NTUC and ask her to count the number of eggs there. ?!?!
Annie (nurse) said that she doesn't do that much with her children. Well, it's a totally different matter for me coz' I'm not working so I have to make full use of it. If I ever worked again, I'll definitely have to slow down.
Annie commented that she is reluctant to learn the new approach in teaching children. Eg. the way she does her calculations is based on what she's been used to for the past 20 over years. Justifiable! I also but my opinion is that for Maths we have no choice but to keep up with how the children can derive an answer from the equation. And she said she only knew what is number bond now, whereas I'm already into number bonds with Athena.

3) Birthdays : We are definitely celebrating Aricia's 1st birthday - important milestone leh! It's only another 6 months down the road, so I gotta start preparing things. Theme is already decided so will work from there. Likewise, to be fair, we will be celebrating Athena's birthday. She told me what she wanted as her theme. As usual, she recently changed her mind to "I want to have my party in MacDonalds" Ai yoh.. that girl huh. I think I'd like to keep it small for her this year. Too many children, cannot cope, too many guests I can't entertain - so paiseh. Won't it be boring for the parents for the MacDonald's party?

4) Aricia's baby book: She's 6 months old and her book is very empty. I haven't had the time to do it. Most importantly, I haven't developed Aricia's photos since she was born & Athena's last developed photos was some time in August 06. Oh goash! It's going to cost alot!

5) Thank goodness I signed Athena up for computer class in her school. Yesterday she wanted to play on my laptop.. and she knew how to use the touchpad and when we gave her the mousepad; she knew how to use it. It's so much better now, I used to scream at her "press the left click, why did you press the right click? Move your mouse, move! "

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