Rounding up the academic year 2012

Time flies. A year just slipped by and this week of school term is filled with PTMs, open house, farewell parties & the anxiety of receiving the report book.

Enjoyed watching mei's performance & how she interacted with friends in school. She's loud & clear in her singing & recital, great in her motor skills to coordinate the dance steps & followed the timing of the song playing on the xylophone. Mummy was busy snapping photo of her proud moments while she explained her art work including the missing kite that has been chosen to appear in the school magazine.

Spent some time talking to the form teacher as she won't be taking them through K2 next year. As a mum herself, she shared her experience of bringing up children of different abilities and characters, juggle worklife balance & latest changes of pri school system which I have not realized. Specific to mei's development, she recommended to practice more on addition questions through games like fishing (add up 2 cards to get the number). Learning through play is so much fun, we will definitely play more this holidays.

For gorgor, it was time to clear his locker & school bag. Well, 1 learning point is that we will need plastic covers to sustain his books for mei to use. His worksheets & quizzes are all crumpled even with a folder. Guess he's still not organized enough & room for improvement in P2.

Academically, he came in 1st in position & aced all 3 core subjects with occasional Bs in social studies, moral education & PE. I know his motor skills are still not as developed & even received a letter to go for a flat-foot check. I'm proud that he has completed the 1st leg of the marathon but also know that there's a long way to go. There will definitely be some disappointment in upper pri & sec school grades in later part of his life as P1 is relatively easy. I'll wait for that moment to deal with it. Meanwhile, it's time to pack for our 1st road trip...

No tuition please

I'm praying that my children can be tuition-free at least until PSLE. I didn't attend a day of tuition in my school life and survived this crazy educational system. But I understand that climate has changed over the years. Instead of minority taking tuitions, it's the reverse in today's context.

How to keep my kids tuition-free? This is my plan. I plan to coach them in their school work when necessary but not over-prepare them ahead of school syllabus. I plan to read and write with them or expect them to read more in their free time when I'm not around to supervise. I plan to bring them out to play more to prevent myopia. This may sound out of point, but I think worklife balance should be cultivated from young. We need to be their role model who play hard and work even harder.

I've heard horror stories of P4 maths and heuristics taking over algebra. I haven't figured out what heuristics is all about. In my era, I always start my problem sum solving with "let it be x" and end with "x=?". At P1, my son is comfortable with number bonds & grasping concept of simple multiplication. I won't be coaching him in heuristics as I have no idea how it works. But I know the importance of reading and comprehension of problem sums starts from P1.

I've heard potato children failing Chinese and memorizing composition to pass. Although we don't fall under that category, reading Chinese books and speaking mandarin should suffice at this stage. I will continue to look for interesting Chinese books to entice the boy to read on his own, which I'm not too successful yet.

Science only comes into the picture in upper primary. I reckon that my son won't have much problem as he likes reading non-fiction books on animals and subscribes to national geographic kids magazine. My girl may have some resistance with science facts as she prefers princessy novels and fairy tales. We will factor in some science experiment activities if the need arises. We will continue to explore parks and zoo to appreciate mother nature.

The journey is a marathon, not a 100m dash. I hope we can smell the roses and enjoy the breeze along the way.

(afternote: I hope all parents have the right mindset when sending children for tuition as mentioned in this article http://sg.news.yahoo.com/blogs/singaporescene/things-consider-sending-child-tuition-classes-102823408.html)