August 2016

I was recently sent a video with 9 things to say to your kids everyday. I thought it was a good list so I thought I’d put the list up here, with a couple of additions that I think are just as, if not more, important to say to our children (or at least in their presence).

And even though the title says everyday, I think the problem with that is that we run the risk of losing the emotion and thus the results if we try to say all of them everyday, as they lose their meaning when repeated to often and at the wrong times. Some, like the first on the list, I try to say everyday, but others are more of a weekly thing. read more

Is it just me or is 7 a bit young to decide what career you want to do when you grow up? Yeah, yeah, I know he’ll change a hundred more times before he leaves school. But then, a lot of us probably do know people who decided young and kept on track to the career they wanted. And with the Olympics just ending, we know that a lot of those competitors have been training from an early age.

The real question for me though, is how much should I encourage his choices at this stage? Especially when there is a high chance he will, like most kids, change his mind again and again. For me, I think I’m going to encourage and support him as much as he’ll take. That way he’ll really know whether he has a real interest in that area, and he’ll know what it’s really about. read more

I’m sure everyone’s heard about the new Pokemon Go game that’s so popular right now. You go around in the real world and collect pokemon, gotta catch em all, right?

The thing is, when I first heard of the game, I wasn’t really interested in getting it. Sure, the concept sounded good, and it seemed like an interesting game. And for fans of the show it was obviously a must have game. But see, that’s the thing. Whilst I’ve seen quite a few episodes with my nieces and nephews, and one or two with my son, neither my son or I are what you’d call fans. Sure, when we watched the show we enjoyed it, but it’s not one of the shows we go out of our way to watch.

So what got me to download it and get Jay (my son) to play? We happened to be talking to our doctor (we’ve all been a bit sick lately) and he mentioned how his daughter was playing it and using it as a way to go out and get exercise walking around. And that’s what did it, what better way to get Jay out and exercising than as part of a video game he was playing.

And it worked. Too well as it turned out. The first day we had it (I downloaded it at lunch time), we went out collecting pokemon twice, covering around 5 kilometres. The second day Jay had school, and I was supposed to be working, so we couldn’t go out during the day. But that night he insisted we go out and look for more. So we did since he didn’t have school the next day (national day holiday), and went a couple of kilometres.

And so everyday since has been the same, going out trying to catch more. Except for yesterday when he had school and since today was a school day we didn’t go out at night. But he still went through what he’s collected and upgraded and evolved what he could.

But the extra exercise isn’t the only benefit. Whilst we’ve been out collecting he’s spent more time playing in the local playgrounds, while I sit and watch and collect pokeballs and things from the pokestop. Plus, he’s become more interested in going out to do other things instead of staying home and playing or watching TV. Like going to kick the soccer ball around. In fact when we went out to do that I took my phone out so he could try to catch a pokemon on the way to the field, but instead of playing he told me to put it away.

Overall it’s been a success, Jay’s getting more exercise and actually wants to go out. And I’ve even been taking longer walks when I go out so that I can try to hatch eggs for him (which will hatch after you’ve walked a certain distance). My biggest problem is that it’s wearing me out, my body aches more than it has in a long time, and everyday I seem to be even more tired. The truth though, is that I’m also feeling better physically and it seems to be doing both of us a world of good.

Let’s get this out of the way first. I don’t speak Chinese. I don’t read it. And I don’t write it. But still I help my son, Jay, with his Chinese homework. How? We’ll get to that in a minute.

But first some background. Here in Singapore it’s compulsory for children to study their Mother Tongue, which is based on what the Father speaks (don’t ask me, I didn’t write the rules). So even though my wife, SO, is Chinese, we could’ve chosen a different language for Jay to study as his mother tongue since I’m just a white guy who has English as my native language.

The three languages available (if my brain isn’t failing me again) are Chinese (Mandarin), Malay, and Tamil. English is the main language for teaching so that’s not an option. As foreigners we could’ve applied for none (an exemption) or chosen another language altogether, but he would’ve had to study that outside of school, and the chances of approval are supposedly very low.

Since SO is ethnically Chinese (she’s Indonesian by nationality) we decided to choose Chinese. The thing is, her Chinese isn’t that good. Oh, she can speak Mandarin and Hokkien well enough to get by and have conversations in. But her reading and writing aren’t that good.

And, as for me? I know maybe somewhere between 10 and 20 words. Mostly family related, such as addressing brothers or sisters as “ke” or “jie”.

So how do we manage his Chinese education? First line of attack are extra Saturday classes, where he gets an extra 3 hours of lessons at a private tuition centre where they follow the school’s curriculum and reinforce what he learns during the week at school. Which works really well, but leaves the problem of his day to day homework. He can’t leave that till the weekend and ask his tutor for help.

So what do we do? Most of the time my wife helps with the Chinese homework, whilst I take the English, cause I is a good English talker, and she is fluent enough in Chinese. Which works most of the time.

Unfortunately, we sometimes end up having weeks like this last week, where my wife has had late meetings/functions to attend, and couldn’t be home to do the homework with Jay. So, after a period of panicking and trying to hide from him, it’s up to me to try and help him with his homework. Fortunately, he’s doing well enough that he can do most of it with me only encouraging him, and keeping him focused.

He does have weekly spelling tests though (for both English and Chinese, but the English is simple and doesn’t need commenting on (so why did I just comment on it?)), and to help him I need to read the words out for him so he can practice writing them. Fortunately the spelling lists mostly come with the pinyin version of the character. And when they don’t, we’ve found that Google Translate works really well. The problem though is that my pronunciation isn’t the best (in fact it’s terrible), and so, Jay has to go through the words with me before I start reading them to him. Otherwise he has no idea what I’m saying, although when I do get one right the first time he will give me a high five, which happens only once or twice for every list of ten words, but it’s nice to get a reward every now and then. So far, this is working well. And to be honest, I think it actually helps him by reviewing the words in a way that doesn’t seem like it’s him learning, rather it’s him teaching me, so he enjoys it and feels like he’s the smart one (okay, maybe he is the smart one).

Overall, his Chinese is going pretty well, and after his first year he was placed in the top 30% of his year. And considering a lot of those students he beat are native Chinese speakers, I think he’s doing fairly well. I won’t take any credit for it though, he is very smart and has a great memory, so whatever I do to help is only minimal. But I do have to say I’m very proud of him and all he’s accomplished, and maybe, just maybe, what little I do, is enough to help him in some small way.