lesson learned from some "peer pressure"

Our current culture in this 21st century, is all about immediacy. We whatsapp, instagram, tweet, blog, and of course, post on Facebook. We know everything that everyone else has accomplished. It's easy to see how this trickles down to our kids. My 5-year-old reads science books daily, so, what will I challenge him with next? Do we often pressure our kids to achieve things we couldn't achieve? And what kind of pressure we add to our kids, and even others' kids through all these so called "peer pressures"??!!

An incident happened recently, got me think really hard on this topic.

Renzo started spelling test this term in K1. There are 4 English words and 5 Chinese words given each week. I usually need to spend about 10 minutes to review with him on the Chinese spelling list as he knows at least 3 words, if not all 5. So I need to make him write the other 2 words a few times, before testing him again to make sure he could remember all. And for English, I do not need to do anything as he has mastered that with his phonics knowledge, so most of the time he knows all 4 words on the list before I even test him.

And, when he brought back his English spelling book on the usual Wednesday night, this was what I saw when I opened it:

I took a deep breath, looked at my happy kid who's enjoying his new Dora DVD I just bought a while ago in front of the TV, I said to him: "Renzo, I believe you need to spend less time on TV and study harder for your spelling test. How can you make so many mistakes when you already knew how to spell all these words?"

He looked totally lost and answered: "I don't know why mummy..."

"But you know in the past you have been scoring full marks all the time!" I then flipped to the previous page, trying to show him how well he did in the past, there, I noticed a full page of corrections requested by his English teacher, and a summary page of "not so satisfying" results:

I suddenly realized, he took back a spelling book which belongs to another boy in his class, by accident!

That very moment, I felt a great relief. But at the same time, I couldn't help but scrutinized every single page of that spelling book, which belongs to another mummy's 5-year-old son. That boy seems to have a bit of struggles here, besides not being able to spell out the words correctly, he seems to reverse his letters, such as writing "p" as "q". I tried to put myself in the that mummy's shoes, and asked myself, what if my son is just not able to get the spelling done at ease each time? And then the smiley face of that cute little boy (the real owner of this spelling book) appeared in my head. He's one of Renzo's good friends in class so I do see him often and know him well, he's chatty, smart, friendly, sociable, sweet, independent, and cheerful all the time in school. His result might not be as good as my son's at the moment, but his life definitely seems not any less fruitful, in any aspect. He's all healthy and happy, isn't that good enough?!

Setting high expectations for kids isn't necessarily a bad thing. But how lofty these goals are has to depend on how our child is responding to them. I start to wonder, do I often put too much pressure on Renzo? If I did feel a little upset and anxious while I first looked at the spelling book, then I guess my answer is, YES.

Later at night, when I showed the spelling book to Daddy Chan without revealing the secret behind, he responded: "Wow, Renzo is so careless this time? He can definitely do much better!!" And Daddy was calm enough to even notice the change in Renzo's handwriting.

We laughed it off when I eventually shared with him about what happened. We were both glad that none of us snapped and lost our cool over such a "big deal". And today when I opened the spelling book that truly belongs to Renzo, just as expected:

There's one lesson I've learned, know our kids well and trust them no matter how! Don't act as pressure parent just because we get so much peer pressures from other parents, other kids. Easy to be said than done isn't it?! So I've decided to bring Renzo for some fun activities tomorrow, nothing about learning at all, since the school is closed for teachers' retreat! But before that, he has to get all his piano and childcare homework 100% completed, right now (by 10pm), right here (in the study room)... LOL

 

 LINKING UP WITH:

online parenting tips which truly work..

Social media network has been flooded with online parenting tips nowadays, such as 9 tips to be your child's best friend, 8 tips that promote most effective discipline, 7 ways to raise happy kid, 6 ways to get your kid to eat better, etc, etc....

I usually take those with a pinch of salt because, I feel that most of the stuff I've read, are either lack of reach and statistical support, or filled with too much scientific proofs which don't sound logical. After all, how many of those so called experts or scientists have kids, and even if they do, how many kids they've really brought up with their single pair of hands? I don't believe they've brought up as many, in order to represent different characters covering a full 360 degree spectrum..

I especially hate those articles keep telling you, 10 ways you will spoil your kids, which my parents have, clearly followed 9 out of the 10 and I am still, clearly NOT raised up as a spoiled brat.

But I do love those tips from parents which worked for their kids, which I find easier to relate to as a parent, and I even came up with my own list of disciplining tips recently.

So among all those stuff I've ever read, some are indeed very useful and effective though.

One good example, is about how to teach your child not to interrupt, there's a single step mentioned here and it worked like miracle on Renzo. Basically following this tip, he's told to hold our wrists if he needs to interrupt when we are in a conversation. And we just put our hands around his in return to acknowledge that, and give him the chance to speak once we are done with our conversation.  It's extremely heart warming to see him doing that automatically after a few rounds of practices and reminders. When I say "a few", it was really just about 4-5 times of practice with us. So doesn't hurt to give it a try isn't it?!!

Another popular article in Chinese circulating around the internet, is about grocery shopping with kids. Basically it's a story about how a 4 years old purchase items independently at super market by preparing a "shopping list" to follow. It's amazing how many words a kid could recognize and how the concept of "managing financial budget" get instilled from young. This is something we've been doing with Renzo, and he enjoys grocery shopping so much because of the sense of satisfaction he got from being able to help out with decision making.

Last but not least, my dad is a true advocate for establishing good routine with timetable for kids. So I had to do my own daily schedule during school holidays since I was 6. There are some tips about setting up schedule for kids here. For my kids, they have their daily timetable set up when they were infants. It serves as a guideline for our helper to follow as well, since she's the main caregiver at home before we sent the boys to full day childcare. A colorful timetable is not only appealing to kids, it is also a great reference for self discipline. Instead of sending Renzo to thinking corner which is a method works the best for his mischievous behavior when he was 3 to 4 years old, nowadays we just need to send him to his timetable. He knows exactly what he is expected to do at what time, without the need for us to reason with him at all. And trust me, it is the best motivation to get him started on a good routine, and then on, he managed to form a habit which helps him to continue with his routine.

So in a nutshell, do not get overstressed with those tips which work for others, but somehow, just not for you. Use your instinct as a parent and LISTEN TO YOUR CHILD!! Did I mention that's my "1 most effective tip to be a good parent"??!!!

Renzo is 5!!

August 12, 2014, Renzo just turned 5 today...

He had a small celebration with his friends in child care center as usual, then the lovely grandparents brought him to Toy R Us to select his birthday present, and even treated him 2 big scoops of ice creams. It must be the most wonderful day for this little 5 years old kid!!

I didn't prepare anything special for Renzo. My own birthdays were spent just like any other normal day without any present or cake since young. And I believe Renzo has more than enough toys at home so there's no reason why I should buy him more, I know it's his birthday, so?!

But I made sure I was the first to hug and kiss him when he got up from bed at 610am this morning, I wished him "Happy Birthday" and told him how much I love him everyday. Renzo hugged and kissed me in return and said, "I love you Mummy, I want you to know that I love you more and I miss you everyday at child care center. Next time when you die, I'm going to miss you!!"

I looked into his eyes, with tears falling from my eyes, the past one year has been different from the year before. Renzo has grown up far too quickly, to a pretty mature toddler who doesn't have the word "tantrum" in his dictionary any more. Instead he's making conscious efforts to learn and absorb more, in order to be a better boy (that's in his own words). He made me the proudest mother, if not the coolest ever.

 

 

 

 

My wish for his birthday is that he will stay as sweet as he is today, and happy and healthy always.

Happy 5th birthday, my little man, love you more than you’ll ever truly know.

GlobalArt lessons for Renzo

Right before I start off this new post, I re-read what I've posted earlier this year, about Renzo' great interest in coloring. I somehow "admire" my own foresight in spotting Renzo's interest and strength in coloring. Back then, I mentioned that we have no plan to enroll him for any art class. For those who know me well, I am never a fan of enrichment lessons at all, so, it's pretty interesting that merely half a year later, guess what I just did? I signed Renzo up for a weekly 1.5 hours art lesson with Global Art School near his current childcare center.

So, why? Why the change in decision?

Let's just say, I was being forced by my 5 years old to send him for art enrichment, yes, that's the truth!

After casually discussing with me about his plan of taking art class, 3 weeks ago, he finally dragged me into the Global Art school nearer to our place after I fetched him from childcare, and happily attended his first assessment there, by drawing and coloring an apple on his own, and coloring another apple by following instructions given by teacher using the color blending method. He did pretty well on those tasks and I was advised to enroll him to Foundation level 2 lessons.

 

 

I gave myself another day to discuss about our plan with Daddy Chan, while letting Renzo have a second thought about his decision again to make sure that's really what he wanted. On the following day, I brought him to another Global Art branch in the same building as his childcare center, and re did the assessment again there. I was quite amazed that he wasn't frustrated with doing the exact same stuff again and indeed, he performed even better. This time, it is confirmed again that he's qualified for Foundation 2 level.

I quickly settled the payment and confirmed his weekly lesson on every Friday afternoon. I love the fact that there's no homework, though they focus a lot on coloring than painting which is not exactly what Renzo wanted initially. All the needed materials from books to crayons are provided together with a nice bag and Tshirt. And the best part is, the art teacher is taking care of the logistics since school is in the same building as his childcare center, so this arrangement will not affect his daily routine, we parents do not need to make efforts to bring him down for the lessons, and he doesn't need to spend extra hours on his hobby during the weekends. 

I explained to Renzo that besides daily 7am to 7pm childcare, I only expect him to attend his 45 minutes piano lessons every Sunday. And on top of that, he is allowed to pick one more enrichment lesson of his own choice. In this case, Global Art it is. If he wants to learn anything else in the future, he has to consider dropping one of those, which is clearly not childcare, and not piano (not anytime soon as I won't let him give up easily), so again, Global Art it is. He considered about it seriously and told me, "then I am not going to learn tennis mummy, can we ask daddy's friends to come and teach me how to play?". So, I totally didn't expect tennis is the next thing in his mind but nope, not for now. It's not just about financial factor here, we all know how expensive such classes can cost in Singapore. This Global Art lesson he's attending, costs about S$32 for 1.5 hours which is about 5 times more expensive than those conducted at community center. But my biggest concern, is TIME! He's already spending a decent amount of time learning in school and I just don't want him to spend his childhood rushing around for enrichment classes!!

So, after bothering me for another week about when will his first lesson begin, he finally had a taste of art enrichment on July 25th. He started with creating his own color chart and he really enjoyed it, that's all it matters isn't it?!