bye for now, yamaha music school..

Renzo has been attending "Music Wonderland" class at Yamaha Music School since last September. We started him with that course in hoping that he could appreciate music through listening and slowly progress on to Yamaha Junior Course in this coming October.

He was doing relatively well when he first started the course. We've met another Aug 2009 boy with his mother we got to know through internet, and that made Renzo more interested in the lessons as he felt like he already has a friend there. Unfortunately, due to work commitment, we could not continue him with the Tuesday 7pm class any more, and we finally made a tough decision, to switch him to the only other available slot at 6pm on Saturday. I don't know how good the course is but I know he could memorize most of the songs he learned during class, and he seemed to be in good mood all the time during that period. He even insisted to take a cab and attend his last Tuesday night lesson despite a super heavy downpour.

I have to admit, changing him to Saturday class is truly a bad move. First of all, Saturday schedule does work better for us as both Daddy Chan and I work 5 days a week, that means we can take turns to accompany him for lessons. But 6pm is not a good timing for Renzo. He is either having his nap, or being extremely tired and distracted at that time. Secondly, Renzo being a very "single-minded" boy, is not adapting well to the new environment and somehow, he keeps mentioning about his Tuesday class teacher and expressing his willingness to follow only that teacher.

After observing Renzo and discussing with Daddy Chan for a few weeks, we finally made a even tougher decision, to withdraw Renzo from the Music Wonderland course for now, and wait till October, before we decide if to enroll him again (since the schedule might not work for us still), or wait for another year and start him on private tuition (either with Yamaha teacher or outside tutor).

I find it a tough decision because being a persistent and determined mummy, I never like to give up easily this way, especially when comes to education. But then, we know for sure that the purpose of sending Renzo for piano lesson, is not for him to pass different grades and become a pianist, or to hope that he could grow up to be a more dignified and noble person. We just want him to enjoy his time while learning something new and fun! And seeing his response to his new Saturday lessons, I am more afraid that he will soon lose his interest in music (though I am not even sure how interested he is now, LOL)...

A close friend of mine, who is very talented and good at playing piano, suggested me to start Renzo at the age of 5 - 7, and meanwhile, bringing him to concerts to cultivate interest, might be a good idea. The decision we made to withdraw him from the lesson for now, really buys me a little more time to decide on what brand/model of piano/electone to get for him (I've been in a dilemma on what to buy for a year), and let's hope his new teacher will be able to advise me by then. And for now, we just want to let him focus on what he really enjoys first, such as working on math activity book!

learning to write his own name

Renzo learned to recognize his name "Renzo" at about 16 months, to spell his name at about 2.5 years, and finally to write his name at about 3.5 years.

Besides writing his favorite "Bad Piggies" once a while, the word he's been writing most often on drawing board, or paper is his name "Renzo".

Last night, when we reached home after work, he didn't welcome us with his usual "dinosaur hit" before opening the wooden door for us, instead we found him busying sketching something on the living room floor using an old school communication book, and after we got changed and returned to the living room, we saw this:

He spelled "Chan" as "Can" with a missing "H", and because he always pronounces his name as "Renzo Chan Yu Chan", so "Renzo Chan Yu Chung" became "Renzo CAN Yu CAN"...

We can't stop laughing although we know he's tried his best to get his name spelled correctly. When I told him that he wrote CAN instead of CHAN, he requested me to add "drink (from) the" in between his first name and "last name", and made that a sentence - "Renzo drink (from) the CAN" That made us laugh even harder and louder!!

He then rewrote his name properly with a little help from me on the spelling of "Chung", with a little more guidance from us, I am sure Renzo will start writing more words and even sentences very soon!

late submission of school work for the first time

Last night, Daddy checked Renzo's comm book in his school bag and we were shocked to dig out a piece of paper with instructions in Chinese from his Teacher Yang, dated Feb 22, requesting students to draw and color their favorite fruit on a paper plate, and bring to school, on Feb 25!!!

My brain was buzzing at the moment I read the deadline and I didn't even know how to react to it. For the very first time, WE made our boy miss his deadline for submitting school work!!!

Usually I am the one checking his school bag daily and make sure all information provided by his school teachers / principal on his comm book are properly read, acknowledged, and executed. So no excuse here, I didn't check his comm book during the weekend and we just MISSED it!!

I pulled Renzo aside and asked him.

"Did Zandon bring a paper plate to school today??"
"Yes Mummy!", said Renzo..
"Did Lakisha bring a paper plate to school today??"
"Yes Mummy!", he answered happily again.
"So did Renzo bring a paper plate to school today??"
"No, Renzo forget to bring the paper plate..." the big frown on his face made me feel extremely miserable and I hugged him and said, "No Renzo, it's mummy who forgot about the paper plate, I am really sorry!"..

Then I asked him if his Teacher Yang said anything about it, he couldn't answer besides telling me Teacher Yang speaks Chinese (well maybe that's the reason he couldn't express probably although I am sure he understands Chinese well enough). Anyway so I told him let's make sure we get it done in the next 20 minutes and bring it to school the next morning. He replied "Mummy, if I forget the paper plate again tomorrow, I will be very sad!!" =(

I read the Chinese instructions to him word by word, and he repeated that in English so I was certain that he fully understood what he supposed to do. For the next half an hour, he diligently followed Daddy's instruction to draw his favorite fruit - GRAPE on a piece of paper, he insisted to draw more than 9 grapes, and Daddy has to draw everything in dotted line for him to trace as he wasn't confident enough to do it on his own after a few tries, and it was too late at night so we just have to get it settled in a quicker way.

After Renzo finished drawing and coloring his grapes, guess what? He decided to write his name!! He did it all on his own without any help in spelling or writing.

While Daddy was cutting and pasting the GRAPES and his NAME onto the paper plate, Renzo grabbed a green pencil (his favorite color) and wrote this on another piece of paper. It took me a while to figure out what he wrote there: "GRAPS FRETS", and he said he wrote "GRAPES FRUITS".. Well done my little boy although the spelling is not 100% right but it's good effort from you!!!!

It's pretty obvious that he writes better than he draws! And of course, for Daddy and I, we promised to check his comm book daily till he is able to read it on his own independently!