FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL: YAY, MEW ENTERS GRADE 1!

Today 26 August 2010 is the first day of the schoolyear 2010-2011. In our tradition, the first schoolday for all Graders 1 even marks the most important event in kids' school life. It sets off a brandnew start for both kids and their parents in the formers' pursuit of knowledge and scholastic success that pave the ultimate way to life success. It is the time when our kids (and us parents) learn about the notion of "homework", "exams", etc. It is also the time when we all cherish the value of education and sometimes feel lagged behind the pace of knowledge evolution when our kids begin to ask difficult and/or complicated questions. It's indeed the time for all of us to learn and keep learning.

And today Mew enters Grade 1! How great it is! We have talked all about her new experience and adventure in Grade 1 (and even further) for the last few weeks. We started to prepare all school stuffs immediately when the school sent us the list. We sat together to arrange and organize things into her new backpack. We spent hours to make name labels and stick them to her stuffs. We told her to be concentrated in class and listen to her teacher. "You are now Grader 1!" - we remind her all the time. And she feels she is really!

However, we were a bit disappointed at the manner her school organized the first schoolday. In fact, they did not celebrate it nor launch any ceremony at all. Although they sent us a letter informing that the school bus would operate today, we waited at the bus stop until 7.30am and there was no sign of any school bus arriving. Finally, Mew's Daddy had to take her to school by bike (we planned that he would accompany her there on the first day before class anyway, but we wanted her to take the school bus by herself to gain more independence). At school, all the kids and parents waited in the school yard and tried to figure out who would go to which class (I wondered why they did not simply prepare a class list in advance and send it to us together with all other documents?). It was a little bit disorganized when parents searched for their kid's name in the list of students on the nameboard post that each teacher held in her/his hand. However, it did not take long for Mew and her Daddy to spot her name at the 15th place in class 1B (there are totally 16 students in her class this year). Her teacher seems to be older than others with a very kind-looking face, so we expected that Mew would have a wonderful schoolyear with her experienced teacher.

Once all the kids found their class and their teacher, they quickly said goodbye to their parents and off they went into class at 8.00 am. It seemed that Mew still needed a little of transition as she sobbed with her teary eyes and held onto her Daddy when the time for separation came. It was quite understandable since as a kid, she was unsure about her coming experience even though we tried to instill into her mind with the excitement for Grade 1.

We are now anxiously awaiting for her coming home this afternoon to see how her first schoolday was. It should be a beautiful memory for her after all, we hope.

UPDATED: Mew was happy with her first day of Grade 1. So happy and excited that she totally forgot to take home her lunchbag and jacket and could not even remember where she did put them the last time (such a memorable day!). We hoped that she left those things on the school bus home and we could ask the driver for help tomorrow morning. The last thing to complain about her school's disorganization today was the unexpected school bus trip in the afternoon. After the no-show of school bus in the morning, all parents believed that they would have to come to school to pick their kids up in the afternoon. And when parents arrived there at around 3.15pm, they were surprised to know that their kids had got on the school bus to come home. Few were angry while others (including Mew's Daddy) rushed back to the school bus's stop to catch up with their kids. Luckily that Mew's Daddy had arrived there just a few second before the school bus stopped to drop Mew. Otherwise, he would have to make another bike trip back to her school to pick her up, phew!

Here is a beautiful song in our mother tongue for you, our dearest Mew, to help you never forget your first day of school:

LET'S LEARN ENGLISH TOGETHER!

Mew will continue her French education for at least 4 more years. While her French will undoubtedly improve, we are afraid that her English may be negatively affected due to the lack of interactive environment. We want that she can not only speak fluently English but also read smoothly. It is important that she can learn how to read English methodologically with a private tutor or an ESL teacher. We are thus trying to find one at affordable rate. In the meantime, we decided to teach her by ourselves. 

After reviewing a number of phonetics materials for kids, I opted for DOLCH SIGHT WORDS as the first step in teaching Mew to read English. (In his 1948 book, "Problems in Reading", Edward William Dolch published a list of 220 frequently used 'service words' and a separate list of 95 common nouns. These lists are estimated to contain 50-75% of the words in children's books. Dolch words, or sight words, provide an excellent base for reading at an early age. They are often called sight words because some of them can't be sounded out, and need to be learned by sight)

I use Dolch sight vocabulary words compiled and designed by Mrs. Jill Perkins to learn with Mew. Her website provides word lists, phrases, worksheets and activities with downloadable Word and PDF files. It is a good idea to have a master printout of the word lists and flashcards for further practice.

If every 3 days Mew learns a column of words (about 10-15 words) and memorizes them by heart and we repeat checking her on those words for 3 subsequent days, her percentage of retaining the words reaches 90-95%. So far, Mew has finished Dolsch Pre-Primer sight word list and she has been able to master about 40 words. Some words she still has difficulty in recognizing and remembering, but it surely takes time to strengthen a kid's memory. Once she has broadened her vocabulary to certain extent, I write down various short and long sentences using all the words that she has learnt so far to test her. For example:
- I go up and I run down to find you.
- I cannot find it where it is. Help me!
- It is big, blue and looks funny.
- I said one, two and three and we can run away (not quite correct grammatically)

And she can read them all!

During the storytime before bed every night with her Daddy, Mew can also recognize a lot of words in the book - that's another positive sign for our joint effort!

We are now working on the Dolch Primer Sight word list and have already finished about 36/52 words. I hope that Mew will be able to complete this list by the end of this month. My homework is then to create new long sentences to test her newly acquired vocabulary. I plan that after mastering (in fact, memorizing) all Dolch sigh words, Mew can read some simple stories. At that stage, we will embark on learning English formally with phonics and grammar. It is a long way ahead, however!

Here are some useful resources for Dolch sigh word learning:
http://www.theschoolbell.com/Links/Dolch/basic_lists/List1.html
http://www.zianet.com/hrmp/sightwrd.htm
http://www.fishforwords.com/sight-word-lists.php
http://www.mrsperkins.com/
http://www.abcteach.com/directory/basics/abc_activities/dolch_word_cards/

PORTRAITS

Our little artist decided to draw a portrait for her Mommy. She sat by me and silently watched me working on the computer. Sometimes she asked me "Ne bouge pas, Mama!". I did not pay a tiny attention to her work, thinking simply that she was just playing with drawing as usual.

But it turned out not this time! Amazingly, she made a real portrait of me, with even my hair clip, my pyjamas and the stuffs on my working table. It is very impressive, fantastic and well, I have to honestly admit, I was speechless when seeing the drawing (haha, I never have any idea of what I do really look like now without her work of art). Here it is, my portrait drawn by my little angel:

Then I asked her to draw her own portrait and her Daddy's portrait as well. Mew spent about half an hour sitting in front of the mirror to draw herself. And she came out of her room with this beautiful portrait:

My daughter, she is so cuuuuteeee, isn't she?

SWEETIE, YOU ARE NOW REALLY A BIG GIRL!

Mew now can wash the dishes by herself, hoorray! And she is just 6 and a half years old! Wow, I remember that the first time I helped my Mom to do the same chore was when I was 10 or 12 years old. What's a big difference, lol!

Last night, Mew asked me to teach her how to wash the dishes. I did not believe that she could do it at the age of 6 but I let her watch me anyway. While washing the piles of dishes and pots, I taught her essential steps, from arranging and piling the stuffs in the sink in a certain order to washing all the edge of bowls and dishes while holding them tightly and carefully, and to finally cleaning the sink area after finishing the chore. And this evening, after the dinner, when I asked her to clear the table and bring all the stuffs to the sink, she insisted on washing everything there by herself! So why not let her do it voluntarily instead of urging her to help me with housework later? We found a small wooden chair for her to stand on to reach the sink. Then Mew put on her own children's apron (very professionally, lol). And I stood by her side to give her a hand just in case and more importantly, to take some snapshots of this memorable event. Mew managed to do almost all the dishwashing from A to Z by herself in fact (I just helped a little bit with knives, tall glass cups, pots and pans).

Such a wonderful night! I felt so happy when realizing that my little daughter has really grown up and become a big girl indeed. Thank you so much, Sweetie!