Great Expectations

The exams are looming and that brings out the tiger mom in me no matter how much I try to squish it back in. The twins have only finished the essay papers for both languages and that itself brought epiphanies to me.

The most glaring one. 

I expect too much of my twins. 

Not in terms of grades though. 

It's partially an occupational hazard. When my livelihood is dependent on teaching pre-university students to think critically, I suppose that it is inevitable that some of that spills over into what I do with the twins. 

It doesn't feature as much in the actual content papers because honestly, some of that is beyond me, even as an adult and a teacher. It does rear its ugly when it comes to composition. It isn't about the phrases and whatever rubbish they are often encouraged to memorise and regurgitate. It's to do with the ideas. 

An example. 

A composition about helping. A picture of an old man selling magazines. 

Jordan's take.

Old man is poor. Needs to sell magazines for a living. 

Nothing wrong with that. But I prod on. 

Could there be anything else wrong with the old man that might require him to sell magazines? 

Jordan: 

Erm... He's sad. He needs money. 

Evan:

He likes reading magazines. He can read them and then sell them. 

I wanted to lead them to talk about people who might be disabled and what led them to that point as well as what their struggles were. I asked them about the old lady who sold tissue paper at the MRT station near us. She always had a walking frame with her. I asked them if they noticed the walking frame. I asked them why was it that the old lady had to sell tissue paper and wasn't doing anything else. 

She stuck to it. The old lady was poor. Needed money. 

Evan wondered what it was like to have a walking frame. 

Smoke started to slowly escape my ears. 

I asked them how else we could  help people apart from giving them money. Jordan offered to give them food. Evan thought very hard and wondered what toys they could give away. 

I realised that their answers were fine. But just not the direction I wanted them to be moving toward. 

I gave up.

Eventually, I showed them the video of 6 year old Alex who wrote to President Obama. Both of them were interested in what had happened that caused Alex to write the letter. I pointed out to both of them that helping could come in this form too. And that little children could help in big ways too and that little Alex had written to the most influential person he could think of to ask for help and that was being helpful as well. 

But on hindsight, I wondered if it was too much to expect my 9 year olds to think of it beyond what they see and to draw connections to things around them. I wondered if my being disappointed that they couldn't draw these connections was an unreasonable expectation. 

I guess, for the purposes of their compositions, their answers were sufficient to get by.

But for them, as people, it's definitely insufficient. I think that was why I was distressed. I see all these young adults who have such beautiful transcripts but without a heart or thought about the world they live in and it makes me angry. I fear that it's the transference of that frustration that manifests when the twins give me trite, textbook answers. 

Then I wondered if by wanting them to think about ideas in such a way , was I telling them how to think. That truly frightened me. What if I was squashing them into the exact box that I hoped they would think out of, unintentionally? 

So I stopped and I left them with Packrat and went out. I wasn't doing anyone favours. Them or myself. 

I come home to this. Of all the things that I talked Jordan through that afternoon, she remembered one thing. She made her letters bigger and clearer and she co-wrote a joke with Evan about Obama for me.

So, without these great expectations, my 9 yos are pretty great and funny and I have to remember that.

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Ducks of a feather

Evan has a thing for ducks.

It all started when we bought him a duck when he was a baby. A duck blankie.

It was what soothed him to sleep, thumb in his mouth, twiddling a corner.

We used to do this thing where we would throw the blankie over his head and like Pavlov's dog, he would grab it, tumble over and stick his thumb into his mouth. It didn't matter if it was hard ground that he was going to tumble into. His ducks have seen many adventures; travelling the world with him and being thrown out the window by Muffin!

He's 9 now. He's stopped sucking his thumb but he still loves his Duck Duck. And his duck duck collection has spawned. There's the original Duck Duck but there is also Papa Duck Duck and a whole host of siblings whom he loves as well, though not so much as original threadbare Duck Duck.

But this love for ducks doesn't end with his soft blankies. Because he loves his Duck Duck family, he has a soft spot for all ducks. His face goes all gentle and full of love when he plays with them or talks to them. He loves ducks in a pond and he loves seeing them waddle around. But more than that, it has become a social cause for him. 

He will not eat roast duck. He loved the Peranakan Salted Veg and Duck soup till he realised one of the key ingredients in the soup was duck. Similarly, the boy who loves roast meat would not eat duck rice and even went as far as glare at Jordan for wanting to eat roast duck rice. 

When I told him about foie gras, the outrage radiated from him and the look of disgust was epic. "Why would anyone be so cruel?" he asked. The poor ducks or geese. To him, they are literally birds of a feather. 

It might be something he doesn't grow out of. It might become one of those quirky things that he can tell people about himself. "I don't eat duck because I had these furry duck blankies when I was a kid."

And since I don't eat shark's fin because I can't bear the thought of drowning, suffocating sharks, I'm going to be on his side for this one, despite the fact that his sister waxes lyrical about how yummy the duck tastes. 

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A giving sort of birthday

The twins' birthday aren't till the end of June but they like doing a thing with their friends. Unfortunately, the thing about having their birthdays during the holidays is that there isn't ever a time where all their friends are around. The solution: to do something before everyone goes off on vacation.

Term, however, ends a good month before their birthday and it does seem strange and artificial to me to celebrate that much earlier. Eventually, the consensus was to do a simple small early- birthday play date with their friends. Nothing elaborate; just pure, unadulterated fun. Not exactly a party.

At the same time, we've been talking to the twins about learning to not covet and how there will be no end to wanting mountains and mountains of toys. We've also been talking to them about helping and the responsibility to others. Helping others who have less. Helping others who need help. Add to that, we've gotten to the point, with JED, that birthdays and Christmas are met with dread because of having to sort out the presents that they get.

So, the eventual party was a swim date where each twin invited 8 friends with dinner at MacDonald's after. There were no goodie bags and no cake; we bought everyone a simple water canon to play with and they could take it home at the end of the day. They played till the water park closed.

And after talking it through with the twins, we decided that we would ask their friends not to bring presents but to bring a donation that would go to Nepal. The twins had heard about the earthquake in Nepal because for a time, that was all that was on the BBC, ad nauseum. To contextualise it, we had shown them pictures of the destruction and talked to them about what they thought the Nepali people needed.

It truly became more of an end of term bash with an occasional reference to the twins' birthday since there weren't balloons, banners and cake with only the small occasional present from parents who thought the twins might still want something tangible for themselves. The biggest thrill for them came when breaking open their home-made donation box and counting the money in it. While there was a great amount of exclamation about how much money they had counted (we raised an even $1000 from their friends!), not once did they ask for that money to be spent on them. Yesterday, we finally found the time to take them to the Red Cross to donate the money. They fought all the way there. Both wanted to hold the envelope. Both wanted to present the money for donation. Both were thrilled when they got the receipt for having donated $1000. 

In the recent week or so, we wished that we could have donated the money to the guide who lost his life trying to rescue victims in Sabah or the local teacher who also lost his life in Sabah as well. But because Nepal was what we had told the twins' friends and their parents, we honoured our commitment and donated it to Nepal. This was once again something we had to explain to the twins. Jordan had asked if the money could go to Sabah when she heard about the tragedy and the children who had lost their lives. We explained that while we wanted to, we had already promised that money to Nepal and we would donate to the Sabah victims separately. Evan's remark was an insightful and telling one- there are so many people in the world that really need money.

Yes, indeed.

If I had a birthday wish for the twins, it would be that we would be able to do this every year with them, now that they are a bit older and able to understand their obligations to the wider world out there.

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Holiday things to do- A day camp with a difference (Review)

We've just passed the first week of the holidays and JED have done their fair share of lolling around. Evan and Packrat have had to recover from camp and Jordan, from her gym competition (which I shall blog about soon.) I'm loving all the random stuff that they have been able to do, sleep overs at grandma's, play dates with friends and they even had some new experiences in the week.

The Giving Treehouse Student Care Centre wrote to invite the twins to their holiday programme. I'm sticking to my guns about not having the kids swamped by holiday classes but this one was different. This one had a heart and it was something I could totally get behind.

The twins, together with their friend Kate, did only 3 out of the 5 day programme but it was enough for them to have a lot of fun and to come home a little bit more thoughtful. Each day was markedly different from the next.

I was very taken by the colours and vibrance of the place. There was a lot of green, inspired by Shel Silvertein's The Giving Tree (already a win in my book!) and an entire wall that was a chalk board for the kids to scrawl on. Obviously, that was what the twins descended on first.

What I liked about the programme was that it was obviously non-academic and these were things that I would have done with JED if I had the time, space and didn't have to worry about anything else. And in my book, that's what holidays are meant for. 

So the highlights for us were 

1. The Trampoline Park (Jordan and Evan)

An entire hour of non-stop bouncing and challenging each other to see who could jump the highest, twirl the most number of times or somersault into a pool of foam had the kids drenched in sweat. Evan's frustration was that he couldn't get up to the top of the mattress no matter how high he jumped. But his efforts did make him look like a basketballer ready to dunk a shot. 

2. Making stuff (Evan)
Some time ago, we made lava lamps at home out of recycled bottles, cooking oil, colouring and Alka Seltzer. We've since thrown those away and he's been bugging us to do it again. I've been hedging because it's a lot of oil to use. So, the fact that The Giving Treehouse's programme included the making of lava lamps, sold the progamme to him in a heart beat. He didn't even ask about what else we were going to do. Lava lamping was good enough for him.

Their weird humour surfaced with the Alka Seltzer bubbling in the oil and colour mixtures. Small eruptions were 小龙包 and large eruptions were obviously, 大龙包. I didn't get it but they seemed to think it was hilarious.

Making the lava lamps

Making kites. 

3. Helping Others. (My favourite)

Evan wanted to do the camp because of the lava lamps, Jordan wanted to do the camp because of the day at the Trampoline Park and I wanted them to do the camp because their last day there had them going to Willing Hearts to help prepare meals for delivery. After Evan's whole 'poor people are Muslim' thing, I really needed for them to see more of this part of Singapore that features so little in their psyche and helping at Willing Hearts was a good start to it. They had to slice food for cooking and then label the boxes. It wasn't very hard work but it was hot, tedious and repetitive. They stuck to it though and Jordan announced that she had helped prepare meals for people who needed food. 

So by Friday, the twins felt very accomplished. In Evan's words, they had had an exercise day, a 'make things' day and a helping day. I couldn't have summed it up better.

My only reservation about going to The Giving Treehouse was that it was in the East and we lived on the other side of the island. But it turned out to be well worth the commute.

The Giving Treehouse is essentially an after school care centre and if I were a working mom and my kids were in school in the East, this would really be the place I would send them to. The coaches were great; they hung out with the kids, talked to them at their level and played with them. The centre was filled with books and games and everything was welcoming. I had a look at their regular after school schedule and there was conscious effort to always include time to do things that were beyond just the books. All good things.

Having grown up in the East, I've always believed that the best things are in the East and this pretty much reinforces it for me.

Now, if only I could convince Packrat that moving to the East was viable.

The Giving Tree House is at Laguna Park. (https://www.facebook.com/thegivingtreehouse)
5000F Marine Parade Road, 
#01-24 Laguna Park
Singapore 449289

T: 6448 5700
M: 9150 5756
It is a Before/ After School Student Centre and there is the option of doing ad-hoc drop-offs too.

The twins were offered a week at The Giving Tree House's holiday programme. There are four more weeks of it and I'd do it too if we didn't live so far away. Anyway, that's pretty much testament of our opinions of the programme.

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Challenging the stereotypes

One of the most frustrating parts about being a teacher is realising that my students bought lock stock and barrel the racial/ religious stereotypes that were virulent in Singapore. I have lectured, nagged, corrected, ranted and raved at them for making grievous assertions.

Evan came home announcing that there was a food drive in school where they were supposed to bring can food to donate to the underprivileged. While Evan tried to explain the mechanics of the food drive to me, I felt the familiar sensation of my blood boiling. But I had to remind myself that this was my son and he was 7 years old and he was reporting a message he had been told in school.

He had said "We need to buy can food to give to the poor people. And the food must be Halal because the poor people are Muslims."

In my mind, this was a precursor to the ignorant assertions I hear from 17 year olds about how all Muslims are terrorists and all poor people live in Africa. I am very sure that their stereotypes come from bits and pieces of misinformation as well.

I don't think his teacher actually said any of that to him. I suspect the message was that
a. We are running a can food donation drive for the underprivileged.
b. Please make sure the can food is Halal so that if the underprivileged we are going to give the can food to are Muslim, they can eat it too.

So, donning my teacher hat, I proceeded to try to correct the misinformation and explained to him that it wasn't that all poor people were Muslim and that it was so that we could bless everyone equally with our donation.

I could see he was having a bit of a hard time understanding everything I was explaining to him but he tried to correct himself later on. And he was very pleased with the stash of can food he had picked out. Of course, he's footing half the bill so perhaps, when I tell him that he owes me $6, he isn't going to be so pleased.

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A Proud Moment

I often use the fact that I am a teacher as a soapbox. I tell students, that while their A's and academic achievements are good things, they aren't what I count as my greatest successes. I tell them that the reality of the situation is that the world is bigger than they are and that in the face of all these problems, it is easy to just go living the way they do and pretending not to see the reality. I tell them that what they try to do to change it might seem insignificant, but every single bit counts. And if enough people hear that, mountains begin to move. I tell them that it is their responsibility to do so. This was something that I told students way before I became a mother.

It is the same thing that I tell JED. That because they are fortunate children and they have a lot of nice things, sometimes they don't notice that the problems are there. But because they are have grown up privilleged, they need to help those who have less than they do. I am never certain, though, how much they internalise, from what I say.

But today, I get a message from JED's school about Evan that I felt most definitely warranted a blog post and us telling him that we were very happy and proud of him.

This was the message from his Math teacher (verbatim).

'We counted the money Evan and his classmates collected from their mega art show (how timely that we are also learning about money now!). And I wondered aloud to the children what the teachers were going to do with the money. I knew that the teachers had planned to buy some treats and have a mini celebration with the children. But Evan was the first to raise his hand and quickly said "We could give it to the poor children." My day was touched by an angel. What a compassionate boy!'

It was one of those moments where I had tears, my heart grew big and everything in the world felt perfect and right.

He starts Primary One next year. He goes to a school where affluence and entitlement is obvious. My prayer for him is that as he grows older and the world he sees becomes more complicated and enticing; where comfort and ease are premium, that he will still remember to be the six year old that selflessly raised his hand to help those less well off.

Hooking up with

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Africa and MILK

Someone posted the link to this article How to reconnect with your child after a long day's work. It gave a list of questions we could ask our children and had categorised them by age. What amused me were indignant comments about how it assumed that we were dumb and had no idea how to talk to our kids. But well, in my opinion, for those who don't know what to say, it's a start.

I try to be home when they get home from school. They are full of excitement and talk on top of their voices, nineteen to a dozen. There's no need to ask questions, it just all spills out of them and I pick what I want to follow through with.

"So and so had a birthday party in class today!"  Requires standard Mommy dismissive "uh huh' to not encourage any more birthday party/ goodie bag/ birthday present talk.

"Someone came to chapel today and talked to us about Africa and milk" Requires further investigation.

Mommy: Africa and milk?
Jordan: Yah! I show you! (and proceeds to pull out a World Vision brochure and a letter encouraging us to support local charity Mainly I Love Kids (MILK) 's effort to help disadvantaged children in Singapore.

Hence, Africa and milk.

The twins have piggy banks. When they do chores, when Jordan helps me pack my JED Packs! stuff, when they sleep through the night without migrating to our room or when they lose teeth; they get between $0.50 and $1. I asked them if they wanted to take some of their money from their tins and give it to any of the projects.

The twins, bless their hearts, ran to their piggy banks and heaved them off the shelf and gave them to me. Since it was their money, I asked which project they wanted to sponsor. We looked at the various project descriptions, talked them through the idea of vaccinations, the importance of sheep to families and why some children roamed on the streets and looked up the various countries on the map and the Atlas.

So while I didn't use any of the questions in the aforementioned article, we spent a good hour talking about Africa and MILK. 

 

The disturbing thing was that we are starting to see a little bit of the privileged, well-fed somewhat entitled and obnoxious attitude in JED. Evan, seeing a picture of a disheveled girl eating the last of her porridge exclaimed how dirty she was and what was the gross stuff she was eating; to which I answered porridge and that was probably the only meal she had that day. Jordan wanted the lamb instead of buying the lamb for the family in Ethiopia because the lamb was cute. They initially only wanted to help the projects that had clean, smiley people on it. While I can't blame them, it bugs me that they might grow up thinking that their condescending attitudes were sympathetic and charitable behaviour.

Eventually, after a lot of explaining and discussion, we decided to sponsor the project in Cambodia that provides a year of food and drinking water for the World Vision's Street Children Transformation Centre and the vaccination programme in Laos where we sponsor the vaccination and immunization of 10 children. Jordan was concerned that the children would cry because she hated injections and imagined that the Laotian children would as well. Evan asked if the money we contributed to the food programme could buy more than just porridge (the boy abhors porridge and eventually felt bad that his money would only buy them porridge).

What we feel strongly about is to teach them not to judge others by what they have at home, to help others without the efforts being a token effort or a condescending one or worse still, to commit to projects that do more harm than good. I am thankful that at school, there is already effort to make them aware of the plights of those that are not as privileged. 

Technorati Tags: JED, Singapore, Social Action

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Our Christmas Wish

This isn't supposed to be the next post after Day 3 in Phuket. But as they say in the movies, "We interrupt this programme for a breaking news story..."

Not really a breaking news story, but something worthy.

It's Christmas. The reason why I haven't posted Day 4 of our Phuket Adventures is because it's been crazy trying to settle Christmas shopping and the general year-end craziness. It is constantly at the back of mind, that Day 4 remains unpublished. But it has to wait a day longer because I think this is a more important post to write or rather link.

One of my dear dear friends, S whom I admire greatly because she is the quintessential supermom  intent on raising her kids right. Not in the book smart, hot housed way but in the Proverbs 22:6 way "Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it." S is teaching her daughter and will teach her baby son, to be God-fearing and empathetic, kind and helpful to those around them. Values that sometimes get ignored in the other more localized and literal interpretation of training up a child.

Anyway, for Christmas this year, S and her daughter, Faith decided to make snow globes out of old baby food jars. When they completed them, more beautifully than I could ever do, Faith decided she was going to sell them; not to fund her own Christmas presents but to give it to a children's home so that the children there could have Christmas presents.

JEDPacks is supporting her and matching every dollar she makes and adding to the contribution the home will get from her because it is a great thing for a 5 year old to think beyond herself and we want to affirm her every step of the way. It is also the same message we are trying to send out to JED. 

This is Jordan, with Faith at their recent ballet recital. Both of them are supposed to be corn in the field. Such sweet corn!

So if you would like to support little Faith's first social cause, please pop over to JEDPacks to find out more about The True Meaning of Christmas and help Faith and JEDPacks bring a bright smile to the children at the home.

... We will now return to our regular scheduled programming *white noise crackle and pop*....
 

Technorati Tags: Christmas, Helping Others, Singapore

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