Ethan Chan's Diary

Exam result

2010-10-13T15:18:00.002+08:00

Today Ethan brought back his last week exam paper. He did not score all the 4 subjects.

At first mother was a bit disappointed with his English test. He had made a careless mistake. Mother asked why he was so careless and he argued with mother that some of his friends did not score any subject. Mother was angry with his attitude and told him not to compare with other people. He kept quite and almost wanted to cry.

Carry him

2010-10-10T16:48:00.002+08:00

Ethan likes his papa to carry him around when we go outside. He will not request his mama to do so because he knows his mother is unable to carry him. Normally mama will hold his hands and walk together.

Knowing that some of people will comment that the kid has grown up but still need parent to carry? We do not pamper him. We just like the feeling that he still want to attach to us. We know that one of these days this action will stop when he grows up. We just want to enjoy this moment before the period ended.

Will mama able to do it....

2010-10-07T10:01:00.006+08:00

Oh my! Oh my!. Mother still has a lot of books that haven't check and read to Ethan. Mother is not sure whether can complete the mission before the Dec month or not. Besides the English story books, there are still Chinese story books and Bahasa Malaysia story books.

Now mother still keep on buying the Chinese story books from Shanghai since they have the National day sale. The English story books mummy hasn't finished all were the one daddy bought when having business trip to US few months ago. Can mother manage to finish all the books? Maybe can or maybe not... All depends on how hard working mother is.

Now what can mother do is reading as many as possible. some of the books need to sacrificed and wait until next year.

Books for revision

2010-10-01T10:06:00.002+08:00

Next week, Ethan's kindy will be having the 2nd semester evaluation. Teacher has given back the books. Mother asked why so many books then Ethan's response was teacher asked to read and do revision during the weekend. Mother really doesn't know what to read to him since the books already done by him and got answer so no need to ask him to do it again by looking at the book.

What mother worried is his BM subject as we seldom use it at home. Even sometimes mother did read the BM story books for him but compared with Chinese and English it was far less. The BM story book mother read for Ethan is quite simple and few words in one page as mother knows that his BM standard cannot beat his Chinese and English. Mother did hope that during the school holiday can close up the gap of his BM language with others.

Calculate the chinese stroke

2010-09-28T10:13:00.002+08:00

It was quite sometime that Ethan did not count the Chinese word stroke. He almost forgotten about it. Today he brought back his Chinese subject and mother found out that he wrongly calculated the stroke of the Chinese word. Mother gave him advise him that some of the stroke even look like a lot of stroke but actually it is counted as one. After getting the advice from mother, the next few days, he manages to get all the stroke calculation correct. Well done Ethan....

Half naked

2010-09-26T10:27:00.002+08:00

Don't know why recently it was quite hot. So whenever Ethan comes back from school, mother takes out all his school uniform and only left the underwear. He is doing his homework half naked as mother found him sweating a lot when doing his homework. Mother doesn't want him to sweat a lot as he needs to take a bath after he finishes all his homework.

At first, mother is a bit worry whether he will get sick in this situation since he is never naked like this at home before. So far so good....

Happy Mid Autumn Festival

2010-09-22T11:22:00.002+08:00

We have bought the lantern two weeks ago but we did not take any action. Tonight is the day that we must lit it up. It have been raining before daddy took Ethan out for the walk. The lantern had been chosen by Ethan few weeks ago. We didn't know why he likes the frog design but we respected his choice.

Daddy helped to light up the lantern

Ready for the walk

Ethan really had a good time as he can see lot of kids in our taman also brought the lantern. Daddy said that he had light up 5 candles for Ethan's lantern....

Swimming fun

2010-09-19T11:30:00.002+08:00

It was quite sometime that we did not bring Ethan to swim. We were afraid that he will cough again as recently he was often attacked by the cough virus. Sometimes we just had to make a move since daddy complaint that we are wasting the benefit to enjoy the facilities in the club house.

He was having a great fun and excited when we brought him to swim. He kept on kicking and kicking in the pool. He likes the adult pool and swims with daddy. Mother did ask him to swim in kid pool but he kept walking in the kid pool. Mother asked why not swim instead of walk, he answered that walking is faster than swimming in kid pool.

Even though he did not know how to swim but we were pleased that he can kick and swim with the help of the rubber float. Last time he wanted us to hold him even with the float. We still have the problem to make him put his head down into the water. What to do, he was very scared of putting the head down inside the water. Still have to gradually lure him to do this. We hoped one day he dare to do it....

Maths : The Division

2010-09-08T10:19:00.004+08:00

You see. Mother did not take any action to teach him the division. During the school holiday, mother found out that Ethan almost forgotten some of the multiply after few months he did not do the exercise. So he needs to refresh again his memory. Luckily he picked up quite fast even not 100% remember.

Looking at his multiply, mother delayed again teaching him the division. "BUT" this kid gone and used the calculator to do the division exercise. Mother spot this and said that he was cheating using the machine. He immediately stopped and mother told him that the division is the opposite of the multiply. He got the idea and do the rest of the exercise by himself. What surprised mother was that he had done all the questions correctly. He really loves maths....

Activity in school holiday

2010-09-05T13:51:00.002+08:00

During the school holiday, mother brought Ethan back to Kedah to stay. The activities that Ethan had in the morning or evening was scribble words on the car park floor. Ethan had a box of chalk for quite some time but we did not let him have fun with it. In Penang, our car park was covered with tiles so we only have cement floor outside the house. We considered it was dangerous for him to draw outside the house because of the cars passing by.

Since grandparent's house car park is covered by cement so this is good place for him to draw or write something on the floor under safe environment. He just loved it, he drew sun, house, road all over the floor.

Our sunday

2010-08-22T09:32:00.006+08:00

Today we went to Eastin Hotel to attend one of seminar organized by one of the branded milk Co. This is the first time we attended this kind of function. Since the event started at 2.30pm so it means that Ethan cannot take his nap time but we asked him to take a short nap like about one hour but he didn't. Both parents fell asleep while accompanying him. He was the alarm clock for us as he woke us up saying that it was 2 o'clock.

We arrived at the Hotel at about 2.15pm and we took the escalator to Level 3. A lot of parents had already arrived and we registered ourselves. The staff gave us a piece of form to fill up in order to get the goodies bag from the milk co. We went to the children corner to let Ethan have some fun. We had been offered by the staff to take care of our kid when we go for the presentation in the other room. At first Ethan refused to let go so we just informed the staff and we would think about it before letting them know. We let Ethan colored the "Doraemon" and asked whether he wants to stay here with the other kids or not. Yes was the answer then daddy went to register him. When the presentation started we informed Ethan that we will go to the other room and we will pick him up at 4.30pm. He said bye bye to us.

Half way through the presentation, daddy went to take a look at Ethan whether he was ok or not. Daddy found him eating the muffin and playing with the toys. The staff walk towards daddy and asked daddy whether is this kid his son. Yes and the staff informed daddy that Ethan was a very independent boy. He even asked the staff to bring him to the toilet. Daddy saw that most of the kids were accompanied by their parents or grandparents. Seems like we are the one who left Ethan alone in the children corner. After the talk, we went to pick Ethan up and he was happily playing in the room. We had some refreshment before we left the hotel.

Ethan slept early at night.....

Eye problem

2010-08-20T10:20:00.003+08:00

Recently we had noticed that Ethan is having an eye problem. He will consistently blink his both eyes. Seems like that was something inside the eye. Last time he had this problem too but only for a while but this round he has persisted the situation for few days already. We planned to bring him to the eye specialist to inspect his eye.

We hoped that after the inspection he could recover from this.

Some art work

2010-08-19T09:53:00.004+08:00

It has been quite some time that we did not do the art work together. Seems mother start to discipline Ethan on his nap time so that he got spare time to do extra stuffs.

Today we started with the cut, paste and draw. This time mother had to sit beside him to look at him cutting or else the whole color paper will transform into small pieces of rubbish. He likes to cut the paper into small pieces. After he finished cutting, he has to paste them on the paper. Mother asked him to draw anything on the paper.

Paste the house

He drew the door and window on the house. Mother asked why is it so many windows in the house. His response was that the house got lot of levels so it would need a lot of windows. He even said one house is Ethan's and the big house is mama's house.

Concentrated on the drawing

He even drew the tree, sun, cloud and birds in the picture. The last thing to do, paste on the wall.

Mother wanted him to practice his drawing skill and not only writing the number on the paper as recently mother noticed him has some interest in learning to draw with the help of the book. Maybe is time to consider whether to enroll him to the art class or not....

His drawing

2010-08-18T09:52:00.003+08:00

For us this was a surprise as this is Ethan's first drawing that mother had noticed. It was part of his school homework. We never think that he can draw. We were please that the school had taught them how to draw.

Need a discplince

2010-08-18T09:31:00.001+08:00

Mother wants to discipline Ethan on his day to day routine. Basically the two main concerns are his homework and the nap time.

Homework:-
Mother wants to set a timetable on his homework like he only has 15 min to finish his homework on one subject. We need to train him or else when he enters the primary school that time where got ample time for him to finish all his homework with his current attitude.

Nap time:-
Last time he takes his nap starting from 1 o clock but recently after his homework and reading session, we actually delayed it to 2 o clock. He can take his nap time until 6 something in the evening. Well, cannot persist with this situation anymore because after he wakes up late from his nap time, he actually only can sleep around 12 at night which causes him not really can wake up early next morning. Mother wants to set the nap time from 2 to 4 then in next year he only entitle one hour nap time. We need to gradually adjust it because we were afraid he will attend the afternoon class when he is in primary one.

After adjusting this two main issues then he got spare time to play. Let's hope the plan can work. Mother will start from today.

Washed the plates

2010-08-17T09:56:00.001+08:00

We did not expect him to help us to wash all the plates in the sink. At first he self fed himself with the multi-vitamin then he wanted to wash the spoon. But he was not tall enough, so he moved the chair to the sink and he started to wash the spoon. Then he continued to wash all the plates and stuffs in the sink. We were pleased with his action even though we have expected that we might have to rewash again all the plates.

Homework issue again

2010-08-17T09:09:00.006+08:00

Few weeks ago he was still fine with his homework but recently the situation changed. He was very slow and day dream when doing his homework. Just a simple few words he can take ages to finish it.

Today he needs to write the Chinese character, he informed mother that he wanted to take a nap first. Ok the deal was on and before he slept he requested mother to read the story book to him. When mother finished reading the book he bargained for more. He seemed like doesn't want to take the nap. Instead wanting mother to continue reading and reading. Mother rejected him knowing that without nap time it would even be more difficult for him to finish his homework. He wailed a bit then he fell asleep.

When he woke up he still refused and made funny action doing his homework. At last mother gave up and said to wait after the dinner and daddy comes back to guide him. After everything was settled, mother quickly bathed him and brought him to the room and asked him to finish what he promised then mother went to take a bath. After the bath, mother went into the room and found out actually not any progress on the homework. He was doing other things instead. Mother was angry with his attitude and said she will not take care and ask him to do the homework anymore. Is his choice not to do that then he needs to take the consequence of it. He was afraid and tried but he seemed like having no concentration at all of doing that. He waited until his daddy walked into the room. He constantly asked daddy to sit beside him to accompany him but he was doing funny action again.

Daddy was out of patient after asking him so many times to write the word and walked away. He was like the boy who cried wolf asking his daddy if he sits beside him then he will write it. After few attempts daddy felt like being cheated then daddy was really mad at him. So the next action was to beat him. He cried non stop and mother also cannot stand his attitude so we collected the homework and banned him from doing his homework. We told him that we will let him not able to hand over the homework to the teacher next morning. He wailed even louder and begged for the homework then we rejected his request. We told him that we gave him so many chances but he did not appreciate it so he has to bear his choice.

He even refused to sleep and walked around the room. Mother erased all his Chinese characters that he wrote because his words were like scribble on the book. Mother gave him the last chance after he said sorry and that time was already 11 something. Mother did her own stuff , Ethan was doing his homework. Half way through mother cannot stand anymore so he needs to complete his homework without anybody accompanying him. Seemed like he had learned his lesson so he wrote it nicely and completed it but that time was already 12 in the midnight....

Now we need to see whether he learned the lesson or not. The result only can be shown in Thursday as normally Wednesday he will not have any homework because every Wednesday is his school fun and sport day.

Shopping center.....

2010-08-15T13:42:00.002+08:00

This is first time mother and Ethan went to "Time Square" in Penang. We had our lunch at "Swensen" after visiting the hospital. Sometimes mother just felt like we are actually out of date. Normally when new mall opens in Penang , we will not pay a visit after the opening ceremony. Like Gurney Plaza, mother's first time visit there was because of company team building and the first visit was after the plaza had been opened for more than one year. Even QBM nearby the place we stayed but we only pay a visit to the mall after the mall had been opened for more than half year....

Not yet

2010-08-15T10:10:00.004+08:00

Sometimes daddy will on and off bribe Ethan with the electronic gadget if he gets good result. Mother always protest about it. Daddy said want to have a electronic dictionary for Ethan but mother does not agree with it. Mother wants him to start with the traditional way, find the unknown word in dictionary book. You can say that mother is out of date but she just wanted Ethan to learn from the basic first.

So far mother also did not feel Ethan needs an electronic dictionary because he is too young and mother still can teach him the words. Will plan to teach him to search the dictionary when the time is right. Mother thinks that the electronic dictionary will be the last source if Ethan really cannot handle the situation.

New game

2010-08-13T10:26:00.002+08:00

Actually mother did not invent this game. This game has been printed in one of his Chinese nursery rhythm book. The book contains some activities beside teaching the young kid to read the simple Chinese nursery rhythm. He likes the game very much and he told his mother that he knows how to read the word hanging on the apple tree. At first he still cannot read all the 8 words but he took the initiative to ask mother to teach him the words. Surprisingly he memorized them very fast and now he knows all the words. He told mother he wants to play the game so mother enlarged the apple tree by drawing on one of recycled poster and pasted it on the wall.

He was happy to see that and he tore down the words from the tree and read aloud to us. He said that one word scores 10 point and in his first attempt he only cannot read one word.

Sweet action

2010-08-10T09:56:00.003+08:00

Everyday when we bring him to the kindergarten, he will wave good bye and kiss us before we leave the kindergarten. Sometime we forgot this step and he will run all the the way out from his classroom to stop us in order to say goodbye and kiss us. So sweet the action.

We don't know whether other kids have done the same thing or not. However, whenever his does this action to us, his classmates will look shock and stare at his actions.....

Bribed him

2010-08-09T09:21:00.003+08:00

Yesterday was the final of the 无敌状元 competition. Daddy asked him whether he wants the "Besta" digital dictionary or not? He wants it. Daddy told him that he will entitle for one if he gets Number 1 again in the next exam. Mother said daddy tried to bribe the kid....

Follow one by one

2010-08-05T10:17:00.004+08:00

Recently Ethan was hooked on the Android 'Fish food game" ever since daddy introduced to him. Ever night after his dinner time, he will request to play the fish game. But hold on! Not so fast as he haven't finish his homework yet . Today he woke up at 6 evening and we went out for dinner so he did not manage to do it before dinner time. Mother told him that he should finished his own responsibility then he only get to play it.

Below are our conversation:-
Mother : You have to finish the homework first. Follow one by one (一个接一个)
Ethan response: Can I finish two by two so can get to play it fast?
Mother asked: How to finish two by two?
He just laughed and followed mother to the room to finish his homework while mother went for her bath.

After he had finished the homework, he immediately walked down and asked for his favorite game. Mother went up to the room to check on his homework, yup he really finished it and kept all the books, pencil box and color pencil into his school bag.

His homework

2010-08-03T10:06:00.003+08:00

Mother wants him to have the habit of "今日事今日毕" on his homework no matter whether it is Friday or holiday in the next day. So far so good even though he will bargain with mother to do it later especially when come to writing the Chinese character. He will bargain with mother that after nap time then he will continue to write it. Seeing that he wrote in snail mode and totally loss of concentration then it is better to let him rest.

What mother is pleased is that he really kept his promise and maintained his self discipline. Mainly because he will inform his mother that he wants to finish his homework even though mother wants to bring him out from the room after he wakes up. He will finish all his homework then only walk out with mother. So shame on mother.

Video capture

2010-08-02T09:17:00.005+08:00

Every night Ethan will request to view back the photo or the video that we have taken since he was born. When he was born we actually did take a lot of video but gradually reduced it. So we promised him to take his video so in future he can view it back.

Today itself mother already captured two videos of him but unfortunately the SD memory card does not have enough disc space.

Improvement

2010-08-01T09:23:00.004+08:00

After half month's of special note for Ethan to learn Chinese words, mother has seen some improvement with him. He showed the keen interest of trying to read the Chinese sentences from the book. Mother was glad that this method did work on him and he was happy to learn it everyday. He even requested the special note from mother if mother forgets to provide to him. With this mother cannot be lazy any more.

Since this method can work so mother is thinking of providing him the special note on BM and English.

Revisited the Public library

2010-07-31T09:44:00.003+08:00

Today mother asked daddy to drive us to the library again. We have stopped borrowing books since April month. Few weeks back mother started to read again to Ethan so it is better to borrow some English books to him instead of only reading Chinese story books to him.

Yes, Ethan is back again as himself. He likes to listen to the story again. Few days of nonstop reading did restore back his interest in the books. Following days will be the busy day for mother because mother need to check the dictionary again for those new books....

Circle the words

2010-07-27T09:52:00.005+08:00

Recently Ethan likes to circle those Chinese words that he doesn't know how to pronounce. He will ask mother to teach him. Even though he cannot instantly remember them but mother is pleased with his learning attitude.

Knowing that it is not easy to learn Chinese so we let him take his own sweet time. What we hoped is that he will keep his interest on learning. That alone is enough for us.

His toy

2010-07-25T10:01:00.003+08:00

Daddy said that Ethan's toy is simple and easy to find. We did not spend much money to get them. Past few months he was interested with time. So he will bring along the digital clock given by the bank with him. He learns how to read the time in analog and digital. Recently he is interested with the calender, we just provided him the paper calender that we received from grandpa. He learned the month like in Jan got 31 days, Feb got 28days and every 4 years Feb month has got 29 days and etc. He even know today is what date better compared to us. Everyday when he wakes up he will tell us today is what date.

What we can say is that his toy is free of charge and we can find it in our normal life...Now let's wait and see what will be the next toy for him....

Recent routine

2010-07-18T10:36:00.003+08:00

Ever since we let him walk on the trade mill, he wants to exercise on this machine everyday. If his wakes up late after his nap time, he will insist wanting to have it even though it is already 8 something at night. We know that he will not give up and will do it even after his bath. We let him walk on the machine about 10 to 15 min before we bathe him.

We did not restrict him from doing this. Mainly because it is an exercise for him since he is not really good in physical movement. We hoped that with this he will improve in his physical strength.

Do you know the name of the game?

2010-07-17T10:33:00.003+08:00

We only remember that we did play this game before when we were kid.. Now is Ethan's turn to play it with us.

Special note

2010-07-16T09:24:00.003+08:00

You see, mother got accumulated the dust on those Chinese flash card ever since we bought it. Mother seldom use it because Ethan doesn't show any interest in it. So in order not to dampen his interest on learning the Chinese word, mother only read the Chinese story books to him instead of asking him to recognize the words.

Few months ago, mother did successfully let Ethan learned the 9x9 multiply table or 3 words chant on the way to school. So mother got the idea that why not try this way too with Chinese. Mother started with a small note for him. Greeting word for him before start learning of Chinese words. Mother wrote down 5 new words for him to learn on the way, whether he likes it or not still a question mark but at least under non forcing and relax situation. Hope that this method can work.

Time before he sleep

2010-07-15T10:45:00.004+08:00

This was another bonding and learning time for us. At night when we switch off the light, mother and Ethan will have some spelling game before he actually falls in sleep. He will request mother to ask him how to spell those words. Sometime we switch the role, he will ask back his mother how to spell.

With this, he learns the spelling fast and he is happy with his accomplishment. Sometime mother wants to stop the game because of sleepiness but he insisted mother to ask him more. Mother has to bargain with him in order to stop the game by promising to ask him another two more words....

Today.....

2010-07-11T10:21:00.005+08:00

Today daddy brought him to the barber shop to cut his hair. Back home, he brought along this Chinese comic book. According to daddy he was reading this book while waiting for daddy to cut hair. The barber shop uncle lent him the book since he insisted wanting to finish reading it.

Now the book is still with us, we hoped that next time when we bring him to cut his hair, he will return this book back....

Lamb hat ...

2010-07-10T10:19:00.002+08:00

He likes to wear this hat when we were back in Kedah.

When...?

2010-07-09T15:32:00.003+08:00

Ethan sat on the staircase while mother was mopping the floor. He asked when can he mop the floor? Mother said to wait until he grows up a bit. He asked again is it 6 years old? Mother cannot give him a particular time frame but just promised him that he can start with lapping the cabinet or book shelves first.

His past time

2010-07-08T10:12:00.004+08:00

Today mother let him practice his hand skill with scissor. He needs to color the picture and cut it out to paste on the correct place. He did it very well because all was done by him without mother's help.

Finished his masterpiece

Mini Sport Day

2010-07-03T15:38:00.006+08:00

Yes, finally Ethan gets to join the school event. These few days we did hope that everything was smooth sailing. We went to market to buy the bread for today sport day because we need to arrive at the field at 7.30am.

We managed to arrive on time but the sky was gloomy. There was a small rain drizzling as we parked our car. We brought along two umbrellas just in case. Luckily the rain stopped after awhile. At 8 something all the children need to straight file according to their team based on the color of their sports wear. There were few kids leading all the children marching into the field. After that, National Anthem, State song and school song "卫理幼儿园. The two warming up exercises had been danced by all the kids and including the parent participant before the sports events started.

There were several games played by the children like "Wild animal race", "Recycle game", "Drinking game", "Gunny sack" and the last game was the "Tug of war ".

The school stopped the game for the kids to have some drinks

The last game needed the parent to participate. According to daddy, Ethan was afraid when daddy was pulling the gunny sack.

After the game every kid has been given a whistle plus a bubble from the school. We went back home to let Ethan have a bath before we headed for lunch.....

What is he doing?

2010-07-01T10:01:00.003+08:00

He was moving and sweating, what is he doing?
Ethan had been standing on the trade-mill machine to do his exercise. Since today is his first day so mother only let him walk on the machine for 10 minutes. Promised him to gradually increase the time and speed for him after some time.

Not spicy at all

2010-06-30T10:21:00.003+08:00

When Ethan looked at the food with red color, he will know that the foods is spicy and he will not touch it at all. He knows that he cannot take the spicy food.

Today mother had cooked two type of eggs, one is for Ethan with no chili source and another one for us(adult) with chili. When he took his lunch, he already pointed out that this plate of egg is spicy and another plate was free of spice. Mother put those non spicy one for him and asked whether he wanted to try the spicy one. At first, he was still struggling but he took the challenge after mother told him that no spicy at all as it is only sweet taste. Mother took a bit and put it into his mouth and let him taste it. He was ok with it then he requested for more.

We were glad that he slowly accept it because both of us like the spicy food so much. This is the first move he had taken and we will gradually introduce more spicy food to him.....

His funny thought

2010-06-27T10:40:00.005+08:00

This two days Ethan have been playing with grandfather "万步机". He has hooked it on his pants and ran about in order to know how many steps that he had walked. He saw the number kept on increasing when he walked with it. He was wondering whether the machine can reduce the number or not. Since he knows that walk forward can increase the number so he tried to walk backward and hoped that the number of steps can be reduced. We were laughing at his action and his thinking.....

Need to recover

2010-06-24T11:08:00.006+08:00

Mother had stopped reading to Ethan everyday for the past few months. On and off will read to him and mother already felt the bad impact on him. He does not have the enthusiasm as before. His concentration was not good as before. But it was really difficult for mother to control the situation as mother was not feeling well and also fell sick.

Even though mother reads one book for him, mother already felt like mother just finished one marathon competition. Mother having a serious blocking nose and it was hard for mother to read out the whole sentence. Now mother had recovered a bit and wanted to start over again but the situation was that mother needs to start from zero again. How about daddy helping? Did ask but daddy read to Ethan just like those people being forced to do. The kid is sensitive when the parent show unpleasant manner on him.

More homework

2010-06-22T10:30:00.002+08:00

Ethan had been back to school this week. Mother felt that after the school started 2nd semester, the homework he brought back became more and more. Sometimes one day he needs to finish 4 books of homework. In 1st semester, he seldom brought back homework. Even there are some, they are only one or two simple homework but not now. Guessed the kindergarten have been speeding up the teaching material after the kids had enjoyed 6 months of honeymoon periods.

Last time he can finish all the homework before he takes his nap time but not now. He will not finish the homework even already 2 something in the afternoon. Mother will ask for his opinion whether he wants to continue to finish it or wait to finish after he wakes up from his nap. His 100% choice will be to wait until he wakes up.

Now the homework is increased but his speed is still slow like a snail when he does his homework. Hoped that he can improve it later.

His weird request

2010-06-21T10:48:00.004+08:00

Ethan has weird request. He likes to ask his mother to take his photo in his underwear. Everyday he will ask mother to take photo of him in his underwear before he goes to bathe. Sometimes mother rejected his request but sometimes mother will follow his instruction.

No vacation

2010-06-20T10:53:00.003+08:00

We did not visit any places during Ethan's two weeks holiday. We did plan to go to Cameron Highland but people adviced against it. There will be traffic jam and the cost of the trip will also be more expensive. The most unfortunate thins was that we were also sick during the holiday. So mother just brought Ethan back to Kedah for one week.

Auntie suggested that we go to Cameron Highland during the Penang governor's birthday but that time Ethan's school seemed like no holiday unless he absent himself from school. Let's wait and see the situation first.

Funny hairstyle

2010-06-20T10:11:00.003+08:00

Mother had made his hair stand like a tall building during the bath time. He just loves it....

Change the lyric

2010-06-19T10:43:00.003+08:00

We know that Ethan is not really good in singing as he could not really remember the lyric of the song. Recently, mother observed that he likes to change the lyric of the song according to his own interpretation. The rhythm is still the same with that of the the kid song but he changes the lyric to his own words. It is so funny to listen to it but he really enjoys his own song......

XX状元

2010-06-18T10:54:00.006+08:00

Recently we watch one of the TV programme called "无敌状元". Even though Ethan doesn't really know what are the questions about but he still sat still and watched it. One of the things that he likes most is viewing the contestants' marks, which group gets the highest mark.

One day we went out for the dinner nearby LipSin Garden where the school "菩提中学 " is located. Daddy said it is 菩提 school then Ethan heard it and converted it to 菩提状元 . We were laughing at his words. Even the two words sound like quite close but it still has difference. Guessed only the kid can link this kind of thing.....

Spelling game

2010-06-10T10:14:00.005+08:00

Mother had made some of the alphabet cards for him to play the spelling game. Mother initial plan was hoping that he will learn the spelling through playing. At first he was excited about the game but after a while he started to arrange the alphabet surrounding according to his will.

From this game, mother found out that he actually knows how to spell some words.

Rambutan

2010-06-08T10:36:00.002+08:00

This morning, mother picked some of the "rambutan" from the tree for Ethan and his cousin. Ethan did not throw away just like his cousin did and he kept on playing with it. He even put it inside the small basket and brought it along. Mother told him that this is "红毛丹" in Chinese word. Then he said is "青毛丹" because the fruit is still green in color. He told mother now is 青毛丹 and when the fruit is matured it will become 红毛丹. Haha, no point arguing with him on this issue.....

Small keyboard

2010-06-07T10:26:00.002+08:00

We have the agreement that we don't want to simply enroll Ethan in any talent class like playing piano, dancing or art class. We will enroll him if he is interested in it and we do not want to force him to learn or he learns because his parents wanted him to.

We borrowed his cousin's keyboard to play. He had fun without wanting us to put back in the box. The next day, he requested from grandma again that he wanted to play the keyboard but this time grandmother rejected him because when his cousin is at home, both of them will fight for this thing. Better reduce the noise and crying.

We did plan for long time ago to buy the keyboard for him only that we did not take any action. Hope that we can get him one of these day......

The clock

2010-06-04T10:15:00.001+08:00

Ethan current favorite toy is the calender and clock. He will bring up and down this thing with him whenever he go around the house.

Today we went to QBM to have our lunch and we had a short shopping at Jusco. We saw a few racks were filled with offered toys and we want to search some toys for Ethan if the price is reasonable. Then mother came across this teaching clock toy. Mother let him play with it while we went to search for other toys. He immediately got hooked on it. He was so concentrated on playing it. He did not want to let go of the toy and kept on playing and playing even though we told him that we want to go home. He just ignored us and daddy said why not buy one for him. No way, this toy costs about RM89.90. Mother said that she did see this toy from the redemption list under Citibank credit card. We decided to exchange it with out points. Luckily, Ethan did not wail or beg us to buy this toy for him. Mother told him to say goodbye to the toy.

Parent and Teacher interview

2010-06-04T09:40:00.002+08:00

Today is the last day of the school before two weeks holiday. No school today because the school is conducting the parent and teacher interview. We brought Ethan along so that he still can meet up with his friends in the school. Because it was raining so mother asked daddy to park nearby the school before the main entrance of the school but the daddy said it will block other parents who want to drop the people in the school. But immediately we saw other parents directly parked inside the school. Mother asked daddy to see and he was speechless. Some parents don't care about other and they only want the convenience.

We headed towards Ethan's class teacher and we were given Ethan's progression Report. We were told by the teacher that Ethan is the number one amongst the morning and afternoon class. We did not expect that they got 36 students in the K1 class. When Ethan saw his progression report, he did not have any facial expression at all. Mummy had some discussion with the teachers while daddy and Ethan went to see his school art work and writing which were posted on the board.

After we finished the conversation, we went to QBM to have our lunch.

These two guy......

2010-06-03T09:59:00.005+08:00

Recently, the task of letting Ethan to go to sleep at night have been switched to daddy. BUT these two guys are just like the cats and dogs. Every night they will fight and beat with each other.

When Ethan keeps on rolling and singing during the night, daddy will go out of patience after his few attempts the let him sleep. Daddy will scold and threaten him but Ethan is not the one who let people "bully" him. He will start to beat his daddy then surely daddy will respond back. So the battle will start and ended up with Ethan crying because he lost.

In the end, daddy will just wash hand and threw back the ball to mother to handle.

Yogurt lover

2010-06-02T10:06:00.003+08:00

No doubt Ethan loves eating yogurt. When he saw his mother takes out the yogurt from fridge during his meal time, he will give lot of excuses not to eat rice like stomach full already, the food is not good etc. After mother gave him the green light that he can stop having his meal, he immediately went to pick the yogurt. Then mother will tease him by saying:" I thought you are already full, are you sure you still got place for the yogurt?". This fellow he just ignored mother and enjoyed his yogurt.

Mother doesn't know why he loves yogurt so much even though mother tastes and felt they are a bit sour for mother. Don't know is it because mother had a lot of yogurt when Ethan was still inside mother's stomach. Last time mother had one bottle everyday because was afraid of the yeast infection during the deliver. But seems like a lot of habit mother had during the pregnancy have been passed down to Ethan for example he loves to drink milk.

Self discipline

2010-06-01T10:17:00.005+08:00

Mother was proud of Ethan's self discipline. Recently, he likes to play his mini computer and everyday you can see him sitting on the chair and playing it for few hours. Mother doesn't like him to be too absorbed in it. Then one day mother asked him to come over when mother spot him wanted to start again. Mother told him that mother doesn't like him to play the mini computer for many hours because it is no good to the eye since the screen is too small. Mother asked him to promise mother not to play it and we crossed our fingers with each other. Surprisingly to mother, he really did not touch and went to that place for the whole evening.

Next day, he asked for mother's permission to play the mini computer again but mother did not allow. This time he knew how to argue back by saying: " I did not play it yesterday as per promise". Even he was saying that but mother still restricted him. He did not wail and throw tantrum instead he sat beside mother and waited for daddy to came back home from work...

Sometimes mother was really glad that he can change his habit and self control himself for not doing something, like watching TV.

Short discussion with prinicipal

2010-05-27T10:53:00.004+08:00

Today mother had a short discussion with Ethan's principal when dropping Ethan to school. We discussed about Ethan's progress in the school.

Mother asked about Ethan's attitude to learning, the feedback was good compared with his first few weeks at the school. He learned and socialized with his friends. The principal said Ethan is a bit perfectionist as she observed from his work. She said he erased the color he was putting on the test paper, at first she thought that maybe he answered the wrong question but "NO", his answer was correct only that he did not want to use the same color as the other questions.

After he erased it, he will choose other color. Mother told the teacher is it like that? As per mother observation Ethan is really poor in coloring, he did not like to color or do art at all. All he likes is the number. Mother told the teacher that Ethan already finished learning multiply and now mother is considering whether should teach him the division or not.

The principal said since he likes the maths a lot, why not let him go and learn the mental arithmetic. Mother's response was don't want to put any pressure on him. The principal observed that Ethan's physical movement is not as good as his peers. Mother knew that since he is a self protective kid. When he knows the movement will harm him, he will not do it. The principal said even his physical side is poor but recently he was trying very hard to finish all the movement requested by the teacher. The principal conclusion was Ethan is very smart in brain works but the physical side needs to be improved.

The evaluation result

2010-05-26T09:05:00.008+08:00

Today Ethan came back from school with some junk food and presents. Mother thought that it was his classmate's birthday party again. Well, not this round. He told mother that all the things were given by the teacher. Asked whether is it everybody got the things? He said no because he is the only one who get the sharpener from the teacher. We were asking why then he only informed that student get 100% will entitle to get the present from teacher. For him whether get the present or not, he seemed like not having any special feeling at all. This is because when mother went to pick him out, he didn't happily announced that he scored all the subjects and gotten the present from his teacher. He just kept quiet as if nothing happened. If we did not probe him, we would not know what happened. From what we observed, whether he scored or not, he seemed like "tak apa".

Mother was glad that he had done the evaluation on his own without mother doing any revision with him. It proved that he really learned in the school. At night, daddy asked whether want to reward him for such a good result. "NO" was the answer from mother. Mother doesn't want to let him have those thinking that 100% mark in test will get reward. Mother doesn't want him to have the think of learning with a motive. What we wanted is to maintain his current "tak apa" thinking then he will not have any pressure in learning and also facing the exam in future.

Acrobat

2010-05-21T09:40:00.002+08:00

So funny seeing him performed so simple acrobat using his toy car.

Back to School

2010-05-20T09:27:00.002+08:00

After resting two days at home, today finally mummy gave the green light to go back to school. Don't know whether this fellow got rest so much in the house when mother claimed that he need to go to school, he uses his hand to put on his forehead and told mother that he still has fever. Now he knows how to use the excuse not to go to school. Of course, his plan did not work out. He still had to go to school. We used the paper mask to cover his mouth as he still have some cough.

When mother went to pick him from school. Mother asked him about his school test. He gave back the answer "I don't know". Mother knew that he doesn't like to talk about his school things so his answer always don't know. Mother had been asking him, do you know what is examination or test ? He gave me the blur face. He doesn't know the meaning and mother also lazy to explain to him. Just let it be. He doesn't know means no pressure on him. Mother doesn't want to pollute his thinking yet and let him enjoy his childhood.

Something will happen....

2010-05-18T08:58:00.005+08:00

Don't know why each time when come to school exam, surely got something happen to Ethan. Last time he got the HFMD during the second day of the test. This round, he got flu, cough and fever the night before his second day test.

At first, mother still drives him to school but on the way mother felt his body heat is up and up. So mother has to turn the car back home. Mother called up the school to inform the teacher regarding Ethan's situation. Teacher asked Ethan to rest at home and she will get him replacement test when he comes back to school again....

We hope that this situation will not happen in future .....

Butterfly farm we go

2010-05-15T09:39:00.003+08:00

This was the second time we brought Ethan to the Butterfly farm. Last time, he was FOC but not for this round. We showed our IC card and Jusco card to get the the discount. Adult is RM8.00 and Ethan is RM4.00.

We tried to make an early departure from house but yet we still late. We only arrive around10.00 am in the morning. The weather was good. The purpose of this trip was to let the kids have some fun.

Ethan gets to see lots of different kind of insects beside the butterfly.

The fun part for Ethan in the whole trip was getting to chop the stamp on the brochure. At first daddy held his hand but later he wanted to do by himself. He even asked us to use the stamp on his hand like what his cousin sister did.

1st Semester Evaluation

2010-05-12T09:48:00.003+08:00

So fast that it was nearly half of year 2010 had gone by. Next week Ethan's school will have the evaluation for the 4 subjects i.e. BM, Chinese, English and Maths. The school has given the parents the scope and the area of the evaluation.

Got revision from mother? Of course not. Mother wants to know what Ethan had learned from the kindergarten. Helped him to do the revision will not know how much knowledge he had absorbed in the school. Let him try his best on his own....

Ninja Warrior

2010-05-05T09:17:00.008+08:00

TV program that Ethan loves to watch the most is the "Ninja Warrior". This program is fun. We did not restrict him to watch it because we can see some good impact on him. He becomes more brave.

Last time there are things that he dares not do like climbing high on the playground facilities and etc. Now he will try his best by saying he wants to be like the "Ninja Warrior". He will ask his daddy to be the timer by sounding "Pee" to start the count and stop the count when he reaches the destination. Not only outdoor he wants to be warrior. Even inside the house, he will use his bolster as the bridge for him to cross over. The photo shows his actions....

Threw up

2010-05-03T09:53:00.004+08:00

This morning when Ethan woke up, he felt uncomfortable with his throat and he started to spit out something from his mouth. At first it was just saliva but later he thrown up some of dishes from yesterday dinner. We thought after he had threw up that he would be ok so we prepared milk for him. After he finished his milk, he laid on the bed and said that he has got stomachache. Then he quickly rose up and threw up all the milk he had just taken.

We decided not to let him go to the school today. Daddy called up to inform the teacher. Ethan told us that he was so sleepy and he continued to sleep until 9 something. We thought again that after the sleep he will recover since he had already cleared up his stomach. So we made another round milk for him. After he had taken the milk and we brought him down to have a bath, he threw up once again.

At this time we realized that situation was serious so we immediately called up the doctor. Now we just dare to let him drink the water and eat some biscuits while waiting for the doctor. After the diagnose from doctor, doctor cannot find out anything wrong with him because he doesn't have the diarrhea. Doctor said that maybe it was the early stage of food poisoning. Asked us to give him the bread and milk slowly. After he was back from hospital he had a slight fever and we gave his the medicine and let him sleep again. Mother went to cook the barley for him. He was only interested in drinking the drink instead of eating the barley. He said he was sleepy and mummy knew that he was dizzy. He cannot hold up his head.

Before we let him sleep, we wanted him to pass the big business in order to clear whatever the thing he had. He tried his best but cannot so we had to inject the liquid into his ass in order to help him to clear it. At last he cleared it and he felt better...

Completion of the project

2010-05-01T09:44:00.001+08:00

Today mother told him that he will not need to stick the sticker on his diaper project again. Even he still had gotten one accident in April month but mother wanted to stop the diaper and announced that he had graduated from the project.

He was a bit disappointed but mother promised him that mother will think of other project to fill in. Really need to crack the head to think what kind of project mother wants to let him have.....

No photo from us

2010-04-30T09:48:00.004+08:00

Today when mother dropped Ethan at the kindergarten, teacher asked whether Ethan has informed his parents to bring the photo of mother and kid. Ethan had forgotten once again.

Gone home, mother had to drag out the photos that we have developed. Shame to say, we did not develop the photos after we were back in Malaysia and also mother seldom took photo with Ethan. Now what did mother do. Mother dragged out the old photos which we had developed when we were still in Shanghai and provided to the school. Hope that the school don't mind.

Replay the puzzle

2010-04-29T10:01:00.004+08:00

Tonight, mother brought out a lot of Ethan's old puzzles and let him have fun again. Mother had saved them inside the shelf since the day we came back from Shanghai. At first, mother just thought that he would loss interest but was wrong once again. He played all the puzzles that mother had taken out.

Talk about homework

2010-04-28T10:03:00.005+08:00

Mother always hope that one day Ethan can independently do his homework. Last time when he first started Malaysian kindergarten, mother had to sit beside him to ensure that he finishes his homework and done it correctly.

Mother hated the most when accompanying him in doing the Chinese writing. It seems like it took ages to finish it. Recently, mother gradually see some improvement because mother does not need to accompany him anymore. Mother told him to finish his homework by himself and try his best and if he doesn't know then only ask for help. Now when he finishes it , he will bring the homework and mother only has to made sure he finished and done it correctly.

Even now he can finish the homework by himself but mother still help him to look through every books he brought back and search which one is the homework and which one is the text book. Mother thought that she should not pamper him in this area anymore. The ball should be passed back to him.....

Car wash

2010-04-24T10:32:00.003+08:00

At first, we thought he might loss interest in washing car but we were wrong. He still shows enthusiasm in helping out his daddy. Sometime, we really don't encourage him to do so not because we are protective of him. We are afraid of the cars on the road passing by.

But luckily Ethan is those kind of person like having self danger conscious. Mainly because when he walks by the car park or places that has cars, he will either ask daddy to carry him or hold on to our hand tightly. But accident sometimes is out of our control so we still very concern about his safety when we are on the road.

Wow, expensive

2010-04-22T10:47:00.003+08:00

Tonight we went to QBM to have our dinner. Besides that daddy also need to buy some souvenirs to bring to Shanghai for his peers for his coming business trip.

We dropped in one of the gold shop because we wanted to buy the gift for newborn baby. While we were busy discussing which article we want to buy, Ethan had multiple questions asking the shop salesman. He asked why got a space between the gold arrangement, the shape and design of the gold and etc. When we decided to buy one of the gold, the salesman gave us the final price. Immediately Ethan shouted out : " Why so expensive?" . The whole shop salespeople were laughing at his reaction.

Miss the school outing

2010-04-10T10:40:00.004+08:00

Today Ethan was supposed to join the school outing to the park but unfortunately he fell sick a day before. Mother had to call up the school to inform that Ethan cannot join.

We brought him to see the doctor after that. He had mild fever, slight flu and cough. What a bad day for him....

Homemade bowling game

2010-04-06T15:41:00.001+08:00

Today, the kids get to play the bowling ball. Mother have collected 8 ice tea plastic bottles after daddy finished drinking them few months ago. Daddy and grandma did ask why keep the rubbish at home. Well, mother thought of letting Ethan play with it as a bowling game one day but mother had been lazy to take them out.

Finally mother took them out today since cousin sister was around so thought of letting both of them something to play. At first, mother had to arrange the bottles and demonstrate to them. When mother hit down the bottles, both the kids were yelling and jumping. They were so excited and eagerly wanted to try for themselves.

Both of them had fun with this simple game. The weather was still hot eventhough we purposely chosen late evening and Ethan drank a lot of water. He finished one cup followed by another cup. After the game, both kid had a good appetite eating dinner but not for the adults....

三字经

2010-04-05T16:02:00.008+08:00

Ethan just finished memorizing part of the 三字经. We did not expect him to memorize it so fast since he only gets to listen to it when he is on the way to school and also if daddy is driving him to school.

It took about one week for him to remember the part below:

人之初，性本善。性相近，习相远。苟不教，性乃迁。教之道，贵以专。
昔孟母，择邻处。子不学，断机杼。窦燕山，有义方。教五子，名俱扬。
养不教，父之过。教不严，师之惰。子不学，非所宜。幼不学，老何为。
玉不琢，不成器。人不学，不知义。为人子，方少时。亲师友，习礼仪。
香九龄，能温席。孝于亲，所当执。融四岁，能让梨。弟于长，宜先知。
首孝弟，次见闻。知某数，识某文。一而十，十而百。百而千，千而万。

Mother printed the following part for him but seems like he is not so aggressive compared with the first part.
三才者，天地人。三光者，日月星。三纲者，君臣义。父子亲，夫妇顺。
曰春夏，曰秋冬。此四时，运不穷。曰南北，曰西东。此四方，应乎中。
曰水火，木金土。此五行，本乎数。曰仁义，礼智信。此五常，不容紊。
稻粱菽，麦黍稷。此六谷，人所食。马牛羊，鸡犬豕。此六畜，人所饲。
曰喜怒，曰哀惧。爱恶欲，七情具。匏土革，木石金。与丝竹，乃八音。
高曾祖，父而身。身而子，子而孙。自子孙，至元曾。乃九族，而之伦。
父子恩，夫妇从。兄则友，弟则恭。长幼序，友与朋。君则敬，臣则忠。
此十义，人所同。

But who cares, let him take his own sweet time. He can stop learning it any time since we treated this 三字经 as bonus to us from him.

Boy in butterfly wing

2010-04-04T15:37:00.002+08:00

Ethan borrowed his cousin sister's butterfly wing to take a photo.....

Money game

2010-04-02T15:32:00.003+08:00

After mother had introduced the money game to him, recently he will on and off request money from mother and plays by himself. Mother cut out some objects printed with prices from the supermarket brochure and let him play. With this, he can play and repeat and repeat for the whole night.

The project we have

2010-04-01T15:13:00.005+08:00

Finally we had completed our one month of Say "NO" to diaper project. Mother thought of wanting to stop the project but Ethan insisted wanting another month. Maybe because he got four rainy stickers in the month of March. When he first gets his rainy sticker, he nearly wanted to cry it out as you can see some tears on his both eyes but we explained to him that everyone including mummy and daddy also pee on the bed when we were small. Besides that we also told him that he got more sun than the rain. Actually all the four raining he got were because mother or daddy forgot to wake him up to pee at the middle of the month or sometimes he pee earlier than our estimated time.

Beside continuing of diaper less project, mother also added another project for him. Actually is a monitor chart for mother. It is called "Reading chart", Ethan has to remind mother to read books to him everyday. After mother read the books to him, at night before he sleeps, he will put a star for mother. With this mother has no excuse to skip reading aloud to him since he will monitor mother.

The school sports wear

2010-03-31T09:35:00.006+08:00

Finally it arrived last week. Mother had kept on waiting for this sports wear. The main reason is mother no need to rush to wash his school uniform everyday. The kindergarten requested the kids to wear sports wear every Wednesday as the kindergarten will have some exercise activities for them.

This morning mother had to take Ethan to the school since daddy had an early meeting. The teacher felt relieved when she saw Ethan wearing the clothes as the teacher was worried that the clothes is too small to fit him.

Sticker as reward...

2010-03-29T09:53:00.002+08:00

Mother told him that he only entitled to get the sticker after he can read the whole Chinese word on that particular page. So far he only entitled to two stickers.

In order to prevent him from just memorizing the sentences instead of words. So after this exercise he can claim that he can read the whole page. Mother will break down the sentence word by word and write them in another blank paper to ask him to read aloud. He only can get the sticker after he passed this test. The purpose is to let him know that he needs to work hard for it.

Ethan's house

2010-03-29T09:51:00.002+08:00

Ethan requested his mother to take his photo with his wooden block. He claimed that these are the houses that he built...

Can travel soon?

2010-03-28T17:08:00.003+08:00

Today, daddy was bugging mother about his expiring mileage in the Singapore airline. Daddy said that it will expire about 20k miles in coming July and more in September month. Mother told Daddy that there would be a two weeks school holiday in beginning of June. Now where should we bring Ethan to travel? In mother's mind got three places i.e. Hong Kong, Perth and Japan. Which place is suitable still under consideration. We will consider the weather and the transport since we are bringing Ethan along.

Cheap sticker book

2010-03-27T09:19:00.001+08:00

Guessed most of the kids like sticker including Ethan. Recently mummy get to know that 姨姨 can buy the cheapo sticker in the market. Mummy quickly asked 姨姨's help to buy those stickers. The stickers are those famous cartoon character like Mickey Mouse, Winnie the Pooh, Ben 10 and etc. Cheap thing normally come with some imperfection. This book's sticker was a bit hard to pull out of the book because it has some uncut areas, it will be torn off so need to be careful . Besides that some of the pages are repeated. BUT what do you expect? The end objective is for Ethan to have fun and it fits the purpose nicely.

Talk a lot of this sticker book and can you guess how much mummy pay for one sticker book?
Only MYR1 per book. Is it cheap?

Do you know what is this plant?

2010-03-26T21:43:00.001+08:00

Do you know what is this plant? We don't know and we just called it "Hot Dog"plant. Since the shape looks like a hot dog....

Curious about the plant?

Let talk about 三字经 Three-word chant

2010-03-26T08:40:00.005+08:00

Mother never thought of teaching him the "Three word Chant" at his age even knowing some of the parents already start teaching their kids at very young age. But recently mother did and this is not because of "kiasu". The learning of the "Three -word Chant" was requested by Ethan himself. How can it happened?

Is story time again. It happened when we went to "Popular Bookstore" last Friday. Daddy said he was quite interested at one of the counter selling education CD like those 三字经, 唐诗,乘法表 and etc. The TV was on to promote the product and Ethan was hooked on it. We really have hard time to persuade Ethan to walk away but he did after the ending of the CD. Back at home, mother tried to find 三字经 in the internet and we let Ethan listens to it. Later, he requested us to teach him. (Most funny part was he even create his own 三字经 before he goes to sleep and we cannot stop laughing at his action). Mother was thinking that just listen to the CD may not know the words and meaning. Searching in the internet and copied out the words and explanation of 三字经 is mother's job again.

Finally mother finished custom made part of the 三字经 for Ethan. The word is big and no other fancy fancy thing beside it. Will introduce the later part to him when he finished the first part. We only plan to teach him on the way we bring him to and back from the kindergarten.

Am or Are?

2010-03-25T11:13:00.003+08:00

Tonight, mother simply wanted to know how far Ethan knows English grammar.
So mother played a game with him. Mother asked him to choose between the two questions and tell mother which one is the correct answer.
i) I am a boy or I are a boy?
ii) You are a girl or you am a girl?

He had given it a thought for a while and then he answered correctly. Why mother wants to know this is because we seldom talk to him in English. Now his Chinese is more fluent than his English. However at least now mother knows that he knows some of the pattern of the sentences in English.

Now only daddy knows

2010-03-24T10:49:00.005+08:00

Ethan loves to listen to the story book. He can be up to the case that he will leave his toy even though he is in the middle of playing it. Mother did a few tests before. When mother picked up a book and read aloud, Ethan will stop his mother and say that he is playing with his toys. Then mother will reply him that mother is reading to herself and he can continue to play and mother can continue to read. Then what he does, he will just leave his toy and climb up to the bed and sit beside mother. If mother already read a few pages, he will request to start again from the cover.

Daddy did not know it until today when he witnessed by his own eyes. Daddy picked up one of the story book beside the bed and started to read. Then Ethan immediately stood up and ran over beside his daddy and listen to the story. Then daddy purposely stop in the half way so Ethan went back to play with his toy. When daddy picks the book again to continue the story book he just ran over and continue to listen to the story.

Daddy said wow he really likes to listen to the story book. Mother took this opportunity to ask daddy not to limit the budget of buying books for him since daddy always complain why mother keep on buying books for Ethan.

Yes, successfully bargained for unlimited book budget!!!

How he learn the spellling

2010-03-21T10:10:00.004+08:00

Today, mother let him write on some exercise book since mother got it from Popular Bookstore promotion. After he finished writing the number in words suddenly the question mark flipped through mother's mind whether Ethan knows how to spell the words after he had written it?

Mother just simply asked him, can he spell the number one in word. He surprised mother. The mother continued to test him for the subsequent numbers in words. He amazed mother again. Mother asked is it that he learned to spell in the school ? Yes and he sang part of the number song to mother. Yup, he learned to spell the numbers in word through singing. Mother was pleased to know that the kindergarten teaches the kids to learn through playing game and singing a song.

Way up up up the kite!!

2010-03-20T11:10:00.004+08:00

Seeing the wind was so strong, we thought like this was the good chance to fly a kite. Unfortunately the the wind was so inconsistent. Sometimes got wind but sometimes no wind at all. It was more difficult to fly the kite compared to at QBM. Besides that grandparent's house is surrounded by trees.

In the end, we decided to drive to the Stadium inside the Taman. Daddy tried to fly it but it was so difficult because of the inconsistency of the wind. Ended up daddy's kite got stuck in one of the trees. Daddy tried to pull it down and finally the kite came down but the stick to hold the kite was gone.

This time mother got chance to bring Ethan to the platform stage. Previously we always miss it because it was too hot and sun shone directly towards this area in the morning. Ethan also gets to see the Malay kids practiced playing the football game in the field.

Youth park fun

2010-03-19T11:09:00.004+08:00

Since it was still early, we dropped by the youth park for a while. We let Ethan have some fun before we headed to Gurney Plaza to have our lunch. It was hot even though there were trees surrounding the park.

We asked him to take photo with the mini tram car. He and daddy post an action according to the statute.

Penang Orchid Exhibition

2010-03-19T10:38:00.011+08:00

Since we did not visit any places during Ethan's one week holiday so daddy took the opportunity to clear his leave. We brought Ethan to the Penang Orchid Exhibition. At first we thought that the exhibition is inside the botanical garden like previous year. No, we were wrong. Luckily daddy asked the parking attendant before we entered the parking space.

This round the exhibition was small and we walked through every stalls to view the flower. Mother loved the orchid plant but did not take action to buy it after considering the fact that we don't know how to take care, no place and no time.

Ethan was the happiest kid as he gets to walk around the place after being stuck inside the house for nearly one week. He post a few cheeky postures in front of the camera. The security guard there laughed at Ethan when he post a funny act.

Fake butterfly on one of the plant

The plant like "Insect eating plant" also can become a house plant nowadays. So weird as last time this plant was widely growing in the mountain. We told Ethan that when you put your hand inside the plant, the cover of the plant will close it and eat your hand. He was so afraid and held on to his daddy tightly when we asked him to take photo with the plant. At last, we told him that we were kidding, the plant actually eats the bugs or insect instead of people.

After viewing all the flower, on our way back we headed to Youth park since the park was so near....

He did it on timetable

2010-03-17T09:33:00.007+08:00

Mother has set an objective to teach Ethan the 12 timetable in a period of one year. But this fellow had surprised us with his ability. He memorized all of them within half a month.

He really shocked us when he read aloud the timetable until 12 to us in one day because we only taught him until 7. Guessed he was secretly self learning by using the timetable card mother done for him. Even though he cannot perfectly 100% memorized all as sometimes he will forget 3 or 4 out of 12 timetable.

We did not simply asked him to memorize the timetable instead mother did explained to him that the multiply is the shortcut of adding. For example, 2X3=6 is the shortcut of 2+2+2=6. So if he forgets about the answer of the 2x4=8 so mother will ask him to add 2 to 6 to know the answer since he knows the 2x3=6. Now when he forgot about the answer, he will use his fingers to add up the next multiply answer. This is the way we let him learn the multiply and of course he loves the math or else he would find it boring.

We were really proud of him when he found out his mother's mistake on the timetable card on "9" as the print out is 9 x 1 = 8. At first, mother thought of printing again the correct one for him but later seems that he had corrected it by himself by gluing the correct figure on it. So just let it be so he can remember it by heart.

Since he knows all the multiply, now is time to let him practice so he can remember it instead of going back to zero.

"MONEY" is our topic tonight

2010-03-13T09:10:00.004+08:00

From previously played shopping supermarket, mother noticed that Ethan does not really understand the concept of money even though we let him pay the money every time for us. Tonight Ethan picked up one of the books which consists of money and asking mother how to do the exercise. The idea flip through the mother's mind and thought of why not play a money game to teach Ethan.

The game is very simple.
i) First mother asked him to arrange the money according to the book which is from smallest to the biggest value. Told him to recognize the value of money.

ii) Teach him to use different combination of coins to form MYR1. Like combination of 5 "20 cent coin" add up to become MYR1. Mother was pleased that he picked up very fast. Guessed because of his basic adding skills is strong.

iii) Mother drew simple things like apple, orange and wrote down the value and asked Ethan to put how many coin needed in order to buy the fruits. He had done it correctly in the first time. He continued asking mother to draw the objects for him to arrange the money.

At last mother had to stop the game and he requested to play it again tomorrow.....

Arrange the money and using the coin to form MYR1 value of money

Photo of the day...

2010-03-09T11:18:00.001+08:00

Mama, what is this?

2010-03-08T10:43:00.002+08:00

Mother replied him that this thing is used for washing the window when he asked. He immediately used it to wash our house's window which he washed the mosquito net inside the window part. Seems he likes and in order to make him understand the function of this stuff, mother went and gotten one red bucket of water and asked him to wash the outside window. He did it and he thought it was fun.

And what you see in the photo is him seriously washing the window. The funny part was he even went to pull the stool and stood on it so he can wash the upper part of the window.

His first song

2010-03-07T17:49:00.003+08:00

Finally he knows how to sing and remembers the lyric of the song. The kindergarten had taught the kids how to sing a song according to the the words that they learned. We were surprised when we heard Ethan singing the song. We think that we had made the right choice of putting him into this kindergarten since he is very happy. Once in a while he will surprise us constantly with what he had learned.

Registration for Standard 1

2010-03-05T17:12:00.004+08:00

Time flies so fast. This month of March, it was time for Ethan to register his primary school. We have chosen the school nearby our house.

Mother told him that we will register a new school for him today, he was afraid that he will need to change his current kindergarten. He said "no" to it and we have to explain to him that this school that we are registering is for his standard 1. He still can enjoy his current kindergarten for another one year plus. We told him that after the age 6, he will not be in kindergarten anymore and he is a big boy.

We came to the school at 1pm plus but the security told us that the office only open at 2.00pm. So we went to the supermarket to buy some stuffs before we came back again. Daddy needed to fill the form and passed over to the admin office and it took about 30 min to finish the whole process.

More sticker for him

2010-03-03T11:03:00.003+08:00

Mother made more stickers for him since he likes it so much. Then he very kpc to help mother to cut it into small pieces. His cutting was terrible but it was like another training for his hand so just let it..since the sticker for him to use and not mother....haha...

Mutiplying project

2010-03-02T20:17:00.006+08:00

Well, Mother did not anticipated that it was so smooth sailing on teaching Ethan on the multiplying.

From the conception of the idea until today, mother had been cracking the head on what method to teach him. Using the ready product in market like buying the CD or flash card and etc.. Or download from the internet the timetable but found out that only have up until 9 instead of 12 timetable. Mother even thought of recording mother's voice reading the timetable and playing it back. In the end, mother homemade the timetable and no recording. Why no recording because the recording cannot stop and wait for the kid to follow and repeat the words. Mother read aloud with him is more flexible depending on his speed.

Where and when mother teaches him? Well, mother only teach him on the way while mother drives him to and back from kindergarten. Normally there was a bit of traffic jam on the road so mother asked him to follow what mother said and he did. Then before his nap time, mother asked him to follow mother reading the timetable again. Surprising, it only take one day for him to memorize the timetable of 2. Of course mother only teach him one timetable since the target is one month per one timetable.

In order to let him understand what is the purpose of him having to memorize the timetable, mother had printed out the worksheet for him to do. Mother's opinion is if he did not constantly practice on timetable surely one day he will return back to zero. People may think mother is cruel but this is the fact.

He was a bit slow when doing the worksheet but he had tried his best to calculate by himself and get assurance from mother. Today he just finished 6 pages of worksheet from 0 - 2.

Say No to diaper project

2010-03-01T18:32:00.004+08:00

Diaper less for Ethan was one of the mission impossible for mother. First of all, he must drink about 11 oz milk plus water before he goes to sleep. He did not like people to disturb him when he is sleeping. It was impossible to have a dry diaper for the whole night.

Why we suddenly have this project? All because mother found out that one day during his nap time, he had woken up to pee and continue to sleep back after that. That gives mother a thought that maybe it can work at night also. So mother just asked him whether he wants to try at night after mother praised him. Surprisingly, he was willing to try it at night.

On the first night, he unwilling to wake up in the middle of the night, so he pee on the bed and mother wanted to discontinue the project and think maybe he was not ready yet. What he did, he insisted doesn't want to wear diaper in the second night. Shame on mum as he did not give up but mother did. And he was right, the second night, he was willing to wake up at the middle of the night and pee in the toilet. So he was dry in the morning. He actually was successful for few days at the end of Feb month.

In order to encourage him, mother did up a chart to let him track his own record at the beginning of March month. He gets to stick sun sticker if he is dry through the whole night and he will get the raining cloud when he pee on the bed. The whole project was just for him to to have fun since he likes to stick the sticker..

This is one month project and let's see how many sun he can get at the end of the project.

Dramatic :- Shopping

2010-03-01T16:45:00.006+08:00

Today, we played shopping. Even he gets to experience it when we brought him along during our shopping. But this time, mother let him choose the product and put under the shopping cart.

First, he said that he was driving a car and finding a parking space. After he parked the scooter, he went to push the shopping cart. He began to shop.

Mummy gave him a list of paper of item that need to buy. The purpose is to let him find the product in the table by himself without mother's help. He need to read how much and what were the product mother wanted him to buy.

After finished shop, he need to pull the trolley and waiting for paying the money.

Mother let him be the cashier, he needs to press the button to calculate how much he had to pay. He even use the scanning machine to scan the product before he put them into the paper bag. Mother gave him real money to pay for the product.

After having paid the money, he needs to go to car park to drive his scooter and happily bring home his product.

He actually wanted to further continue after shopping and back home. He wants to cook all the product he bought. Mother told him to play in the next day.

From this game, mother have noticed that he was poor in calculating the money. Like total he needs to pay is RM44. He needs to pay 4 pieces of RM10 and 4 pieces of RM1. He was blur about it. Mother plans to teach him the concept of money another day.