Puzzle Tracks

We bought a puzzle train set for Valerie last Christmas but she didn't really catch on to this until two months ago. Before that, all she wanted was to let daddy build the tracks and then sat and watched as the train went round and round.

But one night, I caught her trying to piece the puzzles together on her own! I was so excited that I couldn't resist recording her. Looks like her logical brain is beginning to develope :)




Check out the video clip...
 

Tangram Puzzle

I bought a magnetic tangram puzzle for Valerie since she has always been doing this in Heguru class. I just wanted to reinforce this activity at home. In the end I've decided on a magnetic tangram since she already has a magnetic board.

What we learn at Heguru is the outline of each tangram piece is drawn on a paper to form an object. Children are given tangram pieces of various shapes and sized to fit in. So I drew a few for Valerie to do. It turns out that after the age of 2, she could put the correct shapes accordingly. Of course she still needed some guidance now and then, like reminding her to turn the shape around to fit. But overall she can do tangrams on her already.

Last time, mommy has to point to her where to put on the paper. But now, she wants to do it herself. My little girl is slowly exerting a bit of her independence :)

Alphabets

Valerie was playing by herself one night, when I suddenly noticed she was putting alphabets on the magnetic board that she got from her birthday. I saw her putting the letter 'A' and she said 'A', then 'N' and she said 'N'. I was shocked beyond words and quickly asked Ivan to come over. Just then she put on the letter 'S' and said 'S'!!

Does this mean Valerie know her alphabets already? Later when my sister came over, I told her the incident and she asked Valerie the same three letters. And she repeated the same. The next day, I pointed to a brochure and asked her what is the letter and she said 'T' and 'O' correctly. I was very thrilled.

Later that week, at Heguru class, she was learning the letter 'N'. I showed the card to her confidently and she said 'N' loudly. Sensei was quite surprised.

Anyway that was about the few incidents that happened. After that she never showed she know the alphabets anymore. And I didn't specifically test her either. Up until last week, while we were out shopping at Jusco, there was plaster tapes on the floor and they were shaped like 'L'. Valerie then pointed to the tapes and said 'L' and then pointed to another 'L'. There was one that looked like a 'T' and she said 'T'. Our hearts leaped a beat, she still remember her alphabets!

And just last week, she suddenly pointed to my shirt and spelled out 'SAVE THE PLANET' one by one... The only letter she didn't seem to know was 'V'.

Sometimes I wonder if Valerie knows the full set of alphabets, or is it because when she sees something, it just come to her mind and she just blurt the letters out? Maybe the memory is stored somewhere and some day the letters flash across her mind and some day, they don't and she doesn't seem to recognise them.

Or maybe she just doesn't like to show her parents that she knows them. Only once in a while she likes to give us suprises? Ahh.. the wonder of how brain works.......

Sunday School

This year I've decided to enrol Valerie to Junior Sunday School after recommendation from a church friend. However I found out that the entry age is only at 3 but Valerie has just turned 2. But since she's born in 2008, she's considered 3 academically. So she's allowed to join but mommy needs to be around to accompany her until she's more independent.

Initially I was hoping to send her Sunday School as part of a transition for her before starting kindi. But after observing her for 2 lessons I guess I have a long way to go. No need to think about going to service while leaving her there. She's pretty much sticking to mommy the entire time. Only at the activity time (last 20 mins), she will not look for me. That's usually arts and crafts time where kids are divided into classroom according to their age.

On the hind sight, I could see she tried to join in the activities. After the first lesson, now she can show me the 'pray' gesture. When I say 'Let's pray', she will put her hands together and pray. Before this, she will let me say the prayer and then she will say 'Amen' just before she goes to bed. But she could never get the 'pray' gesture despite me teaching her many times.

Now we've started the family prayer where we hold hands together to pray just like what she learn in school. This has become one of her favourite moment before she goes to sleep. But somehow she only wants Daddy to say the pray, when I try to pray, she will put her hand to my mouth to stop me and then point to daddy. This happens every night. Maybe she knows daddy is the head of the family?? Hehe...

And at offering, she's very funny. I gave her RM1 and asked her to put into the offering bag when it's her turn. After putting, she will follow the teacher around and keep looking at the bag. Luckily she didn't come back and ask mommy for more $$$.

In terms of singspiration, she's slowly picking up songs. For the fast songs, she's still trying to follow the actions. For the slow songs, she could sing 'Jesus Loves Me This I Know' very well, that's because I've sang this to her since she's born. :) We're given an activity each week where parents have to do with children. Usually is to reinforce a particular bible verse that is being taught. There is also weekly memory verse. But I will not enforce that for now.

One of her favourite is the puppet show. This is the only session where she pays full attention to. I now see the vast difference between sending her to Heguru and Sunday School. Heguru is pretty exclusive and kids are taught they will have equal turn to participate in each activity. Well, you paid for the classes :P

But Sunday School is like a representation of what public kindi / school will be in the future. There will not be equal participation from each children simply because the group is a lot larger. And only selective kids will get to play a game or an activity. I feel this is something Valerie has to learn to get used to.

Valerie is 2!!

Time really flies this year, and Valerie is finally two! This year we wanted to keep the celebration simple but we ended up inviting the same group of people, Ivan's family, my family and Uncle Herrick's family. And this time we let Ivan's mom to be in charge of the food. Last year, we didn't want to trouble her that much but she still ended up cooking loads of dishes. So this year, we let her come up with the entire menu. And she cooked fried rice, 2 types of mee, sandwiches, jelly, paos, fried wantons. One wonders how she managed to do it all by herself!

Ivan's dad provided fresh fruits as usual and we had a sponsor of chicken wings and curry chicken. We ordered balloons but not as many as last year :D  The birthday cake was sponsored by Ivan's bro so nothing fancy looking compared to last year, but taste wise, well, you could never fault a Secret Recipe cake :P

All in all, we cut down a lot on the birthday budget and we still had lots of fun :)

Hey mommy, can I drink this?

Let me just take a lick!!

Mommy, Daddy and Me with my birthday cake

Bloooowwwww....

Let me cut... I can do this!

This year Valerie is old enough to open the pressies...

Crayola Art Desk with magnetic alphabets and numbers! Purrrfect!!!



Check out my Minnie Mouse cap and swimsuit, so matching..

Last pressie, from mommy & daddy

Look how engrossed Valerie is with the toy...

Finally a smile on her face! Mommy knows best :D

Look at me feeding nen-nen to the baby...

Flash Cards Works!

Right up to now, I seldom test Valerie on what she knows although I've been showing her tons of flash cards. As described by Shichida method, the flash cards should be done at half a secord per card and at large quantity (at least 200) to activate the right brain.

For us who are left brain dominated, this does not make sense. How could anyone remember anything that is flashed that fast? Let alone a small child? I have to admit, on many occassions I'm tempted to flash the card slowly, pronounce it slowly, and show maybe about 10 objects. And if Valerie could show me she remembers any of these, I'm very happy. 

Nonetheless, I resisted that idea, and continued to show the flash cards at the speed recommended.  According to the Right Brain educators, we are also not advised to test our babies as this will put a  lot of stress on them and thus make them lose interest in learning altogether. So, being an avid follower, I didn't test Valerie. In a way, it's also good because I'm also not stressed, knowing she will learn eventually. And my job is just to provide her the opportunity to learn, as well as to take the time to bond with her.

It was until last week, Valerie digged through her box of books that she found the Baby Einstein flash cards on Animals. She took it out and gave it to me, waiting for me to do something with it. I bought the set long time ago, thinking I would use it to flash animals card to her but then later dropped the idea because they were not A4 size as proposed.

She's more excited than she looked, really... :P

Since Valerie expected some activity out of it, I took out 3 animal cards and asked her which one is 'Elephant'. She looked at the cards and picked the right one. Then I asked her to put in on the headboard. This seemed fun to her. Then I added more cards and she picked the one that I named. Soon there were animal cards all over our headboard.

I have to say I'm pretty impressed because she got about 98% right out of the stack that I've asked. Those she didn't pick correct were because they have not been shown in the flash cards so she didn't recognise them.
So I have to say, flash card works. Flash them fast, flash them in big quantity. Believe it or not, your kid can remember them even if it doesn't make sense.

Valerie Can Count

I couldn't remember since when Valerie could count, probaby about 3-4 months ago. To be honest, she got bored of those dot cards I've been showing her. So I thought of another way to teach her counting, while going up and down the stairs. Everytime we went up or down the stairs, I would count 1, 2, 3... and she soon caught on and tried to recite after me.

I didn't think it was significant until 2 months later, Nanny came up to me excitedly and said.. 'You know, Valerie could count 1-10. You must have taught her that'. Just then I realised, 'Yeah, Valerie could say the numbers in order'. Then I told Nanny that I've been teaching her all the way up to 17 (because there are only 17 steps in our house... hehe... ).

Nanny said, 'Can meh?'. I said 'Why not? Nobody said kids can only remember up to 10. If you teach them more, they will learn more.' I then told her she is taught up to 100s in Heguru, but whether she knows them, I'm not too sure.

The next day, Nanny told me... 'Yeah, I tried more than 10, she could go up to 14... then the rest not very clear'. In fact, Nanny and her kids got so excited that they tried to get her to recite from top, from halfway like from 7.. and she could continue with 8, 9, 10... The only thing they didn't attempt was saying the numbers backwards. :)

Then and again, I wouldn't really say Valerie could count. It's more like reciting the numbers in order. If one day she could tell me '2 balls' or '3 apples', then I think she really understand the meaning of quantity.