Getting there.

Last weekend I went for the parent interview with baby’s class teacher. I dread these interviews. Perhaps dread isn’t the right word. I feel it is I who is judged at these interviews,( even though the idea behind these meetings is for the teacher to tell me how my child is doing in class and to ask if I have any concern) because my child’s output directly reflects on my input.

My idea of what my children ought to get from going to school is very different from everyone else and I do worry sometimes that I fail my children. I am supposed to check my children’s homework before they submit them for correction to ensure that the homework is complete and done correctly. I do not correct my children’s work because it is their job to do their work well, not mine. If they don’t know to do something, they can ask me and I will help them. I also do not tell my children to do their homework because it isn’t me who will get in to trouble for not doing the homework. I want my children to be responsible for their own life.

I do not go through their textbook and test their knowledge or teach them, however each evening while we are having our dinner, I do ask my children what they are learning at school and we talk about it.

Every evening after dinner my children read story books till they go to bed and not once I have seen them studying. I never felt the need to ask them to study either.And so it was with great trepidation I walked in to my daughter’s classroom to meet the teacher one to one.

The teacher briefly introduced what she will be teaching and what is expected from the children. She had already prepared a leaflet with instructions about homework and assignments and instead of giving the leaflet to me, she said ” you don’t need this, your daughter’s work is always perfect”

It felt so good to hear that because that perfect work my child hands in each week is her own work, done entirely by her.

Then the teacher told me that my 11 year old has been assessed and they found out that she reads at grade 12 level and the school will be providing language extension classes for her.

Before this post be construed as an egotistical post by a very happy mother, I shall say what I wanted to say when I wrote the title “getting there”.

The only reason my children read at a high level is because I read to them everyday since they were babies. I started to read for Yaya when she was 4 months old. At first it was just a few sentences each day. I don’t think she understood anything the first few months,but it gave both of us a routine.

As they grew older, sometimes, they asked me to read the same book over and over and I hated doing it. ( my son loved a train book that I read everyday for him for months and I tried so hard to get him to give me any other book, but he wouldn’t. He just wanted the train book) I also hated some of the story books my children loved, especially the magic school bus series. I never understood what they saw in those books.

When they were little, I used to skip few pages when I was tired and skipping pages didn’t work as they grew older for they used to keep an eagle eye as to where their mother’s eyes were and knew if I skipped a sentence. Yaya also knew the story I was reading for her siblings because I read it to her when she was little and if I skipped a line and even if the younger two didn’t notice, she would tell me, “mama, you missed that part” and I will end up reading it again.

I loved fairy tales and bought Celtic fairy tales for my kids and I remember wanting to burn that book because the stories were so long and at one stage, my children wanted me to read stories from only that book. Even if the story was 8 to 10 pages long, I still had to read three stories, one for each child. And then there were the readers the school send that my kids had to read and I had to sit with them to do that as well. Usually by the evening, after all the swimming and skating lessons, I was exhausted and this night time ritual was killing me.

But I persevered. My children still read a lot and the effect can be seen in their school work. All three of them get straight A’s for English. And even the assignments in other subjects are all written well and they do have a very good command of English. Reading to children helps them a lot.

 

9 thoughts on “Getting there.

  1. Totally agree!! Did not do that when my little one was little.. while she does well in school and is a straight A student, she is not an avid reader. She does write poem’s and songs though.

    I try to take solace in the fact that I wasn’t one until about 17-18 and then I read everything I could lay my hands on…so there is hope..

    But I think I have missed the bonding boat (that comes from reading together)…

    • MS: I don’t know why it was assumed by my mother and her cohorts that reading books is bad. I had to hide my books in my text book to read. I wish parents realize how important it is for children to read and how beneficial it is. While I studied by mugging up pre written essays, my children can confidently write three pages of essays without even trying !

  2. Everytime I want to sleep and my 3 year old wants me to read her a book I remind myself I am giving her a gift for life. All I can hope and wish is the love she has stays forever

  3. My 3 year also same. when I read my book before sleep she also pretends to read her story book. She wants me to read for her same story every day before sleep. Now she started telling me that story.

    • Anju: You daughter by telling you the story is learning memory retention and it really will help her as she grows older

  4. Hey Sarah! Thanks for the raisin pickle recipe. I plan to make it in a couple of days. I at e it last month when we were in Kerala and loved it. I am from Calicut and love the date chutney that accompanies the scrumptious Biriyani. Your quote on Women who can’t go back applies so much to my Ernakulam born wife. I plan on reading through your blog.
    Shanti and I , Mohan live in Texas. Shanti cries every time she hears the plane’s wheels leaving the tarmac of the Kochi airport. She loves Kerala and its mangoes, chakka and kozalappam etc. etc.

    Regards
    Mohan

    • Mohan: I will always be a Malayalee and I will always miss Kerala. But I know I will never go back. So there is always this ache somewhere deep in my heart and it grows big every April..for I miss the school holidays, mangoes and then the first monsoon rain after the hot spell..

      • Good to hear from you Sarah. We are Malayalees too who are straddling two Vanjis, Kerala and our adopted county, and cannot go back. Our children have married here and have children.
        We are empty nesters living with three cat kuttas: Devan, Lakshmi and Socks. We watch Kairali and Surya.
        We just got back from Kochi. In the four weeks we were there, we had one day of hartal and two days of pani modakkam! On the happy side, we got to spend time with the family and ate all the traditional food and had the obliogatory late afternoon kappi and palaharam. I sure got to indulge my Sapatraman side. Although, I don’t yearn for Kerala but go regularly to visit loved ones. But, Shanti misses Kerala. She loves to go home and in addition to eating and shopping she loves to walk in the paramba and though she would love to do so, she cannot climb the mango trees now!
        Regards.

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