Welsh Rarebit - snack from Wales

From the book : Easy Snacks from Around the World by Heather Alexander.

Welsh Rarebit. It's a traditional snack from Wales. I think children will like it because it's cheddar cheese. It's tasty. After writing a long ingredients list, it's time to get into action. She woke up at 7am excitedly. We arranged the ingredients and she crack the eggs, beat it and mix all the necessary ingredient. Along the way, she noted down her observation. It was really fun watching every single step she made. 

Ingredients: (mostly from the book with little improvisation)

Bread*

2 eggs, beaten

8 ounces grated cheddar cheese

1 teaspoon of soya sauce*

2 teaspoons mustard

1 tablespoon butter

4 tablespoons milk

1 ripe tomato, sliced 

Steps:

1. Cracked and beat the eggs. 

2. Pour milk into the saucepan with low heat.

3. Gently pour the beaten eggs into saucepan and stir well with milk.

4. Add butter, mustard and soya sauce and mix well.

5. Make sure it's low heat as we don't want to burn the milk.

6. Slowly add cheddar cheese into the saucepan and stir well.

7. Continue to stir until the sauce is thick. 

8. Toast the bread and line up the tomato slices on it. Spread the savory melted cheese sauce on the bread.

9. Toast it on the sauce pan until golden brown. Served.

* Note: 

1. You can use any bread as long as you toast it before you spread the melted cheese sauce on the bread. According to the author, sourdough works well.

2. You may replace soya sauce with Worcestershire sauce.

                                            

                                           

And her observation: 

                                            

    

                                    

Cold Sesame Noodle

We have incorporated 'food' as one of the topic as we learn about the countries around world. She is getting very good at locating country in the map. She likes to involve in hands on activities and that includes cooking. I feel it's important to allow our children to learn about food. I think it's important for them to learn at young age about nutrition and junk food. This will allow them to learn the right 'vocabulary' of food so they can make the right choices later in their life. We were in the library and I spotted a book by Heather Alexander - Easy snacks from around the world. 

This book allow her to learn to make different type of snacks. The fun part is to know where the snacks comes from. This time she has choose to make Cold Sesame Noodle. According to Heather Alexander, this dish is from Hunan and Szechuan provinces in China. She had fun time locating the provinces in the world map. 

We have improvised the ingredients a little so it'll be tastier. 

Ingredient:

Spaghetti

Sesame oil

Rice vinegar

Light soya sauce

Brown sugar

Fresh ginger (thinly slice to 8 slices)

2 medium stalks of spring onion

2 small stalks of parsley (for fragrant)

1/2 cups of unsalted cashew nuts (other options : unsalted peanuts/almond)

Steps (for 3 persons):

1. Bring spaghetti to boiled. Drain when it's soft.

2. Mix 2 tablespoons of sesame oil and 1 tablespoon of light soya sauce to cooked spaghetti. 

3. Put aside. We didn't put it into fridge because we don't like cold noodle. You may put into fridge to chill the spaghetti.

4. Minced ginger. spring onion and parsley and set aside.

5. Crushed the cashew nuts.

6. In a bowl, mix 2 tablespoons of sesame oil, light soya sauce, rice vinegar, brown sugar and ginger. 

7. Pour the sauce into the spaghetti and toss until evenly coated. 

8. If your like cold spaghetti, store in the fridge until it's cold.

9. If not, you may serve immediately by adding crushed cashew nuts, minced spring onion and parsley. Toss until the spaghetti are well coated.

10. Served.

We had fun throughout the preparation. She was very focus and trying to understand the steps to make it right. This is another precious moment I had with her. Try it, it taste really good! 

                                                  

Lesson in Basketball court

5 years 7 months old

Mommy observed that you like outdoor activities. Mommy realized you like to play with the soft ball at home. You like to kick, throw and bounce (soft ball don't bounce back).

I have decided to get a small basketball/netball for you. You were so happy. Bouncing it at home, play ground and at every flat surface you can find. Mommy has decided to bring you to a basketball court this afternoon. You were running happily and starts shooting. As the goal post is for adult, it looks impossible for you to reach it. After a few tries, you ask for helped. Mommy showed it to you. After shooting, mommy said that we need to look for a children's heights basket. I caught myself saying this. Mommy, don't feel good as I have helped you judge the situation we were in. My self talk questioning me by thinking who said children can't shoot at adult's height basket. 

So I kept quiet and left you with the ball. You keep trying. You kept telling me it's too high. Mommy kept encouraging so you can go on. You strength increase as you practice. Eventually, you can throw it as high as the basket. You confident soar when you shoot it! You made it! Wow! You told me that you are proud of yourself. Mommy is happy for you.

I learnt a big lesson from here. As parents/caregiver, we don't judge a situation for a child too early. Let the child decides whether he or she wants to stop trying. We can encourage. Adult's mind are fill with analysis of 'can or cannot do'. Children don't. Children do things as they desire. It comes from heart. That's powerful. When there's a will, there's a way. 

I learn to keep quiet when I see limitation. I need to encourage first and let you decides whether it can be done (Not life threatening situation). Allowing you to decide and make decision will help you in many more decision making to come. This afternoon has teaches us that perseverance pays. You kept trying and you made it. Mommy is very happy for u.

                                                 

Ee Wern communicates with mommy

16 months 3 weeks old

This week is our second week at BSF at Bethesda Bedok -Tampines Church. The first time, you were not aware that mommy will leave you to a 2 hours class. You cried a little and hold on pretty well. Today, you cried when I leave you, for a few seconds. Mommy realized you can control your emotion very well. Teacher said you were not certain at first, eventually you starts to participate and enjoys it. 

Mommy thinks you adapt fast in new environment. Tonight, after dinner, you were holding the table mat. You put it on the floor and lie down on it. Then, you stand up and 'tap dance'. You did this for a few times. Mommy don't understand so I sat down besides you as you wished. 

Mommy starts to understand when I gave you a towel that you used in BSF class. You happily lie down. then, you stand up and tap dance again. Mommy was moved. Moved by your desire wanting to share your experience with me. You were delighted when I acknowledged that this is what you learn in BSF. 

Mommy admires your ability to communicate using your body language so I can understand. Daddy and mommy love you.

Child-Like Learning about Coins

It's time to teach simple calculation and money management as she (my eldest girl) is starting Primary 1 next year. 

We started with simple counting exercise. Besides counting, we sum different combination of one dollar. Then, she traced the coins. We continue to play. We take turn to be hawker and customer. This has helped her in counting especially addition and subtraction. After playing for 2 days, I continue to prepare her on saving versus spending. 

As she was preparing for a school visit, her school asked her to bring SGD 3 (combination of SGD1, 4xSGD0.20, 1xSGD0.50, 7xSGD0.10). With my previous experience with her, she need to learn not to spend all her pocket money. So I initiated by asking how much she plan to spend during her school visit. She said she plan to buy chicken rice, ice milo and an apple. So we estimated it will cost her about SGD 2. With that, I asked how much she can saved by deducting SGD2. She took sometime to count and answered SGD1. I continue to asked is there anything that she wants to eat? She said 'mamee' which is a junk food. It will cost her another SGD 0.30. With that, i asked how much can she saves? She answered SGD 0.70. 

So I continued to clarify whether is it better to save more or little. She answered little because with money she can buy things she likes. So I continue to compared SGD 1 and SGD 0.70 using more or less. I asked which is more, SGD 1 or SGD 0.70? She said SGD 1. So which is better? SGD 1 is more and SGD 0.70 is less. She pondered a while and answered SGD 1. So I asked, which is better, more or less? She said, more. I concluded that it's important to save more than spend money on things that's not important (like mamee, it's junk food). The more we save, the more opportunity we can utilize our saving to better use. 

Few things I learnt here:

1. Children at this age (5 years old) are very instant. When they have power to purchase things they want, they will buy. They can't utilized judgement yet. Their judgement is 'child like' judgement. If I want that, I will buy it. Period..

2. It's important for parents to role play with their children in new situation. The more we role play, the more 'control' possibilities come up and we, parents gets to control the thinking and the outcome before they step to the real world. They carry the benchmark they learned with you (parents) and compare when similar situation arise. 

3. Be patience. When they starts counting money, it can be very confusing for them. At primary level, I feel they need to know combination of coins to make it a dollar. So be patience and play with them. Help them identify a few different combination of a dollar.

4. Continue to follow up and play money game. 

After her school visit, she happily told me that she used SGD 0.80 for her fish ball noodle. She didn't buy any drink because she has water with her. Her eyes brighten when she said she saved SGD 2.20.  I am so happy for her. 

To judge or not to judge?

Recently I spoke to few mothers about education. It looks like (always been) the Chinese school system here put a lot emphasis on academic. 

Mother will say 'poor thing'. Parents wish their children to have more outdoor activities but 'no' time. Children have to go through so much pressure. Parents tried to sits with them every night to completed their homework together. This culture of 'supervising' has been going on and become a norm. The amount of pressure the children go through in their early years is 'no joke'. 

What's school expectation for a 7 years old child? They are expected to know how to write and spell. They are expected to be able to read, 'good' in comprehension, 'fast' in abacus and obedient in class. Children in Standard/Primary 1 are expected to read and write basic Chinese character. Teacher will call the parents if the child is 'slow' in the class. What about parents' expectation?

Parents always think their children can do better. They expect their children to stay focus and discipline in finishing their homework. They expect their children to follow instruction and direction by teacher in the class. Parents expect children to be less playful. It is a scary thought that children are expected to play less once they start school. The 'lingo' will be - have you finish your homework? Children is being force into a system. We have even seen parents took up mathematics class so they can teach Maths at home. (Nothing wrong with it) Parents is being force and conform into a system too. Parents desperately want their children to excel. We know, it's love. What about society pressure?

Are we careful about the different between 'society' standard and our children's standard? Society standard is temptation to parents. It's mass. All marketing activities from private will tailor to society standards and enticed parents to response accordingly. We will see all the advertising from enrichment centre promoting about 'additional' enrichment to prepare a child towards Standard/Primary 1. Some of day care centre unique selling proposition are preparing a child to Primary 2 when they are in Primary 1. Is that necessary? Can't the society learn to be patience towards our children and pace them age appropriately? Pressure among parents too. We starts to worry. Worry whether our child is ready to enter the school system. 

Parents are in dilemma when they starts preparing their child to Standard/Primary 1. The more we know about the education system, the more we feel they are loopholes. Parents feel uncertain, helpless and hopeless. Uncertain because limited choices, helpless because we can't control the outcome of which school the child is being send to and hopeless because we question the relevance of syllabus versus the 'real' world. We don't want to put our children to an unnecessary rat race on academic. But we don't want our children to slack because of no direction either. We don't denied the important of academic but we value more about children exposure and proactivity telling us their needs so we evaluate and make decision together. It's their life, not our life. Empowerment is easy to 'say' but not easy when 'practice'. 

What we can do as parents to cushion these external pressure? 

Don't judge our children's ability. Because of external pressure, it's very easy for educators and parents to judge their children. Children as early as 3 years old is being judged. Comments like 'she is loud', 'he is too active and noisy', 'he is a slow learner', 'she is obedience', 'he is bossy' and so on is everywhere. I call these 'free opinions'. This is unfair to children. They are curious in the world around them. As their mobility increase, that's when the fun starts. And that's when all the judgement come too. Therefore, it's important for parents to not to pass judgement in front of their child. Don't label them. The world that our children live in are so judging. Parents has to provide 'cushion' for it. If children feels safe and not being judge at home, they will prosper. Children will raise their 'bar' and achieve.

Parents have to grow within themselves. They have to learn to see things beyond their children. To lead their children and not undermining their ability. Leading them to love learning, to love exploring, to respect authority, to understand the important of boundaries, to inculcate the right eating and sleeping habits, to learn self control, to empower decision making that build self confident and self worth age appropriately and the list go on. Parents should lead their children into possibilities of becoming and not conforming. Parents should learn to stop 'commenting' but empowering. Having said that, all families have their own priority to mould their children.

To lead is to trust. Do we trust our children enough? This is tough. 'Trust them'? 'Trust these little people?' Learning to let go the 'control' is a learning experience for parents. If parents feel their children's decision is incomplete (most of the time) children will learn to depend too much on parents. In return, parents will feel burden and continue to make decision for them. The vicious cycle go on and on. The child will never grow. Parents should understand that they shouldn't babysit their children forever. To trust them is to see things through our children's paradigm. Our own paradigm is full of our past experiences. Our children's paradigm has no past experiences but with our influence. If parents are able to provide positive influence and empowerment, the child will learn and take full responsibility of their life. And prosper. 

Take time off to crystallize the family value. Rat race in the world will go on and on. It's important for parents to know their vision for their family before they are being sucks into a system. By holding onto a strong family value, our children will learn too. First, they learn from their parents. Then, they will learn not to conform if the external temptation and pressure go against their value system. 

Initiate involvement. Include our children before we make any decision for them. This is tough. Especially when parents know they know better (with life experiences). Eg. If a child is weak in Maths, does he need an enrichment / a tuition class? Yes and No. The question we should ask is what drive him to learn? We shouldn't focus on his weakness and tell the whole world he needs to attend tuition. We should discuss find out what drives him to achieve and improve. I know, it's easy say than done. Organize weekly discussion to discuss issues. Make decision together as family. The family will not only prosper, a confident with good self esteem child will emerge from here. 

All it takes is practice and time. Practice makes things perfect. Time will show us the result. When our children see us putting in effort to work things out as family together, they will learn to work things out with us. They will learn to be sensitive to our needs. They will learn to respect authority when we say 'no'. They will learn to handle disappointment when things don't happen their way and will pick themselves up to move on. They will learn that it's ok not to conform and be identical all the time. 

I am writing this to remind myself. I am living in the world with multiple temptation and pressure from different sources. It's acceptable for not being perfect as parents. We are human. But it's not acceptable if parents 'forget' to look at a child strength and help him grow. Let's allow our children enjoy every bit of their childhood with us. Let them be the child they want to be. 

Things that matters most..

It's a month! A month of school holidays. We are back to Malaysia for 2 weeks. It's a week now. Time flies. It was good to meet people that matters to us. Catch up and eat! 

We have been away for a year. I realized it's s easy to take things for granted in our daily life. When we were here, we would justify whether to take an extra effort to meet person A or person B. Partly because we were very busy in our career then, coping with work and family and feels tired most of the time. Therefore, there are time we made decision of staying at home. Excuses and reason is always there.

This trip allowed me to see the importance to make an extra effort (despite super pack schedule) to meet friends and family. I realized the strong relationship will last for a long long time. We are modeling. Teaching our children the important to building relationship with people that matters to us. 

This was a fruitful visit since the last one year. I get to meet my CG friends. Ee Rynn has decided on her first sleep over. As I am sitting here pondering whether she will be ok, I realized it's time to let go. Mommy has to learn to let go so she can learn to be independent. She stayed over at her favourite uncle Kah Wan's house. He is our CG leader. Ee Rynn is so close to her 13 years old daughter. A wise man told me when I was young to allow our children to build relationship with someone whom I trust (same value system). Because there will be times we (as parents) will not able to influence them positively. This is when these person will play an important role. I am glad Ee Rynn has build a few relationship with few friends whom we trust and able to influence her positively. 

I get to meet my family, some of my friend and ex-colleagues. Everyone seems has moved on in life but the relationship stays. This visits has taught me a lesson. To make effort to build priceless relationship that will last for a life time.