Pressures on mums of Preschoolers

"When there are children in the house, a wife needs her husband’s understanding more than ever.

Youngsters between two and five years of age have an uncanny ability to unravel an adult’s
nervous system, with their constant talk and their endless questions. Furthermore, they’re a perpetual danger to themselves and others throughout the day.

Even if mum begins her morning with guarded optimism, by 4pm, the pressures often reduce her to a lump of play dough.

It’s a well-known fact that human beings tolerate stress much more easily if at least one
other person know they’re enduring it. This is highly relevant to young mothers.

The frustrations of the day are much more manageable if husbands take time to comprehend them.

Even when a man can’t change the situation, his respect for his wife and his awareness of her difficulties make it easier for her to handle them again day after day. "

I have only one to contend with. So it is still quite manageable, i feel. Obviously, if i have more than one, without anyone to help or to have company with, till my hubby comes home...probably i might turn into a lump of clay too.
Well, if God willing, i still don't mind being a mum of preschoolers. Soon please. Part of me is impatient, part of me is wait-ful upon God. I will wait for God's timing (or at least a year before we go seek help) cos i start to see a glimpse of why we have been waiting for months already without any news.

On homeschooling

I am still exploring the option of homeschooling and reading various books, websites, organizations, blogs of mums who do that, etc. Last night while talking about Ww's uncertain application for phd, we also talked about why we want to homeschool. For me, it is so that Eliza will grow to have an education that grows in her a love for learning, one that is not marred by competition nor is it success-driven.

But i'm also half-hearted about it, i'm uncertain of my ability to carry out homeschooling at all, and i do think the good variety of programes / friends in schools are great too. Yet i'm reading different accounts from different places about homeschooled children that are quite promising. See this article.

Ww's for homeschool because of the system here. If we are going to be here in SG, he would rather Eliza be homeschooled. If we were to be in Aust, he wouldn't mind giving the schools (ok..it's the private Christian schools) a try.

There's so much so much ahead as i learn to teach, from scratch.

Why she fell asleep at 9pm yest and 930pm today?

Yes and she went to the room for bedtime at the same time.

I'm learning patience in while putting Eliza to sleep for bedtimes. I get quite easily frustrated when Eliza doesn't fall asleep for a myriad of reasons, reasons which i feel are not necessary. Sometimes the frustration are really uncalled for and i just needed to learn to cool off and not take it so hard. Sometimes i just needed to be more understanding of Eliza and that she needs more time. But i'm not dumb, there are times when i sense that she is just pushing the time to be awake. [this is so common isn't it? I do that too. I'm still trying to sort out that disparity].

We are not robots, so we don't sleep the exact same time or take the same time to fall asleep, but the principle is that when Eliza's sleepy by bedtime, she needs to sleep. Actually it's better to catch her before she's really too sleepy, cos when she's at that state, she's less co-operative and more likely to take longer to sleep. Maybe that's what happened today.

So one change we need to keep to:
- one book only for bedtime reading (i told her we can read many many books in the day but we bring only one book for before bedtime reading)

The good samaratan

You know this story.

When does it apply in our life?
How far will you go to help someone in need?
Will you give up your income for this person?
Will you give up your freedom for this person?
Will you give up your time to this person?
What if this person is not worthy to sacrifice for?
What if this person is not your family?
What if this person doesn't learn his/her lesson?
Will this person repent from his/her ways?
What if you are to bear this person's burden?
Does this person deserve the good that comes to him/her?
Should not the person be responsible for his/her wrong choices made?

Jesus does all that, doesn't He? We don't deserve it and yet he did it. Many times we don't repent, and yet he did it. I'm not Jesus, I'm trying to be like Him but even so it is difficult.

34“Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. 35For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, 36I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’

37“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? 38When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? 39When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’

40“The King will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.’"

Matthew 25:34-40

Lord, convict me and grant me the grace i'm lacking.

Tools of the Mind

This is actually a program i read from the book NurtureShock which i managed to finally read it after discovering that i can borrow it at the library! Anyway if SG has such a program i would surely love to put Eliza in one. Meanwhile, i'm not sure if i want to put Eliza in any preschool yet. Moreover, she's just turned 2 and i don't think it's quite a school going age for her yet.

By the time she turns 3 and not going to school, i bet you my socks that everyone to my neighbour and to my relatives will ask why she isn't in school. I'm still uncertain about sending her to school early and i'm uncertain whether the schools are good or suitable for her. Mostly, i'm uncertain on whether i'll homeschool her. I meet very little mums in SG who ever considers the other way, the standard route is to go pre-school, kindergarten and so on. After all nowadays school going age starts as early as 18mths.

So when i read about Tools of the mind. I am obviously excited. After all it's a research backed program and curriculum. and the benefits are great. In short it's:

"Tools of the Mind is a research-based early childhood program that builds strong foundations for school success in preschool and kindergarten children by promoting their intentional and self-regulated learning. In a series of rigorous experimental trials, Tools of the Mind has been shown to have a significant impact on self-regulation of preschool children. The study also found these gains in self-regulation to be related to scores in child achievement in early literacy and mathematics."

check out the Tools of the Mind website for more details.

On discipline

We're still learning how to discipline. And now that Eliza's 2 years old, we con't to learn to refine how we can guide and discipline her.

There are things that i feel i'm not strict enough on and these things are those i still need to be convicted in. On eating without distractions, on that day we discovered that TV works for her while eating, it was a bonus for us cos it was so difficult to get her to eat! Thankfully, she can also eat with or without the tv, so i'm wondering on how to work towards not having her to eat in front of the TV so as to build better habits. It's something that i do as well, something that i grew up with too. I remember i could take 1hr to eat lunch and watch tv in my primary school days. Is it wrong? I don't think so. but it is not a good habit. After all, you aren't really aware of the food you eat and eventually end up eating more. Not a good habit to cultivate as we grow older either. So hopefully we don't start young.

There are things i felt that we did ok. And as I read from the Ong family on their high chair training, it starts early. I remember one thing i felt paid off even though it did take slightly longer for me to teach her but the results of it lasted till now. We went to Toys R'us to just browse and let her play with toys and at some points we was just taking the toys out, fiddling with it and walking away from the mess. So i had to carry her back to the messy spot and put the things back with her, it was more like a fun thing and she got to do a putting back activity that didn't seem like a chore. With much practice and reminders, she has more or less gotten to the habit of putting things she fiddles with back where she got it from. Same goes with our trips to the library, she has to put the books back after taking it out to browse. There are some exceptions when she's not allowed to touch (obviously when the items are breakable) and on this she's still learning the difference.

Now that she's older, i start to see the defiant streak in her. I find myself repeating the same instruction again, only to be ignored and have her doing the opposite or alternative of what i ask/instruct her to do. When that happens, i pre-warn her that i'll smack her and promptly do it when she does it. Usually that happens in just a span of a minute cos the warning is ignored. And the smack on the hand gets an immediate response. I remember once a warning got a response even before i did it. She loves playing with the door handle of the cars and once i sternly warned her that she'll receive a smack if she does it again, she almost cried and well, stopped doing it.

We have much more to go and i pray for wisdom to also speak to her on what God desires of us and how we live as children of God in our everyday lives, in the mundane of the daily humdrum.

learning & parenting

I'm still trying to read up more on homeschooling, about parenting, about learning.

Many thoughts that i can't seem to know where to start. So in random fashion:
These are a few inspirations:

1.
http://parenting-works.com/?p=370

2.
"However, academics may not be the developmentally appropriate way to provide stimulation for the young child.

More than a hundred years ago, Rudolf Steiner, Austrian philosopher and founder of the Waldorf school, stressed that early academics do not strengthen the young child’s development, but instead undermines it.

This has been echoed by Jane Healy, a leading authority on brain development and learning, who warned that early pressure on preschoolers was a prescription for trouble, resulting in problems in motivation and achievement that could create learning disabilities.

In contrast, what the young child needs for his intellectual maturation is nurturing relationships; in particular, he needs the security of an unconditional bond with a primary caregiver, preferably his mother, from which he can confidently reach out to explore his world.

“Children’s emotional experience, how they feel about themselves and the world around them, has a tremendous impact on their growth and development. It’s the foundation on which all learning, memory, health and well-being are based,” says Pearce.

“When we make children afraid we stop their learning dead in its tracks,” Holt says. “It is love, not tricks and techniques of thought, that lies at the heart of all true learning.”

3.
" Always keep your word. If you promise your children ice cream at McDonald’s then be sure to deliver. I have a 40-year old friend who still remembers that her father failed to fulfill his promise of taking her to the movies when she was 10.

Never lie to your children. If mum and dad have a fight, explain that to them. It’s pointless hiding away in a room when they can hear the yelling through the door. Children sense dissonances and inconsistencies in the household better than they let on." Eileen Lian

4.
"It’s not hard to see why R.C. Sproul Jr said in his thoughtful book ‘When You Rise Up’ that all ‘education is inherently religious‘. He quotes Robert Louis Dabney:

True education is, in one sense, a spiritual process. It is the nurture of the soul. Education is the nurture of a spirit that is rational and moral, in which conscience is the regulative and imperative faculty. The proper purpose of conscience, even in this world, is moral.

But God is the only Lord of the conscience; this soul is his miniature likeness. His will is the source of its obligations. Likeness to him is its perfection, and religion is the science of the soul’s relations to God. Let these statements be placed together, and the theological and educational processes appear so related they cannot be separated.

It is for this reason that the common sense of mankind has always invoked the guidance of the minister of religion in the education of youth……….Every line of true knowledge must find its completeness as it converges on God, just as every beam of daylight leads the eye to the sun.

In my previous post, I argued that the question of what you want your child to be comes before your education choice, whether homeschool or conventional school. Figure this out, and then decide what’s the best route to get there. Sproul also quotes the poet Milton who wrote: “The end of learning is to repair the ruins of our first parents by regaining to know God aright, and out of that knowledge, to love Him, to imitate Him, to be like Him.”

I happen to be in Milton’s corner here. I like the way he has articulated well a model for education that works for my family. And so we have embraced homeschool because we believe it offers our children the best opportunity to nurture soul and spirit holistically. By doing so, we believe they are better placed to love God, to imitate Him, and make a positive difference in our world.

What about you? What’s the reason for your education choice?"
~ David BC Tan

5.
"Infants and young children are not just sitting twiddling their thumbs, waiting for their parents to teach them to read and do math. They are expending a vast amount of time and effort in exploring and understanding their immediate world. Healthy education supports and encourages this spontaneous learning. Early instruction miseducates, not because it attempts to teach, but because it attempts to teach the wrong things at the wrong time. When we ignore what the child has to learn and instead impose what we want to teach, we put infants and young children at risk for no purpose.
David Elkind (Miseducation: Preschoolers at Risk)"

I know i'm reading a lot of materials that's veered towards one direction. but i've also read books that veer towards the usual direction (and a lot of marketing by a lot of pre-schools and enrichment centres).

So which direction to choose? for now i'll just play with Eliza. It's fun :) and she amazes me with her creativity and curiousity everyday, though there's always the usual guiding and disciplining & dealing with her whinings or impatience. she's only a 2yr old toddler. God made her. It's amazing how God wired us.

busy weeks

It has been a busy few weeks helping to design my friends wedding cards, i haven't done it for a year and each time i do it is a learning experience. The irony of it all is that i will procrastinate on starting it and when i start i can't stop. Sleep doesn't always overcome me, and the thought that i need enough shut eye to still wake up for work the next day makes me send myself to sleep instead of going on and on through the early mornings. Usually i go to sleep by 1-2am. But if you consider having to start doing it at about 10pm (after sending Eliza to sleep and packing stuffs), that doesn't always give me much time. Cos i between Ww & I will be chatting or i'll inevitably go surf the net, read something interesting etc. Still it has been a fun time designing the cards and seeing the end product.

It's also why i'm lagging behind on all my other little projects, like blogging, and sorting out photos and even planning for Eliza's birthday celebration. Actually we wanted to stay at the Ritz Carlton over that weekend cos we'll be attending two events around city hall area, there're interesting exhibitons to see & the Singapore Design Festival to check out; plus it would be fun having her mini-celebration at the hotel room (which is huge anyway). Oh well...too bad the quota for using our club points was reached, else we could have gone ahead with it.

Reflecting on reflecting

"And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into His likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit." 2 Cor 3:18

The beauty of the reflection on a still lake. Did you notice?

Read this on someone's blog sharing:

"Imagine if someone were to pull a “veil” over Maroon Lake…kind of like the cover that people put over their swimming pools in the winter. The lake would miss out on her most glorious task…to reflect the glory of the majesty behind her.
Standing there today, I was struck by how well the lake was doing its job. I was also struck by how poorly I was doing mine.

The world around us will continually say that it is all about us. But it isn’t. It is all about Him.

Have you ever noticed how the three persons of the Trinity do this as well? The Son points to the Father. The Father points back to the Son. The Holy Spirit points to the Father and the Son.

Well, Job 12 tells us to learn from the creation: the animals teach us, the birds tell us, the fish inform us, and the earth will teach us…if we will listen. Today, I learned a lot from an old, non-descript mountain lake.

It convicted me. I wish I were as faithful as she."

We're are the water that reflects the wow-ness of God.

the heart

Proverbs 4:23
" Above all else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life."

"The heart is the seat and center of our identity, the essence or our total inner selves that expresses itself outwardly in word and deed." ~ Marshill Church abstract for "Proverbs: the Heart" sermon

I'm learning about my heart, that by default, it is sinful. That i do a lot of things for myself.
While i seek to teach Eliza about God, I find that i'm fall short so much. And all these seeking is turning me to God.

As parents, we're always trying to change the behavior of our child that's not good or not right. But really, it's the heart that's leading the child to behave in that particular way. The behavior is a manifestation of the heart. Same goes with us. When we do things that are destructive to ourselves or displeasing to God, the root of the issue is our heart. Fixing the outer behavior without the inner renewal isn't going to change things indefinitely.

Ezekiel 36:26
"I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh."
Jesus, is my redeemer. He renews me. He is patient. He is kind. He is the one who gives me that new heart. A new passion.

So as i live with a new heart, that's always renewed everyday in Jesus, I pray i'll grow be like Him, patient, kind, loving, wise, selfless. That i may honour Him and glorify Him. And that as i guide Eliza to find wisdom in God's word, as i turn her to realize that her heart is the wellspring of her life, she will learn about sin, God's love, God's forgiveness & grace, Jesus sacrifice and redemption...and by God's grace, she'll live as a child of God.