Choosing a Primary School II

Martini – you certainly sound more clear-headed than I am. My deareast boy is truly on the brink of facing the big (bad?) world out there and he’ll be off to Primary 1 next year. As much as I want to protect my children from the cruelties of childhood and growing up, I know I can’t…so my next best choice to hold his hand and walk him through it as far as I can. I can only imagine the challenges that will surmount him in mainstream public school especially since my son is a special needs child.

So you can imagine my headache…and my dilemma…and confusion at having to choose a primary school for my boy. Well, actually, if you ask me, ‘choice’ is an illusion. I don’t really think I have a choice at all in which primary school to enrol him, thanks to the wonderful phases of primary school enrolment in Singapore.

So here are my two cents’ worth:

Distance – Distance does matter to me as I am a working mom and it’s The Grandma who will be dropping the children off at school. As Grandma doesn’t drive and have to drop off both my son (to primary school) and my daughter (to kindergarten)…I can’t possibly tax the Grandma into travelling all over the country every day. Especially since Grandma has to cook and take care of Great-grandma as well. So under this constraint, I have little choice but to enrol my boy in a school within our neighbourhood.

Reputation: While the reputation and ‘track record’ of the school is important to me, I have little choice in the matter as well. First off, chances of being accepted into a school is highly dependent on whether the parent has contributed 40-odd hours of volunteer service to the school one year prior to the child’s enrolment. Since I’m a working mom, I hardly have time to volunteer my service to these schools. And I don’t even live within 1 or 2km radius of these schools…so chances of my boy enrolling there would be zero.

Teaching Methods: I believe most MOE primary schools have similar teaching-methods. There’s only so much you can do when you have 30 kids to one teacher…so I don’t think teaching-methods in MOE schools differ that much from school to school. Unless one is considering sending one’s child to international or private schools. Unless The Husband somehow strikes it rich I don’t see how I can reasonably afford to send my children to international or private schools. Even if the government allows it….which they don’t.

So as you can see….it all looks pretty bleak. BUT for some reason, I am still optimistic because I truly believe that THE MOST IMPORTANT VARIABLE in all these factors is ME (and hubby, of course).  I believe that if both parents are actively involved and engaged in the child’s education, then where he goes to primary school becomes less important (secondary school is a different matter…but I’m crossing one bridge at a time). I must be there for my children and guide them in their schoolwork, provide comfort and advice and lots and lots of love.

To be honest, I owe my doing well in primary school not so much to my teachers but to my parents. My parents were so loving and firm in the way they raised me that I owe all my successes to them. If I were intelligent and responsible and well-mannered in primary school, it was because my parents raised me that way – not so much because my teachers nurtured me to be so. (This isn’t to de-value teachers in any way….this is only a reflection on personal experience.) And while I grew more independent in secondary school, my parents truly were my pillar in my pre-adolescent years. Maybe because my parents were always there for me, I didn’t feel the need to grow too attached to or dependent on any of my teachers. I can only hope that my own children will trust me to bring them up well the way I trusted my parents. While teachers are important role models to our children, as parents, it is our responsibility to raise our children such that they will not grow up to be a burden to their teachers (or anyone else).

End (happy) note: My litte girl (who is 3 years old) appeared to have undergone a developmental growth spurt. Two weeks ago, she could only confidently recognize 10 letters of the alphabet but now she can recognize 16 of them (with their sounds to boot!). Also, two weeks ago, she could barely write the letters independently (without copying or tracing) but all of a sudden she’s now writing letters all on her own. This really made my week.

My daughter’s favourite nursery rhyme is ‘There was an old woman who lived in a shoe’. Today, she surprised me with her version of the rhyme. She went:

‘There was an old woman who lived in a shoe,
She had so many children, she flushed them down the loo.”

And she burst into hysterical laughter.
My goodness. I must make sure she doesn’t repeat her version of the rhyme in school.

-happimom.

Househusbands

I was reading an article on househusbands in one of the parenting magazines and after reading the article, I turned to The Husband and asked him ,”Would you be a house husband?” Without even spending a moment to think about it, he said ,”No”.

I decided to rephrase the question and I asked him, “If we have all the money in the world and you really don’t have to work anymore, would you be a househusband?” and he said ,”No. I would still want to go out to work.” 

I decided to rephrase the question again and I asked him, “Don’t you want to be a househusband and spend as much time with us?” and the answer was, “Er, well, yes, but I still want to work.” I find his answers rather perplexing because between the two of us, he is the more “domesticated” one and he really enjoys doing housework and taking care of The Daughter.

Now, I still haven’t figured out why my husband insists on working and not being a househusband. Maybe he feels that a man is defined by his profession. I’m not sure. I will find that out in another conversation but I really salute all those men who chose to be househusbands because I think it must be a very tough decision that they had to make and what more, with society not being used to accepting men as househusbands, the social stigma doesn’t make it any easier.  -martini

Marriage

I was surfing the net when I came across this interesting article. I think it is true that sometimes, in our enthusiasm to become good parents, we forget to become good spouses and we forget that part of becoming a good parent is to be nice to your spouse and to treat him/her with as much love and respect as possible. For the sake of our children and family, let’s all make an effort to show our love to our spouses.   -martini

The Myth of ‘Quality Time’

I wanna be a full-time mom and a part-time worker.
Right now, I feel like I’m more a full-time worker and a part-time mom.

And the guilt runs DEEP.

People try to tell me that it’s not the amount of time that matters. That you can work all day and still come home to spend quality time with the children. I KNOW for a fact that’s not true.

Surely, the statement assumes that our energy level remains at a constant optimum level throughout the day. Let’s face it – even batteries run down with time. Likewise, I wake up fresh and early, invest my time and energy at work and by the time I get home to my kids, they really only get the raw end of the deal. Cause as much as I try to will myself not to feel tired, the truth is, I do get tired.

Which is why I believe that quality time is a myth. How do you spend quality time at the end of the day when you are exhausted from the day’s work? Quality time takes effort (read: ENERGY) and patience. And sometimes, I end up snapping at my children because they want to play a little while longer. And I try to stifle a yawn during reading time. It is awful.

They way i see it, my children have a right to demand that time and attention from me. And there I go snapping at them.

Total time spent at the office per day: 11 hours (7am-6pm)
Total time spent with the children
(excluding the hustle-n-bustle of bathtime and dinner time): 2 hours (8-10pm)

My little boy once asked: ‘Momma, will you catch a cold tomorrow?’
I replied: ‘Why do you want me to catch a cold? I’m sure you don’t want momma to be ill? Then I won’t be able to play with you.’
And he replied: ‘Yes, but if you have a cold, then you can stay home. I like it when you are at home.’

Something must be wrong somewhere when a child says that to his mother.

The idea of being a stay-at-home-mom is becoming more appealing by the day.

-happimom.

Detox Part 3

Remember my detox entry? So far, not so good. I notice that I can’t detox for more than 2 days in a row because it will make me depressed. Now, this is what I eat on my detox days.

Does it look appetising? Now you know why I can’t do it for more than 2 days in a row.

But I keep telling myself that I must eat healthily because The Grandma always reminds me that as parents, we must keep ourselves healthy so that we can take good care of our children.

Which brings me to this point. As parents, do we always have to think of our children in everything that we do? Do we lose our individuality the day we become parents? I know, for a fact, my life has changed the day The Daughter arrived. She has become the centre of my universe. Is that the way it should be?

Must we as parents keep making sacrifices for our children? What if they are not thankful for all that we’ve done? Do we just accept it with a sigh or do we take them to court and sue them?   -martini

Favouritism

I was listening to the radio this morning when the DJs started talking about favouritism- parents who favour one child over another. I began to wonder if I would practise that too should I have more than one child and I strongly believe that I would…

My mother is one who definitely does. It is obvious not just to me but other people too that my mum favours my brother. I’m not very sure why but I think it’s because he is more intelligent and she likes intelligent children. I don’t grudge my brother for being the favoured one as I love him very much but what if I don’t? Wouldn’t it have resulted in very unhealthy sibling rivalry?

And why do parents show their favouritism? Is it because they can’t help it? CAN parents love their children equally? This is a question that I’ve been pondering.