Winter Solstice Festival and a Lesson in Tolerance, Respect, and Culture

We are a family of mixed religious and non-religious beliefs. Because of this, we observe a variety of traditions and festivals to embrace the beliefs and practices of all the members in this family. I won’t pretend that I didn’t have initial reservations about it to begin with but now I think it is a good lesson for the

Help Me Be Good – Lying, Being Destructive and Other Undesirable Behaviours

This happened recently… If you can’t figure out what you’re looking at,  it is our dining chair with four pencil holes. After some investigation, we figured out that the culprit was G2 except that he refused to admit to it and he even lied to us saying that it was his brother who did it.

Apps: My Story World – Interactive Educational Read Along Stories

My Story World by Mindshapes is the latest of our collection of read-along storybook apps to be discovered and this one’s a keeper. Loads of stories! My Story World contains over 70 interactive stories with more being added to the collection each week! These are some of the stories in their collection that your child is sure

Character Development: What are We Subconsciously Teaching Our Children Through Movies?

What is the Bechdel Test? There is something I learned about recently called “The Bechdel Test”. Alright, we’re late on the bandwagon since this rule has been around since 1985 when it was first introduced by Alison Bechdel in her comic strip “Dykes to Watch Out For“. The rule is basically about the unequal representation of

So Homeschooling Raises Socially Awkward Kids?

I had to post this… I remember when I first entertained the idea of homeschooling the boys I was met with a lot of negativity – not that it should have been any surprise since it goes against everything we are familiar with. One of the common misconceptions that struck me was belief that it

Character Development: Raising the Visionary, the Trail Blazer, the Pioneer

“Faith is to believe what you do not see; the reward of this faith is to see what you believe.” – Saint Augustine There is a story I like to tell… It’s a rock climbing one but it’s a true one and it goes like this: At the rock climbing gym I used to go to,

How Do You Teach Your Child that it is Okay to be Wrong?

I am perturbed… Recently, Daddy suggested I give Hercules a canvas and let him create something with it. Aristotle’s early abstract pieces adorn our walls but Hercules has yet to have a canvas with his name on it. So it was time to correct this oversight… Unfortunately, I had one canvas and one easel but two

Developing Stress Tolerance in Children

The 2013 World Education Games are coming up in March and Aristotle’s school has registered for the Maths category. So when Aristotle came home with his login details, I thought to give him a chance to practice to help build his confidence. I was not prepared for the reaction I received. Aristotle was not keen

Character Development: Social Grace

Some time back, hubby and I were watching Romance of the Three Kingdoms. The novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms by Luo Guanzhong is one of the four great classical novels of Chinese literature. It is a historical embellishment of a period in Chinese history containing both elements of fiction and non-fiction. See the Preview.

Character Development: More Books…

Code Road Raising a compassionate, caring and moral child has always been one of my priorities as a parent.  With Gavin becoming more “aware”, I had been scouring the bookshelves for books on character development in the hopes that reading and learning about morals and values could help him pick up a few himself. Recently,