Just My Rambling

My family has been asking me to post videos of Lil’ C for the longest time. Unfortunately the video-ignorant me could not figure out how to download from videocam to my pc!!! Duh!!! I still don’t and my technical support aka the hubby is too lazy to help me!! So I finally ended up using the video feature of the camera. So hopefully this works!!

I was just reading Mumgather’s post about board games and I couldn’t agree more with her that board games are good for kids. This summer with Lil’ C out of school and us travelling so much, I have been using this opportunity to play board games with her.

We started off with My first UNO. It is the kiddie version of the regular UNO and less complicated. When she first started playing, she started crying and got really upset when she didn’t win. But soon, she started to learn that she couldn’t win all the time and got over it. Now although she still likes to win, she doesn’t get upset anymore.

Another game we play is Chutes and Ladders. It is a great game for counting. The latest game that we are playing now is Monopoly. I got the Junior version. Since Lil’ C is able to read, I took the opportunity to let her read the instructions herself and figure out the game all by herself.

Here she is playing the game and actually beating her daddy!! She owns more blue ticket booth ( the junior version uses ticket booths instead of hotels in the regular Monopoly.) than her daddy’s green ticket booth. I love this game because she learns counting and also learn how to use the different currencies. It’s great for learning additions and subtrations too. For example she has to pay money to buy ticket booths. Now she understands that to buy a $4 hotel, she can use either four $1 or 2 $2 or even a $5 and get $1 change. Lots of fun ways to learn Math.

Lil’ C finally got over her fear of getting her head in the water during swimming class yesterday!! It’s a big breakthrough from the first day of class last month when she didn’t even dare to put her face in the water. She even went under water to pick up a ring! Once she discovered how fun it was to go underwater, she couldn’t get enough of it. She kept dunking her head even while the instructor was talking. Hehe…. I think pretty soon she will be able to swim on her own already.

Remember how Lil’ C loved puzzles? Well, she has a new craze right now and it is doing maze. I bought a couple of maze book during the cruise to keep her occupied and she hasn’t stop since then. When she first started, she did not know how to do a maze but after a few lessons, she is very good at them now. I wonder how long this maze craze will last and what’s next.

In spite of the fact that I live near the sea when I was growing up, I never learned how to swim till I was in high school. I wished I had learned earlier. It was so much harder to learn when you get older. That’s why I am determined to make sure that Lil’ C should learn swimming as early as possible. It’s not my intention for her to be a super swimmer but just to learn enough that she can swim casually and also to learn water safety.

So a month ago, I send her to swimming class twice a week. When she first started, she didn’t even dare to put her face in the water but today, she finally dunked her whole head under the water! She can also float on her back for a few seconds. Way to go, sweetie!! So far, she’s loving the classes. The club pool is an indoor pool so we will probably going to continue her classes in the winter. Hopefully by the end of the year, she will be able to swim all by herself.

Seriously do you read the books before letting your kids read them?  When Lil’ C was reading the baby & toddler books, the books were never a problem since I had to read to her, so I know what is the content about. But now that she has started reading chapter books on her own, I am having a hard time keeping up with her. Usually I try to glance through the books before she borrows them from the library but since the books are pretty long, I don’t go through every page.  

Frankly, it didn’t really bother me too much until last month when I bought some books for her. These books are very popular in the elementary schools and is on the recommended list of reading. So I thought they should be ok but I got a little worried when I read one of the books. There were a lot of words in there that I would not want Lil’ C to learn!! The main character of the books is supposed to be a bratty little girl so there are lots of negative words coming out of her mouth. I don’t plan to shelter her from all negative words but to me, 3 1/2 is still a little young. Maybe in a few more years when she has a better understanding of what is fictional and what is reality. So in the meantime, these books have been hidden away.

For now, I guess I will read through the books first before giving them to Lil’ C.  It will take up some of my time but at least I will feel better knowing that these books are mommy-approved.

My little girl loves books. In fact, I always have one of her books along with me wherever I go especially when we eat out. That way I will get to eat in peace while she keeps herself busy with her book. Needless to say, both of us were very happy when we received 2 new books from Cedar Valley Publishing. The 2 books we received were “Let’s Get Ready For Kindergarten” and Let’s Get Ready for 1st Grade”

When I first flip through the books, I really love the fact that the books are very colorful. Kids love colors, so that is a major plus for the books. I also love the fact that you can write on the pages with a dry erase marker and then erase it easily with a tissue. That means Lil’ C can redo the activities in the books as many times as she likes.

Lil’ C is 3 ½ years old. So the “Let’s Get Ready for Kindergarten” book is more appropriate for her. The topics in this book emphasize on early childhood skills such as alphabets and letters, colors, numbers 0-20, money, name, address and much more. Lil’ C is familiar with some of the contents but not all. We have been learning about money at home, so the topic on recognizing the different coins came in very handy for us.

The “Let’s Get Ready for First Grade” book is a little advanced for Lil’ C but she has already started to show interest in some of the content like the punctuation and compound words. She even liked the section on solar system especially since we just came back from a visit to the Flight Museum where she learned a lot about space. The topics in this book emphasize on the pre-first grade skills.

Both of these books have received numerous awards including winners of the 2008 Best You Can Be Award for Books in Education. So if you are interested in good books, go check out these books today. You can see sample pages on their website. If you purchase books from Cedar Valley Publishing, 10% of profits will be donated to charitable organizations.