Summer 2013

It's that time of the year again!! When the kid is home for 2 straight months and you wonder what you can do to keep him away from the TV. Well, TV watching is not banned completely but definitely not for long straight hours. Most the time the kid is out playing with his friends and doesn't hassle me too much. He is outdoors early in the morning till evening and the kids play lots of games together - which is good and kind of how our holidays used to be. But this holidays I also want him to do a couple of additional stuff just to get exposure to various sports and mediums. So here's the rough plan (tentative and subject to change as usual)

1. Debated between these summer camps and sports (kid is willing to try anything - even hockey!! dont know where hockey's come from!) - football in his school, football at SPT, cricket with IACA. Finally narrowed down to cricket with IACA because of the proximity and the timing. For the other two, he would have to leave home early in the morning and I wanted him to have a break from early morning during the holidays. So its going to be 2 months of cricket for 2 hours 6 days a week. We paid the fees and bought the cricket kit yesterday and the kid is counting down hours to start his summer camp.

2. Spend the first days of holidays cleaning his room (with my help) and sort through all the books, toys and clothes and give away what he doesn't need or use anymore.

3. Follow the complete IPL series and note down the wins and loses every day. We plan to make a chart together so that he can track it easily. Will also get him to get the details from the newspaper everyday (atleast our newspaper will get opened this way!!).

4. Play lots of monopoly - we bought this game yesterday :)

5. Read one book all by himself - just to improve his reading, have given up on the thought of him being a bookie

6. Kids been telling me to teach him cooking - so maybe one dish a week (not cakes and muffins) which he can remember easily

7. Get him to write in a notebook about what he did everyday - maybe just a line or two - again just to improve his writing and spellings and also to get into the habit of writing.

This is what I would like him to do regularly apart from the usual playing, playing, playing and of course, the TV!!

We have no big holidays planned for the summer - just 3 days in Ooty along with our friends. I know already that the kid's going to enjoy these three days as his best friends are going to be with him and also the place where we are staying has lots of new activities for them to try. Looking forward to the summer!! :)

Over and done

Grade 1 is over and done with! Adi's last working day was 2 days back and today we received the report card with his grades and "promoted to grade 2" written on it (well, that wasn't a surprise!!). A year gone by all too soon - with some things going as we expected it to, some not and with some surprises along the way too.

This year has been a year of learning for me as much as it was for Adi. Throughout his UKG, I worried if I was being a lazy mom and should be spending time teaching him at home and making him revise what he's learnt in school. So this year, I decided to experiment and see what the results will be. I made him write hindi or learn spellings everyday for 10 mins at home and then went for weeks without making him do anything at all. I did a  basic revision at home a day before his assessments and then some days I sent him without any preparation at all. And the assessments results did vary based on the preparation and effort he had put in at home. His hindi underwent a remarkable improvement after he revised everyday at home and then came down to average after we stopped. The same with spellings too. So I guess I've figured out that with my child, additional preparation is indeed necessary. Not to the extent to spending hours over his books everyday - but just a 10-15 mins of revision maybe twice or thrice a week. He definitely doesn't have the discipline for this this right now and unfortunately neither do I. My interest and will to make him revise is never consistant - it goes through phases of ups and downs. My only hope is that once he is older, he will get into a routine himself and figure out what he needs to do "if" he wants to excel. This is a choice that we have left entirely to him - atleast for now ;)