Hello there!

It's been a while since our last post.

In 2018, we spent three weeks of the winter break in my hometown --- mainly to visit family and check out some prospects with a little traveling on the side.  What really happened was the first and the last one mostly.

P was able to travel with M all the way to El Nido. He was able to try paddling on a kayak (which he wouldn't be able to do if he was with his Dad), endure a long bus ride with family members throwing up in the bus, survive a few weeks with lousy internet, get holed up in an airconditioned room just to avoid the heat, meet a friend at a mall to watch a movie, and do hospital duties as little as he can since it's really a stretch out of his comfort zone.

Real life beyond the books and the four sides of a screen are what you call alternative learning. It can be a little more expensive but I seriously want him to be able to experience it. It left a big dent on my wallet but that is outweighed with what intangible things we had gained.

The 2nd year of MS simply passed by, with highs and lows on his test and grades on papers, not to mention, a disappointing phone call from his teacher, all wrapped up in 2018.

This year's winter break is being spent with catching up with Maths, Korean History and adding extra work on basic programming language Python along with a few other skills online with the help of his D. I've almost signed myself done with being the academic teacher/mom at this point.

It is also around this time that a Korean drama on the overzealous education culture has become popular that has left Korean parents thinking (if not talking about it.) Nonetheless, I seriously doubt that it will make a dent on how things are nowadays when it comes to the Korean youth's education. We leave the basic academic education that they get from the Korean public school system and try to fill in some gaps with what we can afford. Thankfully, English is not included in our case.

Now, if I can only teach my son to improve his writing abilities, presentation skills and get interested in sciences, I will be a happy teacher/mom.


 

CoEx

Korean Traditional Musical Instruments at Korean Public School

Korean elementary students are required to learn musical instruments at school. A friend of mine who has a first grader this year had to buy a set which includes a triangle, Korean traditional gong of sorts with cute wooden drumsticks.

As for my son, I had to buy a recorder when he was in 4th grade, and Danso/Tanso the following year.  It pays if a foreign parent has an idea about these so they can pick up one in advance before the teacher requires the student to bring one the very next day. I really hate those last minute buys. Either the teacher tells the student a day before or even if the teacher tells them way in advance, the student forgets it and remembers it just on that specific morning.

Grr...I remember having to jump out early morning in late winter, (just before the school year has barely started so it was still pretty cold morning) having to go with my BIL and son to grab his art supplies. Kid was already in 4th grade but we were all pretty new to the place so it was pretty much an adjustment to everything. From then, I tried to stay on top of things having typical school supplies on hand. Fortunately, my son is growing and has learned that I am not a magician. :)

So before I ditch and clean out this danso remnants, I'll just have to post the photo of the finger chart for this Korean flute.

middle school aptitutude test

Today is practically the first time that my son steps into his new school. The freshies were to take the aptitude exam before they start school next month. They still have to finish their last week of elementary next week along with the graduation on that Friday.  Now, they were told to a couple of things for the test: pens, some documents and the indoor shoes.

We tried to let him practice taking the bus yesterday but he ended up at subway station stop since he missed his school bus stop. Since me and SIL were in the area, he went home with us by car.

This morning, we decided to give him a ride to school but he has to take the bus on his way home. We woke up at around 8, I went downstairs at 8:45 to warm up the car and he hopped in around past 9. we barely got 10 minutes to get to school. Traffic was light so we made it like 2-3 minutes before 9:20, the time he's supposed to be there. Why? He had to do a last minute bathroom stop! Btw, there was another boy getting off a car just after I drove off. 

Then I started back home. Somewhere on the way, I felt my phone vibrate but cant take it coz I was driving. when i finally got a chance to pull over, a missed call from my son and called him back. He forgot that cracky indoor shoes/slippers!

too late to turn back and I am not buying him a new one. He has to learn something! 

I debated on turning around and buying one at the nearby convenience store but ultimately decided against it. Mommy-rescue syndrome, will cost me about 3-5K maybe, and a bit complicated finding him and probably messing up the testing logistics like disrupting them. 

On the other hand, his feet might be cold, which might affect his test. His first impression at school might also go awry as the kid who came without indoor shoes. A bit negative but there's bound to be something good at the other side of it all. Hopefully, he'll learn not to forget those indoor stuff next time and double check his stuff. 

I was helping him prep his stuff last night when he insisted on using his giant school bag to pack everything! I left him alone to do his thing. He could have listened to me to bring all his stuff in a paper bag and it will be easy to double check. He says it doesn't matter if he use the big bag. There you go! 

Let's see how the rest if the day turns out!

Summer 2016 Homeschool

Another school break upon us so it's time to kick it up with the homeschool thing.

Writing.

I decided to continue the writing lessons that we had been doing every holiday break. So far, we've done simple diary-keeping, creative writing winter, and started a bit of essay this time. We still have a long way to go in making a headway in a proper essay that should be useful in the coming years ahead.

Math.

Aside from writing, I can only add a bit of math review for this summer since the writing part really take some time to complete. I had planned on reviewing and solidifying (if I can) the "fraction skills" and cover the basic geometry (equations and all) before moving up to pre-algebra for next year. It's getting harder but I hope that I can still cover the basics in English coz he's learning everything now in Korean. This has been evident in some part of fractions (i.e. GCF, LCM) and solving for geometry equations. It seems that they don't use equations. Whew! I had a hard time wrapping my head around it as I tried to help my son a few weeks ago. I figured, I had to teach him this in English.

There are other topics that I think they missed like converting between the metric and imperial measurement system. This we learned when when we were in grade school so I pretty much have an idea using both. Of course, proper computation would mean knowing the conversion tables for such but I am more flexible in estimating smaller distances to say the least. I mean, at least, inches and cms. But km and miles are a bit off for me though. I want my son to be more flexible and not grow up with just one way.

Geography. 
I would love to do geography this summer but I have yet to find a good resource for this. We only have 5 sessions and I am not sure when we can squeeze it in.

Typing
This one is inspired way into the summertime already and I have to find a schedule for this. But this can be fun if done every other day.

That will be all for today. I'll write more about the writing journey, geography and typing later. Gotta to do quick chore for now before I head out for my gig.

Winter Writing 2015 (part 4)

            

              

   

             
               

Winter Writing 2015 (Part 3)

Part 3