MM's first time going to a hairdresser

She was reluctant at first, but once she sat on that chair, it was all smiles. She was so proud!

done!

Jeff and Laura's fashing(mardi gras) party

MM the ladybug

Lily the butterfly

me doing face painting

the kids lined up and waited for their turns

scarecrow and go go dancer

Hugo the viking

making music

Party at Paola and Jacob's

Jacob made a mouse and a seal out of pizza dough for the kids

eating their mouse and seal

their new game: head butting

MM and Anissa

kids sitting to listen to Regi play

Kaukau's valentine gift for Ming Ming

THANK YOU - to LKY and Selina

A big THANK YOU to Janet for all the new Chinese books!! Ming Ming was so happy when we got them last week. We still haven't read them all, at the moment MM's favorite is 晶晶的腿.

Also a belated thank you to Selina Yiyi for this book! It was a lot of fun reading it.

This is one of MM's favorite, we would read it and act out the "scratch-tap code". Selina yiyi you should practice it too, so that we can play together next time we meet.

another funny poem that MM really enjoys.

school update

school letter  Feb 5th
This past week was all about Tu B'Shevat, the birthday of the Trees! From singing songs with Shari to making observations of our Amaryllis plant, we had a ball! We named the Amaryllis parts on our larger than life illustration that the children colored in so beautifully!

Read books about how paper is made & the rainforest and it's amazing trees and the animals that live in them. And even planted some wildflower seeds!
It will be such a surprise to see if our wildflowers and Amaryllis plant have changed since last week.

In honor of Tu B'Shevat we are "growing" our own tree in the classroom! The Green Room went on our first "mini field trip" to the park across the street from Akiba to observe the amazing trees in our own neighborhood. We collected branches and bark to add to our class tree along with leaf rubbings & prints. This week we will put our tree together. 

Week of February 6-10 

02/12/2012

 

This week we continued celebrating Tu B'Shevat and learning about plants.  Our amaryllis bulb continues growing at an amazing rate and the children have really become quite astute little scientists as they observe and compare their observations to their earlier predictions.  Even greater surprises await them as we anticipate that the bud which has grown will open next week.  We also continued the Green Room tradition of making paper.  We have decided to make this activity a regular part of the class for several reasons - it helps us teach the children to be good stewards of the Earth by making the most of our resources; it builds many of the muscles in the hand which are integral to fine motor development, especially those used in drawing and writing; and last but of course never least, it is an opportunity for the children to create truly beautiful art and to experiment with a number of artistic principles such as tone and texture.

A big thank you to Laura, Anya's mom, for coming in to teach us about how trees eat and drink.  Not only did the kids have a great time "coloring" with the chlorophyll in spinach leaves, but they really took in and remembered her lesson on how tress make food.  When we had a fruit salad party in celebration of Tu B'Shevat with the Purple Room on Wednesday the Purple Room teachers were both impressed and surprised at the detailed answers to their question of "what do trees need?" 

A glimpse into a typical Thursday in the Green Room

Ming Ming and Bella

talking about which animals need trees

relaxing at the end of Yoga

Chinese class with Helen Laoshi

With some other Chinese parents, we organized a Sunday Chinese class for kids from 3 to 6 year old. 

Ming Ming's first homework. I did it with her. she can recognize all the characters in green now.

ice skating update

MM in her ice skating class, Feb 3

Feb 4, we went skating with Lucas and Lily. Keven and Lily skating

Ming Ming, Anna, and Lucas

Feb 12, skating with many neighbors: Nourit, Avi, Oscar (his first time on ice), Lucas, and Anissa.

Oscar is a natural; he ran around like he already knew how to do it.

Antoine challenging Avi for a race... this was his second time skating (he stayed on his skating shoes for two minutes the last time we came here).

Antoine leading, not that it was anything glorious to beat a four year old.

Ming Ming had a very good start with ice skating at her first class. We had the luck to see Liz and the girls there, she got really excited and got on the ice with them, and then she joined her class and was very active and happy participating. I was pleasantly surprised by her enthusiasm.
On retrospective, this first experience is probably an exception rather than MM's usual way of approaching a new sport. She got more and more reluctant going on the ice since then. I really want her to learn ice skating (I would really like to do it myself but don't think that it would ever be possible). As she does not want to participate in her class, I arrange for her to go with our neighbors. Anna kept telling me that MM has a very good sense of balance but did not have the confidence to move around on her own. I feel a little bit bad. If she has inherited Antoine's skills (I hope so), she must have inherited my lack of courage. I was like this with every sport when I was growing up, and still, it has been three years since I got my driver's licence, and I still dare not get on the highway in Chicago. how pathetic!
At the end of this section, I got on the ice (no skating shoes), and rewarded MM for every meter she walked on her own with a M&M chocolate. She walked around the rink on her own and finished up a tiny bag of M&Ms.

Pretend darling, etc...

Ming Ming talking to her baby: my darling.... My darling...
Me: who is your darling Ming Ming?
MM: I don't have a darling.
Me: can I be your darling?
MM: no, my baby is my darling.
Me (sad face)
MM: but you an be my pretend darling. Can u be my pretend darling?

-----
bed time, putting on her diaper (only for the night) and PJ.
MM (unhappy): Ha, it is Dora, I want the princess diaper.
me: but Dora is a princess too.
MM: No, she is not. Princess don't use backpack.
me: what? but where do princess put their stuff?
MM: in their treasure box.
me: but when they go for an adverture, when do they put their treasure box?
MM: in a bag... and they put their diaper in (she started to find the idea funny), and their peepee in.

Ha, the treasure box turned out to be a potty, who would have thought!

--------

bath time
MM: when am I turning four? when is my birthday?
me: remember? your birthday is at the beginning of summer.
MM: is it soon? it is already summer in Africa.
(her teacher Hannah just came back from a one-week-trip in Ethiopia, this must be from her)
me: that is right. But your birthday is when summer comes to Chicago.

then again, at another occassion
MM: picking apples is fun, right?
me: right
MM: I picked apples with Julian, and it is very fun, it is in Charlottesville.
(sometimes she would tell me in a worried voice: I don't remember Charlottesville anymore.)
after a while...
MM: can I pick apples for my birthday? or cherries? I can, right? because my birthday is in the summer!

When Ming Ming was really really angry

Ming Ming was on her timeout chair (for refusing to brush her teeth and being uncooperative). I was sitting outside the door reading, and keeping an eye on her so that she would not start playing or pull everything on the floor.

After a few minutes of high-pitch screaming, she started trying her best to say mean things to me. I could almost see her brain at work, going through all her experience of the world and knowledge of meanness, to try to come up with the meanest expressions she could muster.

Last night it went like this:

我不喜歡你! x 10 times (I don’t like you)

你是壞 pee pee! (you are bad pee pee)

You are poopy man! [pee pee and poopy man are insults that she has learnt from school lately]

我要把你放到垃圾桶里面 (I will put you in a garbage bin)

你再也不是我的媽媽了 (you are no longer my mom) [from “petit ours brun est fache avec maman”, a
French book that we read often]

有一陣風把你吹走 (you will be blown away by a big wind)

I will give you three choices. 1, you go live in another house; 2 you turn into a piggy; 3 you stay here. You go to a fire house. 1 2 3 you have to make your choice now. If you don’t choose, I will count again. And you have to choose again. 1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3. [she was mad that I counted five seconds for her to come to the bathroom with me. So she was counting me now.]

All these, with some attempt at spitting, and all the tears and mucus, she was quite a sight.

But what could I do? I was already putting her on time out. Eventually I just ignored her (and repressed my impulse to laugh), and waited for her to calm down. After a while she calmed down and we went brush her teeth.

Back to her room. I told her that there would not be any stories tonight because she behaved badly. And I already told her several times that if she would not cooperate there would not be any stories. I tried to be sympathetic but her emotion went from sad to anger again. Another episode of screaming and me sitting outside the door. She finally got too tired and recognized defeat and asked me to put her to bed. We picked up stuffs that were all over the floor (this time I did not intervene as she pulled blankets and pillows and toys down), me doing most of the work, and then she was asleep in two seconds.

Okay, the superior French parents (accroding to Pamela Druckerman), do your kids ever act this badly? Have I not earned enough authority in my relationship with her?

Tomorrow, I will be running to the public library to grab some disciplining books.

Why French parents are superior?

the title is a bit sensational, but something to consider. click here for the WSJ article.

婆婆在美國

與鄰居除阿姨練習一支新舞, 下星期婆婆的歌舞團要開party. 每個人得準備一個節目.

在芝加哥大學圖書館新翼.

東亞圖書館窗前

婆婆也不怕冷, 接著自個兒去散步一下午. 我和明明先回家..

Ming Ming and Guitar