Saturday, March 28, 2009

Kaelyn loves to draw, write and read books

Kaelyn enjoys reading when she was very young.

As early as 1-2 months old, Hann Sze and me has already started reading out to her flash cards on numbers, "ABC"s and objects/things.

She is very keen whenever we read to her, and will sit quietly listening when we are reading to her.

She will also point and ask for "book", and will flip through the book (some mama's books with mainly words) as if she is reading..

Kaelyn at my sis place.. reading Koko Gaven's book!


She would expect us to read to her in car, whenever we are around. When we come home after work/or during weekend, she will take a book, hold our hand and say "come", then she will sit on the floor and expect us to read to her.

See Ma ma reading to her..



She also likes to draw. we taught her to the outline of our hands only once. Then she always like to draw outline of her hands and even legs!

Kaelyn drawing outline of mama's hand!





Kaelyn drawing in deep concentration at nai nai/ye ye's house



I wish that she will continue to be interested to read and write for the rest of her lives!!

In fact, we just bought her a new set of table and chair from IKEA for her to read and write yesterday!

English or Mandarin

English or Mandarin? This has been something which David and I had been struggling with since Kaelyn was born.

I grew up speaking Mandarin at home and David mainly Hokkien and some Mandarin. English, although I wouldnt say was a huge struggle, is something I wished I could master better. After all, all subjects through my entire school life was thought in English (except for Chinese of course). You have to do well in PSLE English, GCE 'O' level English and GCE 'A' level General Paper before you can progress to a good school. And as I am working in a British Bank working with many 'ang mohs', it is all the more important for me to express myself well in English. Whereas for Chinese, the subject never really counted as a core subject in school. You are still able to get into a good school even if you do badly in this area. And I thought Mandarin was only useful with the 'uncles' and 'aunties' in the market / supermarket / coffeeshop / hawker centre etc.

With all the odds stacked against Mandarin and so much pros going for English, of course English was the way to go! We decided that we wanted our dear gal to have a headstart so we began to only converse with her in English since the day she was born. The idea is for her grandparents to speak to her in Mandarin and everything will just fall in place.

So 19 months on from that day this decision was made, how have we fared?

Kaelyn's language report card 1 month back:

English - A
  • Responds very well to her English name, Kaelyn.
  • She understands English instructions very well.
  • She is able to express herself with simple English terms. e.g. Mama hand walk walk (means asking me to hold her hand to walk); Papa leg pain pain; Aunty eat; Mama hand draw; Come, sit etc etc.
Mandarin - C
  • Takes a while to register her Chinese name, Yixuan.
  • She understands instructions in Mandarin sometimes, but still not very well.
  • Usually doesnt use Mandarin to express herself other than 'Bu yao, bu yao'.I think she understands quite a number of words as her grandparents have been speaking to her, but she doesnt naturally use them. A ball will always be 'ball' instead of 'qiu'; and bird is never 'niao' to her although we have been repeating these words to her. It is only when we ask her where is 'qiu' then she will point to the ball.
I made a U-turn a few weeks back after looking at this not too great report card. And also it was timely that MM Lee also spoke about speaking to our children in Mandarin at home. To some extent, I do agree with him that it is easier to pick up English than Mandarin. Kaelyn doesnt have much problems repeating English words after me, but I cant say the same for Mandarin. She sounded like a non-Chinese trying to pick up Mandarin for the first time! Also, I realise in my job, I was required to pick up some Business Chinese to speak to some Taiwanese clients. I had to put in quite a bit of time to prepare for that 20 min call. I also want Yixuan to be able to converse with her paternal grandparents and great grandma in Mandarin, as they dont speak English.

The tide has turned...

I just hope the poor gal doesnt get confused with Ye ye and Nai nai speaking to her in Mandarin, Aunty (our helper) speaking to her in English, and Papa, Mama, Gong gong, Popo speaking to her in a mix of both....

Lady Kaelyn

Our Kaelyn is a typical girly girl.

- She loves it when we comb and clip her hair and tells her 'mei mei' (pretty) after its done. So she'll keep very still while we are at work.

- She loves her soft toys... from Ernie...
... to Pooh bear....
.....to Minnie mouse..... to Bert, Cookie monster, angel bear, care bear, bean toy etc etc... which we didnt have a chance to take a photo of all of them. Maybe we should.


- She loves shopping for shoes (high heel ones...) Yikes, hope she doesnt grow up to own hundreds of pairs of them!


- She loves to cook for us and her soft toys and feed all of us, behaving like a Mother hen at times.


- And last but not least, she 'nags' ! Yes, no kidding. If you dont keep your shoes away when you come home, she'll pick up the shoes and asks you to keep them. And when David carries my handbag for me sometimes, she'll show her disapproval and says that that's 'Mama's bag' and so has to be carried by Mama...

Tuesday, March 3, 2009

From Bs to Ws...

Kaelyn has progressed in her range of vocabulary.

Several months back when she first started to talk, her vocab was restricted to words beginning with Bs.

Bird, Ball, Baby, Back (means to put things back), Bao bao (to carry her), and of course her all time favourite even till now - Bu Yao Bu Yao (dont want)

Now she seems to take a liking for all things W..

Wet wet - used when she spilled (or rather intentionally poured) water on the floor, or when she wets herself sometimes.

Why - used when we asked her to do something or do something for her which she doesnt like. E.g. 'Kaelyn wear your socks, we are going out'. Refuses to wear her socks and screams 'WHYYYYY'!

Walk walk - used when she wants to go out. She will pull your arms / clothes etc and point to her shoes and door. Sometines also used in pretend play. E.g. she carries a basket in her arms and when we ask her where she is going, she replies 'walk walk'.

Wum (means I want) - used to indicate her preferences and demands. e.g. 'Kaelyn do you want to eat bread?' To which she replies 'I wum.'

Wait - used by us when we asks her to wait while we get her food / water / toys etc. Most of the time she will obey and repeats what we told her. 'Wait!' with the hand action.

What - used randomly, sometimes when she is angry or throwing tantrums.

I wonder what alphabet will be next..