mid-year

the kids' mid-year exam has a weird schedule. Tahap 2 only started on Wednesday, Tahap 1 started on Tuesday. Then Friday it was no-exam for teacher's day celebration. Monday (today) is a public holiday. Tomorrow they have school, but no papers. Their mid-year starts again on Wednesday. The only core paper the Tahap 2 have left is Science. Tahap 1 still have Maths and Science. THey all finish on Friday, and then their 2-weeks holiday starts.

As the kids put it, "we have 5 days to prepare for Science."

Yeah right.

Thursday it was as if their school holidays have started, no one thought of going through their usual school day routine of studying in the afternoon. Friday moms are at work, we trust they did do their 2 hours study time well. Saturday the kids were all in front of the computer, doing non-school stuff. Saturday night study time with mummy. Sunday night study time the kids flunked big time. Today no computer time at all, some study time in the morning, and some more later tonight.

Hania did some math drills online, she did better with division than with multiplication, so papa's changed the drill focus to multiplication now. Her row of mirrors is now overlaid by rows of multiplication table, papa decided his girl spends too much time under the stairs in front of the mirror, at least now she's expected to spend a lot of time under the stairs in front of the X tables.

Feedback is that the papers were tough. As long as we're seeing improvements, not expecting a total jump to straight As, not that that would've been unwelcome :).

Kiasu parents? Nope, just want them to fulfill their potentials.

surat kiriman tidak rasmi

in preparation for their mid-year exam which started on monday, the Tahap 2 kids wrote a letter to their dads for more computer time, here is amjad's. will post syazmi's and syakira's later.


Ke hadapan,
Ayahanda Mohd Rozi semoga ayahanda dalam keadaan sihat walafiat.
Anakanda Amjad ada satu tujuan menulis surt ini. Tujuan anakanda menulis surat ini kerana untuk memasuki internet selama dua jam.
Anakanda tahu bermain komputer dua jam itu sangat lama tetapi untuk menenangkan otak selepas dua minggu peperiksaan. Anakanda bukan hendak bermain game tetapi memasuki email dan youtube.
Harap ayahanda akan bersetuju dan memberitahu kepada anakanda.
Sekian, terima kasih.

yang benar
(Amjad)

anyway, the kids gave it to their respective dads, and abah and papa cair so they got their two hours a day (though they didn't explicitly asked for daily quota!).

for more reference:
format

here we go again...

the dreaded division unit.

hania is getting everybody else around her all worked up again with her 'shrug' attitude towards division.

would've been okay if she's getting it right but she'd go 'but kawan nia cakap' -- and it bugs papa who is her math tutor.

papa: this is 10 divide by two. see, what would you get?
nia: ten.

so we try the roundabout way.

ibu: I have RM10, to give to you and azraf, how many do you get each?
nia: 5!

money talks :).

at least papa can still withstand nia's long-suffering sigh after she listens to his explanations -- which is why he is hania's math tutor.

papa: so now there's 12, and you put into 3 group, how many in each group?
nia: ibu has RM12, to give to 3, so (thinks), RM4 each.

papa's trying to get her to see the connection between multiplication and division.

he should get a medal.

scrapbooks

so last night at 10 pm amjad remembered he had a scrapbook homework due the following morning.

they were to do a scrapbook of a book they have read.

so he spent two hours doing it. I'm actually surprised he did it all by himself and did not throw a tantrum to have us finish it for him. at one point, I asked him whether the project was really due the following day as syazmi had already gone to bed. but he finished it, and the only thing we had to help him out was to staple the thing together.

and then this afternoon I asked syazmi whether he finished his scrapbook, and he said yes, in school. he said he forgot coz there was no book at home. that almost got him a figurative knock on the head but as it was his birthday today I let that go with just saying that's not true, there are lots of books at home.

a little later the whole story came out. I thought he finished it in school before it was due. it turned out only a handful of them finished the project and the teacher got very mad and after a scolding, they were sent to the library to finish the project.

and then we have syakira who has finished her scrapbook way ahead of the deadline.

and the teachers deal with 40 different personalities daily... phew!

sweeping out the cobwebs

off this blog :)

the new school year has just been a busy one, but nice kind of busy.

this year, mummy and ibu decided to do more value-added thing. more mental exercises to help with their concentration, memory etc in addition to working on their school work.

alhamdulillah, the kids have been showing some improvement. still not there yet but they're starting to be more independent and show better concentration. and they seem less pouty when it's time to do work. and everyone's generally getting most of their homework done during the homework period (off-adult supervision).

final year results

we are definitely dazed!

all the kids turun kelas. their individual grades have generally improved from pkbs3 but there's still a lot of room for improvement. but at least there are more As to go around for each of them.

oh yeah, more work ahead next year!

Program Nilam

Syakira came home on from school on Wednesday with a brand new bicycle. THe school called for an impromptu assembly to give out prizes for the NILAM program. She got first place for Year 3, and then won the overall prize for Tahap 1. Cool!

We never really knew the prize is that much, after all, 3 older kids in the school but none even came close to a 'podium finish.'

Syakira reported 377 books, and she wanted to continue with the book reports after the last report was handed in, but her teacher said no need, keep it for next year. and no wonder, it wasn't even a close call, the second prize winner reported 17+ books.

Congratulations Kak De!

hania's hafazan win

some time last month, while we were doing hafazan at home, hania said she was entering the hafazan competition in school. so I said, ok let's practise at home. and little miss confident said 'it's ok, i know already.' and she added she had known the suras from when she was in kindy. fulamak!

anyway so they had the competition in school the following week. she said she did okay, she knew the suras, while some others made mistakes. the only thing was being a little scared in front of the audience. this was in conjunction of the school's panitia agama islam week.

the announcement of the winners came two weeks later during assembly. i was already in the car waiting for them so got to hear the teacher announcing the winner. hania came second. the moment her name was announced she got up. well, i guess she did have reasons to be confident!

Vocab building

I started a little game on our notice board. make up words from a given sentence. We've done dragon booster, melawati, grandfather etc.

We started with any english word, but now it's 3-letters or more only. The responses have been pretty good. actually, better than expected.

Last night, when I had wiped out the previous words, the kids were suddenly throwing out big words, I wasn't sure what they were doing and then I realized they were giving me the main word. we decided on SPECTACLES.

Hania had a good list of 4-letter words going, I think all in all more than 20 3 to 5-letter words. Pretty impressive.

Some days nobody wrote down anything, some days they couldn't wait to do the word list.

Syakira has asked mummy for this at home, but wants it done upstairs or 'nanti orang kata kita tiru ibu.'

public speaking anyone?

Mummy and Ibu have been pulling our teeth out (yeah, right:)) getting the kids to speak and write English well.

This week Mummy started having the kids act out scenarios.

Monday it was simple stuff. "hi, how are you?" etc etc., basic text book conversations. Then they had to find something around the house and talk about it for two minutes.

Let's just say Azraf gave them a run for their money. His vocab and content was simple, no big deal, he's only 5, but his sentence structure was more English than the others and so less grammar mistakes. The older kids were basically thinking in BM and translating it out loud. Amjad and Syazmi had pretty good content though. Hania has good pronunciation, now if only she pays as much attention to the content!

Tuesday was a bigger challenge. They did giving directions. And for the second round, they had to choose whether to speak on favourite hero, sports or food. Syakira dumb-founded everyone when in the second round she chose as her hero the Prophet Muhammad.

Wednesday moms were exhausted and out of ideas, but the kids were gung-ho. There was a flyer from Domino so we had them do a phone conversation ordering pizza. Then they really wanted to act out scenarios. So we had them pretend to be tourists and tourist guides. They ended up sitting around talking about touristy stuff in English. Interesting.

Thursday we were all pooped out, plus Syazmi wasn't feeling well. So they pretty much had the day off.

mid-year

time for their mid-year exam.

this year, the schedule came from PPD, and it's a weird one. Amjad and Syazmi started last FRiday. But today on Tuesday, they only have PJ paper (first time ever -- nobody has a clue what it's like, but we trust the boys will pass it), and otherwise it's class as usual. weird, weird, weird. So they still have English, Maths and Science. Science will be on Friday, the last day before school break. Maybe they're trying to cut down on the number of absentees?

Hania has Science today but spent the better part of last night preparing for her Seni. Out of the four questions, Question D is to make an ornament from paper. Everyone who read the question paper has no doubt which question miss fashion palate would choose!

The boys said their teacher said for the Pemahaman paper, most seemed to be so much better than the last two assessments i.e., more As, and they're hoping to be in those A category. I think their test taking strategy is getting better. So let's hope they'll get their wish.

the champs

Here they are!

This was right after their 4x200 gold finish.

Notice the now happy faces!

It was a thrilling win after all.

The kids have been watching the footage over and over again; but it's too big to put up on youtube and my video editing know-how is currently non-existent.


(and notice the muddy clothes!)

sports day pix

some pictures from the sports day 2007.





listening to the umpire's instruction. the last event for them that day, notice the tired and tanned faces.







waiting at the starting line. Amjad is first runner, and Syazmi is second runner.

Sports Day -- the report

Annual Sports Day 25 March 2007.

The condition of the field was horrendous! It had been raining a lot the past few days, the kids were happily sloshing around in the mud, some like Amjad chose to go barefoot all the way.

But the weather itself that day was very cooperative, alhamdulillah. Sunny without being too hot. Perfect if the events had gone on schedule and finished by 12; as it was, they dragged on a bit that it all ended at 1:30, and it was sweltering hot.

The organization, whatever there was of it, was bad. We're probably pros at attending sports days what tagging along with mummy and daddy all over segamat in addition to our own school experiences, and this one by far was the most disorganized that we went to. We've never been to the school's sports day before as so this was quite a shock.

Get all the bad things out of the way first so that Ibu can really Brag :) :) :)

(warning -- big time bragging ahead!)

Amjad participated in 3 events -- 100m; 4 x 100 and 4 x 200 (all the events were organized by year and gender).

His first event was 100m. After a false start (duh! teacher who was responsible for the flag signal didn't know what he was supposed to do and was given a crash course there and then by the sports' secretary), he dashed up to finish 3rd.


Their Blue House had the same team for both relay events. Amjad was first runner, next was Syazmi, then Azim and then Faris. Poor Syazmi was still so confused not quite sure whether he was in the team, so when they called for the students to go to the middle of the field, he was still going around looking for his friend. (where was the house teacher who was supposed to manage the team???)

4x100. Amjad faltered at the start, but managed to keep up with the rest of the pack, passed over to Syazmi, who really ran and narrowed the gap with the other two teams, passed over to Azim, who went like the wind and luck was with them when the red team runner slipped, passed over to Faris who kept the second position until the finishing line -- he was only one step behind the green team!

The close silver finish got them -- and everyone else -- excited. After all, blue has traditionally been the worst team, now there was even a glimmer of hope of getting a gold medal.

And won the gold medal they did, and with such excitement! They were already pretty tired by then. The house teacher/manager did a good job trying to keep the students motivated (finally!). It was blazing hot by then, he patted water down their face, put in some encouraging words etc etc. Amjad was ahead of the pack pretty much most of the way but lost the lead in the last 50 m. Syazmi started out forgetting to go into the inner lane, and most some time there, but made up for it in the last 50 m and kept the second position. Azim again went like the wind, and managed to close the gap with the red team. Faris kept up with the lead, but stayed a little behind, until the last stretch. He somehow got a second wind and dashed the last 15 m to clinch the lead -- much to the blue supporters' excitement.

The kids' achievement made up for the disorganization of the event :).

Amjad and Syazmi, I take back all my thoughts about you guys being 'kaki bangku.' In addition to talent, the spirit that you both showed was just awesome!

WONDERFUL WONDERFUL JOB BOYS!!!!

p/s will post the pictures here later.

sports day

for the boys, the current flavor is not the pkbs scores, but the sports' day that will be held this sunday.

they're not having classes this week, instead, it's all sports practise.

both of them are taking part in the same events -- 4x400, 4x200. We're lucky they're in the same team, so there's no need for split loyalty.

as a 'tempias', I had to iron Syazmi's sports clothes this morning. Sahrim washed them last night and didn't take them out to dry so the boy woke up, started looking for his clothes and realized oops, they're wet. So he put it in the spinner, and then I had to iron them dry. but luckliky, it was syazmi and not amjad. He was simply matter-of-fact about it -- amjad would have thrown a fit and pouted and ibu reacting to that would be screaming in my head while ironing the clothes -- which wouldn't be a good start for the day! So with Syazmi, it was simply a matter of -- uh oh, we have a problem, let's just solve it, no need to get upset about it.

we'll cry ourselves hoarse this sunday :).

pkbs1 results

the results are partially in.

the others are not satisfied that Hania, in her 'dazed' studying habits, managed to pull in all A's -- even her Jawi! This year, her class teacher teaches English, and she likes her, so it shouldn't have been such a surprise that she aced both English and Spelling - 100!

Syakira so far is reporting in all A's, but they could've been stronger ones.

Syazmi and Amjad, came back with mainly B's --ack!

Syakira's teacher miscalculated one paper -- her 82 came back as 78, and that was duly changed by the teacher when it was pointed out to her -- and the girl was so happy that instead of a B, it was upped to an A.

Syazmi's teacher also did a miscalculation, although there was no grade change, but it was a mistake and was duly changed when he went back to the teacher.

So now you can see the kids getting out the calculator as soon as they got home and started adding up all the points again, and again, and again -- for all papers, regardless.

We seem to be very result-oriented here, but it's just the flavor of the day.

School holidays

someone clueless would've realised that this week is the school holidays -- the morning traffic is so much less.

my usual hot spots are just so lukewarm, it was like -- heh, dah sampai ofis dah... wow!

not complaining since the mayhem at home will be dealt with by mummy today :)

school holidays...

are just around the corner, but in the meantime, this week, the kids are taking their pkbs1.

syakira came home saying 'i got 90 for penulisan,' and the parents went 'hah? 90 only?' hmmm... if syazmi were to come home and said that, the parents would go '90? wow!' talk about expectations. but syakira did not seem stressed out about it, like she would have before.

syira broke down when she called home. after a glowing first week report, the stress -- the adjustment, the catching up, making new friends etc etc -- has gotten to her. but mummy kept her cool, not going to school and called up the school instead (ibu sees herself freaking out in her shoes!!! cutting off the umbilical cord seems so much harder the nearer the time comes). but just a few more days, and she'll be home.

her pesan to abah, 12:30 be in school ok. and I thought I had it made when I could head off for home at 2 pm.

fractions

I lost my cool with Amjad helping him out with his fraction homework last night.

it didn't help that Syazmi seemed to get the concept when we worked it out, and Amjad would ge 'ya, now baru abang faham' and then proceeded to show how much he didn't understand when he did the questions.

fortunately papa came home early, he said concepts and fraction sheets don't help, just give amjad the 'jalan kerja'. or unfortunate? coz now amjad can do the questions using the jalan kerja papa showed but he's still a bit blur with the fraction concept.

but anyway, papa took over and showed amjad how to derive that 2/5+ 1/5 is 3/5 and not 3/10. or that 2/5 + 3/10 is 7/10 and not 5/15.

we'll try and tackle the concept part slowly -- along???? help???

when the takwim sekolah is useless...

alright, so this is one upset parent.

the kids get the takwim sekolah in the beginning of the year for the activities throughout the year. and so, me trying to be a supportive parent and trying to get more organized this year, dutifully jotted out the activities in my diary so that I can work out my schedule around those activities.

this weekend, they were supposed to have their annual sports' day. I arranged a meeting to start in the afternoon so that I could go in the morning to cheer the boys who will be participating. what did I learn when I went to send them to school for house practise yesterday?

boys: no house practise.
me: huh, why not? isn't your sports day this saturday?
syazmi: oh, they cancelled it, teacher said it will be later.
me: huh? how come there's no letter? (sometimes amjad forgets to give them to me)
boys: no letter.
amjad: but abang tak dengar pun cikgu cakap.
syazmi: ada, cikgu cakap masa practise hari tu.
amjad: ya ke? masa bila?
syazmi: alah, hari tu, bila ntah, angah pun tak ingat.
me: habis tu, tukar bila?
amjad: 21 mac.
syazmi: 31 mac.
boys: eh, ntahlah.

arghh!!! this is why teachers cannot just expect the students to convey the changes to the parents -- tahap 2 or not. these boys go to the same activities, are in the same class, are smart enough to understand stuff, but yet there is still disagreement about whether they actually got the information or not.