On Spelling Names

I used to teach, and tutor, but teaching my kid to learn how to write and read is a bit perplexing. At times I worry that I am not doing enough. But the laid back mommy part of me always tells me, relax, things will work out fine.

Since pre-school started, I was able to be with her classmates' parents and though I have not become an active mom in discussions, I was able to learn from the meetings that some of the kids in their class already attended nursery and was able to read and write the alphabet, and words already.

As a mom, I must admit that this gave birth to some feelings of anxiety and frustration - were we (my husband and I), wrong in not pushing our baby to attend nursery after her playschool days? Are we in fact, shortchanging her because we believe that play would be beneficial to her?

Good thing though that I was never one to wallow in self pity and doubt forever - I did what I could to create a makeshift board at home. I remembered that aunt mommy gave the kids some non toxic chalk and I felt it was time to make good use of them.

I converted our plastic, IKEA multipurpose drawers into makeshift black board  and proceeded to fill it up with the alphabet and basic 1 - 10 numbers. My goal is to help familiarize my kid with the letters, so that she will not find it hard to work with letters in class.

Three weeks later - I feel so happy because our efforts were not in vain. Now she can  identify the letters as well as sing them, and she's getting better at writing all the time.

I am looking forward to teaching her to discover words, and sentences and paragraphs! Words and books have always been my special escape  - and I know it can be hers too.

How to Teach Babies to Write the Alphabet

I had experienced being a tutor in my previous years. For a time, I even dabbled as a part - time college lecturer. But when I became a mom and started teaching my kids, I learned how different (and difficult!) it is to teach toddlers and babies.

Since my husband and I are advocates of giving the children time to come into their own, and to spend time playing before becoming students, it was only this year that our firstborn was introduced into the classroom  as a pre-schooler. As a student, I am confident that our baby will hold her own when it comes to comprehension and analysis, because these are common sensical skills that we have been imbibing them with since they were still babies. However, there are skills like writing and reading that I depend on the school to help us with.

Just as I expected, teaching my darling how to write her ABC's is different from teaching her how to sing them. For days, I was thinking of ways to make her interested in going beyond the one page practise writing and writing more so that she can also associate the letters with words.

The other night, I came upon the idea of setting up a blackboard where I can write the letters of the alphabet and then she can copy them; to make it more interesting, I used non-toxic pink chalk to write on the board. And to my delight, I was not yet finished writing down the alphabet and she was already for the chance to hold the chalk and write.

Of course, I had to make a few adjustments here and there - she wanted the letters laid out as they are in the song, so I had to make sure that I wrote them as how they are sung. I noticed that this way, she can easily copy them and make them her own :)

Last night, she also asked me to write down two things - she wanted to see how they looked when written as words. These two words are: baby and milk - her two favorite things.

I am excited to see where this journey of writing will take us. For now, her kid brother thinks that the letter A looks like a cabinet when written down on the board. It's ok - I am sure that in a few days time, he will also be writing down letters just like his ate. For now, it's ok that he draws things he loves on the board.

Thank God for non-toxic and colorful chalks :)