Kavya is 8 and Ishaan is 5 years old !

It's hard to believe that Kavya is 8 and Ishaan is 5 years old already !
The days and weeks and years have flown by really fast .. I don't want the kids to grow up so fast !

Many older and experienced parents have told us to enjoy the kids while they are little.. and while it is sometimes hard to do that, it is so true.With each day passing by, they are getting older and smarter; slowly but steadily getting ready to face the world and create their own destiny. In the process, they are also losing their innocence.. I think that is what I will miss the most when they are all grown up. Their innocent questions (although sometimes there's too many of them and that too all at wrong time :) ), innocent thoughts and ideas and innocent mischief (if there is such a thing :) ).

I will miss Kavya asking us if she can live with us forever .. Ishaan wishing that nobody ever dies because he does not want us to die .. the kids fighting like enemies and playing together the very next minute as if nothing ever happened..

I have also enjoyed seeing them learn new things every day. In fact, I have learned lot of things with them. Kavya is already correcting my pronunciations and teaching me about some of the characters and plays (Nutcracker) and books (Ivy and Bean, Magic Tree House, Magic School Bus, Rainbow Magic) and festival traditions (getting Booed on Halloween) which are popular in US, but I never knew before. It is rewarding to learn from a child and not to mention the satisfaction that they get realizing that they know something more than their parents !

Being brought up in an academic focused environment, I cannot help but also worry about their career and future. Like many moms, I am also guilty of pushing them to be the best - especially when I know they can do it. Whether they like it or not at this age, hopefully, when they grow up, they will understand the thoughts and reason for the push.

While it is lot of work to care for and raise kids, it is an experience unlike anything else. Every day has new challenges - some are easy, some are hard. There are definitely days when you want to pull your hair out and think why did we do this to ourselves .. but then their love and the feeling of family makes it all worthwhile.

I may not say it enough, but I love you very dearly, kiddos !

Ishaan is concerned about mommy's schedule.. Can you believe it ?

I volunteer for Computer Lab at Kavya's school every Friday. Ishaan somehow knows this.
Now, tomorrow - Friday, December 6th is Ishaan's Winter program at his school. So, parents are asked to come and see as the kids sing different songs.

This evening Ishaan came up to me and asked "Mumma, is it going to be tricky for you tomorrow?"
I could not understand why he was asking that. So, I asked him "Why do you ask that?". He promptly replied "Because tomorrow my winter program and you have computer lab too". I was  pleasantly surprised that my almost 5 year old was concerned about how I will manage both of these things on the same day. I smilingly replied "No, it should be OK". He immediately asked "Is that because my program is in the morning and the computer lab is in the afternoon?". I smiled and nodded. He had a wide and innocent smile on his face.

I was very happy to see how concerned he was  because it tells me that even at this age, he realizes that parents have these conflicts when both kids have some activity on the same day.

Pressue of homework and tests in US Elementary Education

Kavya is in 2nd grade. For the past 2+ years of her Elementary education (KG, 1st grade, first couple of months of 2nd grade), I have never felt any pressure or stress due to her homework or tests. I have to push her to finish her homework, but that's just because she is interested in doing everything else first. Her homework has always been easy and simple. I always wished that the teacher gave more challenging homework to keep her busy and motivated. To that extent, I was also thinking that may be I could give some extra homework sheets to the teacher that she can give to Kavya as extra homework (without Kavya realizing that it came from me :) )

This changed all of a sudden yesterday. I got an email from Kavya's teacher that they have a Social Studies test on Friday. So, she will be sending some papers and the text book home for the kids to review and she requested parents to go over the material with kids. She also said that the test will be in a different format than what the kids are used to and that she will allow them to refer to their books for this first test. The email got me serious (probably more serious than I should be) So, after dinner, I sat down with Kavya to review the materials. The test was regarding Unit#2 which was about 70-80 pages long. I started reading the pages with Kavya and asking every possible question to test her. We covered about 20 pages when I realized that both of us were tired. So, I told her that we will finish the rest of the pages the next day.

After finishing the social studies review, Kavya said she needs to practice 50-in-a-minute. Since those are getting harder (both due to level of difficulty and due to the time limit), Kavya wants to practice every day to make sure that she clears the level during every Thursday test.

After she finished both sides of 50-in-a-minute practice, I remembered that she had Library on Thursdays and so she would have to return both of her borrowed books. But she had only read one of them and she wanted to read it again. I could see how tired she was. So, I told her to read it later.

After all this, when I went to sign her homework folder, I realized that she hadn't done 10 minutes of Lexia. There was no time for it since it was late and Kavya was very tired. So, I did not mention it.

Then today, I spent almost another hour with her to finish reviewing the book for her Social Studies test - asking her multiple questions along the way. Although I knew Kavya would do well in the test and that the tests here are not as grilling, the Indian mom in me wanted to make sure Kavya knew the entire unit properly :)

After finishing the review, she spent 15-20 minutes doing Lexia on the computer (the homework that wasn't done from yesterday).

She can also take 2 AR (Accelerated Reading) tests during their computer labs on Monday and Friday. That's how they meet their allocated target goal for AR. While Kavya has already reached her target of 8 points, I always ask her to have 2 books that she can take the test on. That way she will read and identify books she want to test on. After all the studies yesterday and today, there was no time to read a book for the AR test. So, without tiring both of us any further, I decided to call it a day.

For the first time, I felt like there was too much going on in school. Reading books for the monthly reading log and AR tests, everyday homework, 50-in-a-minute practice and tests every Thursday, Spelling Word test every Friday, Lexia and Dreambox practice on the computer at home and Accelerated Math (AM) is starting this week and to top it is this Social Studies test for each unit that they finish. Oh.. and not to forget the monthly book project and the monthly poems :)

Studies are starting to get busy. I wonder how will we manage once both kids get in this phase ? Hopefully, Kavya will manage her own things by then :)

Ishaan wants to be a race car driver when he grows up. Guess why ?

Today morning, when I was driving Ishaan to school, we had an interesting conversation.

Ishaan : Mamma, I am going to be a race car driver when I grown up.
Me : Why ?
Ishaan : So then I don't have to go to work everyday!
Me : Why do think that you won't have to go to work everyday ?
Ishaan : Because races don't happen everyday.
Me : But you have to practice everyday. Only then you can be good at it.
Ishaan : But I don't care if I don't win a trophy.
Me (Trying hard not to burst out laughing) : But they will not let you race if you are not good. They will kick you out.
Ishaan : Oh, Is that how it works ?
Me (Smiling away) : Yes, you have to practice everyday.

So interesting how kids think and reason :)

Ishaan's excuse that made me laugh

Most of the times when kids come up with excuse for not doing something, I get mad. But this one made me laugh.

Ishaan was trying to fill-up an entire page with dots using crayons. After he made lot of dots, he started complaining that his hands are getting tired. So, I told him to take a break and just go walk around the house. His prompt response was "But then my legs will be tired". So, I said "OK. don't go walk.. just go and sit on the sofa". His response right away "But then my butt will be tired. They get all sweaty when I sit for a long time".

I couldn't stop laughing :)

Kids do talk when you listen

Recently, Gaurav started listening to this audio book titled "How to talk so kids will listen and Listen so kids will talk". He liked it very much and suggested that I read it too. He put it on kindle for me to take when I went on a business trip couple of weeks back. While I was able to only read first couple of chapters, it did inspire me to be more patient when dealing with kids.

One of the evenings this week, I gave a 50-in-a-minute sheet to Kavya for practice (They have these sheets with 50 addition/subtraction problems for various levels and they try to complete those in 90 seconds). Now, Ishaan loves Math and is also able to do these problems - although not as fast. He was working on a lower level sheet at the same time. He kept talking while he was doing it and that bothered Kavya since she was being timed. She got mad, shouted at Ishaan, threw her pencil and walked out crying. Ordinarily, we would be upset with Kavya for being upset about such a small thing. But for a change, I asked Gaurav to keep Ishaan away and went and talked patiently with Kavya without being mad. I hugged her and let her cry a little. I told her that even with all that disturbance, she was doing fine and would have completed the sheet with plenty of time left. In a little while, she opened up and started talking.

She said that Ishaan was learning things much faster than she did at his age. Like he learned to bike without training wheels at 4.5 years age, while she learned it when she was 5.5 yrs and that he was also so good at Maths. I told her not to compare like that and that Ishaan is learning fast because of her... that he looks up to her and wants to do the same things as her. I told her she was smart and that she is older and can do the Math problems much faster.

That was when I realized 2 things :

• How important it is to give your kids a chance to open up !! Being patient and keeping ears open with welcoming arms is so important - especially in our fast paced lives !!

• We always assumed that Kavya was happy to see Ishaan's progress. Her previous reactions always suggested that. But I am glad she shared her thoughts that made us realize that she was seeing this as a competition. So, we need to be careful in our words and actions - try not to compare the kids and encourage each of them in their own ways. It also made us realize that although she is the older sister, she is still little !

I am going to try and practice listening more !!
Often times its hard.. but the hope is practice will make it easier

How far back do kids remember ?

Ishaan started school at Montessori Way when he was 2.5 years old (July 2011). He went there for little over a year before we shifted him to Challenger last year (Aug 2012). He was pretty set and happy at Montessori way. He loved his teachers and enjoyed his days there.

During the entire last year, we talked about Montessori way and the teachers some times, but we never visited the school. For this summer break, I figured it would be best to send Ishaan to Montessori school since it was familiar environment. When I went there with Ishaan to enroll him last month, he stayed very close to me and he seemed to not recognize his teachers or school building/classroom.

That surprised me quite a bit and made me wonder "How far back do kids remember?". I am sure each kid is different and some events/memories stick with them while others don't. May be at 4.5 years of age, it is hard to remember things from 1 year ago. I guess if we had visited the school in between and kept in touch with the students/teachers during that year, he might have remembered it.

He has been going there for about 3 weeks now, and while everyone is nice, he still doesn't like it as much as he used to like it before. He does not want to let go of me or Gaurav (whoever drops him off) and asks to be picked up early. Although, when I go to pick him up, he seems fine and happy.

Along the same lines, Kavya often says things like "Remember when I was 5, we did xyz...". While her recollection of xyz is accurate, the age is totally off. We might have done that when she was 3 or 4 or even 6. So, it seems that even if they remember things, they don't have the right concept of time/age associated with it.

It is also interesting how photographs help them remember. I have selected photos printed and nicely stored in photo albums and kids often pull out an album to look at their younger selves. And from time to time, they talk about some events from the past that they remember based on the photos they have seen.

When I try to remember my childhood, I only have few memories from 6-8 years range. Most of my memories are from when I was little older. I guess some memories fade away to make room for new ones :)

Very fascinating how human brain works !!

Ishaan learns to bike without training wheels !

Ishaan had out grown his 10 inch bike. So, we thought its a good time to teach him to bike without training wheels on that bike since his feet fully touched the ground.

Our good friend Shailee loaned us the bike handle that makes it easy to run after the kids as you teach them to bike without training wheels. Ishaan liked the idea. We started using it in May .. used it for a week, but didn't see much improvement. Then we had a couple of weeks of break and then started again in the first week of June. The first day it was the same as before.. but then the second day, Ishaan was able to paddle a couple of times without any help.We all were very excited. Gaurav, Kavya and I encouraged Ishaan and he wanted to bike more and more. He continued to improve over the next couple of days.

June 6th was the last day of school. So, he practiced some more on June 7th and at this point, he was able to ride quite a bit (couple of rounds on the road in front of our house) on his own.

That called for a celebration ! We went to Yogurtland to celebrate the milestone :)

Since then, he has continued to practice and has become more and more confident - even going up and down the ramps.

So proud of my 4.5 year old !! Looking forward to go on longer family bike rides !!

Kavya wants her own room

Recently, we got new curtains and paint in most of the rooms. We put blue and grey in the guest room upstairs and told the kids that it will be Ishaan's room when they got little older. We put purple on 3 walls and green on the other wall (where Ishaan's bed is) in the kids room that they shared. We also put some flower decals on Kavya's wall and some cars and trucks decals on Ishaan's wall. The room looks very beautiful.

After we put the cars and trucks decals, Kavya immediately asked, "Can we move those decals to Ishaan's room when he moves to his room?". We smiled and nodded.

Then yesterday, Kavya came upto me and asked "Mommy, when will Ishaan move to his room ? I want my own room." I couldn't believe that my little girl has grown up so much. I guess the day when she would have her own room is not very far.

Ishaan is getting smarter in dealing with Kavya

Kavya has figured out ways to manipulate Ishaan and get her way. She would say, "If you give me X, I will draw car for you".. OR "If you do Y, I will make a goodie for you at CDC" and Ishaan would listen to her.

Today morning, I took out 2 sand timers (both pink) and gave them one each and told them that they need to use it to monitor how long to brush. Kavya looked at hers and asked Ishaan if she could have his. She explained that she wanted Ishaan's because it had a "Made in China" sticker at the bottom. Ishaan looked at Kavya's timer and said "No, I don't want yours. It's broken." Kavya gave a cunning smile.

I realized that Kavya knew that hers was slightly broken and that was why she wanted to exchange. But she couldn't fool Ishaan this time.

Ishaan is getting smarter and getting ready to be a good match to his older sister :)