Chronicles of E²: Back to school

It's been about a month since I've gone back to work. Things have been pretty hectic around here. The kids have started Chinese school once a week. So far, I think they're enjoying it. It's a kindergarten level class, so it's mostly learning-made-fun, trying to get the kids to let go of their fear of school. They wait till next year to hit them with the harder stuff. When they get older, the lessons get more advanced. There are composition classes, poetry recitation competitions, I think even Chinese calligraphy classes. Wow! I don't expect them to be that good in Chinese, unless they want to. I just want them to be able to talk to Ah-gong and Ah-ma. And for Emma to not lose the language.

Evan is in the kindergarten class now. We went to the parent orientation. It seems so intimidating. There's homework, reading journal, even spelling tests! Yikes! When I was in kindergarten, all we did was play and draw, I think. I didn't even know what homework was! He's doing all right, but he just can't sit still, especially at circle time. Sometimes he can't seem to control his body. I was trying to talk to him one time. He was moving like he was possessed or something! His speech therapist (her office also does occupational therapy) brought in this weighted vest to help him be more grounded and settle down. They make something similar for hyperactive dogs too. It seemed to work with him. We got him evaluated and see if he needs any other sort of help. We'll find out the results in a few days. Quite a while back, they showed me this joint-compression technique to calm kids down. It works well. Both Evan and Emma ask for it each night at bedtime. But honestly, Evan isn't the only kid who can't sit still at circle time, although he's probably the top 25% wiggliest of the wiggle-worms. But we want to do whatever we can to help him overcome this so it doesn't impede his learning. He's starting to be interested in reading. And he loves books! I love that about him!

Emma, oh, Miss Emma, was showing a lot of testing behavior at school. She has done it at home also, but she had a few bad days in a row, not listening to the teachers, getting sent to the "peace table" (a more PC name for time-out table), even smiling at the teacher while doing what she's being told not to do! She thinks it's cute or funny to do something she's not supposed to. We had been using the good-girl sticker chart and she was making good progress until lately. We've taken away TV, Qiaohu (her favorite Chinese kid videos on YouTube), doing extra homework, tried reasoning with her. I'm running out of privileges to take away. I'm tempted to revive the corporal punishment technique that my parents enforced when I was growing up—kneel on the floor holding a stool over your head. So far, that hasn't been necessary, but I'm keeping it in my back pocket. All options are open. I remember the foster mom kept telling me over and over again what a perfect wonderful little girl she was. You just had to reason with her, persuade her, convince her to do what you want and she'd do it. What the heck happened? I think Emma is a smart kid. A bit too smart for her own good. And she likes to push buttons and can be a bit manipulative (although probably not consciously) at times. I would like and try to give her the benefit of the doubt, but she's finding out her limits. For now, hubby is the "bad cop" with her, although I don't think I'm quite the "good cop" either.

I'm finding out the differences between boy and girl. Evan is so much more straightforward, whereas Emma is quite a bit more complicated. The graphic below is so true.

Here's a funny little exchange we had...

Emma: You have grey hair! (yea, news flash)

Me: You gave it to me.

Emma: Did not!

Me: Then who gave it to me?

Emma (after some thought): Ah-gong!

Me: No, you gave it to me. That's why you don't have any grey hair left. Ah-gong still has his grey hair.

Emma could not figure out the logic in that.

Emma is picking up English pretty quickly. She can pretty much figure out what's being said to her. She can manage to get her point across one way or another. She's still nosey and bossy. She and Evan will play together. Their favorite game of pretend family where they pretend to be mom and baby, or worse yet, 2 babies drives us nuts! Hubby has implemented the rule of no pretending to be babies. One of the first things she has picked up is "I want," most likely from Evan since he said it a lot. Hubby has also implemented a rule where a demand/request that begins with "I want," the answer is automatically "no." They have to ask for things nicely.

We're continuing to try to foster independence. The school sent home a list of chores kids can/should do at various ages. Haha.. these knuckleheads will have chores coming. Maybe it'll make my life a little easier?? Maybe it'll just make it harder because I will have to keep reminding/nagging them. Ugh!

Grandma, Grandpa, Uncle Robert, and Ms. Jackie went up to Lake Arrowhead for a week. We went up also just for one night and completely destroyed their peace and quiet.