by rossanahead | Sep 13, 2011 | children, Education, family, Karen Galarpe, parenting
By Karen Galarpe
Back when my son was in preschool and the early grades, I would try to rush home early, and beg off from after-work activities to make way for “Homework Time.”
That was the time I reserved on weekdays to help my son with his homework, and if there wasn’t any, to make him answer reviewers I would make myself.
As the years went on, I trusted him to study on his own. But there were times when he and I agreed a tutor would help, such as during one summer he spent going twice a week at a tutorial center for high school math stuff.
He also attended a summer tutorial course this year to prepare for college entrance exams.
My friends who are also parents likewise believe in tutoring their children. Most of them take the time to help their kids with homework, and some of them have hired tutors when they couldn’t be there or don’t feel they’re up to the task.
Back when I was a student, tutoring was not the norm. Even parents did not take the time to teach and tutor their children.
Over the years, with more studies done on education, though, and parenting, too, experts have realized that children stand to benefit from tutoring.
One, it can help children keep up with their lessons and understand the subject better, according to the article “How to Know When It’s Time to Get Your Kid a Tutor” on parentingworld.net.
Two, tutoring can help a child who’s already excelling in the same subject. According to the aforementioned article, a child who already knows the subject matter being tackled in class will become bored and uninterested during class discussions. A tutor can teach him beyond what the class can offer and challenge him to keep on learning.
Tutoring provides that one-on-one mentor-mentee relationship, or at the least, a learning environment with a very small group. A student is free to ask questions and go at the pace he wants and needs.
When my son had that math tutorial a few years ago, he told me that his tutor was still a college student studying chemistry at the University of the Philippines. And though the tutor was not a math major, he knew his algebra and trigonometry and made it so much simpler than my son’s teacher in class did.
Sometimes we need a little help, and a tutor just might be the answer.
by rossanahead | Aug 18, 2011 | children, Education, family, Lyra Pore, parenting, woman
By Lyra Pore
“Mom, are you going to have another baby?”
“No.”
“How do you know?”
“We can’t afford another baby.”
“Mom, you don’t have to buy it! You just pop the baby out of your tummy!”
To my seven-year-old daughter, having a baby is but a simple matter. Several years ago when there were only two children in the family, she pointed to the empty seats around the dining table. “Maybe we should have another baby,” she said, “so someone can sit on that chair.”
Indeed we’ve had one more baby since she uttered those words. Not really to fill empty chairs in our dining room, but because we always found joy in having children around the house.
We broke the news to the girls in the park. “We’re having a baby,” their dad told them as we all sat around a picnic table next to the playground.
“Are they going to cut up your tummy in the hospital?” They asked. “Or are you going to pee and the baby comes out?”
“I’m going to pee,” I said. I’ve had two natural deliveries and was expecting the third to be the same.
“Is she going to have blond hair and blue eyes? Some of our classmates have blond hair.”
“We can’t have a blond-haired baby.”
“How come?”
“Well, Daddy and I are Filipinos and Filipinos have black hair.”
When the baby finally arrived, the girls came to visit us at the hospital. They looked at her lovingly as she slept in her bassinet.
“Can she speak English?”
“Not yet. Newborn babies just cry. They have some growing up to do before they can talk.”
“Can she eat sinigang?”
“Not yet. But someday she will.”
by rossanahead | Aug 11, 2011 | children, Education, family, Lyra Pore, parenting, woman
By Lyra Pore
Hogwarts. Quidditch. Wands and spells. The first time the Harry Potter series hit bookstores back in the late ‘90s, I couldn’t stand the books.
“I’m too old for this.” I dismissed Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone after just a few pages of reading the book. If the series had been published when I was in high school, I would have loved it. But I was by then a new mom to a baby girl ― my world was filled with diapers and formula, not owls, wizards and some fictional beings misguided by a Nazi-like obsession with the purity of species.
Last Christmas, however, my baby girl who had since turned ten received the children’s edition of the complete Harry Potter set for Christmas. Keen to find some bonding moments with her, I picked up the Philosopher’s Stone and tried reading it again.
I couldn’t have chosen a more auspicious time to take up Harry Potter. My daughter, just like Harry in the first book, was turning 11 in a few days. And like Percy Weasley, Ron’s older brother, she’d just been elected school prefect.
Over the next two months, the two of us would explore the Harry Potter world together. It would soon become a family affair too, as my husband and our other children would join us in watching the film adaptation each time we finished a book. Not only did we form a mother-daughter book club, we’d also organized family Friday Night Movies. We’d all sit on the couch on Fridays, watch the Harry Potter DVD and talk about how the movie differed from the book.
“It wasn’t Neville Longbottom who gave Harry the gillyweed in Goblet of Fire. It was Dobby!”
“How come the other elf Winky wasn’t in any of the movies?”
At times, our Harry Potter journey turned into a writing lesson. My daughter, who was starting to develop an interest in fiction writing, would comment on J.K. Rowling’s style and how it differed from that of Rick Riordan, author of the Percy Jackson series. I worked in publishing; I took delight in talking about books especially with my children.
The excitement over the release of Deathly Hallows 2 took over our household. My husband would buy our girls Harry Potter souvenirs that were being sold with every purchase of a local newspaper. The family also organized a weekend trip to an IMAX theatre to watch the movie in 3D. Making a day of it, we set out at 9 a.m., picked up some friends who were also going to the movies with us, went to lunch at a restaurant just a short walk from the cinema, and spent the rest of the afternoon not just enjoying the last movie of the series but savouring gelato that IMAX moviegoers could get free for each scoop they bought.
“Lord Voldemort’s wand will be out with the Sunday newspaper,” I told them after dinner on Friday. “I thought it was Dumbledore’s,” my husband replied. “Oh, you’re right. It’s Dumbledore’s. The newspaper says it is.”
Upstairs our two year-old daughter was fast asleep. She’d been playing the whole week with Harry’s wand, yelling “crucio!” and “stupefy!” at her older sisters.
by rossanahead | Aug 2, 2011 | children, Education, family, Lyra Pore, parenting
By Lyra Pore-Villafaña
My family has had a number of conversations lately about the best high school for our oldest daughter who’s now in Grade Six.
“I want to go to OLMC,” she declared last year. OLMC is an exclusive girls’ school run by the Sisters of Mercy in Australia. It prides itself in educating Catholic girls in the Mercy tradition for over a hundred years.
My daughter has been particularly impressed by the breadth of extra-curricular opportunities that OLMC provides. There’s a string ensemble, a cake decorating club, a debating team. Name any activity that will catch the fancy of teenage girls, and they probably have it. They even have a strong swimming team that my child, who loves racing, is looking forward to joining.
We’ve already made up our minds about OLMC that we’ve enrolled her there one-and-a-half years before she’s due to go to high school.
Then a few weeks ago, my daughter received an offer from one of the government-run academic selective schools. These are like the Australian equivalent of the Philippine Science High School system. Each year, thousands of Grade Six students apply for admission to selective schools, but only a few get offers because places are limited.
While we are all extremely happy about her passing the test, the good news suddenly throws our plans into disarray. My daughter will have the opportunity to study in one of the best high schools in Australia at a very minimal cost to us. All we have to pay for are the school uniforms and supplies and a small contribution to educational resources. The decision to forego private schooling seems to be a no-brainer ― but it actually isn’t.
Yes, the quality of education in an academic selective school will be superior. Yes, it will save us a fortune. Foremost on our minds though is this: Will she be happy in a highly competitive environment that these schools are known for? Will she thrive in a school where she’s constantly striving for good grades, leaving her with very little time to pursue other interests?
My husband and I have been in the workforce long enough to know that building a successful career isn’t all about having the brains to do the job. Don’t get me wrong. Having walked the grounds of the University of the Philippines in Diliman myself many years ago, I am all for academic excellence.
My experience in the “real world”, however, has also led me to appreciate that doing well in life doesn’t depend on intelligence alone. Equally important is one’s ability to build relationships, to bounce back from failure and rejection, to keep one’s focus even when the going gets tough.
What type of school will help a person build that character? It depends. Some children excel in a highly competitive environment. Others blossom when allowed the time to pursue arts, music, sports, and other co-curricular activities.
We decide to give our daughter room to weigh her options. Though she’s only 11 years old, we feel that she should have a say in the matter. It’s her future after all.
“I’ll go selective,” she announces just a few days after mulling things over. “And why is that?” I ask, amazed at how quickly she has come to a decision.
“Well,” she begins. “I checked out the school uniform, and I think I will look good in it.”
“And I have some friends who are going there too.”
So there. I seem to be making things more complicated than they really are. To an 11-year old girl, it’s all about the outfit and the friends.
by rossanahead | Jul 30, 2011 | children, family, parenting, woman
By Tina Arceo-Dumlao
The realization that I was truly and absolutely responsible for someone else’s life came without warning one quiet morning in 1996, a few days after my son, Miggy, was born.
My mother had left that day for work and left me home alone with my two brothers with the firm instruction that we should give Miggy – who was a little over a week old at that time – a nice, relaxing bath as soon as he woke up from his early morning nap.
She neglected, however, to tell us exactly how to do just that.
Because I delivered via caesarian section, it was my mother who had been giving Miggy a bath since we came home from the hospital, and I did not see for myself how she transformed the little life form into a sweet smelling baby since I was mostly in bed recovering from my operation. My husband, Jerome, who was an executive at that time in an office in Makati City, was not around to help because he had left early for work.
And so there we were, three siblings without any idea how to give a fragile, crying baby a refreshing bath.
We argued over options: Should we just put him in the tub? But he might drown! Do we just put him on the bath mat? But we might miss some spots! Should we use a sponge or a small towel? But it might hurt him. How much pressure do we apply? Will he get scratched?
There were too many questions and just us three loudly arguing over what is the right thing to do.
In the end, I took over and made the final decision. I was the mother after all and the call was mine and mine alone to make. Talk about responsibility on a young and first time mother’s shoulders.
And so I told my Kuya to carefully hold him over the bathtub while my younger brother and I took turns soaping then rinsing him.
Of course, it was the wrong and inefficient way to do it, but he did end up smelling like only newborns can – a faint mix of milk, baby powder, and baby soap. I came out feeling oh so proud of myself because I, who was 24 years old when my son was born on Feb. 2, 1996, had made my first major decision for the good of my son. I had become a mommy!
Armando Miguel Arceo Dumlao is 15 years old now and in his final year in high school at La Salle Green Hills, and it has been one decision after another since that time I gave him a bath for the first time.
Some do not require much brain activity: Mom, can I go to the party? No. Mom, can I stay overnight at a friend’s house? No. Mom, can I get a new pair of shoes? No. Others you have to agonize over: Mom, can I ask somebody to be my date to the prom? Ummm….Yes (Sigh). Mom, can I start driving soon? I’ll think about it.
But through everything, I was guided by the same overriding, singular thought that crowded my head that time that I was splashing water on my baby’s tiny, wriggling body: What is the best for my son?
My decisions are not right all the time, but I rest easy knowing that right or wrong, I tried to do what is best for him – always for him, not about myself. And that sacrifice, that heroic act of putting my son’s interest before my own (even if it kills me) is, for me, what motherhood is all about.
Tina Arceo Dumlao is a multi-awarded journalist and desk editor of the Philippine Daily Inquirer. She has a Journalism degree from the University of the Philippines.
