Homeschooling on a budget: Minimum Input, Maximum Benefit

Posted by Multilingual Mama

So I am about five months into homeschooling my two little girls: P, now 5.5 and C nearly 3.5. It’s actually been much less since I embrace the international school holidays, of which there are many. In addition, I had a rather stressed and horrid start for a number of reasons I won’t go into now.

Most of the time, I feel I haven’t really started yet. Especially when I am trying to finalise my ‘goals’ for each girl -and here’s a chance to give a shout-out to a most impressive Mama and homeschooler Jody from Mud Hut Mama for providing so much help.

Friends will say I am being too hard on myself. I am sure they are right to an extent. And then maybe not. There are not many days I’ve actually planned stuff ahead. It seems that whenever I do, we go off track. Overall, I’ve just been enjoying time with the girls and often letting them play. But every so often, a little gem presents itself to me. I got lucky today.

If you walk into any toy store or mega market, you will find a number of shape sorting toys. You can opt for cheap and cheerful plastic ones or the posher, tree hugging (that’s usually me) wooden versions. In the end, I’ve noticed it’s almost always the parents guiding the kids. And if feels like a rather futile exercise.

So today, once again I am focusing on life skills (aka fobbing off my homeschooling duties) and by that I mean: help me put away the dishes, brush your hair, your teeth get dressed by yourself, etc., in the hopes we would make it out the door in time for this amazing Friday art class a fellow homeschooler organised at Attic Studios. Unfortunately the Bangkok protests made it impossible for us to get to the class leaving me with nothing planned as usual.

As I walked back in the house, closing the door covered in Halloween stickers and dropped my bag by the fully decorated Christmas tree, I looked upon the red Chinese Lantern waiting to be hung and realised I could no longer postpone taking down end of 2013 holiday decorations any longer.

While the kids sorted the decorations, It dawned on me that I had a sorting/classification activity before my eyes. There were several groups: salt-dough decorations –from a burst of Pinterest parenting from Christmas 2012, which looked more like the ‘I nailed it’ meme than actual decorations– fragile Mexican figurines, wooden decorations and then the subdividing of my favorites: the traditional swedish straw decorations.

I felt rather chuffed about this and, as I went to take a picture for this post, I noticed that the girls’ morning chore of putting away their clean dishes and my cutlery could also qualify.

So here you go: a cheap and, in my opinion more important, useful way to teach your kids classifications. Because really, I always try to stick the pentagon in the hexagon slot so why would I expect my 3 year old to get it right.

p.s. Notice how I lump shape sorting/grouping/classification all into one group. I figure they are close cousins and must be developing similar cognitive skills, whatever those may be. #whinging it.

p.p.s. I can’t believe I just hash-tagged within a post. It’s official, I have no shame.

Bangkok Living: 20 Ways You Know You’re Embracing Your Inner Thai

Posted by Multilingual Mama

I’d like to thank the many readers and friends who helped me win the Thailand category and made me one of the top commented on blogs during this year’s expat blog’s competition.

Here’s the winning post, in case you missed it first time around!

If you had told me two years ago that I’d eat in the gutter off plates washed in a plastic basin, filled by a garden pipe, and prefer it to most restaurant meals, I’d have called you as mad as the hatter from Alice in Wonderland. Yet Thailand is just that, a country as wonderful and beguiling as it is perplexing. No sooner do you think you’ve cracked the code that another contradiction presents itself to figure out.

So here I am, squatting on a plastic stool, finally ordering things other than Pad Thai and Thai Green Curry and loving every second of it. This is my attempt to create a list of my experiences that encapsulates the tell-tale signs that I’ve finally acclimatized to my new home.

Drumroll please!

20. You no longer bat an eyelash when seeing a man riding on a pink bicycle or a python slithering across your garden.

19. Friends are chosen less by chemistry and more by the number of miles of traffic between your homes.

18. When you talk about a white Christmas, you are referring to a white sandy beach.

17. You stop wondering if you’ve found yourself on the set of Charmed when everyone suddenly freezes in a public place to that lovely tune in the background (aka the national anthem.)

16. TukTuks are for tourists unless you are trying to transport a dining table or 15 friends to a party.

15. You can finally use a squat toilet without peeing on your ankles.

14. You automatically switch between mouth and nose breathing as you walk by sewers and street food, respectively.

13. Sidewalks are for street vendors and open-air eating, not pedestrians.

12. You think it’s weird when you don’t find sugar as a condiment.

11. You don’t think twice of riding amazon (for us ladies) on a motorbike taxi while texting on your phone.

10. You loose your wallet more often than you loose face.

9. You cringe when new arrivals do the Wai (hands together in a prayer-like position) in stores and restaurants.

8.You’ve accepted that YES, means ‘yes’, ‘no’, & ‘ I don’t understand a word you’ve just said’

7. You aren’t surprised that your waitress, with full foundation and red nails, is sporting a three-day beard stubble.

6. You eat all baked goods, including chocolate chip cookies, muffins, and –as a New Yorker this last one pains me– bagels with a fork and knife.

5. Seventy-Five degrees Fahrenheit (24C∘) feels like jeans and sweater weather.

4. You finally stop trying to shop for booze between two and five in the afternoon.

3. You eat by pushing food onto a spoon with the back of your fork and your knives haven’t seen the light of day in months.

2. You can’t bear to flush toilet paper and keep reaching for the ‘spray’ when back home.

1. You no longer wonder if that’s his niece.

Sawatdee khaa Y’all!

P.S. Feel free to share any examples you think should have made the top twenty!

To read other amazing entries including my favorite: N is for Nomads, an A-Z on why Mongolian living is awesome. Click here!

Expat Blog Entry: Ten Words for Me Please?

Posted by Multilingual Mama

Expat Blog Entry: Ten Words for Me Please?

I’ve entered this competition. I normally avoid them. They just make me stressed as I teeter between just letting things be and wanting to do everything possible to win. That said, the prizes here are amazon vouchers. Why is that so special? Well in Thailand, imported English books are P-R-I-C-E-Y! And as a homeschooling mama, I am always in need of them. So since I regularly poor out my heart and words for you, I am asking you for just ten words in the comment box of my entry.

Also I’ve tried to keep it as short as possible and I hope it will make you laugh at least a little!

Thanks everyone!

Bangkok’s Emporium: Pooping on the Spirit of Christmas and Charity

Posted by Multilingual Mama

I seldom blog in anger. Well ok that’s not entirely true but if I do, it’s published on BluntMoms and is reviewed by the most awesome editor ever.

Tonight however I am so disgusted that I am putting all sensible thinking aside and posting a rant at 11pm at night, when I am exhausted and behind on many other writing commitments including my Monday Musings post. And yes we are nearly Thursday.

There will be typos of all sorts but tonight I don’t care.

A wonderful small children’s theater group called Curtain Up Drama decided to organize a Christmas Caroling event to raise funds for the victims of Typhoon Haiyan which struck the Philippines last month. It was the biggest storm ever recorded and has left innumerable people devastated.

They reached out to Emporium to get the OK to sing out front and the Shopping Mall, much to their surprise, said they could perform indoors. There were some caveats: the song list needed to be approved and the mall asked that we wear long trousers and skirts and no sandals. (Even though if you wear these to go in and shop at Louis Vuitton, they are quite happy about it).

It was all good: Song list approved, flyers made, email sent out with dress code.

A dedicated group of us showed up with children, many of which were sporting christmas hats, white dresses with wings, etc. We had some excellent choir singers among us. The rest of us (like me) put in a lot of heart and an acceptable number of false notes.

About halfway through the event, they came down and asked us to leave. The ‘official reason’ was that we weren’t in choir uniform as promised. This is absurd given that at no point was this agreed as is obvious by the fact they were telling us what not to wear.

In truth, Emporium decided that we didn’t look ‘posh’ enough for their tastes and in the true spirit of christmas, decided to hell with the victims of Haiyan, let’s make sure we don’t offend a potential Chanel client.

Well here’s what Coco Chanel had to say about people like you:

Emporium: You are the Christmas Grinch. You are everything that is wrong with the world. You care only about image, not about heart. I will never shop at your store again. (I may just use the loo if I am passing by. After all, I have kids under the ages of 6 so that’s all you’ll get from us). I can only hope others join me in a boycott of your store. (Ok, I realize I am thinking about them since I am writing this post but I’ll be terminating this affair once I’ve adequately shared this message)

Dear readers, I don’t often beg that you share and tweet my posts but today I am setting standards aside and pleading with you to help me get this message out.