Ice cream "man"

I have always wanted to find a group of moms to teach the young kids Chinese together. We started it several months ago, my goal was to expose her to some Chinese while playing and singing and laughing. 

My friend was more strict and she wanted the kids to learn the Chinese characters. She started with the word "人" (human in Chinese), and the kids tried to remember the character by putting stickers on it. I didn't know she remembers it until one day during bedtime story, she pointed at the character and told me it was "人".

Since then she was able to recognize it. One day, while eating ice cream, she pointed at the candies and told everyone that it has a human on it. I looked at it and understood that she referred to "人". It just made my day. It makes me feel that it worth sacrificing the Saturday sleeps in and sending her to classes, and she is progressing. Slowly, but still, progressing.

Chicken and Duck Talk

Aelig starts using sentences mixing Mandarin and French. Sometimes, after coming back from school, she would speak pure French to me. Most of the time I ask her to speak only Mandarin, but sometimes I just let it go.

One day, she was using mixed languages again. I stopped her and explained that if she would say the same thing to my mother, my mother would not have understood. "Your grandma doesn't understand French, she wouldn't have known what you are trying to say. This is just like a chicken trying to speak its chicken language to a duck who doesn't understand a word of chicken. We called it chicken and duck talk in Mandarin. " I told her.

She paused, looking at me, proudly said this with a smile:

"Oh I know, you are chicken, dad is duck, that's why I know how to speak Chicken and Duck languages. " Her response made me laugh, she was not wrong in her logic. Unfortunately, chicken and duck both have pejorative meanings in Mandarin. Chicken could refer to a prostitute and duck could mean male prostitute. I didn't correct her as I didn't know how to explain this to her. 

Anyway, during lunch time, hubby spoke in Mandarin about something. Aelig didn't get it because she didn't expect her dad to speak Mandarin. I told her that the fact she speaks Mandarin at home, it helps her father learn as well, and now he could speak simple mandarin to his mother in laws. But then she should keep doing it so that her dad would make progress. 

Her response : "Why doesn't dad speak English to grandma? 

"Because not everyone speaking English in Malaysia, including your grandma. " I promptly said. "Then dad would speak in English, and someone else would translate for him." She came out with a solution. 

"Well, it is better if we all can speak Mandarin to grandma. And you know, grandma had never had chance to go to school, do you know why?"

"Yes, you told me that, she needed to take care of her siblings."

"Yes. How about you quit going to school, and take care of your sister at home instead?"

"No! I love going to school!!!"

Wishing everyone happy and prosperous year of Rooster!

The apprentices

I kind of like Trump when he was the big boss in the show "Apprentice".
"You are fired", such a powerful word.
Now he is the President of the USA, who would he fire?

This post has nothing to do with Trump.
I just want to jot down some apprenticeship of the girls, as their process growing up.

Buying bread
I started sending the eldest to the bakery for bread.
On the way home from school, I would park in front of the bakery, give her some money, and let her go inside the bakery to handle the process. She was proud to be able to do it. The more she goes, the more she gains confident. Sometimes I asked her how much the woman gave her back and why. She didn't quite get the concept, but I'm sure she will get there.
Today, she insisted to go with her young sister. And the two year old asked for a chocolate bread.
Me : "Aelig, can you please go buy a baguette as usual?
Aelig : "Can Awena come with me this time"?
Me : "No, I will have to unfasten her seat bell then fasten it again, too much work."
Aelig : "Please, please." Then she asked Awena if she wanted to come buy bread with her, and the later nodded.
Awena :"Pain au chocolat."
Me :"Ok, buy three, one for your dad".
Aelig:"Ok Awena, we will save the chocolate bread for tonight so we can eat with dad ok?"
Awena :"Why?"
Aelig:"Else dad would be sad to eat the bread alone".
Awena :"Ok".
During the 4pm snack, Aelig couldn't resist the temptation, they ate their chocolate bread.
Daddy had his dessert alone in the evening.

In the school

As she goes to standard two, she has to jot down homework on an agenda. Sometimes I don't understand what was written, so we were mad at each other because I didn't know what she needed to do and she was not happy that I didn't understand what she wrote. She did ok on her tests so we didn't put too much pressure on her.

She likes to go to school but sometimes I feel that she didn't take things seriously. It happened that she forgot to bring home her agenda, so we didn't know what homework she had to do. I had to send a sms to a parent to know the homework for the next day, that was quite embarrassing. The best thing was, we got a reply from the parent so we knew what needed to be done, but she forgot her exercise book in her classroom so nothing could be done anyway.  

I noticed that she made mistake on spelling, especially the S at the end of a word (because S are normally silent in French when it is placed at the end of a word). For example, she would write gro gro bisous (big kisses) instead of gros gros bisous. She would write j'ai fai instead of j'ai fait. 

As for the little apprentice Awena, she starts counting in Mandarin and in French. She would say one two three five six seven....until 20 in Mandarin and missing the number 4. In French, she would say one two three five eight nine, skipping number 4, 6, 7 and 10. She speaks mostly French to me, unlike her sister, but she understands my reply in Mandarin. We tried to encourage her to speak Mandarin, I would pretend sometimes that I don't understand her when she speaks in French. Hubby tried to sweet talk to Aelig so that she would speak Mandarin to her sister, but she refused. She said that it's easier to speak French than Mandarin. True, she gets frustrated sometimes with me because she couldn't express herself well in Mandarin and tends to switch to French easily. We would see how it goes.

Her bla bla bla

Awena can pronounce some words and she loves to repeat after me. It has become a game between us.

Here would be how it goes (we speak in Mandarin):

Me : Mao (cat)
Awena : Mao
Me : Ma (horse)
Awena : Ma (this is her favorite word, whenever she sees a horse in a park or on a book, she will scream this word until I repeat after her)
Me : Zhu (pig)
Awena : Zhu
Me : Ji (chicken)
Awena : Ji (there is a book with chicken shape she would yell "Ji" each time she sees it)
Me : Niu (cow)
Awena : Liu (she couldn't really pronounce it)
Me : Gou (dog)
Awena : Gou
And it continues with other animals : Yang (goat), Yu (fish), E (goose), Ya (duck), Wa (frog)...
She understands but couldn't pronounce these : Xiao Tu Zi (rabbit)...

And then I noticed this:
Me : Papa
Awena : Papa
Me : Mama
Awena : Mama
Me : Jie Jie (big sister)
Awena : Aeyi (she wanted to say Aelig)
I paused as hearing her saying Aeyi.
I repeated : Jie Jie
Awena : Aeyi
Ok now I got it, for her Big sister means Aelig, which is her big sister.
I continued : Mei Mei (younger sister)
Awena : Mei Mei
Me : Ge Ge (big brother)
Awena : Ge Ge
Me : Di Di (younger brother)
Awena : Di Di
Me : Ah Gu (uncle in Hokkien)
Awena : Ah Gu
Me : Ah Kim (uncle's wife in Hokkien)
Awena : Ah Kim
She still couldn't pronounce Wai Poh, Da Yi, Er Yi, San Yi, my other family members' name.


And then this:
Me : Xiao Xiong (her stuff animal)
Awena : Dodo (French way to call stuff animal)

So each time I say Jie Jie (big sister), she would call the name of her big sister, and when I say Xiao Xiong (her stuff animal), she would say dodo.

She can also point to her body parts when I ask her where they are, but she couldn't prononce them : Tou (head), Tou Fa (hair), Yan Jing (eyes), Er Duo (ears), Bi Zi (nose), Zui Ba (mouse), She Tou (tongue), Tu Ji (belly button), Shou (hand), Jiao (feet). She could say Bao to represent Mian Bao (bread) and Fan (rice). She says Bei (cup) when she wants to drink. Mei You (finished) when finished something.

As for songs, she likes to listen to Da Xiang (Elephane), Xiao Zhu (Little Pig), Xiao Xing Xing (Chinese version of Twinke Twinke Little Star).

In French, she could say : Pain (bread), Au revoir (goodbye), paule (épaule) (shoulder - when she wants to sit on her dad's shoulders), ballon (ball), bateau (boat), feuille (leave), main (hand - when she wants us to hold her hand). And, Noooooooooo (with her mouth stops at O shape), this is the word that she learns fast and uses often.

Stock up books from China

I have heard about purchasing services (代购) from China, but have never really used them. I love reading but I couldn't find cheap options buying Chinese books from France. The purchasing services I found online usually required some fees, and that topping with the hefty shipping costs have stopped me completely.

But a reading worm needs its foods. I bought some from Taiwan for my birthday. And finally, the urge to share my childhood readings with Aelig has prompted me to seek again, especially I heard many Malaysians are buying from TaoBao (淘宝), a website that hosts many sellers from China for a wide range of products. My effort didn't bear any fruit as some didn't ship overseas and some didn't accept international payment. I thought it wouldn't be possible without a Chinese banking account, but recently I found a solution. My friends recommended a purchaser, who specializes in buying books for overseas customers. I just sent him the websites (淘宝 or others), he calculated the shipping costs, we both agreed on the total (books + shipping), then I did a wire transfer to his French account. Once he received my transfer, he went to order the books, sent me a photo when the books arrived, then shipped them to me. He didn't charge any fees, but accumulated points from those websites and got some discount from the shipping company he used.

And voilà, two months after, the package has finally arrived!

And what did I order? 45 Doraemon comics! It is a shame that Doraemon is not famous in France, despite the fact that French are very familiar with Japanese mangas. Doraemon was my childhood hero, and the fact that Aelig has shown interested in comics, I thought it was time to introduce it to her. I think she will love this robotic cat who is afraid of mouse but who helps his master in many ventures that kids can only dream of.

I also ordered a set of Chinese story books. It features 366 legends related to traditional festivals, ancient believes, tales and myths. I looked online on books that are suitable to Aelig's age, and I always wonder why those famous parenting bloggers recommended classic western fairy tales or story books from USA (all translated into Chinese), instead of stories written by Chinese authors. In today's world every kid seems to read and watch Disney's cartoons, know by heart fairy tales like "The Ugly Duckling", "The Little Red Hat". What is it so wonderful to teach our kid about a wolf eating a little girl? Anyway, this set of books are arranged by month. We started with January so we touched about the story of Nian (why Chinese celebrate New Year with fire crackers), the Chinese Zodiac (she was intrigued). Some stories are not for her age but she still remembered some part of it so I think she will get there eventually. And, I have to say that by reading these it helps refresh my memories on certain legends or learning something new.

I read to her the first book of Doraemon. She was curious, she placed all of them beside her bed, but she decided that those are books that she would read alone without me. Ok, I don't want to force her. Anyway, I can't help but take one to read for myself. Maybe deep down I bought these for myself!

The Chinese legend series are arranged by color on the floor in her room.

Ok, I have to reveal that this is one of the saddest moments being a parent. Aelig is myopic so she has to wear glasses when she is in school or when she is watching TV. I felt guilty as I was myopic too so she probably got it from me. I hope all these books that I bought her would not increase her myopia though.

Wednesday = no school no work no daycare day

One month into the Wednesday = no school no work no daycare day routine, we are slowly adjusting to the new organisation. The girls wake up at the same time, but we can take things slowly instead of rushing out of the door for school/daycare/work. Hubby enjoys it as well as he can sleep a bit more on Wednesday mornings.

In France a lot of government subsidized clubs used to offer sportive activities for kids on Wednesdays. However, since this September every government schools have class on Wednesday mornings. This has pushed majority of sportive activities into Wednesday afternoons. We went to a club forum where many clubs set up a stand to explain their activities. Through a friend we found a club who organizes session of get-together where everyone is encouraged to converse in Mandarin. For a long time I had looked for a Mandarin playground for Aelig and this seems to be a nice fit.

So I enrolled her for this program and we tried out the first session. The group was small with kids from mix couples (Chinese/French) and a French kid. Some kids prefer to speak in French, but the organizer spoke in Mandarin. I brought a long some Mandarin books and I was proud that Aelig volunteered to tell a story in Mandarin. Even though she was not that fluent, she had the courage to finish the story, with my help. Then, I was surprised that she was not shy but blended in instantly when the organizer was telling a story.

We decided to go back and enroll for more sessions. The organizer proposed to teach Aelig Chinese writing along with her own kids. She learnt to read and write several words a week. Most importantly she started to show some interest in writing, she even did some practice at home.

Through internet I also got connected to a group of Chinese mothers in my city. We informally started a playground, not regularly but occasionally we gather in a place to let the kids play together. I would like them to speak in Mandarin but some kids prefer to speak in French. I observed that some kids choose to speak French even though their mothers speak Mandarin to them. 

Another picnic + playtime for Aelig and her new friends. Hopefully the group would grow so that we could organize the outings more regularly.

Well, we had exceptionally sunny weather in September, it is going to be a challenge to bring them out as the raining days seem to be back in October.

When Chinese is easier than French

I have to admit that I don't pay much attention to Aelig's progress at school.

Actually I don't know how to. At the beginning of school terms, I wanted to know what she was going to learn this school year. All I got was a list on a paper saying that she would learn how to express herself in speaking and writing, nothing in detail. There is no text book nor syllabus. We just need to provide several empty exercise books and the teacher will glue printed paper with her work on it. We only got to know what she actually did at school the last day before a school break when all the exercise books are passed back.
Hubby would take time to browse through these exercises, praise her when she did well, practice with her on her weak areas.

One day while browsing through all the exercise books, my MIL teased us that we didn't even sign a feedback book where the teacher graded her on different aspect of her works. Only then we discovered that there was a mid term evolution and we had to sign on a page. Her teacher put a number of smiley to represent how satisfy she was in each area: counting from 1 - 20, writing her own name, finishing a puzzle by herself, able to answer a question after a story telling... Overall she was doing ok but very weak in public speaking, and not able to tell what day it was, not able to distinguish morning and evening.

Well, she knows how to say what day it is in Mandarin, but not in French. This is simply because in Mandarin it is so much easier, it literally means day one (Monday), day two (Tuesday), day three (Wednesday)...so she knows after day three (Wednesday) it will be day four (Thursday). Whereas in French, everyday is a new word, she knows a few but still doesn't get the sequence right.

Days during a week in English / Mandarin / French:
Monday = 星期一 = Lundi
Tuesday = 星期二 = Mardi
Wednesday = 星期三 = Mercredi
Thursday = 星期西 = Jeudi
Friday = 星期五 = Vendredi
Saturday = 星期六 = Samedi
Sunday = 星期日/天 = Dimanche

I think she still hasn't figured out how to memorize these in French. She chose the easier way by telling me that Wednesday = trois (three in French), it seems that she wanted to apply the same system from Mandarin to French. She was also telling me one day that she and her wolf friends are using a different system: it would be day 1, day 2, day 3 until day 9, then it would restart again at day 1. That's how it works in her wonderland with all her imaginary friends. I told her that it was not how it works for human and it was certainly not her to decide.

Anyway, I think she likes to question the existing system and try to apply the easier way out, which is probably a good thing. But still, she would need to know that every language has created it's own system / logic which she has to accept.

As simple as 1 2 3

Aelig was watching a Taiwanese cartoon. At one scene it was teaching kids to read Chinese numbers from one to ten. She could read 一二三 (1 2 3), when she saw number four 四, she yelled and said it looked like a 口 (mouth). When the cartoon repeated the numbers, she was furious and told me that the number four was wrongly written! It should be like this like this, she explained to me with writing gestures. I told her that what was shown was the right way to write, but she insisted the other way, and quickly ran to write down what she thought should be the number four : four straight horizontal strokes, a continue series from 一二三 (as shown on the photo below).

lol. If Chinese characters could be as simple as 一二三, then we wouldn't have to spend hours and hours practicing thousand of characters since our early life.

Sometimes she likes to venture into my bookshelf, picking up books and try to see if she could recognize any Chinese characters. With her limited knowledge, most often she concluded that she would have to learn more in order to read those books. Hopefully one days she would be able to read my books.

Confronted with French alphabet prononciation

The same 26 letters, but in French they are pronounced differently compare to English. I didn't get to learn how to pronounce them probably because when I went to the French school here I started at level II. So, one of the biggest challenges while talking on the phone in my earlier years here was to be able to spell my name correctly, in French.

Today, there are certain sounds I still don't know if I pronounce them correctly. I still have problem with "G" and "J", as it seems to me that they sound exactly opposite when pronouncing them in English.

These days Aelig likes to write. She would ask me how to spell certain words like father and mother and she would write them down. One day she asked me to spell her classmates' name, and I couldn't because for some of them I have never heard of so didn't know how to spell. The other day I was deep into my reading so when she asked me how to spell "Elouan", a common Brittany name, for some reason I pronounced the letter "U" in English. She kept asking for confirmation, and finally told me that she didn't know how to write "U", that "U" didn't exist. Ops, I quickly corrected my mistake, and told the opportunity to tell her that in English all these letters have a different pronunciation. Well, she didn't look convince.

She is very keen into names now. She told her father that in his name, there are two "A". It was wrong as there was only one "A" in hubby's name. She revealed that in "PAPA" (father in French), there are two "A". We finally realized that she thought the word father and mother in French is our name. We tried to explain to her but she hasn't quick grabbing the concept yet. And, she writes only in capital letter.

Sadly, she refuses to learn how to write in Mandarin. I don't know when she would be able to write father and mother in Mandarin. It does seem that writing in alphabet is so much easier than writing in Mandarin.

Bilingual road : Learning at her own pace

I was chatting with my coworker about kids. I was telling her my worries about my daughter's seemingly weak command in French compared to kids her age. She suggested that I should start speaking French and Mandarin at the sometimes with my daughter. She couldn't understand how a family can function like ours, where three languages were practiced at the same time at home.

Well, there were times that I have doubts about what we were doing.

The initial plan was that I take care of Mandarin and hubby takes care of French. One thing I didn't that into consideration was that a mother naturally interacts / handles more things with her child than a father. The outcome was that the little angel prefered to speak Mandarin than French, as she knew more vocabularies in Mandarin. We spent time together singing, reading and chatting in Mandarin. And then I wondered if I have put her in disadvantages compare to her pals at school.

Examples:
1. At school while kids were singing songs that they have probably heard at home, she learned about them for the first time. Well, she did know a couple of French songs but not extensively.
2. She might not be familiar with instructions in French (while doing craft, drawing...).
3. During story telling times she might not understand much compare to her pals due to her weak vocabularies.

I suspected that these have made her behaved reservedly in classroom. While kids in her classroom started to form groups, she didn't belong to any and would usually play with boys or older kids. Her teacher used to tell me that she didn't speak much at class and sometimes didn't understand her instructions. Her after school carer told me that she was a quiet girl. I noticed that she spoke less fluently in French compared to kids her age.

And then this coworker told me: "Well, according to the National Education guideline, a kid that has finished the first year of Kindergarten should recognize 1 to 5. Does she know this?" The true is no. Yes, after one full year of school, she doesn't read 1 to 5. Another fact is that she doesn't know A to Z either. I'm restraining myself to teach her alphabet because I don't think I pronounce them correctly in French. I thought she would pick all these up at school. The coworker continued : "Some days I asked my daughter whether she had to work a lot at school, she told me no they were playing all days. The fact is, she was learning a lot but she thought it was games. They have a talented teacher who knows how to make learning fun, we are very lucky." I hope Aelig will meet a similar teacher, her current one has 33 kids to take care of, not sure if she could handle it.

At that point, I had all these questions to myself:
Should I change the method and start conversing with her in Mandarin and French?
Should I start teaching her writing and reading, even in Mandarin, even though kids here do these formally the first year they are in primary school?

In fact, kids in Malaysia start reading and writing since they enter kindergarten. They have dictations and small tests. I believe kids are capable of doing these before they turn 6. But I do ask myself what the rush? She still have a lot of time to learn. I started learning writing and reading when I was 7.

Before making any decisions, I decided to talk to her teachers. To my relief, her second year teacher thinks that she speaks well and blend in without problem with her classmates. Her after-school carer (the same one from last year) told me that she has improved a lot in term of expressions. And she eats well in the canteen. What a great news!

Now, we will continue the three languages practice at home (she doesn't speak English, she just tries to imitate us sometimes). And, I want to make learning a fun game for her. No pressure, she learns it at her own pace.

Teaching her how to write one to five.

She decides which exercise books she wants to "draw" with. Sometimes she writes a word, I write another one. She doesn't do it everyday.Well, learning is a lifelong process, way to go!

A daddy version of bed time story

Aelig could be very harsh to her father, she refuses to do certain things with him, for example, having him during the bed time story.

To change this habit and enable daddy to share more bonding time with her, I asked hubby to pick one of her favorite stories, written in Mandarin with pictures.

It started well. She slowly calmed down and stopped protesting the present of her daddy in the room. She was actually curious how daddy was going to tell the story in French.

It was not an easy task but he did it. The book was printed from right to left so I had to correct him when he turned the pages.

Here is daddy's version of the story:
The little cat is hungry but he couldn't find his cheese. He realized two mice stole it so he scold them badly. With an empty stomach, he played with butterflies. Once he saw his mother, he asked if she could give him some food as he was still hungry. His mother gave him some eggs. After eating, he played with a turtle and a bat. (Aelig protested when he said "chauve souris" (bat), direct translation = "bald mouse", she said the bat is not a mouse). While he was sleeping two mice came to visit him. They had good time playing together. The second day after waking up, he realized all his eggs were stolen. (Finally he realized it was not eggs but Chinese bun so he switched to "bao" (Chinese bun in Hokkien)). The "bao" reappeared  and he managed to catch the mice. He can finally enjoyed the moon and stars.

The real story:
The little cat likes to chase butterflies in the garden. He has never seen a mouse in his life. One day, he asked his mother how does a mouse look like. His mother told him : " The mouse has shape mouth, round ears and long tail...". She got cut off as he said he knows what a mouse look like now. One night his mother has to go out so she asked him to guard the Chinese buns. While guarding, he confused a turtle and a bat as mouse. He was so tired until he felt sleeping. He got awaken by a weird sound and finally met the real mice. However, the mice convinced him that they were good mice, and were invited by his mother to help him. He believed them and played with them. He even treated them to a dinner. The mice encouraged him to take a nap which he gladly obliged. The second morning, he discovered that all the buns were gone! His mother arrived just in time to console him and told him that all the mice are bad. The little cat was determined to catch the mice. He prepared some buns and hid behind his bed. The two mice came and he caught them without struggle. After this episode, he finally knew what a mouse look like and has since become the bravest guardian.

Ok daddy's version was quite different from the real story but they had a good laugh, that was the most important.

3 year 4 month

 Some highlights of the month:

1. Pacifier-weaning
She has been pacifiers free for three weeks.
We know we need to do this, but we kept procrastinating it.

She had two pacifiers, one green and one blue. She usually puts the green one in her mouth, and the blue one in her hand. We let her have them when she sleeps. Sometimes she asks for it when she is frustrated, tired or uncomfortable. They helped her calm down.

One day she lost the green one. The blue one was at the school. Each day she forgot to bring back the blue one so she slept without any for three nights. She had hard time falling asleep though. The fourth day she brought back the blue, she was proud as she remembered to bring it back. But, we were cruel, we hid it. Since then, goodbye to pacifiers.

Then one night she begged me with a sad and serious voice :"Maman, I have lost the green and the blue pacifier. Can you please find them for me? Can you go to aunt's house to look for them?" I almost surrendered to her plead. I kindly explained that the pacifiers wouldn't fly themselves to her aunt's house in Malaysia. They should be in the apartment. But, since she is a big girl, she doesn't need them anymore. She was not convinced but she has no choice. In my heart, I feel that I have taken away her two best friends that have gone through up and down in her small world. I'm not convinced that pacifier would harm her teeth. I agree that esthetically it doesn't look nice when a kid has pacifier in her/his mouth, but why bragging around a stuffed animal wherever a kid goes is accepted or even encouraged at school?

2. The first dental visit

In France very kid has a health book. It recommends the first dental visit at age 3. I have heard that kids are afraid of dentist, so I tried to prepare her mentally. After eating chocolate, I would tell her that some chocolates were glued to her teeth, if she doesn't brush her teeth, the ants or insects would come dig a hole. And we need to go see a dentist to let him / her catch the ants and insects. She agreed to go see a dentist.

The day came, we went as a family. I went first to show her how it works. I asked if she wanted to go after me but she said papa should go first. Then it was her turn, she did it without fear. She was very happy to hear that all were fine with her teeth.

Here is where I found skeptical about the pacifier's harm on teeth. The dentist looked at them, and concluded that she must be sucking her thumb while sleeping. Well, he was wrong, we told him about pacifiers. He said it must be the pacifiers who started to make her teeth parting away from each other. Ok, that was not his first diagnosis. I feel that every dentist will tell you different things, there is just no concrete evidence on this.

3. Language development

The school starts teaching the kids recognizing alphabets and words. Sometimes she would point at some alphabets on a billboard and scream with excitement. So hubby decided to teach her ABCD. She doesn't have much patient though. However, she prefers alphabet to Chinese characters, I think she can sense that learning ABC is much more easier than learning  大小. On the other hand since French's pronunciation on ABCD is different than the English one, she feels confused when watching Dora or when I accidentally pronounce an alphabet in English (eg French pronounces i as e). She would say, no maman, you are wrong!

4. Trip to library

The Town Hall built a new library so we decided to pay it a visit. This was the third time she went to a library so she knew she could choose the books she likes and bring them home. She chose quite some and I borrowed the DVD "Chicken Run" for her. She complained when we returned some book to the library but she finally accepted that they were not hers. One day we went for grocery shopping and was passing by the books alley. She went to pick up a bunch of Dora books and said we would bring them home. I told her here is not library, we need to pay! Eventually I let her buy one book, she was so excited to see Dora and boots in a book!

5. School carnival

Her school organized a yearly carnival where kids were invited to disguise in whatever they wanted. I asked my mother in laws to pass me one costume and guessed what? She passed me a costume from my BIL, disguising as a Chinese, with a Chinese coolie hat (斗笠) tailing with plait. When we arrive in school, her eyes almost popped out seeing her teachers dressing as a crown and a witch. Some kids came to see her and I told them that she is a Chinese. "I know", said the two boys. Suddenly I felt very stupid, even without the costume she looks like a Chinese. I have heard several times kids telling their parents that I'm the mother of the Chinese girl in the class. What was I thinking? Next time I will dress her up as a Malay or an Indian.

6. Enjoying holidays with grandparents
It's school holidays again so we sent her to her grandparents. Previously, when we had to leave without her, she would cry and protest. This time around, she waved goodbye to us with a smile! Hubby said this is just the beginning, the day would come when she would cry when we go picking her up!

She is so blessed, she gets to climb apple tree, goes to the beach / zoo / library / bicycling, plays hide and seek in the garden. Not to mention that the weather has been pleasant these days.

Enjoy your holidays my girl, I hope to bring you camping again since you loved it so much during our trip to Noirmoutier.

3.3 year old

She makes me speechless.
Example:
During gatherings we usually have some wine / alcohol, and for the kids we serve fruit juices.
Sometimes Aelig wants to taste our drink, so we have to tell her that alcoholic drinks are for adults.
Me: "When you grow as tall as papa, you can drink alcohol".
Her:"Ok."
One day hubby put her on his shoulder.
Her:"Look maman, I'm so tall."
Me:" Oh yes you have grown so tall!"
Her:"I can drink alcohol now, can I?"
Me."..." speechless.

She likes to catch me making mistakes.
Example:
I was reading to her a bed time story.
We turned to a page with a photo of a giraffe trying to read a book.
Me:"Look,  the kangaroo is reading.."
Before I got a chance to finish, she cut me.
Her:"Maman, you did a mistake, it was a giraffe!"
Me:"Oh sorry, you are right, it was a giraffe."
Her:"Oh maman."
She was very proud of herself whenever she caught me making a mistake.

Everything is consisted of a father, mother and a baby / babies.
Examples:
She collected a bunch of stones.
Her: "Maman, the one big is the papa, this is the maman, and all these are their babies."
She saw some butterflies in a book.
And each time I read that book, she has to interrupt me to show the father, mother and baby butterflies.
She picked some flowers.
The big one is a father, the medium one is a mother, the small one is their baby.

She is a lady (this is a comment from hubby).
Examples:
We went to a charity fundraising run organized by the school.
While waiting for the run to start, she was playing alone. A male classmate approached her and wanted to play with her. She looked at him, decided to ignore him.
We went to a restaurant.
While seated, a boy her age drew a French flag and asked his mother to give it to Aelig.
She liked him, so she went over to make friend with him.
But, most of the time, she just sat there, and the boy kept coming over to pass her some color pencils.
Before he left, he invited Aelig to his birthday party.

I started teaching her some characters in Mandarin.
It is very handy as these words appear in most of her books.
大 = big
小 = small
一 = one
二 = two
三 = three

The 3 year old : Language Development

3 years 1 month

She now speaks mandarin to me and French to her daddy.
However, we got some alert from the after school sitter.
Apparently she didn't talk much, and several times she went to the corridor, just standing there until someone comes looking for her. One evening I went to pick her up and I asked her to say good evening to the sitter. When she said that, the sitter claimed that it was the first word she heard from Aelig since she entered the after school room.

And, her daddy was worried because she still couldn't have a simply conversation with him. It would go like this:

Daddy: How was school today?
Aelig : How was school today?
Daddy: Did you play with M?
Aelig: Did you play with M?
Daddy: What did you eat at the canteen?
Aelig just continued to play with her stuff and ignored him.

 But, when she is with me, she becomes a chatty box, not necessary answering my questions, but inventing stories. Example:

Aelig: My lamb is hungry, I need to go get her some grass.
Me: Oh really?
Aelig: Yes, she is hungry, just like the horse. (She fed horses during our Christmas holiday).
Me: Ok, let's us go grab some grass then.
Aelig: Did you hear it? It sounds like the fox is nearby! He is going to come get the grass! (ok, scene in Dora Explorator)
Me: Ok, we need to stop him.
Aelig: Oh no, the wolf has eaten all the grasses.
Me: Nevermind,  there are plenty of grasses around our apartment.
Aelig: I don't like fox and wolf, they are bad, they want to eat my lamb.
Me: Don't worry, when they come, we will just say "swiper, no swiping!".
 
We will probably need to talk to her teacher to see if she copes well during classes.
Oh is it just normal that at 3 years old she doesn't know how to describe what happened during the day at school?

The language choices

"We wish you a mauli Crisma, we wish you a mauli Crisma, we wish you a mauli Crisma, and a Happy to you."

This is how Aelig sings the song.
We are in the Christmas mood so we have been exposing Aelig to Christmas carols. It makes us laugh to hear her singing "mauli Crisma", and I shared this with my coworker.
He looked at me, and said: "When are you going to teach your kid something French?"
I was a bit surprised. I told him that hubby is the one responsible to teach Aelig French. Well, hubby uploaded many Christmas carols in English for us as he likes the joyful and festive ambiances in these songs.  As for me, I didn't teach Aelig any Christmas song in Mandarin because I don't know them. I was not exposed to them when I was a kid.

Anyway, I don't think we need to justify anything to anyone. This is our decision and we just want the best for our kid. However, I do want to share why we chose these languages.

Even before Aelig was born, we have decided to separate the job: hubby would teach her French and I would teach her mandarin. It was a total no brainer for French, since she is French. I chose Mandarin because it is my mother tongue. There were questions raised about this choice, I will share about this in another post.

The hard part was English. This was the language we spoke when we met, and we chose to continue to use it among us so that we won't lose it. We decided to let Aelig learns it herself when she goes to primary school, but something came up which made me had doubt about our choice.

We were in Krabi, Thailand, a place which do not understand either French or Mandarin. There was a safari room where you can drop your kid for several hours while running your errands. Aelig went to play there sometimes. At one point, she was with several kids, some from Singapore who spoke in English. They were all playing one two three jump to an area full of balls. A little girl commanded one two three, everyone jumped except Aelig. She looked lost because she didn't understand the command. I decided that it may be time to teach her some basic English. So, I added English songs, DVD and Youtube clips to her entertainment times.

And the result, now she knows how to count in three languages:
Mandarin: from 1 to 20, going towards 30
French: from 1 to 10, going towards 15
English: from 1 to 10

She is probably slower than other kids her age but I think she will get there eventually. Let's see.

I'm hearing myself

With Aelig speaking more and more mandarin, with my type of pronunciation / tone / expression, I feel like I'm hearing myself. She is the reflexion of me, and it made me realize how I have missed pronounced / used certain words.

Anyway, we have fun conversations now. Example :

At the first few weeks of school, she always wanted to poo on the way home. And, she did poo in her pants with shit sticked to her leg. lol. To prevent this from happing again, whenever she begged me to take her in my arms, I would do it. Sometimes I have to bring her with me all the way up to the stairs with my backpack + her school bag + my handbag.

One day, while approaching home, I put her down and asked her to walk by herself.
Me: Aelig, you are heavy, you should walk towards home yourself.
Her: (wailing) I want maman to hold me.
Me: Keep going lah, we are almost there liao.
Her: (continue wailing) My legs are hurting...
Me: We will be there in no time, come.

Another day, I sensed that she can't hold it for much longer, so I decided to take her in my arms.
Me: Eh, you are heavy, I will put you down and you walk up the stairs by yourself, ok.
Her: No lah, we are almost there liao.
Me: See I'm carrying you with so many things, my legs are hurting...
Her: We will be there in no time, keep going lah.

I was impressed and surprised at the same time. She knows how to use my words against me. Wow.

She is also progressing well in French. She seems to learn a lot of new vocabularies at school.

Conversations with hubby:

Hubby: How was school, were you naughty today?
Her: No I was not naughty, because I'm a girl. (No je fais pas bêtises, je suis une fille moi).

I put Aelig to bed. Several minutes later hubby went to her room to kiss her goodnight.
Hubby: Have a nice sleep my little angel. Calm down and have sweet dreams.
Her: But I'm not calming down! (Mais je suis pas calmée)

How to download YouTube Videos to Freebox

I'm so excited, I finally found a way to download YouTube videos and play them on the TV. It is very simple but it took me several months, as previous attempts all resulted in failure.

It requires three steps:
1. Download YouTube videos to flv file
Simply put the URL of the YouTube video here and download it to your hard drive, in flv file (I think it would work in other file formats too, but I didn't try.)

2. Convert the file from flv to avi format
I use this free converter, you need to download it first. There are many free softwares out there, I like this one because it is easy to use and the transfer rate is fast.

3. Upload the converted avi file to Freebox (our internet provider)
Hubby gave me a location to upload the files. I turned on the TV and it worked!!!

I have uploaded around 15 songs (including one Hokkien Christmas song), I'm so eager to see Aelig's happy face when she sees this in the morning. Well, it is going to be a reward for her, she actually went to bed herself at 10pm (still considered late though). She just climbed into her bed, sang to herself, and fell asleep. I was surprised that I didn't hear her for a while, usually she would come back to the living room after playing in her crib. This time she stayed there, light off. Way to go girl!

22th month

New vocabularies
French: au revoir (goodbye), fait attention (pay attention), bain (bath), pain (bread), papillon (butterfly), tétine (pacifier), saute (jump), petit ours brun (Brown little bear, a French cartoon series), marché (market), donne (give), goûte (taste).

Notes: She usually says "Bye bye" when waving goodbye to someone but now she switched to French. I was a bit surprised when she told me to "pay attention" the other day. She finally managed to pronounce the word papounet (grandfather) correctly but still calling her grandma mamoutête instead of mamounette.

Mandarin: hu tie (butterfly), ma yi (ant), mu ji (hen), ji dan (egg), Lao shu (mouce), bian fu (bat), hu li (fox), niu you (butter), di shang (floor), ti (kick), qiu (ball), mi feng (bee), kan shu (reading), mian bao(bread).

Notes: She has difficulty pronouncing anything ends with "zi", like "ya zi"(duck), "tu zi" (rabbit), shi zi (lion), hou zi (monkey). Many animals in Mandarin end with "zi" so there are a bunch of animals she could not pronounce.

Counting: When I go up and down stairs with her I try to count the steps in Mandarin. She starts saying it but mixing French and mandarin. She would say ".., deux (two in French), san (three in Mandarin).

Overview: Overall I'm happy with her language achievement. However, the fact that she is with her sitter the whole day limits her intake in Mandarin. I suspect that she starts getting the concept that we use different language at home, as sometimes with me she would ask for a biscuit in saying "gâteau" (biscuit in French) then quickly switch to "bing gan" (biscuit in mandarin). I hope to help her grab the concept but don't know how to do it.

Physical development

Climbing, jumping and kicking are her favorite movements these days. She loves to stand on her car or toy to look at stuffs on the counter-top or simply messing around. She got frustrated if her car or toy did not stand still and caused her to fall down. In the Petit Ours Brun series, the little bear was jumping so she would do this every time she watches the cartoon, and she would ask us to jump with her. She adores kicking and throwing ball.

Social and emotional development
She is a bossy girl. She starts issuing orders around. She would pull my finger and have it point to images on books. She commanded me to sit on her car or her chair or on the floor. She also pull my hand to follow her to the room and say "Du shu" (reading) and "assis" (sit down). When we do not obey her, she would bang her forehead on the floor and scream "tête-tête" (head head).

Photo shows Aelig having a good time with hubby. She is no longer the little baby who sticked to me all the time. In the past, when I got home, she would start crying and being cranky. While I cook, she would cry beside and refused to play with daddy. The phase has passed, now she would only push away her daddy when she is extremely tired. This is really a good change as we can now play together. Our game these days:
Me (in mandarin): Aelig, what sound does daddy produce when he farts?
Aelig: puuuuuuuuuuuuuttt
Hubby (in French): Aelig, what sound does maman make when she farts?
Aelig: puuuuuuuuuttte

Ok, this was the first boy ever who held Aelig's hand. We brought her to a gathering and she was running around with a bunch of kids, mostly by herself without really joining the group. At one point I asked this boy if he could play with Aelig. He said ok and I didn't expect him to hold Aelig's hand. They ran together for a while until he came to me saying that Aelig didn't want to play with her. Later when I talked to his mother, I discovered that he told his mother that Aelig was holding his hand extremely tied that he felt painful so he wanted to let go of her. Haha, so she actually scared off a boy.

Her pass time activities

Reading is one of her favorite activities. She loves pointing to images especially anything involves cat or dog. When I tell her lets go "kan shu" (read) she would happily go pick up books and sit down on the floor.

Since when she starts liking TV? She didn't show interest when she was younger. We have loosen up a bit for letting her watching her little bear series (Photo showing her watching her cartoon while eating a biscuit). From time to time she would watch her Mandarin song DVD in my computer. But now when hubby watches news or shows she would also watch with him.

19th to 21th month

Aelig turned 21 months yesterday and we totally forgot about it! How dare we!! Remember when she was a baby we used to buy her a cake for her monthday.

Anyway, over the summer we did a lot of activities with her:

Helping her tonton (uncle) Benjy moved to his new house.


Changing the flooring to parquet. Aelig and her friends are inaugurating the new flooring.


Celebrating her great grandma's 90th birthday.


Discovering the beach with her grandparents and us.

Language developments
She is in a phase that she picks up a word quickly. She might not know the meaning completely but she could repeat after us easily. Her new vocabularies in French:
Poussette (strolley), bisous (kiss), gâteau (biscuit), par terre (on the floor), partout (every where), ballon (ball), tomber (fall down), chambre (room), bouche (mouth), main (hand), nez (nose), travail (work), bêtise (messed up), couche (diaper), petit ours (little bear), dodo (sleep), bravo, nounours (Terry Bear), il y a plus (there's no more), assis (sit down), c'est bon (it is good), ça y est (done).

In Mandarin:
Ping Gan (biscuit), Da Xiang (elephant but normally refers to Youtube videos or DVD), Lao Hu (tiger), Tiao (jump), Pai Pai Shou (clap hands), Wa Zi (socks), Yi Fou (cloth), Shui Yi (night dress), He Shui (drink water), Yu (fish), Xia Hu (raining), Si Si (wet). She also points correctly to her body parts when I call out the word: head, hair, eyes, ears, mouth, nose, hands, feet.

In terms of instructions, she understands when I say:
I'm going to change your diaper
Let's go; Watch; Give it to me
Let's go wash your hand / Wash your hair / Comb your hair
Let's go take a bath (she will go to the bathroom)
Let's go to sleep (she will protest or walk into her room, waiting to be put in her bed)
Kiss daddy goodnight (she will bang her forehead against daddy's face)


In this photo, Aelig is learning mandarin characters. How I wish, she usually just messing around. She picks up words faster / more in French than in Mandarin. When she says a word in French and I say it in Mandarin, she just keep quiet as if she is confused. To cope with the confusion, she would say the word in different languages from one moment to another. For example for the word "cat", at one moment she said "chat" (cat in French), then she said "mao" (cat in Mandarin), then "mimi" (the name of her sitter's cat), and now she says "miao" (cat sound in a song).

I finally managed to buy DVDs with Mandarin kid songs, now every evening she is asking for "Da Xiang" (Elephant) which refers to playing YouTubes or DVD on my laptop. With all these watchings, she starts singing the "Da Xiang" song.

Her sentimental developments:

Authority: She gives instructions to her toys these days. It is hilarious, she would ask her doudou / cat / dog / tiger to sit down quietly beside her. If they bend to one side, she would scold them.

Jealousy: We went to visit a friend who got a 5 months old baby. When I held the baby, she protested by lying on the floor and crying out loud. Grandma did the something but she didn't bother about it.

Like praising: Each time she manages to follow an instruction correctly, or eat with her spoon, she would look at us and expect some praising from us. If we do not response, she would say "bravo" and clap her hands to herself.

Expressing her wants and dislikes: These days she would pull my hand when she wants me to do something with her. If she doesn't get what she wants, she would lay down on the floor and band her head. Then she feels painful and would look at me and says "tête-tête!" (head). Or she would throw her toys to the floor and cry to me that her toys are on the floor.

Get involved: We toss with family and friends when we eat together and now she wants to do the same. She would raise her cup and do tossing with everyone. Now I let her "help" around, when we got home with grocery I asked her to put potatoes and shallots in the container.


Yesterday we made crumble together and she enjoyed it. She loved it so much that at the end she scoped out the crumble and eating them before I even had change putting them into the baking dish. Result: the dessert has a hole at the edge as there was no enough dough to cover the pear filling.

Overall, we are happy with her developments. Most importantly, she is getting closer to her daddy. When he watches TV, she would climb to him and make herself comfortable sitting beside him. A real improvement!

Sources to get Chinese children books from France

There are Chinese bookstores in Paris so I guess people living there should be able to get some children's books there. For people living outside of Paris and do not go there regularly, internet becomes handy in terms of buying / getting Chinese children's books from France.


See what I got? All these are FREE! Thanks to internet, I discovered and then joined a Taiwanese-French forum. Members here are mainly mixed couples who have experiences teaching Mandarin to their children in foreign countries. One member was giving away Mandarin children's books in Paris and through helps from various people, I managed to get some for Aelig.


These books were from Taiwan so there were printed in Traditional Chinese. Aelig is still young to have the level to read them but hopefully one day, she will fall in love with them.


Some of the books here are about animals so she was happy to find cats, mouse and ducks inside.


I also bought some books from Odonato Publishing in Malaysia. Thanks CL for recommending it.

Now I have plenty of books to show / read to Aelig. Hopefully she could appreciate them.