Tag: tobias

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I’m Very Serious…

That’s what Tobias said when i asked him how serious is he about learning to play the guitar 😉

He has been talking about wanting to play for a while now. While we were in Singapore, Daddy had said that maybe we could get a guitar for him from there – likely cheaper than over here in Switzerland. But we got caught up with meeting family & friends & of cos all the amazing foods that we didn’t get round to buying one there.

So he was a little disappointed to be leaving SG without one. But i told him, maybe we’ll find one in Switzerland.
The week before Aldi (one of only 2 German supermarkets in Switzerland) had a special on a guitar – just CHF75/. – i though that’s cheap – we should go see. So we hopped over (there’s an Aldi just next to where we live) to have a look last Friday evening. Tobias was very excited! BUT… it was not the right size – it was an adult full-size guitar & Walter felt if we bought that, Tobias would not manage to hold it properly & was hinder him from learning. So we didn’t buy. Needless to say, the little guy was very very disappointed now! Near to tears that he could not get a guitar.

That’s how we came to go shopping for a guitar for him the very next day & we bought one – a shiny brand-new one for …. (wait for it…) CHF… (can you guess how much?)… CHF355! i thought it was very expensive but Walter says this is Switzerland and it is a good one so…

Here’s our happy little camper with his new musical instrument:

See it is a child-size one…The one on the right is Daddy’s.

Here he is having lessons with Daddy:

He is finding it very painful to keep pressing so hard on the strings but Daddy says he has to keep at it till his fingers are used to it & then no more pain. i encouraged him, saying,”Remember what Tigeress in KungFu Panda said, she kept hitting the tree till she doesn’t feel anything anymore. That’s how she became awesome. So you have to keep pressing.”

Watching movies does help parenting – hehehhee;)
syc

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Exciting New Adventure… 1st Grade… or Primary 1…

…or as they say here in German, 1. Klasse, said as “Ersten Klasse”, or direct translation – 1st Class…

Tobias started 1st grade about 3 weeks ago & he loves it!!
Here he is at his desk on the 1st day of school, 16th August 2011, Tuesday:


His teacher is a real nice lady, very smiley & seems to truly love teaching the kids.
Here they are at storytime with her:


Tobias is enjoying the much larger variety of ‘subjects’ as compared to what he got at Kindergarten, which was a lot of crafts (he’s not a very crafty boy). He has German (of cos), Math (which he loves), Science & Brain Teasers (i think this may be just a general knowledge of the world around us type thing & the teasers are just for fun & a little something more challenging for the kids to do). There is also Music, Gym, Workshop & Religion, which are all in different classrooms. So there is a fair bit of coming & going which suits Tobias just fine as he is such an energtic boy 🙂

There are a couple of firsts for our little village school – this is the 1st year they are having a mixed 1st & 2nd grade class. At the Parents’ Evening last week, they explained that practically the 2 grades are really together for one whole day in the week – other than that, they have different classes, e.g. 1st grade goes for Music while 2nd grade stays to do German. Of cos break time is together & some mornings they do start the day together. i think it’s great that they have such classes – it helps for the 1st graders to have someone to follow when doing things or when they don’t understand. i’m also hoping that it may be possible for Tobias to do some 2nd grade work if he gets a little bored, like in Math, i think he will enjoy the 2nd grade work more cos he is already at that level. Just to let you see the difference, 1st graders are expected to learn to count to 20 (forwards & backwards), while 2nd graders up to 100 – & Tobias can already count to 100. But we’ll see…

This being Switzerland, they are very organised, even with homework – there are fixed days on which your child will come home with homework – for us it’s Monday, Tuesday & Thursdays. They also tell you how long your child is expected to spend on homework each time – 1st graders no more than 15 or 20mins after which they recommend that the child stop working & should the homework not be completed by then (which should be never as the work is very easy), the parent should include a note in the homework folder to indicate that the child worked on the homework for 20mins & still could not finish. & that would be accepted. Notes from parents are also accepted if you have a special family event (e.g. Grandfather’s Big Birthday Bash) & can’t finish or do your homework.

So very different from Singapore…

& that’s not even talking about the homework situation in Singapore today but even when i was in school, i remember coming home with hours of homework from about Pri 3 onwards – here Pri 3 level students are expected to do 1hour of homework only.

Here’s Tobias concentrating really hard on his homework:


This one happens to be a drawing assignment – just to draw a nice picture for a classmate whose birthday is coming up. All the other times so far, he’s come home with either Math or German homework in a workbook.

Here he is with the half finished drawing & the finished one:


Oh, the 2nd ‘firsts’ for our school is the giving out of actual grades or marks for the lower primary classes. It’s so new to them that they still haven’t quite worked out how it would function. What we found out last week was that it is really for the teachers to be able to keep better track of each child’s progress & to know if there are any areas where special attention might be needed. But it looks like we, the parents, won’t see any of this till maybe January. They want to have it all worked out 1st & they really don’t want it to give added pressure to the kids so they want to make sure that the way marks are given will reflect that.

Once again, so very different from Singapore…

& i think it’s good… young children are like little sponges & should be encouraged to learn & learn & not perform… getting good marks can take over & make a child more worried about the marks than about actually learning & enjoying the learning experience which will make them into life-long learners.

So here’s to having fun in school & life-long learning 😉
syc

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More about Tobi

It has been a while since our last post – so what’s been up??
Well, we’ve been trying to settle back into our routine here in cold cold Switzerland. Oh,ok it’s now not all that cold cold anymore – just windchill is hard to bear sometimes. Temps are around 7 to 10 so not really warm (to me anyhows). Really wish Spring would hurry & get here! Had lots of housework to catch up on & of cos emails too (even with checking periodically in Singapore didn’t help lower the load too much). & of cos we also had to change classes for Gymboree. & then there is some stuff happening at church too. So we’ve been busy.

Now to Tobi – he… well, he is not 100% – for our christian friends please pray that for a 100% restoration of his health – his little penis is painful – has been for the last 2 weeks – we’ve seen the doc twice already & he says to wait & see cos this sort of thing normally heals itself (a very Swiss doctor type thing to say – they are very much into the body healing itself). It does seem to have improved a little – so we’ll be waiting another week to see how it goes.

Now to more cheerful stuff – here’s a photo of Tobi with one of his “galfriends”:

Naomi & Tobias walking back from lunch on a Sunday.
Naomi is such a little cutie – parents are Swiss & Thai so she got the best of both worlds – don’t you agree?
syc