Speed reading... Can you?

I have been reading a book on speed reading by Makato Shichida. I think it's very very important for me to speed read since I have so many books to read - health, success, kid's education, baby's development, business, etc etc... Time is never enough to read. It's not the "normal" speed reading technique that you read about. It's about speed reading using the right brain - the image brain. The very first thing for this technique to be successful is deep breathing. Then relaxation... Then imaging a nice and relaxing scenery by auto-suggestion.

Ok, more about it in details when I have more time...

Stroller under service...

hmm... We sent Aloysius' Aprica stroller for servicing last week. The wheels are somehow misaligned. Lucky the servicing is free, cos it's new :) It's not easy to live without a stroller.. hahaha... I had a taste of it, going out alone with him. He dislikes the sling though. Slinging is tiring too if it's gonna be for a few hours. I carried and sling him for 5 hours! I went out alone with him, hence, nobody to help me to carry him for a while. I needed the loo, and brought him in in his sling.. hahaha... He was sleeping in the sling then :P. Nowadays, he loves to stand and jump a lot. He even wanna practice his standing and jumping while on the MRT... It's indeed a very good arm muscles training for me...

Last weekend, we brought Aloysius back to my parents' home in JB. He has been a very good boy. He seems to love sitting in the walker, pressing and licking the toys on it. I introduced the piano to him. He was rather curious. I took his finger to press on the keys to play a few nursery ryhmes :) It was quite enjoyable...

Yesterday, we went out shopping at Robinsons with Aloysius. We saw the different exersaucer and jumperoo on display. I put Aloysius on a Safety 1st exersaucer. He loves it very much! He kept smiling, coo-ing, and jumping. He was very curious at the toys around it, and started reaching out his hands to play at the toys. We wanted to get one for Aloysius, however, it was out of stock... Then, we put him on another car exersaucer beside... hahaha.. he loved it too! There are lots of buttons to press and two mirrors. It quite a cute car exersaucer. To our dismay, it was out of stock too... However, the helpful salesman told us that we can actually pay for it first and it will be sent to us :) Yeah! We paid for this new toy for Aloysius... It will be delivered on Friday :) Really looking forward to it :) I hope Aloysius can stay entertained for an hour at home... hahaha... Then I can get my work done.

We also got a teether from Safety 1st for Aloysius to chew :) I think he's teething.. He has been drooling lots and rubbing his ears...


Flashcards sessions:
Aloysius' flashcards sessions are reduced now... Two sets of English, two sets of Chinese and two sets of Maths equations now... :) Each set flash once a day, at most twice a day...

Note on Breastfeeding!

Recently, I have been experimenting how to prepare semi-solid food for Aloysius. So I cook for myself to test :)

I will soak brown rice and "wu gu mi", and then blend them in a blender, then cook. For myself, I will add sweetcorn, vegetables, red dates, wolfberries, lily bulb, black sesame seeds, almond nuts, walnuts, etc... haha.. whatever I fancy to eat for a "balanced" diet... After starting this diet for a few days, my breastmilk supply increased a lot! Now I can pump and still have milk to feed Aloysius... :) Maybe you dun have to blend them :) I am experimenting with brown rice and blending here...

Aloysius is 4 months plus already!

Hello blogger...

Aloysius is now 4 months plus already. He loves to stand and jump now, and dislike sitting nor lying down. Sometimes, I will put him on his tummy to look at his pooh bears and his favourite hippo... He can giggle when I tickle him. Tickling him is for his gnostic stimulation :). Sometimes, during feeding, I will give him a "cranial massage"... I dunno really know how, but what I do is, "sayang" him...

So far, we have bought some new toys for Aloysius :) When we went to Melaka, we bought him two sets of motor driven sets of gears. I assembled them and played with them first :P. It's not suitable for him now, cos there are small parts. It's pretty fun assembling them and see the small gears driving the big gears and the merry-go-round. hahaha... a mommy trained in engineering who loves hands-on... :p

We also bought a wooden percussion instrument... tick tock tick tock... :) I dunno what it's called though... We are looking for a small, real xylophone for Aloysius :) Ideally, a real and tuned xylophone, cos I want him to learn the "actual" note. If any of you knows where to get a small, real xylophone, do let me know ok? Thanks in advance... hmm.. this reminds me when am I going to arrange for the moving of my piano..

Last Friday, we brought Aloysius for his 2nd 5-in-1 jab. Before that, we went out, and I have forgotten to feed him Indinine. And we rushed out, so I had forgotten to put the Indinine in the bag :( I fed him Indinine when we reached home at night. He started to have a fever that nite. I used a cloth to put over his head and let him sleep on my chest for that night :( His fever came on and off on Saturday, especially when not in air-con room. Despite his on and off fever, he was still a very active and happy boy when we met his ye-ye and nai-nai, shu-shu and shen-shen, for dinner... Aloysius still spread his happiness and joy to everyone :).


GD Program:

We brought Aloysius for an assessment by Lawrence. We were showed how to help him to crawl in a cross pattern :). We have consciously started this cross pattern "training". Aloysius can see the smallest flashcards in the set already. We were told that when Aloysius start to crawl, his vision will be improved by a quantum leap :). hmm... I am looking for more flashcards for him now. Perhaps, I will buy blankcards and a thick marker to write the words. After I have finished the smallest cards in the GD set, I will start to DIY with smaller cards and words... I hope I have the time... :)

Prehensile grasp:
Aloysius can grasp my thumb for 10 seconds in the air already :) So far, this is the longest he can hang in the air... We are looking for a piece of wooden "bar" for him to hang in the air :). It gotta be smooth and not too big, cos he has small hands...

Flashcards:
I have started the encyclopedic flashcards with Aloysius. He's only interested in looking at a set once. If I repeat the set in a day, he will look away. hmm... And I gotta change a new set daily to keep him interested in looking at the cards.
Nowadays, it's getting a bit tricky to get him to be interested in flashcards. He does not like to sit down. He wants to stand more than sitting down. He will wiggle and wiggle when I put him in his "usual" flashcards position. hmm... how??
I have been doing multiplication with him for almost two weeks. He's not as interested as before. I guess he must have been bored. hmm.. gotta make some changes... So I just started division today and he looked at all the cards attentively... hmm... maybe two weeks of addition, two weeks of subtraction and now one week plus of multiplication has bored him... Towards the end of subtraction, he was also not as interested... I had a Shichida 65 days dots program. hmm... in the program, addition was 10 days, subtraction 5 days, multiplication 10 days and division 5 days... I have seen successful cases based on Shichida program. I think I will have to be faster in changing the program with Aloysius than the recommended program from Lawrence. I will go into multiple steps equations already... I gotta find time to read the book on "How to teach your baby math" again... So many things to read...


Ok... That's all for now... I am feeling very guilty on my thesis writing again... haiz... hope this type of feeling will go away asap...

Just a quick note.

I just took out a book from my books collection to browse through. This time, I took out the book on "Ru he pei yang tian cai er tong" by "qi tian zhen". Translated to English, the title will be "How to nurture genius kids", written by Makoto Shichida.

I was reading a chapter on the success of right brain training. There's an example of a mother who began flashing cards to the baby starting from 2 months old. The mother did "tai jiao" before the baby was born. Shichida reminded this mother when the baby was 4 months, that the idea of flashing cards to the baby is not for the baby to remember, but more for stimulating the brain from all these cards. If we flash the cards with the aim of letting the child remember, we might fall into the mistake of repeating the cards too many times. This will cause the child to dislike flashcards and hence look away during flashcards sessions. If this situation is repeated too many times, the child will lose his ability to concentrate. Once we recognise that the child is not interested in the cards, and cannot concentrate on the cards, the cards are too old already. Shichida recommends not to flash the same images for more than 3 times. In this example, when the kid was 6 months old, he has already seen 4,000 cards! hmm... How can I achieve that too?? I only have 2000+ cards now.

There's another out of the ordinary example quoted in the book. The parents will make 1,000 cards per month for the infant! Gosh! 1,000 cards per month! At 7 months, this baby know 1/2m is less than 60cm! Wow!

In this book, Shichida reminded the importance of good "tai jiao" during pregnancy. "Tai jiao" and the emotional control of the mother during pregnancy will affect baby's emotions control,and baby's acceptance to others. hmm... after reading this, I felt that I am very lucky :) And I should thank my husband. During my pregnancy, I did not write my thesis, cos the stress can get quite over whelming. My hubby just let me be and trusted me. I cannot imagine having to write my thesis during the pregnancy and having to soothe a crying Aloysius... Stress in the mother will cause emotional instability in the baby after his birth.

Ok, I gotta stop here... :) Later all...

I am so guilty and stressed...

Hello...

I am feeling so guilty today. Plus stressed and tired... I looked after Aloysius on my own for the past few days. Plus the housework... Plus my thesis... Plus my meals... He's starting to nap shorter and shorter. Yesterday, I woke up at 5am to write my thesis, and I felt so tired to read and write. Then, I brought Aloysius out in the afternoon till nite. There goes a day... Nothing much achieved for my thesis. I wish I have more than 24 hours a day.. Or I do not need to sleep at nite...

I wanted to buy colored papers or cardboard to enhance the checker board program for Aloysius, but I haven't got time to even go to the bookshop to buy them :( I wanted to bring Aloysius down to GDbaby for an assessment, but I haven't got time too. Haiz.. time is ticking away.

This morning, I even took the stack of dots cards to the toilet to plan and arrange the flashcards sessions while I do my business... lol... cham hor?

Ok la.. enough of all the negative "chi"... I better go and eat more VP and continue writing my thesis... I am not going out today already. I think I gotta get my priorities right now...

Breastfeeding in Singapore (II)

New addition:

Breastfeeding at CK Tangs.
The family room at CK Tangs is at the toys level. I think it's level 5. There are two very cosy rooms. Inside the rooms, there's a steriliser, an electric thermo for hot water, a changing mat, and a basin. This family room is out of the ordinary. I have not seen any other family room with a steriliser! And best of all, there's a musical mobile for the baby at the changing area. This is the first family room with a musical mobile...
The only thing that I dislike about this place is it's too noisy. Cos there's a speaker inside the room. When I was breastfeeding there, they played rock music.. It's too noisy for me and make my heart beats.. lol.. The lighting is cosy enough to make my fall asleep...

Breastfeeding at Bishan Junction 8.
hmm... There's a small bench to sit to breastfeed. It's near the toilets. It's very brightly lit with white lights. I dun think I will go there for the family room...

Breastfeeding at Woodlands.
There's a "family room", but not for breastfeeding though. It's a converted disabled toilet. There's no changing mat, though there's a big area to lay your own changing mat, if you have brought any.