The Good and Bad of School Hols

The school hols are upon me.

Yay to sleep-ins, lazy days with the kids, and no need to worry about what to pack for school lunches.

Nay to having the kids around me all day long, fighting with each other and driving me nuts with their endless need for interaction and entertainment.

This year, we are doing things a little bit differently.

First, we're not going away. That'll take some of the $ pressure off while I build my organics business.

Second, we're setting GOALS. For Beth especially.

My big goal for J is simple: getting her 100% off training pants by June. Shouldn't be too hard as she's already 90% there with her timing accuracy.

With Beth, I'm finding that she needs specific, measurable, achievable etc etc things to aim towards.

She's a bright girl with lots of potential. But we do need to work on her resilience, her attitude and her temperament.

So I've started listing some things for her to focus on in the new year.

Simple things like school awards, Principal's Reading Challenge, VIC Premier's Reading Challenge, knowing her times table by heart up to 12x12, playing through Books 1 to 4 of her Yamaha JMC in different keys...

Next year, she wants to take up gymnastics @ Gym Monkeys, which is run by one of the school mums (Zoe's mum Sue), self-defence and keep up with swim lessons, which she loves. She's doing really well under her swim instructor David who's from China. He is very firm with the frisky kids and very encouraging towards kids who display a positive learning attitude (like Beth and her pal Catherine, also from China).

We've also agreed on breaking up the hols with play dates, day trips and excursions to places that interest Beth, like Melbourne Museum/IMAX, Eureka Tower ... Beth has the list in her brown notebook.

Tomorrow is Bedtime Story Day/Dress-up Day, and Beth is going as Susan the Archer (Chronicles of Narnia). I got her a green T-shirt, green netball skirt, and Mandy kindly lent us a plastic bow and quiver of arrows and a lovely maroon velvet cape that can be tied around the neck. The Grade Ones get an icy pole at lunch as a special treat, and an afternoon snack while they watch a DVD.

CA and I often jest that we pay more school fees ($5k a year) and get less actual study (by Sg standards).