Worksheet activities --- "Jumbo Book"

"Are you kidding me? These are homework, not games or toys." I am sure most people will react this way. However, I really mean that worksheets can be a "game" to any child. Learning the concept of encouragement from "Hooked on Phonics" set, I created a set of progress sheet that he can put a sticker whenever he finishes a chapter. I always give him a lot of praises and encouragement, following what I learned from the books.

Most of the time, my son likes to do worksheets. He understands that he learns something. I can see that he enjoys learning. I have made it clear to my son that everyone has "work" to be done. If he wants to play with his other toys, he must do 20 minutes of "work". To me, the goal is achieved when he does the worksheet. I seldom correct or check his work because my intention is to cultivate a habit in him to do the worksheets, and I learned that correcting his mistakes in a wrong way may discourage him.



I did not pay much attention on which books he should work on. I selected "Jumbo Book" because that was the only Singapore Syllabus worksheet available to me when I was in Malayisa. Someone told me that this was a Singapore textbook. You should be able to find this in major Popular Bookstores (but not every Popular Bookstore has it). In Penang, you can find this in Popular Gurney Plaza and perhaps Queensbay Mall. Please call up to make inquiry before you make the trip.

To state the fact right, most Singapore kindergartens do not use text book and it's wrong to think that Jumbo Book is a text book for Singapore kindergartens. I bought the Grammar book later as it is specifically fine tuned to improve skills on grammar. By the way, over 2.5years, my son has completed 4 Jumbo Books - nursery, K1 and K2 levels (for the ages of 4, 5 and 6 respectively), plus the Grammar worksheet.



Let me show you a few snapshots of his work. The "Jumbo Book" contents include science, numbers, grammar, creative writing, vocabulary etc. I won't reproduce too much here but show you a few pages that I like best to let you have a feel of how it looks like.





I like my son's work on creative writing. I am amazed by his ability to write sentences together to form a paragraph.





I admit that sometimes my son is reluctant to do the worksheets. He hates creative writing because he usually does not know what to write. The trick to overcome this is that I let him do less worksheets, and I always keep the time short. The stickers and the praises/encouragements that I gave also played an important role.

My son was going to attend primary school then. Realizing that, he volunteered to go extra miles to complete all his English related worksheets. I did not think that he could complete those worksheet last year, but he did.

Thanks to all the materials he did and the kindergarten's teacher, I am confident that my son would be able to cope with English language when he is in primary one in 2010.

P/S :
1) I can send you the progress sheets (Nursery, K1 and K2 for Jumbo Book) that I created if you want. Just let me know.
2) I wrote part of this in 2009.

Visiting Workplace

Children might be curious about what their parents do at work. I enjoyed following my parents to their workplace when I was young. I found out that in my Singapore office, I am allowed to bring my son to work place. I told my son about the plan and he loved it.

The first concern was whether he could stay quietly without disturbing my work. My wife had experience bringing him to her workplace few times before. She helped me to prepare some activities for him. A night prior to the visit, my son was so excited and he prepared his "worksheet" in advance together with his mum. And my wife did a fantastic job educating him that he should not "disturb" my work.

Upon arrival, he wanted a visitor badge. But the receptionist refused to give him because children were not required to have any badges. He was a little bit disappointed, but very soon he was happy when I served him a hot "Milo", taken from the drink dispenser inside the office. Look at him here in the photo, he was a little bit nervous, but happy.



He started to do his "work" after that. He played with some stickers, and then later he did his "Jumbo Book" English worksheet. I should praise him as he was very obedient. He talked very softly such that the person in the next cubical could not have heard him. He did not even ask any questions when I was concentrating on my work. Instead, he waited patiently when I finished my work or when I happened to stop doing my work. Impressive..

I took him to cafeteria where he enjoyed a cold chocolate drink and a hot chicken pie. He continued his work after that. In total, he "worked" almost 3.5 hours continuously without disturbing me. Really Impressive! As a result, he finished doing almost 20 pages of worksheets, reading a story book, and playing a game with his sticker book. Productivity for both of us were high!

Before we left, I let him try my seat. Please take a look at his happy face?



The visit increased our father and son bonding. And his two-year-old sister said, "when I grow up, daddy must bring me to workplace, ok?" I would definitely like to do so...but I wondered whether I would be working for the same company. So, I just smiled and told her "It's my pleasure to do so, if I can."