Tuesday 21 April 2020

Extended WFH + school closure - HBL

I just finished instant curry noodles. The last time I had that was probably 20 years ago in Oxford, of all places. I had it coz I felt like a beer or instant noodles. My itchy nose told me to go for the noodles - spicy would be great. And Sito happened to have bought a pack a couple of weeks back.

And I felt like a beer or instant noodles coz of the news on the extension of the circuit breaker, aka WFH + school closure.

I knew that PM was going to speak at 5 pm. But I was busy with freeze dance.

In the shower, I was just thinking that one nice thing about this whole thing is that we get to start dinner earlier at 5.30 pm, which gives us a lot of time to eat, shower and read. Today, we read quite a bit, especially Yang who was enjoying the self-narrated books from the NLB app.

Then I turned on my phone and saw the news everywhere. Need to find more nice things to keep me sane.

The next piece of news at 9 on was easier on the heart and mind - they are swopping June holidays for May holidays! No HBL in May! School is still closed but at least I don't have to care about learning!

Sito forgot to buy coke in the day and went down when I was having noodles. I read about no bubble tea and no bah kwa, and called him immediately! But he would have known from the queues downstairs.

My dear husband 不负重望 and came home with both prized goodies. But no coke coz the supermarket line was too crazy.

No cakes or desserts too

Friday 17 April 2020

I'm alive, yeah!

The Mac died though. It happened the night before school closure, which explains why I took this long to update. I managed to back up the last bit by mirroring the dark display to the TV just before the whole thing went bust. Learnt from JY that the repair shop was open so made an appointment on Friday for Sito to bring it down - the display went bust, a known fault so it was replaced for free despite being way out of warranty.

I had wanted to reprint the timetable for the next day coz I only just learnt that Kai’s HBL would take about four hours; I had catered for only two hours based on his first HBL and had asked Sito to print already. Since the Mac died, I referred to the printout and drew out the amended timetable instead. And some time in the evening, I had this beautiful idea of letting the kids put a sticker on completed periods. And if they get all the stickers, they get a marshmallow!

I even set up school bells!


The dreaded day came finally. Wednesday, 8 April 2020.

They kind of followed the timetable. Yu was sticky at some points. And the PE didn’t go very well! I happened to have a video call at that time and pretty much left them to fight!

Lunch was ok except for Yang who was still angry over what happened. I don’t know what happened haha!

The whole COVID-19 thing was giving me a lot of work so I didn’t manage to end on time as usual. So Kai had to wait for me to sort out his last remaining assignment on SLS - audio recordings.

Turned out that the browser didn’t allow audio recording. But somehow I couldn’t download chrome! It took a pair of reading glasses before I read the pop-up box that said that the system was in a mode where only approved apps could be installed. But thankfully I could get out of that mode.

I let Yu play an old game to learn Mandarin on the old iPad. And guess what, the iPad sound gave way at the end of the day! How timely for school closure...

Yu enjoying his game


Results at the end of the first day - no one got a marshmallow!


The next day was surprisingly easier. They were quite nicely occupied most of the time. Were they getting used to the timetable? So fast?!!

Sito finally set up his home office after bringing back his monitor the previous night


He works with Big Scary Llama in the same room :p And one afternoon, it rained so his video call backdrop went from the pristine white wall to clothes!

They had their PE finally!


Yu was too tired...!


My napping babies :)


Volcano time! Everyone wants a turn at this


Scooting downstairs - different master legs for the two right-handers...


That was taken just before the security guard chased us away! So apparently, we could not play there. The playground was supposed to be closed though it was not stated so in the circular. During such time, it's better to be a dog - even a dog gets to run about!

Yu got the first marshmallow and was the only one to get it!


The first WFH + school closure week was a short week due to Good Friday. But this public holiday weekend, we could only nua at home :(

Made a lot of mini muffins but in the end, they preferred the normal ones and kept eating half of those, grrr!


And we had a good balanced lunch of porridge and air-fryer mid joints!


I put only salt on the chicken. Sito had doubts until he saw and tasted them :) But Kai didn't like it. Sito said perhaps kids need a more complex favour....? Yang and Yu didn't even try coz they were full from the porridge - I sad... I thought this time - second time I did this combi - I would ensure they could finish their porridge AND chicken by giving them porridge first :(

The younger brothers came home on Tuesday with only an Easter activity, which we really enjoyed doing on Friday while Kai played chess with Papa :) Yang even did a little show-and-tell of the Easter story!

Yang doing his work


Yu was also very serious!


Made these collages to send to their teachers. When I was doing so, I saw that they had just sent a list of five home activities for each boy for next week! I thought they wouldn't have :( Thankfully, even though they were all facilitated, they were nothing demanding. And no live lessons thank goodness! Just had to adjust our timetable to accommodate these activities after nap time.

I heard of live lessons for preschoolers from friends, even for 2yo kids! Seriously, those need parents to be super involved, if only to prevent the kid from hitting the keyboard! I'm very glad my centre is very normal and understand that parents also need to work.

And I'm working part-time leh. If I were working full time, I’d just say sorry teacher and simply read at bedtime (English and Chinese), give them counting with Paula (maths) and blaze (science), and cast Avengers workouts (PE) and cartoons from 腾讯 (more Chinese).

This Easter Sunday, I did not buy Kinder eggs - they would just fight over the toys like last year! Instead, I made English breakfast! For lunch! :p Of course, I must first inform the boys in advance that we were not having pizza for this stay-in Sunday lunch...

Hotdog buns for the kids which they loved!


Sito's version - no mushrooms, with omelette


Mine - with mushrooms and overeasy overhard eggs!!!


On Sunday night, I had to adjust the timetable again coz Kai's log-in time had changed from noon to 8.30 am! But it was late when I read the message so I decided it was ok to just log in after 8.30 am, i.e. noon :p

But his form teacher called me that day to check on Kai. I asked him if the timing would be fixed henceforth. He said yes and that it would be good to take attendance at 8.30 am and do the work later if I had a timetable issue. He also confirmed that it was ok if the kid took way less than the four hours mentioned - I was glad to hear that!

So in the end, I made three changes to the timetable - include younger kids' work, reduce Kai's HBL hours and move them to 8.30 am; it's too much to have him log on twice. Kai wasn't too pleased coz that meant he couldn't have Nintendo in the morning. Oh well!

Monday was a day of a particularly ill decision - I couldn't help them set up PE before lunch so I joined them before dinner. I felt the pain come on halfway through *.* It was so painful by night time. I wondered if it could also be due to a slightly longer jog on Saturday.. But the pain on the outside of the thighs must be from one of those darn Avengers workouts!

I told them I had backache and couldn't do the donkey kick - not false coz Kai jumped my back last week!


Yu was sitting out the first few videos coz he was waiting for Spider Man. I didn't watch all the clips fully or carefully so when it came on, my jaw dropped - so much floor work, so difficult!!

The boys doing the Spider Man workout; me, um, backache...


Kai tends to ask me how to do this, how to do that. But I'm always busy thinking about something at work or having video calls. If he has no IT difficulty, he has to wait until 2 pm when I knock off - actually usually later... But I have realised that he can figure things out by himself! Or he just got it wrong! Hoho! I don’t know coz I don’t check his work; I just congratulate / praise him on finishing his work! I’m super thankful that his HBL is meant for independent work and not demanding on parents.

Happened to turn and see him reading his Chinese textbook to answer questions on SLS :)


I was looking forward to this egg activity with Yu! Lucky we always have eggs at home - raw and hardboiled!


Yang can write dates in Chinese!


Coz I was still hurting from the PE, I swopped it for freeze dance on Tuesday. It sounded pretty boring to me, especially when I didn't have any rewards or penalty. But they were quite engaged!! It only matters how challenging the video is, e.g. Kai doesn't like the 12345 one coz it's just wiggling fingers...

Kai had a tummy ache and did it sitting down *.*


Before school closure, I thought I would still doll up despite WFH since I would still go out to send Kai to school. But when school closure also hit, I've been wearing only a nice tee or blouse with pyjamas bottoms *.* And Yu crawled into bed on Tuesday night and his head landed on my lips - no more mei mei :(

Yang and Yu weren't bothered by this but Kai didn't dare to look at it!


The first half of the week, they boys were pretty rough after nap time, running all over pretending to fight and actually fighting!

We spent almost 30 min to clean up this mess *.*


Yu suddenly didn't want to nap for two days. The first time, I didn't give him funny video. The second time, I kept him in the room while his brothers were watching funny video. Back to napping after that :)

He also decided that it was "too hot" to wear pants *.* Very often, we see a little boy running around in his underwear...

And yesterday, I stepped out of the house for the first time since Sunday morning. Coz this laptop was ready! Took a bus there and suffered in the sun at the bus stop - I believe this caused me to knock out with the kids. Cabbed back coz I thought I could save some time and get back earlier. I saved some time indeed but spent it waiting for Koi - 20 min!!! Came back to find that the new iPad arrived too!

The kids enjoyed popping the bubble wrap for the laptop!


So today, Kai and I listened to Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone on the library app on the iPad. Yang and Yu played Reading Eggs on the iPad too. And now I'm typing away on the laptop, Happy! :)

Yang did his activity but didn't smile for the camera coz he couldn't poop *.*


And the teachers have uploaded activities for the next week! I managed to print out some worksheets, and upped my timetable quality to a printed version - with pretty clock faces! :)

So there, we have survived a full week plus a bit of school closure! More to go, jia you!

Monday 6 April 2020

WFH + school closure = depressing weekend

When I wrote my last post, I certainly did not expect round 2 to last one month!

I was helping my colleagues deliver stuff to SSOs on Friday afternoon after the end of my work day when I saw that the PM was going to address the nation at 4 pm. Even before that, the driver of my second Grab car (who was standing next to me at the void deck when I called the ride!) was telling me that people were rushing to the supermarket already.

Why oh why do such things happen when I want to cook on the weekend?!

Towards the tail end of my tour of duty, I heard from R that our worst fears had come true - school closure!!! I reached home past 4 pm and caught the media conference. For a short while, I wondered if preschools included child care centres.. Wishing against hope!

After that, I was feeling pretty low. WFH + HBL was bad enough. Now the younger ones are going to be home too!

The kids were naughty at dinner time, which irked me a lot. And worst, the wifi went down. Hello, WFH?! I restarted the thing two or three times. Somehow, it worked again. Then Sito was 45 min late for dinner.

Super low.

We went to IKEA to get a desk. Sito was working on the dining table and in bed for two days the previous week. Not sustainable if WFH is sustained. But plenty had the same idea - n weeks ago! Coz we faced very limited options. In the end, we got a white desk that is longer than what we had eyed earlier. We wanted a black one that could eventually go into Kai's room in future. Oh well.

Me squeezing in with the desk in the cab home - a leg went numb


Had to cheer myself up


And I really felt much better! That was maybe six hours of depression there. It will give way to angry and shouting mama in the coming days... Seriously, WFH with young kids is hardly feasible for many with young kids - my boys had angelic faces but they are no angel!

I decided last week that we would scrap Saturday lunch from the foodcourt so I went to the supermarket early in the morning to get some quick groceries. Not too quick in the end coz Yu insisted on following... Lunch was a simple porridge with Ikea fried chicken wings.

For dinner, though, it was the usual eating out. And we decided we would eat out on Sunday too else no chance - ya, we were one of those "last dinner" type :p It's going to be a nightmare three times a day to get the kids to eat at home. They're super slow and run about the whole time. Eating out is so much easier - they just sit there! At most, they shift in the seats. But they sit there and finish their food!

Conveyor belt sushi at Ichiban yesterday


For some reason, dinner at Dian Xiao Er usually turned out unexpectedly smooth after much whining by Kai


We went to the library on Saturday to return some DVDs and got new books and DVDs - not many but should be enough to tide us through the month. Tried to go outdoor but the BPP playground was closed. We went home after an ice cream. Sunday morning, we finally had some outdoor - pool time! And I went down with them. It was quite fun :)

After a while, Sito and Kai went to the deep pool, leaving three of us in the kiddy pool


And that afternoon, I got news that they're closing the pool too! So sad for the kids... I'd probably still give them pizza for Sunday lunch - keep them happy...

I’m going to prepare a timetable of activities but I suspect in the end, I have to feed them YouTube, coz Yu would run to me every advertisement time *.* This means I lose my bargaining chip for them to be good until their 3-min YouTube before bedtime. I might even lose the afternoon nap for Yu over the month. Woe is me. This “circuit breaker” had better work!!

Wednesday 1 April 2020

WFM vs. HBL - round 1

The most common abbreviations these days: work from home vs. home-based learning.

And today, these two had their first showdown!

I think WFM kena KO-ed.

This is my week in office but I decided to WFM today to help Kai with his first HBL day. He was scheduled for 12 nn to 2 pm so I drew up a timetable for the morning to keep him occupied for the morning:

8 am: Read narrated picture books

I chanced upon these marvellous books yesterday and Kai likes it! He read two books yesterday evening. So I downloaded more last night in preparation for today. He read a few books and went on to an old Cat in the Hat app to read it. I was so happy that he was reading for over an hour!

Pulled out our old iPad and a stand that was almost never used


His brothers enjoy the narrated books too, especially Yang who even sat through an audiobook


My grand plan is to slowly move him to wordier books.. By force if I have to! Though that would mean I need physical books and my glasses - I should probably make proper glasses than rely on $2 versions... We'll see..

Anyway, next..

9 am: Play Rubik's cube

I got him a new 4x4 cube recently. But he was playing with it during breakfast so he didn't want to play again. He decided to skip to the next activity which was supposed to start at 9.30 am, since it was about 9.15 am by then.

9.30 am: Draw or paint

He chose to paint. I left it to him to get paper, paint, paintbrush and palette. I didn't notice how he was painting behind me on the dining table coz I was working. Then he showed me paint flecks on the floor, and he went to shower. I continued working until he finished showering and told me to look at the walls.

Goodness. There were spots of paint on the two walls facing the table!

I gave him wet wipes and had him wipe down the walls. He exclaimed that he was so tired! But nope, he had to deal with the consequences. Recapped this at bedtime just now - good, he now knows splattering paint about isn't so fun when cleaning is involved!

He went to lie down in bed to rest after that. Really tired!

11.30 am: Lunch

He took lunch a little earlier. He asked if we could have tea. I have stopped giving him afternoon on weekdays coz it was too much right after lunch which affected his dinner. But today he had an early lunch so I agreed to afternoon tea.

12.00 nn: HBL starts

Unlocked the laptop for him and help him log into the platform. He told me he got all his answers correct for his first assignment, which was Chinese. I praised him. Then I pretty much left it to him to do everything.

Of course there were questions and comments - how to spell this, how to draw (no need to draw!), how to get out of this (window), do I spell the number, oh I watched this before, ah so tired! This boy doesn't read instructions too carefully so I kept reminding him about that.

Starting on SLS


I also referred to the WhatsApp message on what to do. It mentioned to refer to two hardcopy thing. I had to dig his mess out of his school bag to help him find. Found the maths one which he did on his own. But I couldn't find the English one. He eventually finished all by 1.45 pm. I had him do five star jumps before I let him loose on his one hour of laptop games.

A short while in, he complained about a dialogue box on lack of space. I found that his lousy laptop has run out of storage! And someone had deleted some audio pen files I downloaded some time ago... Anyway, it's still good for e-learning.

Shortly after, he started to throw a tantrum and cry. I had to go calm him down. Of course that escalated pretty quickly and I had to threaten to take the laptop away if he didn't calm down. I mean, why play when it makes you unhappy?! He was still sulking when he went back to the game but after a while, he told me that ok, he had calmed down. Gosh. He tends to dis-regulate quite a bit. I just did a quick google and will go read more...

With games, I finally managed to finish work in peace!

At 3 pm, we left the house for afternoon tea. He wanted to stay in but hello, nothing to eat at home. And I think he could really do with going out after being cooped up at home for much of the day. And he deserved tea :)

He asked for Yakun, as expected. So we had that before I picked up some toiletries at Watson while he dashed about the shop - I brought Yu there before and seriously, I don't know who was the more difficult one!!

When we got back, I decided to teach him - once again - how to pack his bag properly. I found crumpled pieces of paper in his bag, and the nth broken book cover, sighs. I also repacked his comms book which I didn't dig out just now, and a good thing I did coz I found that he had written about Chinese homework which was not mentioned in WhatsApp or SLS!

One item couldn't be found. The other, he could do mostly on his own. And while he was doing, I keyed in my expenditure today and happened to check my emails. And lucky I did, for his form teacher had sent an email about him (and some others in bcc) forgetting to bring back his worksheet - ah, that missing English worksheet!

It is due tomorrow so I had to print it out. But our printer has an issue with black. I did a power clean and thankfully, it worked!

Now, we're doing HBL once a week. We're entering a new era of blended learning now, the pace made quicker and more urgent due to the COVID-19 situation. This means we are likely to have more HBL in future. SAHPs have no issue and welcome it coz safer for kids to stay at home. WFH vs. HBL is a problem of regular working parents.

But the group of parents who can't WFH and have no caregiving support, the children who need teachers' help to cope, the children who already have school attendance issues - would they be stranded somehow? Kai's school has support for parents who need help. But I know at least R's school doesn't and her student care would take the kids only from 1.30 pm onwards. Hope this won't end up with some children missing out on learning.

So there. Our first showdown; more to come. Maybe next time I just go to office and let him loose on the laptop. So tiring with kid at home while WFH, with laptop issues, with homework surprises!

I gave myself a facial mask just now. I deserved it.