Another school next year

The famous spaceship playground

One of the walkways of the school

Last weekend, we went to Maris Stella Kindergarten to pay for C1's school fees to confirm her place there next year, 2011! She will be attending the afternoon session in Bluebell class! All the classes are supposed to be named after beautiful flowers, until I found out that there was a class called Golden Shower! To make things worse, Chloe is supposed to be that class for in the morning session. Thankfully, I had to change her class to PM, phew!!!

Gawd, dunno why no one has told the nuns the other meaning of this...Maybe I should?

Another day at school

Its been 3 weeks since Chesley started going to Zesty Spot. Just like her sister, for the first few days she walked in happily as she got distracted from the bubbles and the moutain of toys. It took her around 30mins to realise that no one was around her any more and she would cry for a while. With her easty going nature, the teachers could distract her and calm her down easily.
Nowadays, she walks into class with out a tear but the crying only comes at the end of class when we pick her up. Hmm... I guess it is must be the built up of anxiety.

Back to school

Back to school after the June holidays, also C2's first day of school

Chloe's school work

Every Friday, Chloe's school bag will be stuffed with her school work. I always marvel at how she is getting better as weeks go by. Every since she has been attending school at Aunty C's place, her speech dictation has improved. Not forgetting her handwriting and colouring - yes, she is still trying to colour within the lines but hey, she is only 2!

Check out some of her work I received last week.

C1 @ school

Chloe with he favourite 老师

Chloe has been going to Auntie C's Montessori-style home school for the last few months. Since attending school there, she has been come more chatty and sociable. She even speaks in whole sentences now. She has also been singing quite bit nowadays, especially in Mandarin but I can't seem to understand it yet, except for Twinkle Twinkle Little Stars!

A new school next year

Goodbye Zesty Spot...Hello Aunty Chris' school!

This will Chloe's school come 2010. We are very fortunate that one of our relatives own a little boutique, Montessori-styled school catered for children from 2-6 years old. There are only 12 students in the school and 3 teachers. Wonderful student teacher ratio and the kids get all the attention they need in learning phonics, counting, mathematics, Mandarin and everything else they are required to know before they start in Primary 1.

We have already started sending Chloe there on Tuesdays and Thursdays as a form trial for the last 2 months, before she starts going there from Monday to Friday, starting next Janurary. She seems to enjoy it there and even tries to show off to us the new Mandarin songs she learns in school. The best part of Chloe going to this school is that she will be under Aunty Chris' guidence and care. At the end of the day, we know that Chloe is good hands.

a-not-so-scary Halloween!!

Sitting at the bar near Aunty Bec's restaurant

Kaitlyn bringing Chloe over to the next house to get more candy

C1 waiting for the party to start at school

Little Strawberry Chloe and Racing Car driver Constantine

Chloe celebrated Halloween again this year with her pals, Kait and Kim at their condo. Decked up as a little 'devilish' strawberry, she went trick-o-treating with the Pink Princess Kaitlyn and the Bouncing Pumpkin Kimberly. The girls had a ball of a time collecting all the candy, except for a few scary costumes that kinda freaked the little girls out.

Earlier in the day, Chloe was also in the same costume when she went to school. I decided to drop her off early so that I could take some pictures of her and her classmates. But when we got there only 1 other boy was in 'costume'. Nothing scary about him either....he was a Race Car Driver! and he has one of the most distinctives name, Constantine! Yup, just like movie

Chloe's first performance

Last Saturday, Chloe has her very first school performance. It was in-conjuction with the Mid-Autumn Festival celebrations held at the condo where her school was. Managed to take a video of her, not a very good one coz of the people in front of me. But, it is good enough to see her performance on stage. From her face, you can tell that she had a little stage-fright at first and after a while she warmed up and started to do her thing.

No more tears

After going to school for 3 weeks, 3 times a week...Chloe doesn't shed a tear anymore when we drop her off in school! She can even bid us goodbye.

Crossing of another milestone.

New School - Week 1

All set, ready for school!

Chloe's first week of school at Zesty Spot started last Monday. When we arrived at her new school, there were some other kids there already. All of them were all occupied doing something like playing with bubbles or going up and down the slide. Teacher B greeted us and sprayed on some disinfectant on Chloe's hands. After which, Chloe got excited and tippy toed to join the other kids playing with the bubbles. Teacher B told me to leave and advised if C1 criesd uncontrollably, like all other children on their first day of school, and if they were not able to manage, she would call me to come 30min earlier to pick her.

Being rather kan cheong, I arrived 45min earlier. Just when I arrived, Teacher B called to say that C1 had stopped crying and its OK for me to pick her at the normal time ie 11am. Since I was already there, I thought I should peer on what my darling daughter was up to. When I looked in, there were no kids were in sight as they were in the pantry cum canteen having their snack time. I came back 20min later to peep and found the little kids seated in a circle listening to one of the teachers tell a story.

Soon after, class ended. I walked over to the entrance and was greeted by Teacher B and Chloe who was a little teary eyed but smiling. Could tell from C1's face she was really glad that I came to pick her as promised. Teacher B mentioned that Chloe is an independent girl who only cried for 10min. To my expectations, I am pleased that she only cried for that long and not a whole hour!

The next class...Chloe cried for less than 5min... A little sign of independence! =)

Chloe's new school

When Chloe turned 18 months, I decided that it is time to instill a little more independence in her. Hence, I decided to take Chloe out of Playdayz and enrolled her to another play school near our home that has the 'drop off' facility.

The play school that I chose is Zesty Spot at Pandan Valley. It is a quiet little school facing the lush garden. It isn't posh, shiny or new but I felt a nice, warm, homely feeling when I first stepped into the school to take a look. The teachers are friendly and best of all, there are 4 teachers in class with only 12 students. Two Chinese speaking teachers who spoke only Mandarin to the kids and two English speaking teachers. Coincidentally, one of the teachers is also one of our friend's younger sister.

Moreover, Chloe's friend Kaitlyn, who is a year older, has been attending the school for more than a year and she thoroughly enjoys it. With a good student teacher ratio, bilingual teaching, close proximity to home and recommendation, I decided to enrol her there.