There’s an interesting news article about that rite-of-passage many parents of young children go through here: the Meet-the-Parents sessions, or Meet-the-Teachers depending on your perspective. In it, the author compares what these sessions were like during her time as a student against the sessions she now attends as a parent. Oddly, I don’t ever recall my parents ever attending teacher-meeting sessions when I was in school. Maybe it was because my brothers and I then were all very well-behaved, sedate, reasonably well-performing and ultimately boring primary school students – that our teachers had no misdemeanors ever to report. Or more likely, it was because my parents were teachers, and my Mom an especially tough disciplinarian that we were routinely a lot more fearful of our mother’s disapproval (and caning) than we were ever of our teachers.
When it comes to the same sessions with Hannah these 2 years now at her kindergarten, Ling routinely makes it a point to have the both of us attend. The most recent session was last week Thursday morning, where we spoke to both of her teachers separately. We’d already guessed that Hannah was probably well-behaved in school, given her disposition at home and at her nanny’s place, but were both still surprised at how much praise both her teachers heaped on her. Oh, as these things go, both Ling and I were alert to listening for areas of improvement or criticism in between their praises, but despite that, we heard nothing that would require us to act on. Their written comments are below:
For the non-Chinese – or actually just our Ang Mo bud – I think the second paragraph is roughly translated to:
“She is a popular girl in class; listening to stories, singing and dancing are her greatest loves. She’s attentive in class, shows very good comprehension skills, listens to her teachers’ instructions, and demonstrates thoughtfulness in her answers to teachers. She shows great interest in homework. She deserves to be emulated.”
Ok; any errors in translation should be blamed at me, since I barely passed Chinese in school after all.=) Her Chinese teacher – who has been with Hannah for longer than her English teacher – was especially pointed too in sharing how Hannah has changed since the last time we spoke earlier this year – e.g. she’s able to handle failure and disappointment better without too easily breaking into tears – and wondered if the fact that Hannah is now sister to a baby brother has also helped her opened up even more. Her parting remarks: “Whatever you’re doing as parents with Hannah at home, it’s definitely working!” LOL.
The glowing praise from her teachers aside, Hannah at home continues to demonstrate assertiveness and the occasional very mild still thankfully passive-aggressiveness. Early on in the week, her nanny reported that Hannah didn’t listen to her instructions to keep her voice down and not wake Peter up, so Ling at home physically disciplined her for the first time (basically hit her hand). This was something we’d already warned Hannah earlier on – about consequences if she didn’t behave.
Couple of pictures from the last week too.
Way to go, Hannah!