Life of Sunny

As you all know it has been 6 months since we shifted to India. I feel that we have been here lot longer. I guess we adapted to this life lot faster than we imagined. Kids have forgotten US except for some special people that we had in our lives. We dearly miss US when we are running short on Almond Butter or some such exotic Trader Joe's goody. I know my life revolves around food!

But anyways Sunny has adopted very well to Indian life. He is now a skinny, tanned boy. He absolutely loves his school. He is most well read boy in his class. So teacher says his thoughts in writing are really well constructed. His handwriting has improved a lot after coming here. He has to write lot of essays and creative writing type of things. He is now trying to write cursive.

His Hindi progress has been phenomenal. In 4 months he is doing grade II Hindi. He still does some mistakes with his 'Matras'. I can tell that he really does not like Hindi as he always finds excuses not to do his Hindi homework. School also has started giving him extra attention on Saturdays on an individual basis so he could do better in Hindi.

His math skill are good. But I feel that the math level that they are doing in school is lower than what he used to do in Montessori. His school is also having math teacher retention problems since the academic year began. I am thinking of putting him in Kumon for same reason so he could learn at his own pace and not with school pace.

One area where he really lacks is his organizational skills. He never completely writes his homework in his Almanac. He fails to bring appropriate books related to that homework. His cubby in his school is never arranged and he has hard time finding right things for the appropriate periods in school. He leaves lot of blank pages in notebooks for no reason. His notebooks are messy. He forgets things everywhere. We(teachers and us) are putting extra efforts in getting him more organized by giving him guide lines and and using points system even at home.

The school giving them good exposure to lot of extracurricular activities like music, soccer, gymnastics, basic computer skills and Olympiads. He plays soccer in school with friends. On Tuesdays he has swimming, Wednesdays he has Horse riding and Thursdays he has skating in school. He has opted for Chess for his activity. They also have computer education where they are teaching him how to write and save a file and some other basic things.

They have show and tell sessions in school on Mondays. They have an assembly in school on 3 days a week. They have morning 15 minutes health class where they do some sort of exercises. He also participates in Gymnastics. Since so many of the activities are covered in school I am happy that I do not have to drive him anywhere on weekends for any classes.

Sunny as usual eats his oatmeal in the morning. At 9:00 is he eats a fruit, snack and juice tiffin. He eats his Roti and subji lunch at noon. He reaches the daycare around 2:15, where one of the didis helps him change and serves him nice lunch. He then rests for some time before beginning his homework. They have evening activities in the day care as well for an extra cost. He participates in chess, gymnastics and skating(playing hockey) in the day care. He then gets his snack with Bournvita milk at around 5:30 pm.

Over the weekend he has Piano teacher coming home to teach him keyboard. I don't think he is doing too well with it since he never practices keyboard during the weekdays. But I am hopeful that this will at least make his motor skills better. Also over the weekend the school gives them enough homework to keep them busy for at least couple of hours.

Sunny and Chiku are always together wherever they go. They sometimes fight but I bet not as much as my bro and I fought. So I am happy that wherever they are, they are always there for each other.

As usual he has been a avid reader where he has fallen in love with Roald Dahl and finished his entire series except two books. He has also finished Mary Pope Osborne Magical Tree House series.

He takes long time to make friends. He only has one boy in school that he say "is not too silly like other boys". That friend is over to our place today for a play date.

So this is Sunny's life jam packed with activities and school. But he enjoys all of it.

I am really glad to have a son like Sunny!