Not quite time to panic yet.

Admittedly, we’re not entirely on the ball when it comes to the academic side of things for the kids. We’re big on learning through play around here. Or to be more precise, playing through play, forget the learning bit. We don’t send them for Phonics or Math or Chinese classes. We don’t make them practice penmanship or use the abacus. And as far as they’re concerned, Shichida is something they eat at a Japanese restaurant, not some fancy flash card memory thingamajig.

Okay, I panicked a little when I saw this English worksheet for a Primary One kid. Seriously, with my Comms degree, I couldn’t even do question 1. If this is what my kids are supposed to know at age 7, I’m in for some fun once they go to Primary School. And by fun, I actually mean the opposite.

Me and the husband, we’re products of the typical Singaporean education system. We’ve gone the traditional PSLE > O’Levels > A’Levels > University route so we know how important it is to see those A’s on the report card at the end of every year. Maybe I’ll be singing a different tune once Truett goes to P1 but I look at the amount of stress kids these days are under and I think it’s up to us as parents to find the happy medium between the pursuit of academic excellence and just chilling the hell out.

I guess if there’s one thing we are big on around here, it’s reading. Tru and Kirsten are able to memorize the words of their favorite books but they’re still not at the ‘pick up a new book and read it to themselves’ stage yet so we’re the ones who introduce them to the awesomeness of fiction.

They didn’t use to enjoy reading as much when we used to read them kiddie books like “this is an orange ball…” But ever since we started reading them proper stories about princesses and talking monkey trucks, they’ve been captivated.

My favorite moment during story time with the kids is when I’m halfway through a story and I pause to clear my throat and they look at me with anticipation on their faces before one of them asks, “then what happened?” In that moment, I know that the words on the pages have stopped being just random words and become something far more magical. That’s when I know that they’ve fallen in love with the story.

I can’t wait to introduce them to the world of Hogwarts and Narnia and Secret Gardens. To dance around with them in Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory and hang out with Charlotte and Wilbur, my two favorite talking animals.

The rest of the school stuff, we’ll all throw up our hands and shriek together once they get to Primary School.

And then maybe we’ll find a way to figure out whether G, P, S or B is the odd one out.