Naomi's ballet performance at Crestar School of Dance

Naomi has been learning ballet at Crestar School of Dance for a few months now. During the school term holidays, she has an excellent learning experience from an intensive workshop --- "Australia Dance Exchange Holiday Workshop 2007", conducted over the past one week at Crestar's Marine Parade dance studio. Tonight was "Performance Day" at Nanyang Girls' High School's Siew May Auditorium. Nothing beats seeing the joy and excitement on her face on stage.

Here's a short video clip (above) on her class (pre-ballet/primary) item "My Teddy Bear", choregraphed by Ms. Emma Nickoll from Australia.

Nathan's last music lesson with teacher Michelle at Cristofori

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Today is Nathan's last music lesson with teacher Michelle at Cristofori. Nathan has always enjoyed the "Little Mozarts" lessons taught under Michelle. Michelle is a very passionate and caring music teacher who understands the behaviour of young children. She is instrumental in shaping Nathan's interests in piano and music.

We received notice from the music school that teacher Michelle would be leaving her teaching profession at the school after her completion of employment contract in December. Here's wishing her all the best in her future endeavours. We'll going to miss her jovial and contagious laughter!

Reward system or behavioral modification program?

A week ago, Sebastian and I worked out a rewards system for Naomi and Nathan to motivate them to exercise self-control and instill discipline in them. They have a hand in the design of their own rewards booklets and are very proud of their works. For example, earning up to 5 rubber stamps in the "I will practise on the piano" rewards page will have a "push-and-pop" sweet reward. They seem to be rather motivated to do that. Whatever it takes to motivate them to become more independent and disciplined, we have to give it a try!

A quick search on the Internet show that there are very good materials available for download. For those who wish to try out behavioral modification program for your children, try downloading some very nice incentive charts from the Association of for Comprehensive Neurotherapy. They even have affirmative notes and coupons to constantly remind your children! It's fantastic!