Questions About Marriage

After one month of work, Tutu’s Mom could not stand having Tutu away from Monday to Friday. She told Tutu’s Dad that she wanted to resign, he supported her decision. However, when she called her boss, she got even better deal: she is asked to work part time! In such a way, she can keep the balance between work and family. Tutu was then taken home and back to his old kindergarten. All of his old friends were happy to see him. Lots of questions were given to Tutu, and he has tons as well for his friends. The most interesting one was “whom are you going to marry when you grow up?” One saying from the kids was “when a boy grows up, he is going to be a Dad. For a Dad, whom is he going to marry? Of course, the person is going to be Mom!” …

First Day in Boarding Kindergarten

Here came the day Tutu was going to the kindergarten boarding school, which means, he will spend Monday till Friday in the school and the weekend at home. Tutu’s Mom asked him to pick a toy to take with him. Tutu chose Xiao Guai, his pet kitten, to go with him — well, it has to be a secret of course! The episode showed that Tutu liked the new school almost immediately; but on the other side, his parents found it hard to have him away: his Dad cried while seeing Tutu off; his Mom kept calling the school just to have a talk with him; his friends in his old school did not want to start to learn a new game because they wanted to learn it together with Tutu. …

Dear Xiaodou Class

Tutu’s Mom started to work. Tutu’s parents therefore decided to send Tutu to a boarding kindergarten. He thus has to say goodbye to his friends in his old class -Xiaodou Class. Everybody gave him something so he will remember them. Tutu also gave Little Prince the teddy bear which Little Prince’s Mom threw into trash can. It turned out that this teddy bear was Little Prince’s favorite toy. To everybody’s surprise, the normally mute Little Prince even spoke out of his joy!…

• Language learning is difficult
• You have to have a gift for learning languages
• You have to live where the language is spoken
• Only children can learn to speak another language well
• To learn a language you need formal classroom instruction
• You need to speak in order to learn (and I have nobody to speak to)
• I would love to learn but I don’t have the time

There are more than 6000 languages. Some are more important because they are spoken by more people and in more countries. For example, Mandarin Chinese is spoken by over 1 billion people. Chinese origin words account for 60% of Japanese, Korean and Vietnamese vocabulary. So knowing Chinese helps learning these languages to a great extent. Chinese culture has influenced the world for thousands of years in terms of philosophy, art, medicine, technology, food etc. It is a language well worth learning.

Critical Period in Tutu’s Family

Tutu’s Mom decided to seek for a job. She got up early one day and cooked lots of dishes for Tutu and his Dad. The dishes were for them to eat for several days. At the beginning, Tutu and his Dad ate very well. Days passed, the food was not delicious any more and any food from other people became good food for them. This was the critical period in his family. Finally Tutu’s Mom came back home. Did she find a job? How did the critical period end? Have a look at the video.

I gave a presentation to 6th grade social studies students on the topic of Balance and Harmony in Ancient Chinese Civilization. Well, the theory was developed thousands of years ago, but it is still in consideration and practice of Chinese people. The major theories I mentioned were Yin and Yang, and five elements. In practice, I talked about Chinese medicine, Fengshui, Chinese diet and Qigong. …

The videos I included in the presentation do not seem to work in the embedded slides, so here they are:

Great Mom

Tutu’s Mom is very capable of doing household work. She cooks well, she takes good care of the house and her family. One day she receives the parent-teacher conference invitation from Tutu’s class. She went to attend the conference, but with fear that the teacher might say something negative about Tutu. But to her surprise, Tutu’s teacher did not say anything negative about anybody; instead she asked the moms to introduce themselves. However, in front of a group of working mothers, Tutu’s Mom felt a bit ashamed. Well, she shouldn’t have felt so though because in Tutu’s eyes, she is the greatest mother in the whole world.

Magical Invisibility Clothes

Tutu came up with an idea: magical invisibility clothes. What would you do if you wore magical invisibility clothes? Different people have different answers. But how does an invisibility clothes look like? How to get one? Tutu and his friends had got no idea until one day they found Baby Xiao Douding disappeared while they were all playing together. They went to Xiao Douding’s house and found him at home. So they believed that the diaper of Xiao Douding’s is the invisibility clothes they were looking for. Having asked for some from Xiao Douding’s mother, the kids started to do things they don’t normally do, thinking that they can not be seen by others. …

Kitty Xiao Guai’s Super Power

Tutu’s kitty, Xiao Guai, has super power: it can speak human language, but only to Tutu! It all started when Tutu cut off its whiskers. Xiao Guai explained to Tutu the importance of whiskers to a cat, so Tutu told his Mom when she was ready to scold him. But the fact that Xiao Guai could talk to Tutu made Tutu’s mother worry because Xiao Guai did not make a sound when other people were around. One day, Tutu’s mother decided to separate Tutu and Xiao Guai by sending Xiao Guai to　Tutu’s grandfather who lives 100 miles away. Very soon, Xiao Guai got disappeared. One week later, it showed up in the bushes near Tutu’s kindergarden…

It is Father’s Day. Tutu was assigned to do two things to show his Dad: first, say “I love you” to him; secondly, do something to please him.

When he told his parents the assignments, they got excited too. Tutu’s father came from a typical traditional Chinese family in which fathers do not openly express love to their children and children therefore do not express their love verbally either. So he decided to invite his father over for this special day. Tutu and his Mom also urged him to say “I love you” to his father too.

When Tutu’s granddad came, he spent a whole day with Tutu in an amusement park. When he was about to leave, Tutu’s father gathered courage and said “I love you, Dad!” to him.