The wonderful about where we're staying is that the library is really just next to us, separated only by a teeny-tiny little road.
Back when I had more disposable income on hand, I would conveniently borrow from the second-hand bookstores cos they stock up some of the newest releases of books or authors that I like. These days, I go to the library -- its definitely much cheaper as long as I don't incur fines from late returns.
Faith's JG Mandarin class teachers were giving me advice on how to pique her interest in the subject by reading to her at home. Of course, since my Chinese is horribly atrocious, they told me to borrow some simple books with Hanyu Pinyin.
Hanyu Pinyin was a life saver back when I was in school and was occasionally called up by the teacher to stand and read a passage or two. It was what I counted on to get me by without which, I can never manage to read an entire sentence without having a clue what it meant or having the teacher to have to read many words that I couldn't managed.
Louis and I felt that in this day and age, Faith would not be able to get by with the level of [terrible] Mandarin standard that we both scrape by. Even though we don't speak much Mandarin at home, I hope to do whatever bit that I can to cultivate her interest in the language. At the very least, not to view it with as much dislike as I did when I was much younger.
Thus, we've borrowed some simple titles like "Gui Tu Sai Pao" (The tortise & the hare) and "San Zhi Xiao Zhu" (Three little pigs) for her. And while I was at the library, I decided to enquire about application of a library card for Faith and was pleasantly surprised to be informed by the counter staff that I could just do it at the e-Kiosk in the library and get the card instantly.
The library system is linked to OSCAR, and as a Singapore Citizen, all I had to do was key in her birth certificate number, slide in my NRIC and minutes later, I had a brand new library card in her own name.
With the additional library card, I can now borrow more books for her with her own card and rotate them around when I read to her at bedtime.
3 comments:
Definitely a good idea to get her started on books at a tender age. Good readers write better too.
yo Eve,
I believe there is a welcome kit for new reader,esp for children. Check it out with the librarian.
Btw, you can register your Mobile/email and the library will send you reminder on due dates, this way you won't miss it...i learnt it via the blogging mommies too... : )
好的开始是成功的一半 ！！
yes. yes...now I am going to get one library card for Grace... she always uses my IC to borrow books.. so now, I think she will be very excited to have a library card herself...:)
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