明報 Happy Pa Ma: 童書繪本 細味媽媽辛酸
母親節快到了！各位媽媽們當天除了與孩子慶祝外，有否想過與孩子一起共讀繪本，共同創造溫馨時刻？書伴我行（香港）基金會項目總監Angela早前接受明報訪問，為各位媽媽們介紹了一些有關母愛的繪本。同場亦有書伴我行（香港）基金會社區閱讀發展總監菜姨姨的圖書介紹呢！
Between The Lines: Is there a right way to deal with a sleepless child who wants to share mum’s bed?
The domestic helper who looked after my younger daughter for the past four years left our home six months ago. My daughter appears to be adjusting well because, rather than hire another helper, I have personally stepped in to fill the void. I know that she is thrilled to have so much of my time and attention. However, something different may be happening subconsciously. I mention this household change because I believe this to be the trigger point for a new occurrence in our home. Three months ago, my daughter started coming to me when she woke up in the middle of the night. Since then, she has made a regular appearance two or three times a week. Because this has not happened in the past, I find it quite endearing to be pulled out of slumber by the pitter-patter of her little feet as she scrambles to my bedside. With full knowledge that my daughter has lost her best friend and constant companion, I am sympathetic to her nighttime visits. She doesn’t fall asleep in my bed, so when I’m sufficiently conscious, we return to sleep in her bed, where she is safely lulled back to sleep. In her bed, I doze off while lying o
Reading for pleasure can help students deal better with pressure
After a trailblazing week in HK, Diane Frankenstein summarizes succinctly why reading together matters so much. South China Morning Post – Wednesday, 16 March, 2016 By Diane Frankenstein, San Francisco, US My work in strategic literacy has brought me to work in Hong Kong and China since 1998. I was dismayed to read about the recent cluster of student suicides in Hong Kong; I remember reading such articles many years ago. Suicide among children happens the world over and is cause for alarm on the part of parents, teachers and the community at large. Hopefully these recent premature deaths should provoke some soul searching for all adults. It is also critically important to speak openly and candidly with children about the pressures they feel to succeed, to be the best. The burden children feel inside the overriding message – that only the best will do, in grades, test scores, sports, in everything – is crippling. My recent work with Bring Me A Book, Hong Kong, the leading advocate for family literacy in Hong Kong, addressed parental concerns that their children were not reading for pleasure and
Between The Lines: Why a good tutor improves a child’s mindset, not their grades
Until recentlyI equated tutoring with cheating or laziness. I reasoned that if I was paying for my children to attend great schools, they should be able to do the work and should turn to the teacher for help if they encountered any difficulty. An outside tutor was a lazy indulgence of the well-heeled and antithetical to the effort to cultivate grit and perseverance in children. I was confounded and exasperated by the parenting approach of hiring tutors to do the work for children or to help them get ahead. I empathised with my son’s vexed geometry teacher who lamented that despite encouraging his students to seek him out and ask questions, few took up his offer. His students admitted that they could not come to after-school hours because they had to go to their maths tutors in Causeway Bay. Why would parents suffer the hassle and expense of hiring a tutor when the person responsible for their child’s grade was available and willing to assist? Then recently I attended a talk by Jake Newberg, founder of Revolution Prep, a global on-line tutoring agency that pairs professional tutors with students of all ages t
Between The Lines: How young children learn to enjoy reading
I was quick to stock our bookshelf at home with Frog and Toad, Ling and Ting, Mouse and Mole and other great character pairings in early chapter books, ready for when the children start to read independently. Yet for all of her first year in primary school, my daughter preferred to have me read aloud from our picture book collection, although she occasionally read them on her own. I had worried that chapter books, even the easy ones, were too intimidating for her, or that she simply didn’t enjoy reading. Such concerns turned out to be unwarranted: halfway through grade two, my daughter skipped the early readers, casually picked up Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and effortlessly read it on her own. So I was once again reminded that the reading journey does not have a specific route or time schedule; it is full of wandering and detours, much like the journey through childhood. Ever since I spied my daughter reading Charlie, I’ve been bringing within view and easy reach all the chapter books including Ramona the Brave, The Great Brain, The Enchanted Wood, and The Real Thief. I try not to let my love for books colou
Between The Lines: How to cut through the chatter and cultivate your child’s most important qualities
Have you ever heard a parenting expert say push your kids to breaking point, sign them up for multiple extracurricular activities, make them take all honours classes, allow technology in their bedrooms to keep in touch with friends all night, eating on the run is fine, and free time is a waste? Neither have I. Yet this is precisely what our generation of parents is doing, and it’s not serving anyone well. Why don’t we follow the evidence-based advice we receive? Unlike most fields of study, where expert opinions vary, parenting experts are remarkably similar on just about every topic except sleep training for babies. In getting kids to sleep through the night some advise letting infants cry it out, while others recommend co-sleeping, for example. While there is some variation in advice for infant care, when it comes to older children, and especially adolescents, the advice becomes strikingly consistent. Over the years I have attended dozens of lectures, taken copious notes and read many books to try to pick up some tips to be a more effective parent to my three children. Most advice falls into broad topics such as
閱讀工作坊書伴我行菜姨姨 (2016年4月21日 – 5月19日）
閱讀工作坊書伴我行菜姨姨 (2016年4月21日 – 5月19日） 閱讀工作坊書伴我行菜姨姨 (2016年4月21日 – 5月19日）現正接受報名, 名額有限，報名從速！ 讓孩子喜歡圖畫書的捷徑，就是父母親自己先去喜歡。 書伴我行(香港)基金會邀請了資深推動閱讀的工作者 ─ 菜姨姨，一起成立【書伴我行讀書會】，以繪本作主要的共讀材料，鼓勵爸媽不只為孩子講故事，也從故事中激發他們的閱讀興趣，並培養孩子的好奇心和想像力。 【書伴我行讀書會】提供了一個分享和討論優質繪本的平台，為個人成長及家庭提供豐富的閱讀資源，讓每個愛閱讀的家都更快樂更溫馨！ 其他文章 合作機構 1. Void
Between The Lines: Vocal heroes: how children of all ages benefit from being read to
I recently read an article about a woman whose marriage improved after her husband read aloud to her while she was sick in bed. Everyone loves being read to, no matter one’s age. Hong Kong has an emerging read-aloud culture. In the beginning, parents and teachers only read to children who were learning to read, to help them sound out words and decipher new vocabulary. There wasn’t much reading aloud to children in the early and toddler years, and even less reading aloud to children who had already learnt to read on their own. In the past decade, through the efforts of both government and non-governmental organisations in Hong Kong, parents and teachers have embraced the ideal of reading aloud from birth. This ideal is so important that the American Academy of Pediatrics has issued a policy stating the three essential things that every baby needs: to be vaccinated, to be breastfed, and to be read aloud to. In order to further develop a strong culture of reading aloud, parents in Hong Kong need to continue reading aloud to children who can easily read by themselves. Modelling best practices is the greatest ben
Between The Lines: If ever there was a classic children’s book, Alice in Wonderland is it
This year is the 150th anniversary of Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. You need not have read the book to recognise the iconic images of a spunky girl in a blue dress, a peculiar rabbit with a pocket watch, the Mad Hatter and the Queen of Hearts. The story includes a number of unforgettable quotes that are nonsensical and sometimes profoundly philosophical: “I give myself good advice, but I seldom follow it”, “I can’t go back to yesterday because I was a different person then”, and the infamous “Off with their heads!” The origin story is as well known as the fantastical tale itself. The author spent a summer with the Liddell family and told stories to the three daughters on a river outing. Alice, one of the daughters, enjoyed the story so much that she asked Carroll to write it down for her. He worked on the manuscript over the course of the next couple of years. When it was published in 1865 with illustrations by Sir John Tenniel, Alice became an instant sensation. The equally successful sequel, Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There, was published in 1872. To commemorate this annive
