Category: Parenting
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Keep smiling, even in pain!
We spent this morning at the hospital. Baby Ray was due for his 3 month shot. We got up early. I gave him a warm bath, put on a blue play suit as it was a cool morning, gave him his meds and spent a little over 30 minutes breastfeeding baby. Hospital visits like today…
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Keep reading folktales to children!
I grew up in Nigeria watching a series on TV called ‘Tales by Moonlight.’ In the series, an aunty, gathered children around and told them traditional folktales or stories that inculcate societies values into children. She began by stating these words that made a deep impression on my mind: ‘Story, story.’ The children replied: ‘Story.’…
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Keep writing family narratives from a child’s lens!
If there is one thing I am thankful for with homeschooling during this pandemic, is that I am learning new things about my children everyday. Learning what makes them happy, what makes them sad, and what makes them curious about life. But what I love the most is the assignments from their teachers. My daughter’s…
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Keep flying with courage like butterflies!
One of my 3year old’s first assignment as a junior kindergarten student was to make a butterfly. His teacher sent the video of Eric Carle’s The very hungry caterpillar. We also read the book. It one of my kids favorite books to read. His teacher shared how caterpillars start as eggs, then into a pupa,…
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Keep focusing on motherhood, it matters!
Toni Morrison once wrestled with eloquently describing ‘Paradise’ credibly and effectively. Images of ‘Paradise’ tend to be ‘grand,’ she said, and ‘accessible, familiar, common, even trivial.’ Paradise, physical paradise, can denote ‘beauty, plenty, rest, exclusivity and eternity,’ noted Ms. Morrison. But how to reveal the complexities of paradise, as ‘a sane intelligent life itself,’ despite…
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Keep thriving like Annie Turnbo Malone!
The year is 1918. Despite a flu pandemic and the end of World War 1, Ms Annie Turnbo Malone became the first self-made African American woman millionaire. As part of homeschooling, my daughter and I went to the Missouri Museum of History’s ‘Beyond the Ballot’ exhibit to learn about the pioneering work of Ms. Malone.…
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Keep waiting!
For poetry yesterday as part of homeschooling, we read the poetry of Margaret Esse Danner, especially her poem “This African Worm.’ Every week my daughter picks out a poem she likes and we spend sometime reading the poem, studying the poet, while trying to make sense of the lessons learnt from the poem. Margaret Esse…
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Keep being different!
Yesterday during my son’s Zoom Art class he was given an assignment to draw a bee. His art teacher started by instructing her students to draw a big circle for its face, then 2 small circles for its eyes, a small but wide letter u for its nose and a large, wide u for its…
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Keep flying kites
There is something so amazing about flying handmade paper kites. Maybe it’s the colors used to make them standout or the lines cut neatly in diamond shape. Even the strings attached to the kites have lasting significance for strength of the kites, the strength to withstand even the most gentle breeze, strength to just simply…
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On the Zoomification of learning
I hate Zoom, especially for children. I hate that it’s the new way to teach. I hate that this pandemic has forced all of us to incorporate it into our daily routine. I hate Zoom especially for my children’s learning. It’s sounds contentious, I know, and hostile, I know, and defensive, I know and old-fashioned.…
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Keep running!
I started to run again. It was favorite thing to do during graduate school. Life since graduating got in the way so I stopped running. Sure I run occasionally, but not as consistently as I did during graduate school. Since homeschooling started this fall, I wanted something that I could do consistently so that I…
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Keep Rolling!
My son loves egg crayons. Not to color with them, but to roll them on the ground or down the stairs. It’s his favorite thing to do and my least favorite thing to watch. After each rolling session, I am right behind him picking each crayon up one by one to put them neatly back…
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Writing with Juliet Iwelunmor 