Read Malaysia

Assalammualaikum
As I have mentioned earlier, I was involved in manning the chicken rice stall in Book and Education Fair held in Malaysia International Exhibition and Convention Centre (MIECC) from 4th June to 13th June 2010. Despite the tiredness of juggling the time spent there and studying for my upcoming end of sem exam and spending almost RM100 for books and stationeries, I gained precious experiences from the 10 day book fair.

Academic Excellence is Certainly Not Everything

There was this one foodstall near ours.
It was manned by teenagers whom I think they are siblings with another couple of adults
And when asked, the woman said the youngsters are her children and one of their cousins.
That foodstall is not her main source of income.
She has another book stall in the same bookfair and when I checked the stall out, the word "stall" is an underestimate. A store is more likely. The compound of her "book store" was huge, and all the books sold are chinese books.

She said she rented the foodstall and let her kids man with the intentions of teaching her kids how to do business, let them know that life is not easy; they have to work to earn their living. Despite teaching those basic living skills, she's also making sure her children did not spend the first 10 days of their holidays playing computer games, sleeping or some other time-wasting activities. The eldest of her children is 17 years old. I think the youngest is around 10 or 11, they look almost the same age. But I rarely see the youngest child. Maybe he/she's at home.

The booth is fully under her children's care, once in a while she and her husband will come and help them out. They also have one Indonesian worker, doing all the washings and cleaning. They sell delicious ice-creams, hot coffee and desserts. The lady paid her kids RM50 per day. Wow... That's a lot... She said she knows this foodstall will not bring much profit to her, it's more for her children's benefit and education rather than money.

And I think this lady deserves my respect.
Don't you think so?
As much as she loves her kids, she made them work hard for that 10 days.
And it's not a working-under-the-hot-sun work, it's just managing a dessert stall for 12 hours a day for 10 days.
And she taught her children the lesson of life.

Educate Your Child!

Ahah.. This is yet another funny topic.
In this fair, there are lots of learning aids aimed for small kids.
Ranging from electronic dictionaries, to e-books, to interactive educational CDs to "light and easy schoolbags".
And there was also a stage, provided for the educational company people to advertise their products. Or basically, it's something like a "parenting talk" where at the end of the talk, they'll recommend you their efficient tools for your kids' success.

And I almost laughed my heart out at the products.
Oops, sorry.
Not to say that I'm totally opposing these products but, I really think books are better learning aids than computers.
My mum used to make me sit with her and learn to read using one thick book full of words from A to Z. And that book was also used for all my other 3 siblings.
Nowadays, parents rarely have time to sit with their kids thus, this is when all the interactive, self-learning electronic learning aids come in handy. And they certainly are not cheap.
Make the young kids stare on the screen for hours a day, they'll wear spectacles way earlier than they are supposed to.
Seriously, even adults will have extremely tired eyes after staring on the screen for hours. Won't they?

So, in my opinion, reading books are way better method of learning for small kids than those interactive computer CDs in which the kids are supposed to match synonymous words, match pictures and sentences etc etc. Hahah..there you go. Parenting tip from me. =p

Hurm, I think I should end this post here and continue studying.

Because life is a test

-AkMaR-
http://nur-akmar.blogspot.com


Tuesday 15th June 2010
4.51pm