More book recommendations for boys

As you know, I'm constantly scouring the internet for book recommendations for Andre. It's an uphill task as reading is not one of his favourite pastimes and the stories have to be able to capture his attention, make him laugh and not be too difficult.

The very helpful readers here have suggested a few titles (thanks so much!) and I've tried most of them, some with better success than others. There was one that was a particularly big hit, recommended by Lilian - Charlie Small.













Charlie Small is an 8-year-old boy who goes on a series of wild adventures and has close encounters with crazy creatures like a spitting Spidion (a cross between a spider and a scorpion). Andre was especially taken by Book 2 "The Perfumed Pirates of Perfidy" which featured, surprise surprise, a gang of cut-throat lady pirates!

The books are written in the form of a journal, complete with vivid illustrations which heightens the appeal. It's a series, I'm not sure how many books there are at the moment. The last I counted, there were five but I'm sure the author is still adding to the collection.

I was commenting to Lilian not too long ago that it seems like kids' reading levels are so advanced these days. They're reading Roald Dahl at p1 and below, by the time they're in p4, they're already into Artemis Fowl and Percy Jackson. I was slightly concerned when Andre was still into Beast Quest last year but then Lilian and I recalled that when we were in p4, we were still reading Enid Blytons! And we turned out fine in the English department.

So I'm not going to worry too much about the level of Andre's reading. Reading is not a race (the way everything seems to be in Singapore), there really is no compulsion to get to the difficult books in such a hurry. As long as he reads and enjoys it, that's good enough for me.

10,000 hours to greatness

I always meant to write on this topic since Lilian posted about it, but somehow never got around to it.

In Malcolm Gladwell's book Outliers published in 2008, he put forth the premise of the "10,000-hour rule", namely the key to success in any field is not talent or genius but simply to practise that task for 10,000 hours. This works out to about 20 hours a week for 10 years.

Gladwell cited specific examples. The Beatles performed live in Hamburg, Germany over 1,200 times from 1960 to 1964, amassing more than 10,000 hours of playing time, which he attributed to shaping their talent. Bill Gates met the 10,000-hour rule when he gained access to a high school computer in 1968 at the age of 13, and spent 10,000 hours programming on it.

I find that like many people with a singular theory or hypothesis, they try too hard to justify their point to the extent of rationalisation and over-simplification. I feel Gladwell completely downplays the importance of talent to make it sound almost inconsequential, ie anyone who puts in 10.000 hours can be great. But common sense tells me that even if I were to swim 10,000 hours, I simply cannot be Michael Phelps because of my physical build, aptitude, etc.

Having said that, I totally agree with him that hard work and practice are more critical for success than genius, and this augurs well for anyone who has ever dismissed their abilities due to lack of talent.

I finally got around to posting about this topic because of the recent inter-school badminton tournaments that Andre experienced late last month. Having been thoroughly impressed by the standard of some of the students, I decided to kaypoh and check out the websites of the top Singapore schools in badminton. What was their secret? Did they manage to attract all the top players? Or did they have some fantastic technique?

One by one, I uncovered the same thing: all the schools list an intensive badminton coaching schedule, some as frequent as every single weekday, 3 hours each time. On top of this, I know some of the kids have additional coaching sessions outside of school.

So really, the secret is no secret at all. It's just plain and simple hard work. (Of course with that schedule, I've no idea where the kids find the time to study and do their homework, but that's another story). A friend of mine has a daughter in primary school who's doing very well in gym and has been participating in overseas competitions. However, she told me that realistically, Singapore has little chance outside of ASEAN because here, training is at most a few hours each day, to fit in studies and other activities. Whereas in China, the kids who train for gym live and breathe gym - they basically do gym from morning to night, everyday. They just amass 10,000 hours to perfection... quicker.

In short, talent is great, but without hard work, it means nothing. All great talents and successes in history have invested immense effort and time into what they do. Conversely, it's also time for people who keep whining that they cannot achieve anything because they have no talent, to get off their butts and start working because they have no more excuses.

Knowing that you have a terrific chance of excelling in something if you put in the hours means there are important decisions to be made. Everyone has a finite number of hours in a day, so where would you invest those hours? Something has got to give. As Lilian suggested in her post, most Singapore kids probably spend those hours in drills for exams. If so, then it's no wonder our kids tend to ace exams but they don't have time to develop much else.

So I'll just leave you to consider this: your child has 10,000 hours to master a skill, what would it be? I hope it's something more meaningful than exam techniques.

Book recommendations for 9-year-olds

I mentioned some time back that I've been trying to widen Andre's repertoire of books as I feel that the Beast Quest series by Adam Blade, which he's very fond of, is getting to be too simple for him. The challenge is that his reading interests are very limited. He's mostly interested only in fantasy, he doesn't enjoy reading about real life adventures.

I scoured the web for book recommendations for boys but I found the fantasy suggestions were mostly too advanced for him. Then Lesley-Anne suggested trying Philip Pullman's books as she finds his writing very engaging.

I first borrowed The Firework-Maker's Daughter from the library and Andre enjoyed it so much that I borrowed two more the next time - The Scarecrow and His Servant and Clockwork.

Just a short intro on Philip Pullman: he writes mostly fantasy books that are very popular with older kids. These three books I mentioned are suitable for Andre's age group - the language is simpler and while they're not exactly fantasy, they appeal to him because they have an imaginative, make-believe quality, like modern fairy tales.

Another recommendation I found on the web was The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart. When I first found the book in the library, I was afraid it might be too difficult for Andre but to my surprise, he seemed to take to it quite well. The Mysterious Benedict Society is about four children who pass a series of tests and are sent to a school called The Learning Institute for the Very Enlightened (L.I.V.E.). There, they meet Mr Curtain and try to prevent him from taking over the world by destroying "The Whisperer", his brainwashing machine.

Once again, this is not fantasy but it's creatively written with a compelling storyline. However, I have to say that the length of the book (almost 500 pages) is quite daunting for Andre and being unable to finish the book after three weeks (one installment every other day) has caused the interest to wane somewhat. So it's probably more suitable for slightly older kids or those with a longer attention span.

However, I feel these are great recommendations for 9 to 11-year-olds, if you're searching for ideas. Meanwhile, let me know if you come across any other finds.

Higher Chinese

We have been trying to inculcate a love of Chinese in our kids, which is no mean feat considering I can barely read a primary level Chinese textbook. Thankfully, despite our rather haphazard methods and many mistakes, Lesley-Anne has not developed an aversion to Chinese. In fact, she can even lay claim to having interest in the Chinese culture and language which is nothing short of a miracle, I think.

This interest will be of paramount importance to Lesley-Anne because *deep breath* she will be embarking on Higher Chinese in secondary school. It's a huge leap of faith for her, considering she didn't take it up in primary school (leaving a couple of our friends scratching their heads, thinking we're crazy). Let's just say, nothing ventured, nothing gained and if she truly can't cope with it, she can always choose to drop it later on. We're not putting pressure on her to ace the subject - as long as she can emerge from the experience with a greater love and appreciation for the language, I would consider the venture a success.

So anyway, we have been encouraging her to read more Chinese books over the holidays and as usual, interesting Chinese stories seem to be terribly hard to come by. After some trial and error, she found a series which was pretty interesting, so I decided to share it here, in case other parents face the same problem.

This is a book she found quite engaging. Once again, as per my previous observation with Totto-Chan and Les P'tite Poules, the interesting Chinese books tend to be those translated from another language. This is the Chinese version of Mrs Frisby and the Rats of NIMH by Robert O'Brien, a Newbery Medal award-winning book which tells the tale of Mrs Frisby, a widowed field mouse, who enlist the help of a group of former laboratory rats in rescuing her home from destruction by a farmer's plow. The rats had previously escaped from the laboratory and developed into a literate and technological society. Fascinating story.

According to Lesley-Anne, the other titles released by this publisher are also generally quite good. This is another she borrowed but has yet to read. It's originally in French but I couldn't figure out the name and author of the book. I think it's Reynard the Fox (which is a famous wily character in French folklore).

Lesley-Anne picked these books because she loves reading about animals but there are also other types of stories. Do check them out! I would place the reading level at about 11 to 13 years old.