The cherry on top - 樱桃
“我孩子每天吃水果吃到我 po kai!”
(My kids eat so much fruit everyday I may as well be bankrupt!) That’s something I repeat a lot to my sister and now she knows it so well that it’s the first thing she thought of when she started writing this post!
There are many things to be thankful for, but sometimes just simply having fruit to eat - especially the delicious summer fruits that my kids adore - is truly a joy. They love the summer fruits so much that, by the time autumn comes rolling in, I’m really hoping that they forget they exist until next year!
It’s not surprising that my daughter’s got a special place in her brain for the books about fruit and food - we are a foodie family after all! One of those books is about an older sister drawing a cherry tree. We love the little catch at the end where the birds try to eat the drawing so we thought we’d do a little activity to accompany the book. After all, sensory learning is the best way to learn! We’ve always found that she learns quickest when she has some physical stimulation or sensory experience with something related to the books she’s read. Hence, she always learns to say words about food and nature quickest because she spends a lot of time in the garden or watching Ah Ma (grandma) cook!
Cherry picking at home…
Yes, the cherries come in a box and they’re not in a tree. And yes, it’s not even a real cherry tree. But yes, I still think it helped her learn the words!
With each page, she instinctively copied what the elder sister had done:
Draw the tree.
Draw the cherries.
Stick cherries to feed the naughty flying cherry thieves (herself).
My sister noticed it once she had read the book. She was repeating the words of the book and the order that it was being done! Her tree might look like a monster but at least she made the effort, right?
She really liked it! We’d leave the cherries up there until mealtime and then she’d bound over after her meal was finished for a delicious dessert!
So this is probably a great time to thank all the farmers and harvesters that have grown and picked these cherries that have helped my daughter and I twofold: once to motivate her to learn, twice to motivate her to finishing eating her rice!
If you’re interested in the book that I used for this activity, they’re sold in whole sets by Le Le Chinese (click here to shop with our affiliate link!).
UPDATE (14/07/2021 14:40): As of today, we have joined the Le Le Chinese Affiliate Program but please note that this post was written before the affiliate program ever existed! You can use our affiliate link below to get 5% off your order with Le Le when you use ‘LELEDEZIREMI’. Every purchase made with this link helps support this blog and the day-to-day running of the bookshop - so thank you in advance! And thank you to Le Le Chinese!
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We used special crayons to draw on the windows. I love them because they’re easy to clean with a damp cloth but they still let the kids be creative and have fun! I think the version we’ve used are sold by Stabilo but many of the stationery brands do their own products so use what you’re used to!
We love to hear from you all and all the things that you’re interested in! If you’ve got anything you’d like us to try or talk about, you should let us know in the comments or on social media. Do you have any activities that you love to do with your kids? How do you get them to finish their food? Let’s chat!