The Week #288

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  • 🎆 The calendar turned over from 2025 to 2026. I am glad 2025 is in the history books an am looking forward to 2026. For more, read my year in review.
  • 🎯 I spent a fair amount of time thinking about the coming year, what I want to accomplish, and the habits I want to form. I wish I had more time to do this kind of thinking throughout the year. The truth is I probably do, but just in hour long busts here or there, when really what I want is a solid 4 - 8 hours.
  • 📚 As per usual there is far too much homework for winter break. This time we managed to break it down and get him to finish days ahead of going back to school without massive battles each day. We broke it down into smaller chunks (2 pages of math and Japanese/day), created a tracking schedule (which Yumi would draw a Moomin character on when he finished for the day), and explained the plan/schedule to him with a small reward when he finishes it all (he gets to play Dragon Ball twice at the arcade).

    The other technique that really helped was to let him earn 30 minutes over-time on his Switch or iPad by doing a page of homework. This technique I will try to use more as school comes back into session to make each day run smoother.
  • 🚘 I think I've finally driven enough in Japan that I don't particularly mind driving in areas that I'm not super familiar with. I was able to sit back, listen to some tunes at an appropriate level and feel bit like I was on the back streets in Texas.