Sarah Cook Interviews Me and also My Mother on Saturday Morning Mastermind

Recently, I was interviewed by Sarah Cook on Saturday Morning Mastermind. Sarah Cook is the founder of Raising CEO Kids, a company that is created to help, support, and mentor kids who are in business.

She also interviewed my mother about how she raised me to become a gifted child. You can listen and also read the interviews below.

P.S. By the way, today, January 3rd 2010, is my 12th Birthday! Yay!

Interview with Me

(Duration: 13:52)

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Sarah – So where can they find you on the Internet?

Gloson – Oh. You can find me on glosonblog.com

Sarah – And where else?  YouTube, you have a YouTube channel right and twitter?

Gloson – Oh.  And you also can find me on twitter.  My username is Gloson – G-l-o-s-o-n.

Sarah – That’s perfect.  So tell us a little bit about your book, the one you’ve already written and published and the one that you’re still working on.

Gloson – Oh.  My first book, “Creative and Funny poetry for kids”, has got 20 funny, creative and imaginative poems for kids.

It was published in May 2009.  My second book which is done now is called “Creative Row your Boats.” 

It contains 20 funny, creative short poems that are to be sung to the tune of “Row, row, row your boat.”  Okay, now I’m going to sing two of the poems.

Sarah – Perfect.

Gloson – Yeah, hold on.  “See the raindrops fall like they were ice creams.  Now I’m going off to bed to eat them in my dreams.” 

And here’s another one. “Walk, walk to the zoo all the way with you.  See the funny kangaroo, he will see you too.”

Sarah – That is great.

Gloson – Thanks.

Sarah – So did you make all the artwork in your books?

Gloson – Yes, I did.  I illustrated my book, both of my books.  I draw the illustrations using pencil and then I scanned them into the computer and then I used Photoshop to make all the necessary changes.

Sarah – That’s great.  That’s great.  So you used like colored pencil and marker or just colored pencils?

Gloson – Actually I used Photoshop to color everything.

Sarah – Got it.  Okay.  So how did you get published?  Was there a publishing company or did you self publish?  How did you do that?

Gloson – Well, my mother self published it.

Sarah – That’s great.  You have a nice mom.  So Gloson, you have been named the youngest poet in Malaysia.  How does that feel?

Gloson – Well, I feel very honored and very motivated.  And I also am inspired to write more poems.

Sarah – That’s great.  So this past July, you and your parents met the Prime Minister and the first lady of Malaysia.

Tell us a little bit about that experience, because there was a lot of the press there, the news people were there.  Tell us about that.

Gloson – Okay.  Firstly, my mom sent my first poetry book to the first lady of Malaysia.  She is Datin Seri Rosmah Mansor.  I think she is very impressed.  She also is very kind and then she organized a meeting with me and my mom on July 10 2009.

When we arrived at the meeting on that day, we were surprised to see so many reporters from all media in Malaysia and also the Prime Minister of Malaysia Dato’ Seri Najib Tun Razak.

And the reporters took photos of me talking with the Prime Minister and the first lady.  The Prime Minister also took my poetry book and read my poem all to them.  And he said it was very good.

They also read my blog as I’m the youngest blogger in Malaysia.  I then performed a poem in front of the Prime Minister and the first lady.  I feel very honored because I have been given that opportunity.

Sarah – Congratulations.  So what is – because most of the people listening to this call are either going to be parents or they’re going to be young kids like you that are in business, what is the number one source of income that you’ve found so far and are you exploring other places for income?

Gloson – Well, in November I got my most satisfactory income.  It was the order from the National Library of Malaysia for my first poetry book.

Other than that, I haven’t been much involved in selling my book.  But next year I would like to do more sales.

Sarah – Great.  So mostly you’re focusing on your book.  Have you done any advertising on your blog at all or anything like that?

Gloson – No.

Sarah – Not so much yet.  Okay.

Gloson – Yeah, I think next year that it will be more advertisements.

Sarah – Right, for sure.  So how did you –

Gloson – Because next year all the government is teaching poetry to all seven year old primary one students in Malaysia.

Sarah – That’s great.  So how did you learn blogging?  How did you get started?

Gloson – Well, I, my father’s friend helped me to set up my blog.  Then, after that I took it from there and then I learned the things all by myself.

And then most of my blogging knowledge came from my experience and experimenting.  And then I also built up my blog knowledge through reading other blogs especially the blogs that teach blogging.

Sarah – What are some of the ones that you like to go to the most?

Gloson – Well, I would recommend www.problogger.net.  And it is a very popular blog teaching blogging.  Another one of the first blogs that inspired me is www.dailyblogtips.com.

Sarah – Okay, dailyblogtips.com and problogger.net.  Great.  Anything else?

Gloson – Well, no.

Sarah – Okay perfect.  Because your blog looks fabulous.  It has so much good information and all the graphics are fabulous so you’ve done a really, really good job.

So is there anything else that you would like share with the biz kids listening to help them reach their own dreams?

Gloson – Well, my advice, my first advice for biz kids is to find out something that you are good at and that you also like to do that thing.

Then, find some ways to make money from that thing you are doing, then you’ll enjoy making money.

My second advice is to be patient because success does not happen overnight, it takes time.  When my blog was new it has quite a few visitors.  Now it has about 150 daily visitors.

My last advice is to learn from your mistakes.  Everyone makes mistakes, you see.  The important thing is whether you learn from the mistakes or not.  Besides, the mistakes are good things to blog about so I can teach others how not to make it.

Image credit: sunshinecity

Sarah – That’s great.  That is so great.  So for sure, learn from mistakes and you said be sure to be patient and also follow the dreams and try to turn their pasts in, the things that they really like to do into something that they can make money.  And that’s what you’ve done.

That’s just so excellent.  So you were seven when you did your first poem or how old were you?

Gloson – Pardon me?

Sarah – How old were you when you wrote your first poem?

Gloson – Oh, I was nine years old.

Sarah – Nine years old.  But now they’re teaching it to seven year olds?

Gloson – Well, no.

Sarah – Oh, okay.  I thought that’s what you said that the Malaysian government was going to start teaching poetry to seven year olds?  No, you meant seventh graders or –

Gloson – No, no, no, I mean seven year olds.

Sarah – Oh okay, okay.  That’s great.  And how many brothers and sisters do you have?

Gloson – Well, I have one little brother.

Sarah – And he likes to do things like this too, right?  He likes to dance and things like that?

Gloson – Yes.  Actually you can view his dances through my blog.

Sarah – Yeah, I saw some of them.  My kids and I were watching them.  So that’s great.  Now anything else that you want to share?

What do you feel like your parents have done really well to help you be successful?  What have you found, what have been the best things that they have done to help you?

Gloson – Well, my mom always gives advice to me and encourages me to become a better person each day.  And she also really loves me and gives a lot of advice.

Sarah – That’s good.  What about your dad?

Gloson – Well, my dad supports me in blogging.  And because he’s good at computers but he doesn’t own a blog.

He helps me with some of the technical aspects like buying domain name and stuff like that.

Sarah – That’s great.  That is so, so, so great.  So is there anything lastly that you want to share before we start talking to your mom?

Gloson – No.

Sarah – Well, Gloson, thank you so much.  It has been such inspiration to talk to you today and I can’t wait to see what 2010 brings for you because you have a lot of experience and your blog is going lots of visitors everyday and you should be able to start making money from advertising on it as well as maybe teaching some social media classes or blogging classes.  That’s just so phenomenal.

Gloson – Yeah. Also in the future I might to like to learn money to earn money through blogging.

Sarah – Absolutely, you absolutely should.  Well, congratulations on that huge order from the library, that’s just fabulous.

Have a great day.  We will be posting this really soon on the Saturday Morning Success series and you can find Gloson at his blog as well as on YouTube and Facebook and twitter.  And make sure to check him out.

He’s a young blogger and a young poet who is doing extremely fabulous job connecting with others around the world.  So congratulations Gloson.

Gloson – Wait, and one more thing.  You also can find me www.poetrytalents.com. That’s where I post my poems and news about my poems

Sarah – Perfect.  Poetrytalents.com. right?  That’s great.  All right.  Well, let’s go ahead and talk to your mom and we’ll see what she has to say about how you have become successful. 

Interview with Grace, my mom

(Duration: 16:31)

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Grace – Hello, Sarah.

Sarah – Hello, thank you.  Hi, how are you?

Grace – Fine, thank you very much.

Sarah – I’m so glad that you’re willing to talk to us today.  This is a little bit unique.  It’s my first time recording on Skype and this information will be shared.

We’ve got about 100 people signed up for the calls and so we’re working on growing this company called Raising biz kids (Now Raising CEO Kids) and helping kids around the world to be successful in business but also really, really helping parents to learn how to raise successful kids in business.  Because it takes a little bit of work to keep up with them and their interests and their activities and handle the news people and all those things.

So I just applaud you and congratulate you for what you and your husband are doing to support Gloson and also your other son.  I just think it’s amazing.

Grace – Thank you.

Sarah – So, what are some ways that you have encouraged Gloson in his writing and his blogging?

Grace – Since he was young, I have been always encouraging him to do a lot of reading because I believe when you read a lot the writing skill will come spontaneously.

Secondly, also encouraged him to do a lot of thinking, like a thinking bee or a thinking pooh to researching and to analyze so that he can understand better and fast.

Thirdly, I encourage him to do research on things that he wants to know, especially through the internet.

Sarah – That’s great.  So why do you think it’s important to encourage the kids to just explore the things that are important to them rather than telling them to do things that we want them to do?

Why do you think it’s so important that you’ve encouraged him in his poetry?

Grace – To me to develop the talents of kids is very important because I believe we are all born with so many talents; we can sing, dance, write, count.

You see, we also know that there is, that was a research done by Dr. Howard Gardner about eight months before intelligence.  So I believe we are born with many talents.

The thing is we should a very important because I also believe the talents can be disappeared slowly or become more difficult to develop later or become dormant or the children lose interest in whatever they have been good at.

And the last point is, they don’t have enough time to do it when they grow up only did they realize it.  The last point will bring to another point is why I encourage my sons or the children of the world and the parents to help the children to explore in business.

In real life in our school, we were taught all basic knowledge like mathematics, science, languages, geography, history, etc.  We are good at a lot of basic knowledge like that but we might not be good at any particular one, firstly.

Secondly, we might not truly know who we are, what we are truly love for, we are really good at.  Then when we grow up, we will struggle of thinking what are the jobs suitable for ourselves.

That is the struggle that I believe we can avoid if we teach the children to explore being in business when they are young.

Image credit: Taod

Sarah – That’s great.  I love what you said about when they’re older, they have so many responsibilities and so many things that they’re required to do.

So when they’re young, it’s a great time to get them interested in business and in their talents because they have a little bit more time.  Yes, they’re busy with school and maybe activities but if we can encourage them right now and they’ll develop a lifelong desire to be successful and to explore their talents.

So thank you for sharing that.  What are some ways that you and your husband have supported your kids?

I know Gloson talked a little bit about helping him get his blog started and you sent the book into the Prime Minister and the first lady.

And I’m sure you’ve done lots of other things.  Can you share with us some things that you’ve done that other parents could learn from?

Grace – Something; I mean, any help I have done to my son?

Sarah – Yeah, anything that you’ve been helpful?  Anything that you’ve… do you read a family poetry?

Do you help him learn about blogging?  Like what are some things that you’ve done to support Gloson in becoming a better poet?

You did talk about some already; reading poetry and thinking, encouraging him to think on his own.  Just anything you can share.

Grace  – I mean –

Sarah – That’s okay, we’ll go onto the next question.  So have there been any struggles?  Has there been a time in the last year or so that Gloson has or maybe in the last couple of years that – have there been any hard times that you’ve had to help him work through?

Grace – Do we help him work through?

Sarah – Like has he gotten discouraged?

Grace – I believe that he has not much problem in doing all this stuff because his EQ (Emotional Quotient) and IQ (Intelligent Quotient) are very good.

Sarah – That’s good.

Grace – So the only factor that I feel that I am not capable of helping him is his physical needs.  He needs to eat so much suitable and nutritious food.  Sometimes I felt that I cannot provide all.

Sarah – All the support for him.

Grace – Other than that, I mean he’s a very good child.  He’s EQ, IQ, I mean, very good.

Sarah – That’s awesome.  It sounds like he’s extremely smart.

Grace – Yes.  I believe it was because when he was born I really trained him in something like memory skills, creativity thinking, logical thinking, analysis, and reasoning.  A lot of stuff which I also now have forgotten about.

And I stopped teaching him when he was two years plus because at the time my husband started to face some financial difficulties.  And, but I noticed that that two early years of his life, he has been really brain stimulated.

And after that he carried on all the learning by himself.  He learned everything by himself, I never sent him to any classes.  But I noticed that he can do whatever he put his hand into. For example, he can learn a lot of things on the spot.  He can write poems spontaneously, everything.

Even he learned to speak good English when he was five years old when I moved to a place that the children are speaking English.

When he was young, we were talking in Mandarin.  Soon we had moved to a new place and he was five, he couldn’t communicate with children in English.

But then from that time suddenly he wanted to make friends with them; he started to pick up English and he picked up so fast.  And he writes good English.  Yeah, I really admire his diligence and dedication for learning.

Sarah – Well congratulations to all of your efforts with helping him to be successful.  That is just amazing.  So is there anything as we finish up, is there anything that you would like to share with kids listening as well as with parents that will be listening?

Grace – To the biz kids, I would like to advise to you all you biz kids there:

Firstly always desire and open your heart for learning.  Listen to advice from good friends and good parents.

Secondly, try to understand yourself and also the facts and reality of life.

Thirdly, learn to discern what and who are really helpful to you.  That’s my points to the kids.

And to parents, I would like to say that try to understand your children’s true passion, talents and focus on it.

And do not think that; don’t have prejudice over which job is better than the other one.  For example, perhaps people commonly think that being a doctor is better than being a singer or vice versa.

So do not think which job is the best for your children because the children must enjoy their true talents, abilities and their passions for that job.

Secondly, I would like to encourage parents that they must spend time to show love, to show concern to their children.

Any 10 minutes heart-to-heart talk at least a day and those who are full time mothers they can do more to show their concern to build up their emotional quotient (EQ).  To me, emotional quotient for children is far more important than IQ development.

Thirdly, I believe they must also mentor their children step by step according to how much work the child can take now.

And secondly, how much hard facts the child can face now so that the parent can administer, council the facts of life to the children as early as possible.

To me, to teach children to exploring business is very important. To me,  it’s almost the most important thing in life because you see when we wake up in the morning, the toothbrush and the toothpaste we use, and until we retire to bed, the bed we sleep on is all about money; we need to purchase it.

So we monitor their mental maturity and tell them the real life is all about money, I believe is important.

Of course this must be done after we have told them what invaluable things are like love, kindness and responsibility – these are more important than money.

After we have done all this, we must have to teach them the hard facts of life is all about money.

I believe if they realize on the money and on the facts and money matters is better than the realize later.  And I remember there’s one movie called “Catch me if you can.”

This is a real life story which was made into movie.  The real person was, (I think he is still living) Frank Abagnale Jr.  He started to cheat the bank when he was 16.  And then after when he was about 30+, he repented from all his mistakes and he said a word that really touched my heart.

He said, “How good if you can be, we can have 20 year old body with a 40 year old brain.”  I believe what he meant is if we can be mature as young as be so that we will find happiness in our life earlier and do not have to go through unnecessary mistakes.

Sarah – Right.  Right.  That’s excellent.  I know we saw part of that movie and I think it’s important what you say that we need to learn early to be responsible and kind and gracious and loving and faithful and true and also learn about money and about business.  Because then when they’re making money, when the kids are making money then they will know how to manage their money; they’ll know how to handle it.

So that’s excellent.  Thank you for sharing all those things.  So thank you both for your time Gloson and Mrs. Teh, thank you for your time.  I so appreciate you staying up.  I know that it’s like two o’clock in the morning, right?

Grace – Oh it’s all right.  It was our pleasure to be invited.

Sarah – Well, thank you, thank you, thank you.  And you both have a fabulous day.

Grace – Thank you very much.

Sarah – Bye bye.

Grace – Bye everybody.  Bye Sarah.  Thank you.

Sarah – Thank you so much.  Bye, bye.

Grace – Bye.  

___________

I hope you enjoyed the interviews and have benefited from it! 🙂

Please check out Sarah Cook’s Raizing CEO Kids.

Also, don’t forget to sign up at Saturday Morning Mastermind in order to hear more interviews like these! Just fill in your name and your email! 😉

 

You can also follow Sarah Cook on twitter – @MomToBizKids.

Thank you once again, Sarah Cook, for giving me the opportunity to be interviewed on Saturday Morning Mastermind, It is like a birthday present to me.

Looking forward to your comments to! I will also regard them as your birthday gifts for me. 😉

Cheers!