Too ask if this is normal for a 4 year old?

[Georgieex]

Hello :)

My daughter is 4 (5 in june) currently attends school and is in reception. I'm worried about her learning..mainly reading and writing ect..

she writes things that 'make sense' too herself but no one eles.. she does struggle with her sounds and putting them together sometimes.

Her school have given them homework books - they have too write words and pictures about the picture the teacher has glued in.. with no help apprently..

Im worrying as shes writing letters that are everywhere, jumbled and no sense too me but I ask her 'what does this say' she'll reply with 'firemen crew' ? Ive attached photos?

The school have set my anxiety off as they told me shes getting extra support as 'shes not where they want her too be at her age' but shes only 4.. are they expecting too much from her or?

Totally normal! My 4 year old would never have even picked up a pen!!

My 4 yo is just a couple of months younger than yours but she's not in school yet as she missed the cut off I can guarantee she is not capable of writing like your LO. Going to sound daft but is the teacher aware she is a summer born as my dd1 is tall and very verbally advanced all her teachers thought she was one of the oldest when she was really one of the youngest in the class it really changed their expectations of her writing and handwriting.

Primary school teacher here. In the first one bird is clear and she has tried to write chicken which is a difficult word to write and baby. She is using her sounds to write quite difficult words.
By all means encourage her to spell words like cat dog etc to widen her correct spellings vocabulary but please let her go mad on writing ambitious words by sounding out. This is age appropriate writing.

Oh and I am always reminding my year 2s about punctuation so it's funny seeing it on such a young child's piece of writing.

I'm not a teacher but I have 2 DCs and their writing was not as good as this in Reception. It looks as if this writer has good pencil control and is making small neat shapes with very good control. Not all the shapes resemble letters accurately but I think that is very common when first learning to write.
Personally, I'd accept any extra help offered- at this age it'll just be a little more practice, with some closer supervision.

At almost 2/3 through the school year most children would be expected to be writing short sentences with capital letter, full stops and finger spaces that are phonetically correct. For example, 'Mumee took me hoam.'

Looks normal to me. My 5 year old in year 1 writes like that and my 4 year old in reception hasn't quite got to that stage yet.

End of reception is sentences that can be read by themselves or others. Use of capital letters and full stops and phonetically plausible spelling. This is end of year goals. I would say this child is well on their way to achieving them and the next term is usually a high progress term as the children, even the young ones, mature and begin to use their skills more confidently. 20 years key stage 1 experience here but I have never taught reception.

I would say accept any 'support' but not pressure. Encourage your child to love writing as the emphasis on spelling punctuation and grammar will take over.

Looks normal to me. And bless her, she's only 4. I hope they don't make too much of a big deal out of the extra support she's getting. As others have said in most places she wouldn't even be learning to write yet.