If you struggled at school how did you parents help you?

[muddledmum25]

DD is in Y5 and has always struggled with school socially and academically.The school are well aware of this and sympathetic, but there is limited extra support what with 30 other children, covid etc.

DD has interests out of school which I hope will boost her very low confidence. She also does some extra school work with me as she is behind academically. However I'm thinking off upping this to doing something extra every day (probably about 20mins a day in addition to the school homework) - she will hate this and it will create tension. I'm torn as I honestly think she is behind and needs to catch up and this will help her in the long run. However the other part of me thinks she is unhappy at school and wants to come home and forget all about it and relax and this is important too for her wellbeing. (She already reads a lot independently and with me and enjoys it - due to me pushing this a lot when she was younger and well behind with reading. She hated it at the time and we had a lot of tears but this definitely has paid off in the end - it was painful for us both though at the time.)

I'd love to know if you found school hard what your parents did that helped you - did they push you/did it help? Or make it worse? Or if you have children similar to my DD what approach you have taken.

Teacher here - I think at this age the best thing you can do is try to make learning seem fun, not punitive. Try not to give your DD the idea that she is behind or struggling. Watch fun educational videos, play board games that encourage strategic thinking, take her to the interactive floor at the science museum, that sort of thing. It would be counterproductive to sit at home thrashing through a textbook with her.

Personally I think an extra 20 mins a day is an awful lot.

When my dc was struggling socially what helped was arranging opportunities to play 1:1 with kids outside school to build friendships that could continue in school.

hmmm I struggled socially, not academically - my parents helped by not pushing me to socialise, and I don't think I fully appreciated that I was a bit odd for not doing any clubs/group activities/parties/play dates/sleepovers and reading all the time I could until I was a parent as a happy consequence.

I don't think my social skills can be improved by practice beyond a certain point so they did the right thing - if you find other people stressful and confusing, and socialising leaves you tired and buzzy and replaying it constantly then there's only a certain amount of coping and skills I was ever going to reach.

Sometimes acceptance is the biggest gift. My parents never highlighted that I was in any way odd.

As for the academic stuff, both of my DDs are like me and look to me for approval and support, it's very, very hard to be the academic teacher for them.

I could never get them to do extra work after school, they're too worn out with the stress of getting through the day, so we try and do anything we have to on a Saturday am. I've got a tutor for one because she reacts so badly to any criticism from me and it's helped her confidence a lot. I wish it was more affordable as one hour a week of that attention from a teacher (remote so doesn't even have to go anywhere) has been great.

The other DD I can teach a bit but I have to be very careful to effectively love bomb her and praise everything whilst doing it.

20 mins a day is a lot if you're trying to do it at the end of the day especially - if I have to do extra work in the week, I'd always do it first thing after breakfast.

Thanks all the for comments - I do appreciate it as I'm really trying to work out what is best for her - both short and long term.
@charliebrown59 your talk of acceptance is really important I think. I want her to know she is loved whatever she is good or not good at. I am worried if I focus too much on doing more/improving she'll feel she isn't good enough. But a the same time it is hard for her always being the bottom of the class/the one with few friends. If she could improve and be more in the middle I think that would really help her self esteem. I just want to do the right thing for her.

It's so hard isn't it? I completely appreciate it and we have similar struggles with ourselves. In the end though, my dd hears 'you're stupid' whenever I try to help her so whatever good it was doing on the academic front, it was a negative on the other front.

Could you look at a volunteer tutor perhaps or ask school about that as they seem to run in some areas. Sounds like your dd might be a good candidate for that and if it could be done remotely at the weekend that might work.

My year 3 DS is struggling at school, emotionally and educationally. I'm not sure how to best help him. He is being assessed for possible dyspraxia and one of his things is his hate of sport. I feel its important to have group activities outside of school to learn teamwork etc. He has no problems socially and has lots of friends, but struggles with authority. We've tried all kinds of sport which he hates so we didn't push, but he's just started cricket which he seems to be enjoying. Academically, he has a tutor as struggles to work with me, and we play lots of the 5 min mum games as a way of doing a bit of extra work but in a fun way. We do lots of visits to museums, galleries etc when open, and I try to follow his interests - these things won't help him pass a maths exam though so I really don't know how to help him further.

Moved me private as back then dyslexia wasn’t really dealt with in primary schools.

@10storeylovesong sorry to hear your son is struggling too. Sounds like you are doing lots to support him. We also try to do lots of things like galleries/museums/theatre to get her interested in the world etc which I think are important. But agree they don't help you with grammar, punctuation and decimals!

@HOkieCOkie yes I'm sure private school small class sizes would help DD a lot. It helped me when I was at school as I took my time to find my feet with school work - ended up really enjoying school though it was pretty high pressure there which had it's cons. Sadly out of our budget!

The only other thing I'd thought is, some councils are good about allowing you to reduce school hours, so take her out on a Wednesday or Friday afternoon when there's double games/PE or a non core filler activity that's less important, and get her to agree to do the focused school stuff then, might be worth a try.

Fwiw, large class sizes are bad for most children and teachers, they are far too big in some schools.

I had maths tuition for 'O' levels as I'd got a huge confidence issue with the subject & it was a vicious circle. It really helped, but what I could have really done with was help with confidence & social skills because even then I struggled: & the start of depression & anxiety issues were already showing . I retreated & isolated myself starting around then .

In your situation I would (and did):

• focus on 'extra work' in the summer holidays as during term time they were tired enough after school.
• a little bit of maths every day in the summer - means that instead of the backwards summer slide they keep skills going and actually improve. first thing after breakfast before they wandered off to do other things.
• summer holiday diary, maybe with a challenge each day to keep it interesting. e.g. write in style of newspaper report, write a story or whatever. Decide each day what the focus is - interesting language or SPaG and only give feedback on that (and only the 'worst' errors, not everything).

My youngest has ADHD and processing issues. He was really struggling at school at 11.

The two things that really helped him. First, getting an educational psychologist to assess him and write a report stating what the school and we needed to do to help him.

Second, hiring a tutor for him to do two 40-minute sessions a week - they usually did some maths, went through anything in his homework he was struggling with, worked on his executive functioning skills, and generally talked stuff through.

He's now 15 and gets mostly As. It also helps that we are in the US, and the average class size in our state is much smaller.

Mine didn’t. I enjoyed school for the most part but experienced some mean girls type stuff for about a term in mid teens. Parents brought it up in any subsequent argument – “your friends turned against you”. Don’t do that

Thanks everyone for your ideas and suggestions.
@CSIblonde I'm sorry to hear you struggled socially and with anxiety. What do you think your parents could have done to help with this? I worry about this a lot with my DD going forwards.

My parents did a "20 mins a day" type thing with my brother in late primary school. Maths drills and handwriting, I think. I still remember the Capital A Atmosphere it created at home. Took for fucking ever because he resisted it so much, took over the entire evening.

If you are thinking about it because you think it will make your daughter happier, why don't you ask her opinion? Let her know there's the option for her to sit down with you and do some more practice, or to hire a tutor or go to a centre (if this is an option), or whatever else you can come up with. Maybe she'll have some ideas - you could brainstorm together! Anyway, explain your reasoning that you thought it might make her happier to be finding school a bit easier, and see if she thinks the same. She might, or she might think her social difficulties are what's really affecting her.

I assume she's generally making an effort at school and is just finding it hard, rather than not doing any work.

No one has a crystal ball, but I have awful childhood memories of the tension in our household around these "quick, helpful" sessions with my brother. Really awful. I'd be prioritising finding her a place outside school where she can be the "talented, popular" one.

If she's struggling read with her. Reading has a bigger impact than anything else, don't necessarily get her to read to you but model reading to her. I've always made reading a positive event, I'd make DD and I a hot drink with a couple of biscuits and I'd read to her while she drank and dunked and then that meant it wasn't a big deal for her to read to me while I drank and had my biscuits. Don't stop reading to her even if she is a conpetant reader now, read more challenging books than she would chose herself.

I wouldn't do obvious school work in the shape of workbooks as she'll hate it but application activities or make a game out of it.

It's not unusual for childrens learning difficulties to be picked up at High School. Slow processing speed and working memory are fairly common along with dyslexia and other learning needs.

*competent

My younger two are bottom of the class with dyslexia. We are working through Word Hornet book every day - ds get treat for this. We wrote on lots of bits of paper, things he would like to do, for example pizza night, choosing film to watch, gets a £1 etc. After so many pages he gets to do a dip for one treat BUT if he refuses to do the work then one in taken out. We usually do 10min a night.

We also encourage DC to be the best they can be and not set themselves by what other people are doing. We tell them as long as they are moving forward and learning that's all we ask.

You could work on social skills a bit - I do this in school and it’s definitely something parents can do. If you wanted to stump up for a months twinkl subscription there is a lot you can download around social stories, recognising emotions, relationships, being a good friend etc. I think there’s an assumption that these are only useful for children with autism but I think they can be widely used. You could probably sneak some of this into to general conversations, watching tv and reading so it doesn’t feel like work. Hope you get some ideas form this thread OP

@PerspicaciousGreen That's really interesting to hear your perspective about your brother and the work he did. That terrible atmosphere is what I am very worried about creating - so hugely negative! I have a younger DD too who I want to make sure also has time for attention and fun after school.

@Hankunamatata sounds like this is working really well for you and your DCs. I think honestly my DDs school will not have enough time/resources/attention to get DD to make the significant progress she needs to make to start catching up.

@callingon thanks for this - I will take a look. I think this would be helpful. I like the idea of just sneaking this into general conversations - much better than doing a formal sit down and discuss 'how to make friends/talk to people etc'!!

For things like maths, something that sometimes works (if you have a conveniently aged younger sibling/cousin/friend) is to get the older child to help the younger one with their maths. Then the older child gets the review/practice (and explaining things to someone else is a great way to improve your own understanding), but in the context of being competent and helpful, rather than needing extra help themselves.

Otherwise, how about practical activities that use maths? Cooking – choose a recipe that needs halving or doubling, work out how much the ingredients will cost (let her take the lead in the shop as well), etc. A building or sewing project --- measuring, geometry, working out cost again. Planning a walk/cycle ride/day out – how long is the route, how fast will we go (can work this out from how long a familiar walk/cycle/etc. takes), how long do we think it will take? That way it shouldn't feel like school work to her, and making things, especially useful things, is often good for confidence as well.

@muddledMum25 ,thank you . It's lovely you're being so thoughtful re your daughter's needs. I think my parents were too negative .They saw my being quiet as a bad thing & were generally very rigid in their parenting . A more relaxed & accepting home atmosphere would have helped my anxiety a lot, with praise not just for academic achievement.. Also my interests weren't developed. I loved to read, cook & I loved animals, children & the elderly . I think some volunteer work would have suited me down to the ground as a teen & helped me massively, as I found that kindness & responsibility were valued . Off my own bat, I got a v lucrative little babysitting business going thru' parents recommending me. My parents surprise at my popularity was really good for my confidence. My 6th forms work experience half a day a week also helped hugely. I did a weekly afternoon at my old primary school with Reception class. Loved every minute of it & was asked to stay on when the 6 weeks ended & you were supposed to find something else or do quiet study. I think you have exactly the right attitude to help your daughter :-)