Supporting child academically at home

[firemansammy]

How can you do this? Obviously in later years, a tutor would help.

My 4 year old ( starts school in September ), seems behind in some areas.

In numbers, writing for example. A recent report said.

I do try to do stuff at home with her. But I'm just not quite sure how to do it effectively.

We have a lot of preschool books for writing, we sometimes practice phonics. We read together etc. how else can I help ?

You can't help but think that the parents must do a lot at home with kids who are very smart at this age ? Maybe I'm not doing enough ?

I was just focusing on having fun with her and then occasionally we do some writing in her books or we practice phonic sounds, which she enjoys. We by no means do this every day. She doesn't get home until after 4 pm during the week, so I don't do much with her then. I usually do a bit of writing and phonics with her at the weekend, but loads.

But looking at the other kids, I now think it's my fault and other parents are doing this kind of stuff more with their kids.

Kids are fine to play when four years old.
Things to include in play ..
counting objects aloud - anything
making groups of stones/sticks - three for both of you, for example.
recognising numbers up to ten and pairing with correct number of objects
reading lots of stories, some that rhyme and where she can join in.
recognising letters, on fridge for example.
learning colours
talking about days of the week
looking at the clock and time
chopping food, packing lunch box
puting on shoes, doing up laces
wearing hat, getting dressed.
saying please and thankyou, taking turns
writing or scribling messages and posting in your letter box.
holding pencil, colouring.
going to the toilet.
sing songs together.

DS's nursery reports were fine but not exceeding. When he started school something clicked and they've been brilliant since (now 10).

If he was struggling in school I would do everything I could do address (tutor etc) but I wouldn't have worried at age 4 unless he was identified as seriously behind.

I did get phonics stuff sent to me and I'm a bit ashamed to admit I didn't bother. I was worried I'd get it wrong and do more harm than good. I guess that's a gamble though and I'm lucky DS has turned out to be bright. What I did do was wait until he got the very basics of reading in the first few weeks and then bought the whole series of books that I knew the school used and we worked our way through every night. I think reading is so important and thankfully he didn't mind doing it and he progressed very quickly.

I don't worry too much about other homework, although he does always do it. The one thing I really encourage is the times tables practice as he got older, using the app the school recommend.

Can see others have recommended some good resources.

Other thing I would say is make sure they go to the opticians from an early age just to check they can actually see the board!

Yeah I would not be concerned AT ALL if she was not exceeding and just as expected.

But we have several things for which she's not even in the expected bit.

She can write her name and is starting to write numbers. She can write her name if it's written and she copies but I don't think she can get just write it when she doesn't have it there to copy.

Development really does usually come in spurts just like when they were babies. And just like when they were babies there will be some parents who overegg their children's abilities, others how focus only on the positives but may have much bigger issues they're dealing with.

It's great to engage with your child's development, and (assuming you're in the UK), since foundation stage is largely play based, there are lots of ways to support your child as they transition to school. Games and activities to support their gross and fine motor skills (Google/Pinterest/Insta will have a bunch you can get inspiration from) will be a great benefit. Letter games, games with numbers (my children are older now so I'm not sure if they're still popular but the Orchard Farm games were always good). Engaging while you're moving from one place to another (in the car/walking) with games like i-spy but using initial sounds rather than letter names to support phonics, spotting shapes and naming where you see them (e.g. 'yes, that's a clock face, yes, the street sign is circular and it has a number on it') is a simple way to bring in communicative numeracy skills.

And reading. It's the thing you'll likely hear over and over again, throughout their primary journey and into secondary. Children who read/are read to do better in their SATs, GCSEs, marriages, eventual campaign for the white house... a slight exaggeration but reading to/with/listening to your child read/encouraging independent reading with your child as their age and stage dictates is really so beneficial.

And don't underestimate how awesome it is that your child is growing up in a multilingual home. That's such a positive!

Number bonds to 10 are very important in KS1. Get some numicon and practice what adds up to 10.

DD is high-achieving and autistic, she finds the school environment stressful due to the sensory input so for us pre-learning, over-learning and contextualising is key. They are all fancy words but carrying out those activities is easy

Pre-learning is about introducing a skill or topic before it is taught in a higher stress environment (school). Basically it gives a sticking place in the brain for new knowledge to attach itself to.

Over-learning is about reviewing what has been taught in the stressful environment. This is cementing the knowledge in place.

Contextualising is about giving wider context, applying and diving deeper into a topic to make it interesting This makes it relevant, applicable and they'll be able to link learning other information to it building bridges between skills and topics.

In Primary school we would read books and documentaries about what she was learning and do museum / zoo / gallery / outings related to the topic, she would become a expert in whatever her topic was at school andit was fun not work.

For phonics, get rid of the workbooks and learn in an active way, reading to your child is always important and not making reading a battle ground.
Include letter/phonic spotting in everything you do so road signs, billboards etc. have her help you read recipes in cookbooks etc before you carry out the activity so it's applying her knowledge in real-world scenarios not just Biff, Chip and Kipper books

Getting her to write for any reason, a thank you note, a story about something, a diary at night of what she did that day etc - she'll apply the knowledge she has to the words she knows and the spelling of everything else will improve as she gets older.

You sound like a great parent op. I think at her age it's probably most beneficial really just to spend time with her, talking and listening to her about anything and everything, playing, drawing with her. Read and tell her stories. Given you're trilingual i would not hesitate to use languages other than english with her, just in the normal way you would speak them. Being able to understand and speak more than one language at her age is a huge advantage to her. Don't hesitate to take her places like parks, museums, shopping, galleries, zoos, beaches whatever you and her enjoy.

And nothing wrong with watching tv / films with her!

With subtitles on! Helps accelerate reading

At her age I'd work on the physical and the academics will come.
Work on her fine motor skills and finger strength to build up the muscles needed to write.
Using scissors, buy a roll of lining paper or brown paper and draw different squiggly lines on it so she can follow it with her scissors.
Lots of play DOH to build up her hands
Buy some pincer laundry pegs and play games with them like seeing who can pick up the most Cheerios.

Let her practise writing on different surfaces, a white board in the kitchen she can reach and nice colourful white board pens are great. Have the days of the week and month written out next to it so she can choose the right one and copy it onto the board. Playing noughts and crosses / hang-man etc all build up her hand strength.

As long as you are reading to your daughter every day, counting things (read a 1-10 counting book / count steps as you go up them / put Numberblocks on the tv when it’s screen time etc), and doing some scribbling / colouring-in a few times a week, that is literally all you need to do (in my view!) . And these things are generally covered by everyday parenting anyway, or your child will be doing them each day at nursery (you should still be reading to them each night though).

Schools value emotional stability and low level independence (able to put shoes and coat on, go to toilet on their own) more than any academic stuff. If you want to work on anything at home then let it be resilience (“oh that didn’t go how you were expecting, did it? Why do you think that happened? You are feeling angry and sad it didn’t work out this time. Let’s take some deep breaths to calm down and then try again. It might go right this time” etc etc) and ability to recognise and name their emotions so they can communicate their feelings to the teacher.

If your child is naturally interested in letters and numbers then it’s nice for them when starting school as they get confidence boosts knowing things before they are taught them. But it’s not necessary. In my experience, by around yr 2-3 everything has levelled out into natural strengths and weaknesses anyway. Being resilient will help them better overall in the classroom, as school is basically a barrage of learning new things, which can be overwhelming for children coming from a household where the parent steps in as soon as things get tricky.

This all sounds so high pressured for a 4 yo who's not even at school yet! My eldest started school at 4 barely able to write her own name and no idea of phonics etc. I think she could recognise numbers to 10 and count well but she certainly couldn't write them or do addition etc. I think they did some phonics and writing work in her nursery school with the children who were interested but it certainly wasn't a whole class activity.

DD had zero interest in formal learning in nursery school and very little in P1, she didn't want to do reading books etc at home at all. Both the nursery teacher and P1 teacher were adamant not to push her, enthusiasm is far more important at that age. Once she hit P2 she's suddenly matured in that sense and is loving reading and doing really well.

Keep it casual, don't do anything overly formal unless she actually wants to. Watch alphablocks and numberblocks, chat about the sounds in words when you're out and about. Be lead by her.

Focus on the social side of things for settling into school and then once she's settled have a chat with the teacher and get their views on how she's doing and whether she needs any particular support.

Btw, knowledge of other languages may be slowing her down a little in English at this age, but what a fantastic gift! I'm sure she'll be flying in no time.

I’m a primary teacher. We did nothing academic with DD1 before she started school. We read to her every day and the in laws did lots of games that involved counting etc when they picked her up from preschool. She couldn’t write her name before starting school.

Shes now half way through reception year and is reading books from the year 1 classroom fluently, can write in full sentences and just spent half an hour writing out her number bonds to 10 for fun.

Development is not linear.

OP this is mental tbh - she’s in nursery.

They are supposed to learn all this stuff at school, not preschool.

My DC couldn’t write their name before reception and is now in year 1 doing really well. Take a chill pill and let your baby enjoy her last year of freedom before 14 years of school.

I know it’s easy for me to say but please try not to worry about the nursery report as your anxiety may transfer to your daughter.
I am a teacher, mum to 3 and grandma to 4 under 6 year olds (soon to be 5). I have also worked on several research projects at Cambridge University on how children learn and the importance of play. If you are interested in academic study - my work has been published in a collection of research papers called ‘The Excellence of Play’ edited by Prof Janet Moyles - one of this country’s leading expert in early years education.

Despite all the evidence to show formalising education too soon does not improve academic achievement in the teenage years and leads to increased mental health difficulties in adulthood, the UK is at odds with the vast majority of countries around the world by insisting children start formal education and testing at such a young age.
To give you an anecdotal example, the children of a friend of mine were a similar age to mine. Her children attended a very formal nursery from the age of 3 whereas mine went to a playgroup. The nursery children were expected to sit and listen to group instructions, complete worksheets etc whereas my children joined in whichever play activities they chose. The nursery children started school being able to read and write simple sentences, count to 100 etc. whereas mine knew a few words and letters and counted to 20 at most. My friend was ecstatic her children were so far ahead of the others in their reception class. Marvellous you may think!

One day, we went on a trip together. I pulled into a service station and my daughter (then aged about 6) asked, “Mummy, what does that sign say.” My friend beamed delightedly when her daughter piped up with, “It says free disposable gloves.” She paused then asked, “Mummy, why do they have free gloves?” Whereupon my daughter said, “It’s to keep your hands clean when you touch the engine bits.” My friend’s daughter had been taught to read the words but my daughter had learned to think for herself and solve problems etc.
Fast forward to age 18…. my daughter went off to university(despite being severely dyslexic she enjoyed learning and managed to get the required grades) whereas my friend’s daughter hated school, left at 16, developed anorexia and at 18 had to be admitted to a psychiatric hospital to treat her for self-harming. Obviously, we cannot be certain whether the formal versus informal nursery experiences were the root cause of these problems but there is strong evidence to show that in countries where formal education is started very early and there is great pressure to excel academically, teenage suicide rates are much higher.
As many other posters have said, play with your daughter, read to her and have fun. Her mental health is far more important than arbitrary government benchmarks.

I also think it's mental, which is why I didn't focus so hard on it and only did these things if she wanted to/ felt up for it.

But having your child at 4 actually marked down, is concerning. I don't know why they do that.

Absolutely this. I think parents of children this age can get caught up with worrying about the academics when that's what the teachers are trained for and very capable of delivering. The best way we can support the process as parents is making sure our children are equipped with the practical and emotional skills they need for starting school so the teachers can do their stuff on the academics in a focused way

Totally agree with this. Would add concentrating on "soft skills" like sharing, getting along with other people, using a knife and fork, putting coat on and zipping it up, getting changed for PE - that sort of thing.

I cannot believe anyone has already decided that a 4 year old is behind and needs tutoring.

Is the nursery attached to the school she would attend? A few years ago schools were discouraging nurseries from doing phonics, reading and writing before starting school and only expected them to know numbers up to 5 or something like that. I would focus on things she won't be taught outside the home, such as speaking the different languages you know, personal care like someone else said, holding and using cutlery properly and tidying up, doing her shoe laces up(apparently in Germany schools teach this before writing, here it's just velcro), play dough and clay modeling is also great to build up strength and dexterity in fingers that will help with writing. Don't get too anxious about her progress, she is too young!

I don't know why the nursery ( part of a school where she'll go to reception ) think it's important to publish these reports and make you feel like your child isn't doing well.

Support is also being given on sharing skills / emotional regulation. Which I also think is more important and that's our main focus at home.

Honestly it would have me judging the nursery more than the child! Our DC went/will go to the most formal preschool in our area as they've been in nursery since they were babies so they are well used to more informal environments. Even the preschool that's structured more like a P1 classroom doesn't do formal learning, except for a small amount in the final term with the DC who show an interest.

Hopefully when you get to school you'll find they're a bit more relaxed in their thinking with this age group!

With the best will in the world, nursery staff are generally not qualified teachers. They have not been trained to teach the Reception curriculum, including phonics and early reading / writing. Their focus, quite rightly, is on play and social skills.
Most children start in Reception not being able to read and write.

Just ignore it. There is no assessment for kids at the end of nursery - the end of EYFS is the end of reception so she’s 18 months away needing to meet whatever they’re marking her against.

Nursery staff at a day care will not be teachers. Teachers in a preschool attached to a primary school will be teachers IME.

Still don't think it's worth stressing about in the slightest though tbh! (Except wondering if the ethos of the school is for you.)

@Compsearch wow ok. Why on earth do they not just say that at parents evening then?

Why make me feel like my child is already behind ?

Also on the social stuff with the turn taking etc. they could just say, she's struggling here- we are supporting her like XYZ and you can do XYZ at home, but we aren't concerned because we only expect children to fully meet all criteria in 18 months time.

I am going to ask for a meeting I think just to challenge them on this a little bit and understand why they've framed it the way they have. If this is going to continue, maybe it's not the place for her.