What age would you put this child at?

[Cbeebiesisdifferentonasaturday]

For writing etc? Any teachers to give feedback would also be very helpful 🙏

How terse this is.
''Most would likely be doing better?''

The little girl clearly has drawing skill and a good imagination, this will stand her in good stead.

Her handwriting can easily be refined. Her spelling is good.

A lad at College who had no GCSE's because he'd been put off by teachers at school, at age 18 took his GCSE's and A levels and got top grades in all..{Maths, Chemistry, Biology and something else {he had 4 grade A's at 'A' level {the highest mark possible then} and went to study at Bristol on his chosen course.

Children can be discouraged early by the ''Could do better'' mentality, and it can cause them to shut down to learning, as a harridan of a teacher can put them off.

Kids need encouragement, so they take pleasure in learning.

We don't know what Country the OP is in, or even if they use a Roman alphabet.

What a wonderful analogy!

The small, soil grown wild strawberries have an intense flavour and texture, warmed by the sun.

The hot-housed, hydroponically grown strawberry 🍓 looks alright, but is odourless, bland, and white inside and so often disappointing.

The child could be an advanced pre-schooler (age 3-4) as letter formation isn’t quite there which would suggest not a lot of formal teaching of letters.

However, it’s most likely a reception child (age 4-5) as they are using phonics to spell but they need a bit more practise with letter formation. If it’s a year 1 child (age 5-6) they are a little behind the majority of their peers and might need some support to catch up.

@oakleaffy I agree, that was a horrible way to put it and also likely not true

I worked as a TA across KS1 in a pretty good area in the UK. I’ve seen 4 year olds write like that and I’ve seen many 6 year olds who were nowhere near being able to write a legible and sensible sentence. There’s a huge range of ‘normal’ and I’d say that’s absolutely fine OP. It’s clear, it begins with a capital letter, it makes sense, the spelling is good, the place name uses capital letters correctly, and the idea shows imagination. I’d be pretty happy with that. I’d like to visit Doggy Land too.

5 to 6

Last year my 7 yr old would only write marginally better than that. She goes to a Gaelscoil in Ireland, where for the first two years they learn no English whatsoever and only now, in her third year of school is she learning to read and write in English. If you aren't planning on moving to a school in england in the next few years then I really wouldn't worry. They learn so much faster when they are that bit older.

Somewere between An older born or ‘gifted’ Nusery child- a Y1 child who is behind in their literacy skills. (so 3-6 year old)

Probably 5 or 6.

Ironically, the UK did look at the research that was done, but only at the phonics element.

There was a good deal of work done in the US on phonics, in the context of the debate between whole word teaching of reading and phonics based teaching. The research was carried out on children in the US who would be starting formal education, having spent the half days of their Kindergarten year playing, doing art, using scissors, pasting crafts together, singing songs, having stories read to them, doing nature walks, doing show and tell, learning to share classroom materials, to clean up after themselves, to put on their own outerwear, hats, mittens, snow bibs, boots, etc.

So basically, the research was done with children aged 6, or 5 at the youngest..

The fact that the children were older than typical British children in Reception was lost on the British experts, who may not have been familiar with school starting age in the US and assumed it was 4 as in the UK. All they noted was that phonics emerged as the best way to teach reading, and set about justifying the expense of providing classrooms and teachers for 4 year olds by making them learn a skill that could be measured.

I respectfully disagree.

If you want a child to learn grammar and be exposed to a wide vocabulary, which children will absorb without a dictionary or explicit instruction, well-written children's literature is the way to go, along with conversation that is not stuck at a small child's level in terms of vocabulary or depth of thought.

The Biff and Chip books are fine for the purposes of school-based grading of fluency and comprehension.

I would guess 6-7

Because the people in charge of our education don't care about research or what's best. Imagine a politian suggesting writing gets scrapped from the eyfs and year 1 curriculum! There would be uproar.

I'm not sure how they'd deal with the self taught or home taught readers and writers then coming into year two not having learnt in the approved way.

They could always look at how other countries manage it - although the UK isn't known for trusting other countries to know what they're doing.

Are other European countries so focused on synthetic phonics? As myself, and the other self taught readers I know, appeared to learn by whole language and analytical phonics.

The graded reading books do expose them gradually to vocabulary and concepts so are important for this. However, I agree that they aren't the be all and end all. My dd and I read her school books but we also read lots of other stuff together. We read fact books and classics which I agree if used correctly are great for expanding vocabulary. She also has a lot of modern books as well which I find are great for fostering independent reading as they have snappy storylines and easy vocabulary. I'd rather she was comfortable picking these up and reading them by herself than missing out on this side of reading tbh.

We left the school reading books for school or read them once, then read other books.

Many children with autistic traits will have memorised the school books before they come home!

Thankfully not (especially the ones with less phonetic languages!), but of course there are other variations in teaching styles. That's what I was thinking of.

@Cbeebiesisdifferentonasaturday

Because there is no consensus and it's also misunderstood as to what other countries are teaching. They may call it preschool but they are still learning from 3/4 at a similar rate to the U.K. in my experience of 3 different countries. Variations in styles but this idea that children learn nothing until 6/7 is not true.

My eldest was reading and writing at 3, my younger at 5-6 (dyslexic as it turns out) every child is different and my elder child was very ready and self taught, my younger was not!

They may call it preschool but they are still learning from 3/4 at a similar rate to the U.K. in my experience of 3 different countries. Variations in styles but this idea that children learn nothing until 6/7 is not true.

This. Most places won't be teaching formal reading and writing but there's a lot of education and learning going on.

My eldest could write like this at around 2.5, he was a very early reader also, by 4 could properly write using cursive letters. My youngest wouldn't even attempt to write his name before 4 so they vary hugely.

The main difference once my youngest started writing is that they were taught proper letter formation straight away, in fact in pre school if interested in writing they do that also.

I definitely wouldn't be worried though as your DD will just learn at the pace taught where you are. There is certainly no difference with DS1s writing ability now he's grown up, it has made no difference whatsoever (his writing is less neat than it was at 4 I reckon!)

If that's where the child's interests lie then it's difficult to change that. Mine was obsessed with jigsaw puzzles, doing ones for 3+ before two, would stand for an hour doing them. He was right on the cusp of a expressive language delay so yes, one thing will come at the cost of another.

Reception age. 4-5. A developing writer in Y1, so possibly 6, but on the lower end. Primary school teacher. If 3 or under (or just turned 4), this is excellent.