How to support DCs at a primary school that doesn't push them?

[hazelnutvanillalatte]

Hi, our local school is very nice but doesn't push the kids at all academically. If a child does well they are ignored and all attention goes toward those that need extra help. Unfortunately we can't afford to move and it's our local school. But Ofsted has highlighted this as an issue and I can really see it in the work and during observation days.

How can I support my children academically as much as possible knowing school will not do it? I spoke to his teacher who again said attention needs to go toward those who need extra support, not those who are achieving to the minimum level required.

We don't have extra income for lessons or extracurriculars but I really want to help them as I know they could be pushed a lot further. Thanks

How old?

Under 7 the most important things are supporting reading and maths. So read every day, go to the library, be a word rich household. Lots of games to help with maths - orchard toys have loads.

Thank you, they are 5 and 7

Unfortunately this is how the whole system is going - it's more important for schools to get more "passes" or more children working at the right level for their age, than to get everyone achieving the best they are able too. I would say work on reading and maths at home with your child.

You can get more books that they can read either from your local library or from reading chest,

readingchest.co.uk

Supporting maths is a little more tricky - there are workbooks etc but you are also good doing things like Lego, shapesorters, duplo, games like shut the box and also things like using money in real life - so maybe giving them pocket money for them to spend.

Literally just read to them and talk to them.
Oh and for god's sake don't 'push' them. Pushing children backfires.

Try nrich for maths activities you can do together at home. My DD really enjoys it. They do use it a bit at school, but we also do bits at home. It didn't particularly occur to me until recently, we talk about maths a fair bit at home as a shared interest.

nrich.maths.org/parents/primary

Thank you. We practice times tables when we're out and about, they enjoy it as a game, and we read a lot at home. I'm just not feeling great as a friend was telling me about her DD's primary school giving them lots of individualised attention and if a child gets through something easily, they're given the next stage of work early. DCs' school has nothing like this - the teachers don't even call on students who raise their hand if they already regularly participate.

my daughter is 4 and we had that worry when looking at schools. our local school is known for being very good but the stats show they are better for getting kids to the middle standard but high achievers don't continue to achieve. That also reflects stories i have been told.
Luckily the school we picked have experience with high potential kids and allow our daughter to do phonics with year 2, so some schools will make that extra effort.

in terms of support at home, join the library, read a lot, play word games - boggle, scrabble and articulate are favourites for our dd, word searches etc. An interactive globe has been a big hit for learning facts about countries and flags which is a particular interest of hers.

For maths we use workbooks for older ages. she does 7-9 maths. Beast academy workbooks and online learning course comes highly recommended. it's in a comic book format. it's American though so postage is high.

This is really helpful, thank you. I was after resources like this because I felt that I didn't know where to start

Amazing, thanks so much, we'll try this. Our school is exactly the same and it just seems such a shame, and it puts kids off trying harder because they're made to feel 'you've done enough, stop now.'

So I would look at what reading level they are and go to the library and get some. Reading program books and have them read to you (or any book really). Check they are blending well and ask them questions about the stories as you go along and at the end ask them to re-tell the story to you. Try to find books they really enjoy and encourage them to read them out loud to you. I’ve been through lots of books but my 5yr old is now happily reading Judy Moody and national geographic magazines (non-fiction is good, if they like dinosaurs or volcanoes etc etc get some books about that).

Check the curriculum and make sure you are confident they know everything they should so far. you can buy short daily practice workbooks from CGP (maths, spelling, comprehension) to do at home so you know they are covering what they need plus they can work at their own pace. There are lots of maths options out there, singapore method, beast academy etc. but if you aren’t confident about their knowledge base I would start with that to make sure they are where they should be.

Have you discussed it with the school and asked for more stretching work?

Same problem here OP. My daughter started school reading a bit already but they started everyone on wordless books for half a term and everyone progresses through the phonics scheme at the same pace. She is now y1 and reading chapter books, but school continue to send home (and spend time reading with her in school) books with 1-2 sentences per page. I find it hard to find out what they’re doing in maths but all the objectives listed on this terms curriculum plan was stuff she could do in preschool.

Unfortunately schools are very understaffed so it’s hard for them, plus an actual feature of the national curriculum now is keeping the class together as much as possible to avoid the ones who struggle ending up further behind. The idea is you spend as long as necessary on a concept until everyone has got it, stretching the ones who get it easily by ‘broadening’ and ‘deepening’ their current understanding, rather than teaching them anything new. You can probably guess my feelings on the matter 😂

Teacher basically just said he's doing well and they don't give anyone different work except students who need extra help, and there are a few of these. When I asked about the participation in class she again said they want to encourage those who need more support. During observation day I saw him raise his hand to answer literally every question and didn't get called on once

So in terms of what you can do:

These workbooks are good for maths. A page a week is a good rate. You can also use them to get a sense of where your child is.

https://www.schofieldandsims.co.uk/mental-arithmetic/

Probably more suitable for your older child than your younger.

If you want to extend more generally then extra curriculars are the way to go.

There are often free or very cheap chess clubs for children in many towns. If you have a computer then looking at coding can be interesting for some children - scratch is usually what is taught at school.

https://brilliant.org/s/sem/coding/?utmmedium=cpc&utmmsource=search&utmterm=1664232707944how%20to%20codeCTGGComputerScienceeCodingLearn&utmmcontent=724143265656&utmmcampaign=21373697719MixeddSearchCategoryyAllNonMathRoW&gaddsource=1&gbraid=0AAAAADwPohXkvel2LOg98Pt3w1Sf4BE75&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI1fetquLcigMVr4FQBh12xwVWEAMYAiAAEgJOGfDBwE

In terms of working on problem solving in maths, another poster has already mentioned NRich.

nrich.maths.org

They do problem of the month for primary and secondary and have a lot of old problems/investigations.

They might also like exploding dots

globalmathproject.org/exploding-dots/

He might be a bit young but there are quite a few YouTube mathematicians who do videos explaining maths -

Matt Parker (standupmaths)

https://youtube.com/@standupmaths?si=MhDq65zX6TG8qPIg

Numberphile

https://youtube.com/@numberphile?si=z8aE7LGmZA5gC3sB

Thats terrible, I would definitely do the work at home, he’s definitely not being stretched. You can let him loose on it, DD usually does 2 pages of maths a day because she can do it quickly so I let her just do what she wants. So if he finds whatever he is doing easy then get him to do say 2 pages instead of one until he starts slowing down of his own accord. In your case I would pretty much ignore school and what they are doing and make sure I’m covering the curriculum at home. In primary it’s not that much work tbh, you can cover a lot in half an hour.

@Octavia64 these are great links, thanks so much for the help

I’m a year ahead of you with similar frustrations for my eldest. I think class cohort makes a massive difference and I’m not convinced my eldest is actually doing any work. I feel like my youngest is being stretched much more as she has quite an easy class behaviour wise.

The things that I’m noticing the most are:

1. no corrections or push on creative writing. Apparently all the kids just peer review but none of them can actually spell. This has been the biggest wake up for me this year and I’m planning to take matters into my own hands and start trying to do something every week. This one is my biggest concern.

2. maths is moving too slowly for my daughter but I feel like it’s much easier to supplement at home than the English as you can do a lot to strengthen mental maths in small doses. Last year they were getting some extension work but this year has been dire. I’ve been doing bond papers and it’s been good to spot gaps and to develop more reasoning skills.

My DS is Year 6 now and I've always done extra maths with him at home. Primarily using these books which align with with NC, but are quite challenging even if you stay in your year group.

collins.co.uk/collections/shanghai-maths-primary

I've then moved onto CGP books in junior then specific 11+ prep which we've thankfully finished! 😂

He is finding Yr 6 maths boring and has the potential to switch him off the subject, so we are keeping him on with his 11+ tutor to give him some challenge and stretch while he waits to join his grammar school in Sept.

I'm a school governor and see things first hand. School budgets are stretched, much greater level of need, both SEN but also the breadth of ability in a class (made worse by covid). TA support has been cut to the bone at a time we need more support for kids. I think you are right to assess what additional work you can do at home with your kids.

I still think you have a right to ask the school what material they are offering to challenge more able children. I think this is more important in maths than English, as I feel there is more room for breadth of learning with class books, comprehension discussion, creative writing etc.

I would agree with some of the links PPs have suggested - Nrich for maths is excellent for stretch.
The more able pupils that I taught generally had families who gave them lots of experiences and I'm not talking fancy holidays. I mean taking them bird watching so they can learn and understand habitats and life cycles, coastal walking to look at rock formations and shell/fossil collecting etc. Also playing lots and lots of word games like Scrabble and card games like cribbage.
I think if you gave them work sheets to do after a day at school they would soon get bored and it might be a bit of a struggle for you.
The life experiences are so important. It will give them a wide vocabulary, a good understanding of the world, animals, geography etc so they will have lots of things in their bank of knowledge to write about when they need to at school.