Uk education

[ForHardyCrab]

Help needed please. My daughter got below expected in year 2 and she started year 3. Is there any way I can help her home to reach the expected level for year 3. I spoke with teachers and they confirmed they will help, but I wanted to help her in home. Any books that will be helpful as well

Is the issue English, Maths or both?

read with her at home. Go to the library and let her choose books to read together and for you to read to her too.
If you want to help her with maths and teachers are helping, find out what your dd is learning at school and practise at home. Lots of free online sites that can help with maths.
Bbcbitesize is good.

All the 3 . They generalised literacy, maths and all other subjects and mentioned she is below expected

Thank you for the suggestions! Much appreciated!

Ah ok. First of all, don’t panic! The subjects link together so any little improvement you can make will have an impact elsewhere. For the literacy side, concentrate on reading. Pick books with her and read a bit with her before you choose it. If she struggles with about a quarter of the words then it’s the right level. Also read to her. Maybe have a look at some of the Read it Yourself books. They’re proper fairytales so don’t feel as babyish as the Reading schemes but are still divided into ability bands for parents. For the numeracy, go back to basics. Part of the issue for a lot of children is that the curriculum is just too crammed and it’s a lot more advanced than it used to be; they’re moving onto new topics before they’ve fully grasped the fundamentals. Get her a couple of children’s Maths books - Collins are probably the easiest and have lots of stickers etc and if your daughter is amenable to it then get an exercise book and give her some old fashioned arithmetic. It doesn’t have to be pages but if you give her 5 addition sums a day her confidence will grow and so will her knowledge of number bonds! A few weeks later, move onto subtraction (but throw in a couple of addition too). Her confidence will grow as her knowledge of the basics improves and then she’ll find it easier to access the actual curriculum. Hope that helps!

Thank you for clear explanation. I will explore Collins books and your suggestions are so helpful.

We liked the Oxford Reading Tree scheme and you can usually find them in charity shops. You could introduce Maths in every day life eg I always used an old fashioned scale with weights so they had to work out how to make the right combination. But please remember that Einstein didn’t speak till he was four and Churchill failed the 11 plus. We don’t all develop at the same rate.

Start with an eye and hearing test.

@ForHardyCrab I would talk to the school about the curriculum this year. For example what are they doing in maths? What basic knowledge does she need to access the curriculum? Where I was a governor, the lower achievers had revision sessions so they could access the new curriculum. So I would be asking what revision they are doing and what you can do so you need to know what she will be taught. Ditto Literacy and reading. Find books from the library to extend vocabulary. Don’t just stick with boring phonics. Find something more exciting. Read to her. More challenging books or poetry increase vocabulary and spellings.

The best schools have curriculum evenings and tell parents what dc will be doing as a heads up. Teachers should work in partnership with parents so I’d definitely want an overview of the y3 curriculum and it should include science, geography, history etc too. Then you can explore the other topics by going to museums, visits or getting books. Eg might be Romans or rivers - but find out.

In maths you need to build her fluency with mental maths. Focus on times tables starting with 2x, 5x, 10x moving onto 3s, 4s and 8s as these are the ones needed for year 3. You could do 11x too. Also talk about how many 3s in 24 etc so she can apply tables to division.
Revise number bonds to 10, moving onto number bonds to 20 then 100.
Practise doubling and halving 2 digit numbers mentally.
Make sure she understands place value ie hundreds tens and ones. Increase to thousands. Check she understands odds and evens.
Introduce fractions by relating to division and using bar models.
Make sure she is solid on written methods but check with the school which methods they’re using so you don’t confuse her. Only when all that is secure, move on to problem solving.
Read to her and with her. Discuss the techniques used and explain vocabulary as well as checking comprehension.
Ask the school for a list of the high frequency words and work on learning how to spell those. Schofield and Sims offer a good spelling scheme to work on alongside this.
Most importantly, don’t panic. Working towards isn’t the end of the world and be prepared for her to still be working towards at the end of the year as the curriculum moves fast in KS2 and the other children aren’t going to be sitting around waiting for her to catch up. She’ll get there in her own time.
If money allows, get her a tutor. I tutor lots of pupils like your DD. It’s all about building a solid platform and boosting their confidence. It can take a few months to backfill the gaps before moving forwards.

Yes depending on how far behind - DS was a year behind at one point took about 18 months and two soild teachers to catch up again and then he just kept going.

If reading fluency/phoics - look at Dancing bears 10 minute sa day and for fun Teach your monster how to read

If it's comprehsion - it's reading more with her and asking questions - reading chest if you need more decodeable books.

If it's maths maths factor - best money we spent on their education - some on here don't rate it but it really helped all three of mine.

If it's spelling punctaion etc apple and pears - that was about 20 minutes a day and highlighted quite a few other issues for my DC - handwriting and memory. You could also try Nessy one of their primary schools used it though my DC didn't really like it.

If it's handwritting - look at grips and slopes - and fun activites that help build the hand muscles up and look at writing programs like write from the start or Speed Up!: a Kinaesthetic Programme to Develop Fluent Handwriting

As pp mention get hearing and eyes checked as well.

if it's every thing - pick one to work on and slowly build up. If she just slightly behind with no specific issues then collins books at home should be enough.

can I also recommend using board games to help with sneakily working on maths?

Monopoly is great - once she has a set of properties, she has to charge double the rent. She will work on her number bonds using dice. Let her organise the bank and be the one who works out what change is needed. Oh and make sure she’s always the one who reads out the Chance and Community chest cards! It’s a great game.🙂

@Macaroni46 It’s unfortunate you say dc “get there in their own time”. That’s plainly not true for at least 20% of dc. The ones on the cusp of meeting expected just might get there but dc often bump along at “below” and stay there. That isn’t to say this dd will but saying all dc “get there” is misleading. They absolutely do not.

I‘m a big fan of the app Reading Eggs. We‘ve mostly used the fast phonics section to teach my bilingual child to read in English, but there are reading fluency and reading games components as well as a whole section dedicated to maths. It gamifies learning and - I believe - is mapped to the National Curriculum.

Numberblocks and Alphablocks on CBBC are great, too.

And board games.

There is truth in what you say. However, I was thinking more long term. For example, ex-pupils of mine who I taught in year 5 or 6 ten years ago. I bump into them and they’re off to uni or have achieved good A levels or qualified as plumbers, electricians etc and are generally thriving. I wanted to give the OP a positive view and was also trying to say, when a child is working at below age related, sometimes it can seem like they’ll never ‘catch up’ despite all the support and interventions. Yes, obviously do extra work with the child if she’s willing but accept that for now, for the next few years, despite extra input she may well remain at WTS but in the long run, she likely will catch up when she’s developmentally ready.

I found the primary school were often oblivious to outside school help and often attributed progress to suddenly being developmentally ready.

Mathfactor took 4 years for mine going from behind - to he's likely got dyscalculia or just a none maths brain - to catching up and keeping going. DS who had two teachers suggest dyscalculia just got a A in maths A-level and a C in further maths

DD1 spelling was later getting help at home as school kept saying she was fine - the test at start Y5 she was put in a group of sturggling Y2 and Y3. The apple and pears test put her lower than school was starting and they took all year to not finish book 2- but at home we did one to one and went from 3/4 of book 1 to book 4 by mid Y6. Start of Y6 we changed school for work reasons and when they tested she was behind for her ablity not age.

Most of kids who were behind and caught up IME tend to have had some outside help - and often parents don't volunteer that information it comes out when you have a struggling child comparing notes/offering suggestions or when in DD1 case the and other move from bottom maths groups to top after testing and another parent in same poistion asked us all.

I aimed to get them as ready and soild in basic skills by end of Y6 - so ready as possible for secondary - just slow plodding along. Y3 really isn't too late at all - it's a really good time.

@Macaroni46 I do accept dc develop differently and definitely stay positive. However there are some dc who simply cannot catch up and don’t go to university from “working below”. In fact over 60% don’t go. Any trade job needs decent GCSE passes and we know many dc don’t get these either so promising “getting there” just isn’t possible for some in the breezy way you suggest. Accessing the secondary curriculum is a massive hurdle for some dc and exam results bear this out.

Y3 will be a time to show improvement and hopefully dc will enjoy learning. Dc that don’t switch off and that light is difficult to switch on again. Thats why churning through boring phonics is such a turn off. My DDs had it as part of their reading regime but much more breadth was included to retain their interest in books. I would encourage op to Brayden our reading and maths snd know what is being taught to hone in where necessary.

I actually agree with a lot of what you say but I was not being ‘breezy’. In fact, if you read my original post, I made the point that it is unlikely she’ll catch up any time soon even with extra support, and that it’s quite likely she’ll stay as WTS for some time.

I would do practical activities - when shopping get your child to check the price, scan the shop and go machine and check against the ticket. Baking activities, using house numbers and bus numbers to do addition or subtraction.
Going out to eat , read the menus together..
Get a large calendar and get your child to put appointments on there - will be maths and writing / reading skills.

When driving ask child to check the changes in speed signs - is that bigger / smaller than before etc.

Give your child small jobs round the house and say 20p/50p/£1 earned and then let your child spend / save - count together / how much left / how much you still need to save for a particular item they want.

Science - do experiments at home and ask what they learnt. Take photos discuss differences etc of flowers at different times / seasons.

Making if fun will keep your child engaged - of it’s sit down and books they may loose interest in learning altogether and HE is all book based really so whilst you can do learning in other ways.

Thank you so much for the detailed explanation!

Certainly practical learning is best

@Macaroni46 Fair enough! Agree trying to help is worth a go though and hopefully dd will respond well.

Thank you. We have school meet the teacher Tommorrow and will discuss the options with the teacher.

Mathsfactor works well for maths.
loads of reading with you. Our school asks for at least 30 minutes per day

@ForHardyCrab Is the school giving you an overview of the curriculum for this term? That would be very helpful. I think when dc are enthusiastic about other subjects such as history, geography and art etc you can widen reading topics and maths topics to help overall learning. Have a good meeting.