What extra work (apart from homework) do you do with your Year 1 children..?

[CharlieBoo]

Hi,

My ds is 6 in march and in year 1. He has done well at school so far, but I have noticed that he's not progressing as quickly as he was...for e.g his maths and his reading.

He is a good reader, but he needs to catch up on the comprehension side...any tips to help with this? He is on reading level 5 on Oxford Reading tree.

Unless he has a number line he struggles with simple sums and often I get this little blank look from him...At school they are encouraging no number lines and to try and work out on your own.

So, what do you do with your year 1 children at home? Each night we read his school books and do spellings. Have just started him with some writing practice, but I don't want to push him as he wants to have fun when he comes in from school. Any tips for fun educational stuff at home much appreciated.

Thanks Lucy

Having this debate now. DS struggling with reading but making good progress now.
Rubbish with numbers and okay at writing letters and copying but not independent writing.
We have school book almost every night, school don't set homework every week. I don't want to put him off school and education by making it a chore.
So I had a thought that we would start a scrape book on Saturday together and add little bits during the week if we have time.
I have given him pocket money and this will help him with his maths I think. Have not started but it's an idea.

So I thought we would do a weekly

Thanks Starbear...dp is bringing home some pads tonight from work so we can use one as his special home book for writing. He is a typical boy and wants to play football, with his superhero figures or play ds....everything school related is a chore to him but I don't want him to fall behind.

Id leave it, read for fun together. Counting in everday life - cakes, apples at shops. letters/postcards to granny etc

But other than that they need a break, if you force them imo you turn them off further.

DS1 is in reception and before he started school I did a lot of work with him. Now he is at school I find it really hard to do anything extra with him, mainly due to time constraints and having a baby.

I feel that you need to be careful about blurring the role of being mum with being a teacher figure. It is tricky. I think my son is more appreciative of us playing with him at the weekend and would resent doing extra work. One suggestion could be to incorporate learning into play eg we have a number game where you match answers to sums. Another way to improve spelling is to play junior scrabble. All fun but all educational too.

Writing could be making a list, buying ingredients then doing baking. Scales are a very good way to use addition.

Just some ideas! (Used to be a teacher myself btw).

Thanks for your replies ladies... I totally agree with you btw, he works hard at school all day and I want him to rest, have fun and be a 5 year old little boy. I know some mums at the school do a lot extra at home and it gets me panicking I'm not doing enough! I totally get the baby thing too. I have a 20 monthold toddler and its hard for ds and I to have quiet time together until she is in bed and by then he's too tired too.

Junior scrabble is great idea! Thanks

fannyfoghorn 2nd junior scrabble ds got it for Christmas & has played it once and loved it. Wow. Time does go fast we do so many other things that fitting in bits of education gets tough. he does rugby on Sunday and Beavers on saturday. We been visiting people we haven't seen over Christmas like Great Aunt Winne. V. important

I don't do any formal "work" as such with dd, who will also be 6 in March. We do play lots of games though - Junior Scrabble, Junior Monopoly, Pop to The Shops etc. She also has an email penpal (dd of a friend who lives far away) which encourages her to type and spell. She likes computer games on cbbc, NickJr and starfall.com. Luckily she loves reading, and I often find her reading to her little sister unprompted.

I am a big fan of the No Nonsense Maths Books (Bond) which you can get on Amazon and which cover the y1 syllabus. They're not very arduous cos they are designed for 10 minute bursts.

I dont do anything specific I read with them talk to them we look things up on the internet together (often even when I know the answer because it can be great fun to do) but I do not sit with letters and additional books. If they come wanting to learn I welcome it but I do not go further than that.

You can use coins in a playful way to work out sums. Have a pile of pennies - start with say 5 each and as you play snakes and ladders get a penny each time you go up a ladder and give one to the other player when you go down a snake. Talk all the time about the amounts. " Oh well I was in the lead with 8p but now I've had to give you a penny for going down that snake again, I've only got 7 left! How many have you got now ds?" etc
As he gets more proficient you can extend it to gain/lose 2 pennies each time, working with 2ps 5ps etc.
You could also try the same kind of thing with smarties or other small sweets - at the end of the game you get to eat your winnings!

IMO, it is very early to expect them to do sums without concrete materials (eg counters, number lines). I think we often move from the concrete to the abstract very quickly in maths and children could do with much more concrete experience to build their number concepts better.

CharlieBoo My Ds came home with a merit certificate from his teacher today very, very hard to get from this male teacher. very proud of him. He always seems to get it for acting. He can memorise words and lines and anything verbal so like planets and loves science. So he won't write a great novel but hey maybe Little Bear will grow up to be a Starbear

Ahhh starbear that is amazing!!! I bet you are chuffed to bits. Well done to your ds!! In ds' class they have a bear and a book to take home if you're the star of the week... Ds is desperate to get it.

Thanks so much for the new replies. Loving the snakes and ladders idea and the childrens encyclopaedia. I think he would like that. We are going into town tomorrow so will pick some fun stuff up then. Saw a thread too on books for year 1 to give them a change from the school reading books although my ds loves the biff, chip and magic key books from school. Will see what there is though. Thanks girls, some great ideas in a fun way.

I am a new member, and this is only my third 'post'. I have worked in Primary schools as Teaching Assistant, and, now retired, as a voluntary helper for 25 years.

It does seem sad that parents and children have this much pressure and worry, when it should be an exciting, happy time for both.

Our Yr1 children have limited reading, writing and numeracy skills, but it is important to praise effort, as well as any progress.

Oxford Reading Tree is a very old scheme (though I think it has been undated, but I haven't seen the latest versions.)

Numeracy is best supported with 'real' objects that a child can handle, count etc. Lego bricks, counters, even dry pasta shapes, can be lined up and counted: multiplication is "so many lots of", dividing is "sharing between so many friends".

Try and make it fun and non-stressful and I am sure you will all be fine.

Lucy

I say this with the greatest of respect

he's 6 - LEAVE HIM ALONE!

Wake him up at 4am to do extra work. That's what Barack Obama's mother did. You don't get to be President by sleeping in 'til 6.30am.

DS I don't think is too great on his maths and is a reluctant reader. I tend to search for opportunities to get him counting his money to see if he has enough for that chocolate bar, adding things, counting how many days to X's birthday party, dividing (sharing)things equally with sister.

Pointing out at what time we do certain things.

Encouraging him to navigate the internet by reading and writing for himself as much as possible. Sometimes I leave him little messages in the lunchbox.

It has not worked jet but I try to get him to read books to his sister (2). She quite likes the little readers, e.g. ORT, Usbourne.

Nothing formal. She's 6. She needs to play and have fun at home. And at this age they are learning loads all the time - not necessarily reading and maths and stuff from a school curriculum, but all about life, the world, people, relationships etc etc. She asks questions all the time and we try our best to answer them, she asks about people from other countries, about what life was like 'in olden times', about the planets/stars etc. We learn about these things together whenever she asks about them. Just as important as writing practice/reading/maths imo

DH and I are both teachers, with DTs in Y2 and we do the absolute bare minimum with them in term of academic work - we make sure reading and any h/w is done, but that's it really. We take them out, we have fun together, we read together, we have conversations about all sorts. They are learning loads.

CharlieBoo We did his diary on Saturday and to write 5 lines and figure out how much he spent from his Christmas money took most of the afternoon!!!! I have to say he was very positive. He liked knowing how much he had left in his pocket money. He liked recording info in the diary and he like sticking a picture of himself under his sentence(he lost a tooth on Friday) It also helps me see where he is and I now know the maths they give for homework is far too advanced. Today we hope just to write one line that he is going to a party and stick the invitation in the diary. I have also written bits in the diary too for him to read
If this afternoon takes to much time we are going to knock it on the head.

Play snakes and ladders, or similar, to get the adding a bit quicker. Learn address and phone number, date of birth, bake, weighing and gaining valuable life skills. Dot to dots and word searches are a great way to get reluctant writers to pick up a pencil. Read a story at bed time as often as possible. This is more valuable than his school reading book and point to the words he should know.

we dont really do any formal stuff at home other than what is sent home from school, they are tierd when they get back and what they have to do is enough without putting any extra on top of that!

we read lots of books though, she has got some fan fact books she had for her birthday, they are wonderwise books and are actually really interesting, she loves them. We also play lots of board games like pop to the shops, junior monopoly and magic coiuldren, these are all fab for teaching money, counting, addition, subtraction and some simple multiplication and they dont know they are learning.

i did do a quick 5 minute lesson on multiplication at the weekend and her teacher said that she is good at maths but sometimes wont try thiongs that she thinks are too hard so i showed her just how easy it is and she was really pleased with herslef in the end that she had done some quite tricky multiplacation sums all by herslef.
but this is really the only extra thing we have done in months!

she loves writing and writes for fun all the time, she also reads of her own accord too. But if she didnt want to i wouldnt make her do any thing. they are only 6 and