increasing her confidence

[arpo]

Hi all,

I'm a dad, looking for advice on ways to address a lack of confidence in one of my kids...

Background: my wife took a full time job recently and I mainly work at home = I'm more involved than before in school runs, homework, packed lunch prep etc.

In a recent parent's evening, the broad feedback was:

• my daughter's confidence has yo-yoed throughout the year
• she over-relies on adult reassurance (often knows the answer but wants reassurance)
• gets flustered with mental maths that has to be done fast (I've always had a concern she never mastered the basics on maths back when she was 5 or so).
• is in a class with some "strong personalities" and could possibly do with pushing for her ideas to shape the games they play more.

I'd be very grateful for any specific suggestions on habits / activities to increase her confidence over time.

You don't say how old your DD is.
Mine is 10 in y5 and since December we have been working on increasing her confidence with the school. There are also 'strong personalities' in her class and she is towards the lower end academically, socially, and on stuff like sport and art.

The main thing that has been done is to use their diary/planner/home-school book to send messages back and forth (not usually used this way at our school). The school are trying to write in positive praise messages 3 times a week, and if we have something positive to say we write it in there too. So she gets praise at home for stuff at school and vice versa.

We are particularly emphasising perseverance, trying to be independent etc. ie the things where before she would give up or ask for help. It really is helping a lot.

It is really helping, and we have seen an upturn in her confidence, happiness and schoolwork as a result.

hth

One thing I wished I had done was to enrol DD in a speech/drama type club out of school. The children who did these type of activity always seemed to ooze confidence.

Ooh yes, forgot that.
DD goes to a drama group run by external provider as an after school club which is good. (She had previously done another one, but it folded, then another which was too serious. Drama does help a bit.)

Also, we talked through scenarios to give her confidence to reply when other children were being mean/thoughtless which helped her too.

Depending on her age, the following might reinforce numeracy or fill in gaps:

Practical things are best for grasping number concepts - bricks, Lego, beads, counters, money, shapes, weights, measuring, cooking.

Do adding, taking away, multiplication (repeated addition), division (sharing), using REAL OBJECTS as just 'numbers' can be too abstract for some children.

Number Bonds of Ten forms the basis of much maths, so try to learn them. Using Lego or something similar, use a LOT of bricks (of just TWO colours, if you have enough) lay them out so the pattern can be seen of one colour INCREASING while the other colour DECREASES. Lay them down, or build up like steps.

So:

ten of one colour none of other
nine of one colour one of other
eight of one colour two of other
seven of one colour three of other

etc,

then of course, the sides are equal at 5 and 5; after which the colours 'swap over' as to increasing/decreasing.

To learn TABLES, do them in groups that have a relationship, thus:

x2, x4, x8

x3, x6, x12

5 and 10 are easy

7 and 9 are rather harder.

Starting with TWO times TABLE, I always say: "Imagine the class is lining up in pairs; each child will have a partner, if there is an EVEN number in the class. If one child is left without a partner, then the number is ODD, because an odd one is left out."

Use Lego bricks again, lay them out in a column of 2 wide to learn 2x table. Go half way down the column, and move half the bricks up, so that now the column is 4 bricks wide. That gives the start of 4x table.

Then do similar things with 3x and 6x.

With 5x, try and count in 'fives', and notice the relationship with 'ten' - they will alternate, ending in 5 then 10.

It is important to try and UNDERSTAND the relationships between numbers, and not just learn them 'by rote'.

An inexpensive solar powered calculator (no battery to run out!) can help learn tables by 'repeated addition'. So: enter 2+2 and press = to give 4. KEEP PRESSING = and it should add on 2 each time, giving 2 times table.

There are good web sites, which can be fun to use :

www.ictgames.com/

www.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/page/default.asp?title=Woodlands%20Junior%20School&pid=1

Martial arts. Honest. Or something else she is good at. Confidence is like skin pigment, it spreads from one area to others. Find something she can do well, and the confidence will transfer.

My DD really struggled with confidence and really struggled with mental maths. I would say try not to worry (Easier said than done I know). My DD is now 12 and a combination of a nuturing school, encouraging her as much as possible, encouraging her to do little things that took her out her comfort zone and letting her choose to do things she really loves have helped (in her case cheerleading and orchestra). I did go through a phase of getting her to do extra maths at home but she started to resent that so I stopped it. She is now in the top set Maths set at her school. I do think sometimes you need to let them develop at their own pace.

I completely agree with Ragged. I did quite a lot of research into this when dd's confidence seemed to disintegrate over the course of a year. The research all said to find something that your child does well or really enjoys and let them do it as often as possible. The confidence they gain from doing well at something they enjoy will then transfer into other areas of their life.

This has worked incredibly well with dd. We ended up moving her to a school which offered huge opportunities with sport and music. It also has an "everyone has a go" attitude which meant that dd had no choice but to challenge herself. She is now unrecognisable from the reluctant, angry, bossy child we saw 18 months ago.

It doesn't have to be martial arts basically anything she enjoys and can experience some success doing will help boost her confidence.

arpo:

I agree with both of what rosiepinkcheeks & mrz have advised. Confidence through activities and taking little risks does cummulatively make a difference. It will be slow, but suddenly you'll find things improve all over.

I would add with maths - there's tons out there to help your DD and like a sport or a musical instrument - some extra time working on concepts/ skills may help her build confidence.

Great websites to support maths:

BBC Bitesize KS1/KS2 (not sure how old your DD is) maths: www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/ks1/maths/ or
www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/ks2/maths/

Adore Woodlands Junior School Math's Zone: resources.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/maths/index.html - lots of links to games/ resources to provide opporutnity at practice in specific areas of maths.

They also have all sorts of resources for other subjects & homework here: resources.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/

If times tables are slow going/ hard work: lots of games on multiplication dot com: www.multiplication.com/games/all-games

If she's seriously struggling - many here have found & praised on-line maths tutorials (most by subscription) - such as mathsfactor/ mathletics/ maths whizz/ Komodo maths. Khan Academy is free and has videos explaining concepts as well.

There also are some really nice workbooks that are beautifully illustrated which explain key skills and give practice: www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=Letts+mythical+maths+workbooks&rh=i%3Aaps%2Ck%3ALetts+mythical+maths+workbooks - DD2 adored these in KS1 (when copies were sent home from teacher for homework). If you go the workbook route my advice is include your DC in the decision - let them have a say in the look of the book - as they're more likely to use it if they like it. You just quality control the book. So if it's nice but provides no explanation - maybe not so useful just now.

Every area is different, but with one daughter in Y7 and another in Y5 - I've kind of twigged over the years that although people tend not to say anything there often is a lot of practice going on at home (we're in Birmingham which is a 11+ area - grammars are free here and produce considereably better results at GCSE than state schools (i.e. 100% C-A* vs. typically 40%) so a lot of MC parents desirous of getting their children into one of them).

I certainly found with our primaries that learning times tables was definitely considered something parents should be doing - although nobody out and out said that. But if you didn't put in the time at home, your kid just drifted down tables.

HTH

Learning to play a musical instrument is a great way to boost confidence, especially if she can play in a small group ( so not piano). Or singing in a school choir??

Play games where she needs to add up scores. We ask my daughter to add up the scores. Lots of card games are good for improving the ability to recognise numbers quickly. Or games like junior monopoly where there is money counting involved. And adding up.

Also check that she understands the methods she is being taught. My daughter failed to 'get' one method and was dividing when she should have been multiplying. So although she knew that (say) 70 doubled was 140 she came up with a written answer of something like 28.

I've been in similar situation.
Re math: we drill it 2x a day for about 10 minutes each session.
Re confidence: I enrolled her to Taekwondo class . It is 45 minutes 2x a week plus parents with children session on Saturday.