Supporting Y5 son in English

[PiousPenelope]

DS (young age 9, year 5) is struggling with spelling rules, grammar and creative writing (he uses "and so..." a lot in his writing).There are gaps from lockdown and inadequate home learning provided by school.

Do you have any suggestions on how I can support him?

I've asked school for extra work and I have ordered some workbooks. But any suggestions of specific workbooks or apps or methods to help him would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you

Reading.

Do you read with him? To him? Have him read aloud to you? Talk about books and writers with him? Make reading the most exciting thing he does at home? Read reviews of suitable new books together? For fun, every day? Does he see you reading for pleasure? And do you talk about what you’re reading and what makes the books appealing?

Really at 9 reading shouldn’t be about workbooks and exercises, at least, not at home - it should be an adventure. That’s how he’ll learn to use language, and his imagination, effectively - and then his writing skills will improve.

Totally agree with@EdmontinaDancesWithOphelia . I have taught secondary English for 18 years. The best creative writers are the students who love books, and the students who love books are the ones who are read to at home.

While I agree with pp re reading I think workbooks can help with writing. I have just got these:

www.rsleducational.co.uk/rsl-creative-writing

Play describing games when you're out and about. For example, if he spots something interesting, instead of 'over there' and pointing, he could say 'on your right, about half way up the fir tree'.

Rory's story cubes might be more appealing than workbooks.

Presume there aren't any other issues like dyslexia, dysgraphia?

Thing is, the OP doesn’t mention reading at all (though they may do this already). But without masses of reading everything else is pointless.

Thank you very much.

We are all avid readers. He sees me reading for pleasure and I read to him and he reads wide and varied texts (fiction books, newspapers, factual books) and loves reading for pleasure.

He has a great imagination but hates writing and his spellings aren't great. He can "see" they are wrong but can't always see why. So he might write "begining" and then see it looks wrong so will write "begginig" and see it still looks wrong. So I think I need to run through spelling "rules" with him - although that sounds boring!

Thanks for the suggestions of workbooks and other activities. That's really useful.

As far as I am aware he doesn't have any issue like dyslexia. He's excelling in other areas. He just dislikes writing/English. Although LOVES reading and devours books (and not the diary of a wimpy type books, but proper chapter books).

Some people's spelling is just not as secure as others, even for avid readers. It could be that, assuming he continues to read, it will all fall into place a bit later.

English Language GCSE places more emphasis on writing style than on spelling, and this is always better for strong readers.

Usborne do some nice creative writing books - would he engage with those?

@mynameisnotmichaelcaine thank you for your reply. Hopefully it'll just fall into place. He might engage with creative writing workbooks. Are there any you can specifically recommend?

Thank you

@PiousPenelope This is the link to the series. My DS enjoyed the ghost one 🙂 usborne.com/gb/books/series/write-your-own

@mynameisnotmichaelcaine thank you so much 😊 I feel so guilty that he has gaps 😔 I supported him during the lockdowns but had to work too. So I'm wracked with guilt...

Thank you so much!!!

Read to him. Focus on spelling. Make it fun by playing lots of interesting educational word games and the like on road trips. For example you could get him to read out some road signs and see if you can use story cubes.

Read the weekly local newspaper, magazines, and anything that you find etc as well to him and ask him to predict what will happen next. Go to a library, borrow and then read/discuss what you have read at family mealtimes.

@PiousPenelope You have absolutely nothing to feel guilty about. You sound like a wonderful mum.

I agree, you do sound like a great Mum. I would ask his teacher for a photocopy of his writing work featuring the the "and so" and help him or feed his alternate phrases. Children are taught to edit their work and come up with better sentence openers or better descriptions. If he can see it he then he is more likely to choose it. He might be able to keep a list in his pencil case or his work book.

I was recently in a year 4 class where they did a brain dump of words to describe something. First they started with the obvious description of "big" and then they all had to use a thesaurus for "free words" that are better than big. These words were all written down meaning the children could choose them for their story. We helped them choose the right ones as it can go awry with a thesaurus.

Mine used to have 100 words for "said" on the classroom wall, also fronted adverbials. At first they look to the wall for help then they use them in their active vocabulary.

Find a book he knows and find a good part to read. Look at what words make the book exciting or fast paced, look at every sentence starter word, the sentence structure and what punctuation the author used. I think children often find it hard to think of ideas or words. In school they use the word "magpie" to steal good ideas or words from books.