Primary teachers - need help with this email explaining how DD is taught letters and numbers

[Shitemum]

The email is just to ask if I could have some info about what level the children will be expected to have achieved by the end of yr 1 (actually Scottish P1)so I can help her catch up beforehand if need be. She is starting at P2 level in Scotland this autumn having been at Spanish infant school till nearly 6 yo.
I am trying to explain that DD1 has been taught letters and number in a sort of intuitive way (not sure if that is even the right word)rather than 'Now we are going to learn the letter 'G'' for example.
Am not sure if the following is just waffle or if it makes any sense?
Can anyone tell me if it does? Thanks!

"My daughter is currently in the last year of infant school here in Spain. She has been full time since she was 2. As children start primary school here at 6 years of age she will effectively be skipping the first year of primary.
She knows the alphabet in capital letters and they do a fair amount of writing at school, mostly copying things they want to write etc. They haven't been taught letters and numbers in isolation from whatever they were working on but rather their knowledge of letters and numbers has arisen from a need to know in the context of everyday practical activities. They also use numbers and counting including subtraction but always in context. For example (DD)'s class, as the oldest in the school, is in charge of going round all 5 classes and counting the children to see how many are off sick and how many will be there for lunch and taking that information to the kitchen staff. The classwork is project based and stems from what they are interested in mostly.
She likes to ask me to give her simple addition sums to do on her fingers when we are walking to school and she can do written addition sums where the answer is less than 12."

Ok, that should be:

"My daughter is currently in the last year of infant school here in Spain. She has been full time since she was 2. As children start primary school here at 6 years of age she will effectively be skipping the first year of primary.
She knows the alphabet in capital letters and they do a fair amount of writing at school, mostly copying things they want to write etc. They haven't been taught letters in isolation from whatever they were working on but rather their knowledge of letters and the written word has arisen from a need to know in the context of everyday practical activities. They also use numbers and counting including subtraction but always in context. For example (DD)'s class, as the oldest in the school, is in charge of going round all 5 classes and counting the children to see how many are off sick and how many will be there for lunch and taking that information to the kitchen staff. The classwork is project based and stems from what they are interested in mostly.
She likes to ask me to give her simple addition sums to do on her fingers when we are walking to school and she can do written addition sums where the answer is less than 12."

It makes sense!

It sounds much less formal than British education - I think you may have a lot to contend with. Some work with letter sounds, simple money work (in context!) including addition and subtaction would help.

i'm not a teacher but my dd is in primary 1 just now, it does sound like they do things very differntly, they learn letters through jolly phonics, dd does addition upto 20.

not what you asked sorry but it will keep it bumped

They don't do any kind of phonetic learning of words / sounds then? That seems to me to be key in the British ed system. By the end of YR they are meant to be able to make phonetically plausible spellings of most everyday words - for instance if they spelt the word 'make' as maik that would be acceptable as ai is a long a sound.

As for the maths I would think that what your daughter is doing is roughly ok.

How will you phrase your question to them? i.e. what do you want to know from them? You've described what your dd is doing but not what you want to know about how she will fit in to the British system.

I would help your dd to read the alphabet not in capitals and phonetically, just to start off with. When they do copy writing presumably they use lower case letters too? Do they do handwriting practise? Just thinking that correct letter formation might be something your dd might need to catch up with.

Thanks - yes, her main problem is going to be separating the English pronunciation of letters and their sounds from the Spanish, Spanish is so much easier.

This evening she asked me to write some words for her and, tho they were really beyond her, with only a little help was more or less able to decifer phrases like:

My sister is two years old.

I am feeling better.

I think most Spanish infant schools are far more formal but she happens to be at a wonderful council nursery where the teachers are very enlightened and try to include some Montessori etc. techniques in the way they teach. After DD being there for 3 years I am still only starting to understand just how fantastic a school it is.
Feel sad for DD2 who will only be there a year before we move back to the UK.

Have you considered a Montessori school in the UK?

If it's a good school and she's been learning and progressing then I'm sure she can transfer her skills after a short time.

How is her reading by the way? Has she been learning in English or Spanish?

Oh, only Feenie had posted when I replied!

imaginary friend - i havent included the rest of the email where i ask what level yr1 will have been expected to achieve and ask for samples of reading material etc, sorry its a bit out of context here maybe.

I sometimes do the alphabet with her phonetically i.e. 'ah' 'buh' 'cuh' is that what you mean?
she also knows it as 'A' 'bee' 'cee'

Also she does try to write phonetic versions of words - she recently wrote QISMS - christmas!

They only use capital letters as there are less ways of writing them so less confusion. They leave small letters for the primary school. So she doesnt do any handwriting practice yet which I think is just as well because here they use a horrible old fashioned cursive which is impossible to read!
Maybe I could get her to write out the alphabet in small letters sometimes.

Feenie - I have applied for a place for her at my old local primary in Edinburgh. We can't afford anything private.
IF - Yes, I'm sure she'll be ok, she is averagely bright, as I've put in the email so I think she'll catch up. It's just that I want to try and make it as easy as possible for her as she is not only skipping yr 1/P1 but also changing country and classroom language and starting in P2 where everyone else already knows each other.

Have to go, DP wants to watch Madame Bovary on the laptop

thanks in advance for any other thoughts...

You could look up online what's generally on the National Curriculum for Key Stage 1 which would cover your dd in Y1 and Y2.

You could also go onto Amazon and get her some basic books to read / worksheets to practise?

In Reception here most children were discouraged from writing in capitals apart from to start their names. This year they've been learning punctuation and are now encouraged to use a capital letter at the start of the sentence.

If I were you I'd encourage your dd to use lower cast letters and practise on simple c-v-c words such as 'cat' and 'dog' to get to grips with basic phonetics.

I think she may have a fair bit of catching up to do but it sounds like she's keen so it shouldn't take too long.

lower case letters.

This website may be useful for you:

parentzone

It gives details of the scottish curriculum. If you click on the left hand menu, on "What is your child learning", and then "5-14 curriculum" you should get an idea of where she should be. At the beginning of P2 she should be working withing level A.

www.coxhoe.durham.sch.uk/

This school gives a great overview of the curriculum in England but has also has some great links. You could also subscribe to 'education city'on line £30 a year as it goes through maths literacy and science via games. You would need to ring them to make sure they set it for her at an appropriate level for Scottish curriculum. You could also maybe get a friend to go to WHSMITH and get the Year 1 and 2 Parenttalk revision booklets £2.50 up and she could work through those. Not a teacher btw!

Shitemum - the way you describe your dd's maths is the way that maths should be developed through nursery and into Reception (in England and Wales) ie. in a practical, contextual way. This is what is suggested by the new Early Years Framework.

It sounds as though she does have a good grasp of being able to hear sounds in words, but that she will need some support to translate those back into letters on a page (encoding). Her challenge will be to put aside her knowledge of capital letters for a little while, and transfer to a lower case system. Additionally, as you say, there are some sounds which are pronounced differently in Spanish and English.

I'm not sure I've understood you - is she going into the equivalent of Y1?

I really wouldn't worry about the expectations for the end of Y1. I would simply start where your dd is, support her and work with the school to gauge (sp) the progress she's made. She may not be at the same level as the others at the end of Y1, but my be ahead of them by the end of Y2 if you see what I mean. Her early experiences may have been different, so her progress rate may be different too (either faster or slower).

Not sure any of my waffle helps, but feel free to post more information if you think we can help.

Brilliant! Thanks for so much info and ideas everyone. I'll look for the material and books mentioned.

Littlefish - she is 5.4yo now and will start P2 this August in Scotland when nearly 6. I don't know if the English Y1 is the same as Scottish P1. Am not sure if Reception is only an English term either or what age it refers to...

If we were in Scotland now she would have just started P1 in August 2008, about a month before her 5th birthday.

We have just been playing with her magnetic letters, capitals and small letters, while listening to 'Letter songs' from the ELC and she was able to put up all the capitals and most of the small letters in order unaided, so she does actually know the small letters, tho not as well as the capitals.

Do nursery/reception/primary schools in the Uk teach simple geometric shapes as an introduction to letter shapes?
DD was introduced to the circle, square, triangle and rectangle from the age of 3 which then helped the children with the shapes of capital letters which they started using at age 4. This seems quite a good way to prepare them for letters.

Reception is the equivalent of P1 and year 1 is the equivalent of P2. DD is in P1 and they havent done capital letters yet and are concentrating on the lower case letters and sounds and letter formation. She has a word box with 39 words so far that she has learned plus she has 3 books home per week to read.

Seona1973 - thanks for the clarification!
So that means she is starting P2/Y1 in August.
3 books a week? Can she read them herself? Do you know if there is a website where I can get the word lists?
Sorry if anyone has already told me it - have not yet had time to look at the links etc.

DD's school seems to use a mix of reading programmes ones of which is oxford reading tree. She also has some Ginn books and others too. She has a mix of books, some longer/shorter and easier/harder than others.

Some of the words she has had so far are:
a, at, the, I, in, it, an, is, and, am, me, my, did, as, he, can, we, into, go, got, get, if, for, on, be, but, you, was, went, his, have, just, to, your, by, only,

(she has her other little book at school with her and I cant remember the words she got last time - they get 3 new words a week to learn)

Seona - thanks! - I didnt like to ask for the word list but you have given me a good idea of the kinds of words to start with.
I'll go and look at the ORT link.

My dd doesn't get words to read to bring home but she is getting some pretty tricky reading books now, 1 a week, with 6 chapters and I'm lucky if we finish it by the end of the week.

Why don't you get her some of these:

www.amazon.co.uk/National-Literacy-Magnetic-Words-Reception/dp/B000CDL85G/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=toys& qid=1232977145&sr=8-1

They're Reception words but if you schroll down they have them for Y1/2 as well.

Dd gets spellings home in Y1 too, the latest of these have been:

friend
bully
mean
meat
street
eat
tree
free

snow
how
now
clown
flow
go
so
two

• should've added that dd is a very strong reader. There are a range of children in her year, some of whom could still not read that list of Reception words I linked to. But I'd say on average most of them could.

IF - thanks for the link.
(Are you the one whose daughter had the skin problem some months back? She looks lovely on your profile!)