Joyce is in K2 this year so the teacher started to give them 10 spelling words and 1 dictation to better prepare them for P1 next year. However, it was not very well received by some of the children including Joyce. Maybe it is because she is just not ready for that stage. She doesn’t like it and cried whenever I pushed her to complete the whole spelling list. She simply shut down. Like any other mum, I have her interest at heart. I wanted to help her to learn and do well and be interested so that she finds it fun. But most of the time, we become stressed, impatient and unknowingly, we raise our voice and she gets our negative emotions and breaks into tears.
I know that I must do something immediately before I kill her interest completely. I talked to her teacher and got the spelling list reduced to 5 words. My strategy is to build up her interest and confidence first. Then increase the no of spelling words incrementally. If she improves after a month, we will add 2 more words until she gets all her 10 spelling words and dictation back. I don’t mind to start slow and steadily build up her interest and good learning habit. I also changed my revision method with her and got her to help prepare the learning materials. We used the colourful cards given by her teacher and Joyce enjoyed writing the alphabets in different colours on these cards. Then we use them to play spelling game. We mix and match into different words and say them out aloud. I also let her use white board and colourful markers to write out the words. No more tears and she is happier during the revision time now since we use these new methods 10 days ago.
This morning, I’m seeing some results. Joyce started writing her new spelling words on the whiteboard all by herself after breakfast. When I asked her to leave for her childcare, she told me that she is learning her spelling and that it is not a game. I praised her for her good behaviour and learning attitude to encourage and motivate her. Bravo! Joyce. Keep up the good learning behaviour. I’m glad that she is more serious with her spelling now. My ultimate goal is for her to be a self-motivated learner.
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2 comments:
Congratulations! Glad to hear that things are back to normal and Joyce is once again enjoying the learning process.
Even though this blog is about her, I think you need to give yourself a pat on the shoulders for convincing the child care teacher to reduce the number of words as well. It is not every day that a parent is able to still make a constructive recommendation to a teacher under stress.
Maybe it would be interesting to string the words into a song that she can play on her keyboard or make up a dance about the words. I know she likes to dance a lot.
I think Spore parents need to take a stand and tell the Spore educational system to stop stressing our kids up. More emphasis should be put on the areas of creative thinking - and they wonder why our workforce here does not think out of the box enough.
As for the teacher, find out if she is really genuinely interested in your child's development. Too many have a cannot be bothered attitude.
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