Long-Term Investment for our child’s Learning
Our school curriculum has no lack of subjects and performance driven tasks and work. Our kids have weekly spelling tests, topical reviews, mid-year exams, end-year exams and a myriad of assignments that are given with the aim to drill and impart content knowledge into our children. Of course, we cannot deny the good intentions behind these tasks; however, we must also look at the long-term investment into a child’s learning.
He/she learns the spelling words for the week with the objective to score 10 out of 10 or revises for a test or examination with the goal to attain higher marks than the previous test. And of course, these are also important outcomes to keep in mind. (Because if a child is learning effectively, then it is also only fair that we expect him/her to achieve good scores, right?)
But, WAIT A MINUTE! We only focused on drilling and teaching the tasks (reading comprehension, problem sums, cloze passage, spelling….)And we may have just assumed the child will automatically possess the right skill sets to learn effectively and produce good results.
We ASSUME the child will automatically have good attention and focusing skills, they should have superb memory to remember everything they have learnt, and they also should be able to make connections about what they read and just grasp concepts like fish to the water.
If we just take a moment to ponder over this, it can seem pretty strange - we TEACH subjects and ASSUME the child to have the ability and skills to do it.
It is almost like us going to a new job and our superior tells us ‘Get this report done!’ and assumes we should know exactly how and what to do. Or a swimming coach telling the athlete ‘Go win an Olympic Gold Medal’ and assumes he has the right level of skills to achieve that.
In those situations, it might be more effective if the individual was equipped with the right skills before setting an expectation to achieve the end goal – the superior will give us guidelines on what needs to be included, where to get the information, etc and the swimming coach will work with the athlete on his breathing techniques, his strokes, his jump-off, etc.
In the same way, while we are drilling the child on the questions, we also need to make a long-term investment in their learning – to teach them effective learning skills to focus, to make connections, to retain information, to be careful in their work and to understand what is being taught.
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Article contributed by Thinkersbox
What should I do if my son hates school
My friend's son refuses to go school and she has to quit her job and stay at home to ensure her son goes school promptly. This article What should I do if my son hates school is a good article to share with all parents. I hope we are sensitive to our children's needs and feelings.
Agree! Its very sad to see
Agree! Its very sad to see them studying only and no time to interact and play....
To emstarr
You may not have done enough research before sending your child to a Singapore primary school. I believe most kids in Singapore are expected to read by the time they reach Primary One. Phonics is taught in various baby classes like those from Julia Gabriel and in preschools especially the more costly ones. Many kids in Singapore are already familiar with the letter sounds by age 3- 4 and there is usually a reading programme in kindergarten. I am not sure if phonics is in the curriculum of Primary One.
The expectations today are definitely higher than during my time in primary school.
I have found kids these days to be capable of more simply because they have been given more opportunities to learn. Many preschools also adopt more child friendly methods today compared to the past which help the kids to learn more painlessly.
"Blur" used in that context is Singlish. I don't think the teacher meant to be overly harsh or it may not even be perceived to be overly harsh by the child in question.
No childhood
Kids spend 6-9 hours in sch (incl cca) and another 3hrs on homework and another 2 hours on tuition. Where is the play time? Their life is even worst than us adults!
My son just started P1 in a
My son just started P1 in a local school and I must admit the teaching style is a stark contrast to the Australian schooling system in which I was brought up. In the first week he was given a spelling list with quite complicated words (for P1) - this was even before the kids are taught the basic phonics (or are kids already expected to know phonics before they start P1?).
Frankly I am not sure if the teachers in the school just go through the materials quickly and expect all the kids to follow, or the parents to do additional teaching work at home to make sure their kids understand. From what I can gather there is very little focus on 'hands on' learning. And today my son came home and told me that one of the kids was scolded by the teacher for being "blur" because he sat in the wrong seat. Firstly, the word "blur" is not part of the English language, and secondly, I do not feel it was right for the teacher to scold the child in this manner. I intend to speak to the principal about this.
I agree with Maria Glazia that at the age of six and seven, they should be taught materials which are more relevant to their age. This way the kids develops a true interest in the subject matter.
Btw Ekari - the correct grammar is "to score well" and not "to score good".
ApplePie Language
What parents fail to notice are they have an equal responsibility in teaching a child as much as the teachers who work by hours in school. If they want their child to score good, then influence or teach them when they are home. Not just by pressuring them with expectation.
Learning skills
This is exactly right. It seems to be assumed by most educational systems that smart children know how to learn and other children don't - that knowing how to learn well is a function of intelligence rather than skills. But this is not the case in my experience everyone can learn 'how to learn' more effectively, easier, better just by learning some 'learning skills'.
I'm new here, does anyone know of a school in Singapore that actively teaches children 'learning skills'?
I don't know the type
I don't know the type of curriculum followed in Singapore. I'm currently teaching kindergarten in the Philippines and we're following a very traditional system. We have lots of written tasks and we hardly have time to play. I have two sets of kids. The afternoon class are more mature than the morning class. I teach these kids grammar rules, three-digit addition and subtraction with regrouping, multiplication and division, and fractions. They're about six and seven-year olds. I don't have problems with the afternoon class because they have developed interest in studies. My morning class is different. They're kids being kids. They don't care. They'd be interested when we play games about the lessons but they'd forget it during evaluation.
I think I'm teaching the kids stuff they won't need until they get older, and they know it that's why they're not interested. It's quite impressive to hear a child recite the multiplication table or the capital city of every country but where would they apply it at their age.
I want to teach kids to share, to be polite, to be obedient but able to think critically. I want to make sure they can tie their shoelaces and they can use the bathroom on their own.
I'm not saying we should do away with the content subject. I just want to teach them those that matter most at theis stage. But that's just me.
Actually this is what's
Actually this is what's happening in schools nowadays. The teacher teaches the concepts and gives written work. The students are expected to excel on their own. If you grasp the basics you may just pass. However, if you want A or A*, you got to do much more on your own and this is where tuition kicks in. It's very rare nowadays to have students excel without tuition. Before somebody flame me, I know of those who do. Having tuition in the past was a luxury, now is a necessity.
Sad, sad, sad.