I'm often asked by parents what they should be doing to keep up their children’s learning in the school holidays. The holidays provide an ideal opportunity for parents to encourage their children to view learning as a life-long activity, not just something you do at school. Just as much learning occurs informally as it does formally in the classrooms and children need occasionally to be left to educate themselves.
According to the late, great Franklin D. Roosevelt, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” Unless, apparently, you’re among the 17 to 30 percent of children who have maths anxiety! Or you might be among the parents who experience ‘maths homework anxiety’ when you try to help your child with the day’s assignment sent home from school. Trying to keep up with the multiple strategies that children must learn in order to do their homework is not an easy thing.
If you want to commit multiplication facts to memory, it is worth taking time to look at some ways to make information easier to remember.
Below are some ideas for questions to ask at parent-teacher interviews. If your child is in year 9 or above you could repeat the first five questions with each subject teacher, and the last three with their form teacher or dean.
These days, digital media is one of the main conflicts between the adults in the house and the kids. Almost all houses ring with sounds of "Turn off the computer and come to dinner", "No, you've watched enough TV today", and "Tidy your room or I'll take away your favourite thing - Nintendo!"
