11 Plus Exams Forum

I have a year 2 DS who like many small boys hates writing anything down! His handwriting is scruffy and spelling interesting! He is fairly bright (graded as 2C in all subjects end of year 1) so I have no major concerns but school and I feel we should encourage him to write more to improve his pencil control and generally get his ideas down on paper.

I have been looking at the Schofield and Sims range of workbooks but there are loads and I don't really know where to start. I want something not too boring and that can be done in very short bursts as he is only 7.

Has anyone used these and can they advise on which are best - The KS1 look easy so have also looked at Springboard, Spellaway, key spellings, comprehension and handwriting practice but unsure - too much choice! A----- 's look inside only shows one page so it is hard to judge.

My youngest likes the S&S Basic Skills books. We have a couple of their early spellings (I think that's the name - not at home so can't check) but they are very boring and repetitive. The Basic Skills ones have a fair but of variety, lots of writing. They're pretty cheap too so maybe worth trying. It's always tricky to advise other people though - it's so subjective and things that click for one kid just won't for another - would have been much simpler if the same stuff worked for all my four

The S&S site has a couple of sample pages for each book I think.

You could save your money and just get him to copy sections out of reading books. Afterall you said it was for pencil control and that academically he is doing fine, my DD did this for a while and it improved her speed at writing and her spelling of high frequency words. It is not as boring as it sounds, honestly!

mazes are also excellent for pencil control. You can photocopy, enlarge or reduce them. Pound shops and markets have them frequently.

You can make them on line too. Google 'make a maze online' or similar.

Yoyo123 - thanks I hadn't thought of mazes - we have done a lot of dot to dot's but he refuses to colour them in!

guest201 - the problem is the discrepancy between his reading and writing. What he currently reads would be far to hard for him to copy out and spelling wise way above where he needs to practice(horrible histories v Janet and John!). Next time we are in the library I will look for an old favourite he may be persuaded to try with.

Y wrote:You can make them on line too. Google 'make a maze online' or similar.

ooh! Thank You, I'll have a look at that

We used the mister men books. My DS also Y2 is an excellent reader too but sometimes he still comes to me with a mister men book that he wants to read together.