DIY Route - A plan?

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cairo
Posts: 276
Joined: Sat Feb 21, 2009 3:09 pm

Re: DIY Route - A plan?

Post by cairo »

Personally I wouldn't do anything before Y5. Until then if you can encourage your DC to read lots (on their own and with you) that will help enormously. Discuss vocab regularly, not just what does it mean and how do you spell it - but also can you think of another word with the same meaning / an opposite / if you take one letter away, what word does that now make? If you have an adjective like 'cowardly' can they turn that into a noun? etc.
menagerie
Posts: 577
Joined: Thu May 26, 2011 9:37 pm

Re: DIY Route - A plan?

Post by menagerie »

Cairo, those are superb suggestions. Thank you. We chat a lot about comprehension but I'd never thought of playing VR games in that way.
cairo
Posts: 276
Joined: Sat Feb 21, 2009 3:09 pm

Re: DIY Route - A plan?

Post by cairo »

As my DS's weakness was vocabulary, here are some ideas for games I made up too:

1. Cut strips of paper and put words on them which the DC has a set amount of time on a timer to put together to find the opposites. As they get better, put deliberate red herrings in, to see e.g. if they will try to put heroism and cowardly together, rather than heroism and cowardice.

2. Every time we came across a word with more than one meaning, we wrote it on a 2, 3 or 4 meaning chart. My DS loved finding new words to add to the charts. Did you know score has 4 meanings?!

3. Challenge of the day: DS2's task was to try to slip a new, difficult piece of vocab I'd given him into his conversation with DS1 without him noticing.

4. We had a running list of animals which we discovered can also be used as verbs (e.g. badger, ferret etc). For some reason DS2 found this funny.

Who knows whether any of this extra knowledge helped on the day, but it definitely improved DS2's understanding of the English language. (I'm ashamed to say that as I typed the word "knowledge" I thought to myself: that's a compound word 'know - ledge' and also has the 3 letter words 'now' and 'led' hidden inside it. :lol: I've really got to get out more!)
cairo
Posts: 276
Joined: Sat Feb 21, 2009 3:09 pm

Re: DIY Route - A plan?

Post by cairo »

...And owl :oops: :oops:
Superflygirl
Posts: 77
Joined: Wed Oct 12, 2011 9:18 pm

Re: DIY Route - A plan?

Post by Superflygirl »

cairo wrote:...And owl :oops: :oops:
I sooo wish there was a "like" button for this as it did ring a bell with me and make me laugh. And believe you me I need to laugh x
menagerie
Posts: 577
Joined: Thu May 26, 2011 9:37 pm

Re: DIY Route - A plan?

Post by menagerie »

:D
Last edited by menagerie on Wed Oct 26, 2011 6:14 pm, edited 3 times in total.
menagerie
Posts: 577
Joined: Thu May 26, 2011 9:37 pm

Re: DIY Route - A plan?

Post by menagerie »

Hey C-air-o,

if you need to get out m-ore, you can al-ways co-me and p-lay wit-h my s-on-s! They'd love you. And I
w-ill give you win-e!
stroudydad
Posts: 2246
Joined: Sat Oct 08, 2011 2:25 pm

Re: DIY Route - A plan?

Post by stroudydad »

menagerie wrote:Hey C-air-o,

if you need to get out m-ore, you can al-ways co-me and p-lay wit-h my s-on-s! They'd love you. And I
w-ill give you win-e!

The-y'd :D
menagerie
Posts: 577
Joined: Thu May 26, 2011 9:37 pm

Re: DIY Route - A plan?

Post by menagerie »

Gah. K-new I'd miss on-e!
Alice in Underland
Posts: 159
Joined: Mon Mar 15, 2010 4:19 pm

Re: DIY Route - A plan?

Post by Alice in Underland »

I agree with all the above comments. I tutored DS 2 myself for eleven plus last year. Started in April of year 5 with small sections of practice papers and built up to doing completed papers by end July then timed tests from then it.

tried to make it as fun as possible. Lts of word games. Hhe is a good reader and good at maths so I was quite optimistic. He was not so good at spelling but good vocabulary.

We had lot of fun learning and solving problems together and I found the whole process very rewarding. I really do not understand why so many people pay for private tutoring...if you are a graduate yourself you should be able to cope with the academic side ! You learn to develop the patience and optimism you need to work with them.

Just make sure you have a quiet place you can work together with no distractions, staring 20/30 mins a day and building up to the 90 mins. Sit quietly with them while they work through the problems. No phone, no TV, no siblings. Reward good work with positive feedback and the occasional treat.

Good luck
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