The 2014 thread - slow and steady wins the race ....

[SleepyHead]

good morning, so glad I found this thread, we are also looking at 2014 for the grammars and 2015 Jan for the indies.

We have started with English first as that is DD's weakest subject, really getting her to read, read and read and then more. DD has always preferred computer games and therein lies the problem.

Haven't got a timetable as such, but made up a list of 30 (yes 30) settings and characters that DD needs to work her way through as a 'lucky dip!'

Also bought boggle and thinking about getting the old scrabble board out.

DD still thinks she has 'AGES' till the exam so there is no really motivation or drive to do anything , and at the moment that's our biggest struggle. Hopefully will get into the swing of things after Christmas.

[fatbananas]

Hi Sleepyhead,

I'm hoping that motivation etc will come as we go round the schools/ DS becomes aware that other DC are also doing the same as him. We've looked at a couple of youtube videos of some of the schools we're thinking about, mainly science experiments the schools have done, and this has really grabbed his imagination!

[SleepyHead]

Hi fatbananas, yes I am hoping that visiting a couple of schools, and even leaving the odd prospectus around will do the trick....
Happy Boxing day.
SH

[bromley mum]

Hi fatbananas and sleepyhead. Motivational tricks used by me.
1. DD wasn't allowed a phone then as she was young. I gave her my old one to use as a timer for papers. Once the work was done she was allowed to play a game or two on it.
2. If she finished the work I had set, she could choose what to watch on tv. The others are older so understood. If you have you get ones, you can perhaps use a modified version of this.
3. As I was the one constantly on her back, I made sure we had some time together when we did fun stuff, just the two of us. In other wirds, I played bad cop and good cop!
4. Take her shopping so she can choose a new pencil case, pencils etc which she uses just for 11 plus work. It doesn't matter how impractical the case is as it'll stay at home. It just made her happy to buy something new and choose it herself.
5. Buy some good quality chocolates (this is for you, not her! You need to treat yourself too. I won't lie and say its an easy journey because it isn't. But we are all here to give support as much and whenever needed). Good luck

[SleepyHead]

Hi Bromley Mum,

Thanks for your suggestions. I really liked the pencil case idea, DD loves staionary, smelly rubbers, different shaped sharpeners etc. I think a trip to Smiths is a great motivator, and I like the idea of a treat for me too.. brilliant suggestion.

I am not sure my next idea works... but I've agreed to do a comprehension verbally with her so that there isn't any writing involved. I am hoping this will still provide some use, as she still has to read the text and answer in full sentences albeit verbally. This way work gets done really quickly, and she can go back to playing with her DS or watching Christmas TV.

A bit worried as we're taking a break from maths now, to focus on English - just hope this won't be detrimental. May be DD can calculate the change from £10 when we buy her pencil case..

[southbucks3]

Hello

I have a tip for reading that has helped my eldest boy read in the past and i am now using on the others. Choose some American novels, such as Hoot, Holes, Bridge Over Terabitha, they have great chapter by chapter multi choice quizzes available on line to see if they have read properly, and discussion threads, themes etc so you can work out if they comprehend what they are reading, without having to tax your own brain too much. When they have finished, the plus side is there is a dvd release of each book, so you can promise them a film evening with sweets and popcorn on completion of the book, and mine really love comparing the two....annoyingly throughout the film..but hey it's their reward so let them. Others with DVD releases are Millions, which is fab, and of course the superb Goodnight Mr Tom, but the quizzes etc are limited for those. At a higher reading level the Hunger Games and the Northern Lights series both work well. There are quite a few though, so have a look, and decide which your dc would like.

[fatbananas]

Happy New Year everyone!

Today, DS did his very first NVR (Bond 10 mins 8-9) paper, which he was fine with - enjoyed, even, and a VR full Bond paper, again 8-9, which he got the hang of once quite quickly. But am guessing they start off easy and get more difficult!

We are also focussing on timestables - there are about 3 individual questions he always gets stuck on - one of them is always 8x3! - and building up some speed. He takes about 3 seconds to answer each question (a quiz of 60 questions). He's been low-level coldy all holiday and I don't think he quite realises the 'aim' yet, but am hoping (there should be a crossed fingers emoticon!) that he'll just pick up speed the more he does of the darned things.

Any other tips for speeding up timestables?

Anybody else up to much over the hols?

[mystery]

Timestables - some people like the child to fill in a multiplication grid - e.g. a 12 x 12 square with numbers 1 to 12 in random order along two edges and child has to fill in the multiplication fact in each square which corresponds to the two numbers which are the "co-ordinates" for that square.

My DD hates doing that. She speeded up using C**** V******* arithmetic school - you can just do the timestables bit of it and then dump it as the monthly charge is high. Her timestable school is not the same.

Another idea is the timestables book from Power of 2 publishing - this has the benefit of working through it all not in the usual order, but in a way which is designed to unstick common problems that children have remembering them. It also does division facts. It requires an adult to work through it with the child if you buy the book (very cheap) or you can instead sign on to do it electronically (again a monthly fee but pretty cheap). You could just do that book and then sign off again.

There are some beat the clock games on Oswego.com These are good as you can be terribly specific in what you pick, but if the child is not fast enough in the first place in whatever you are trying to pick up speed on, it can be demoralising depending on the child. One of mine just gives up if they can't beat the computer first time round.

Other tip is to do other things which use the tables facts but are not pure and simple table practice - e.g. short and long multiplication and division, division with and without remainders, fractions, problems requiring multiplication and division etc etc.

This I am sure is how I did it at school - we learned the tables with weekly tests and then did lots of work every day which involved using those facts to keep them at our finger tips.

[mystery]

Oh and what have we done this Christmas holiday - nothing until now, but aiming to have done two Bond Verbal Reasoning papers age 9-10 by Saturday - they have 65 questions each - not timining them at this stage.

I'm feeling a bit lost really - when I knew that Kent was GL Assessment I had it all planned thanks to all the good people on here; now I'm feeling in limbo until I know whether it will really have all changed for September 2014 Kent takers.

Strangely, DD1 announced out of the blue yesterday that she wanted to learn to play Scrabble. It's not as great as it sounds as little sister wants to play too, but gets stuck. Then if I help little sister this leads to a fit of jealousy from big sister (who does not want to be helped but considers it unfair that little sister should be helped) and it comes to blows and tears. Also DD1 is not satisfied with her score. She wants me to play "normally" but she wants to win .... think I might need to lose the Scrabble board soon.

[fatbananas]

Have you already done the VR 8-9 books? I thought I'd start him on the age appropriate ones but accelerate through them quite quickly, so am going to do a few during the week as there are 20ish of them, but only 1 NVR paper a week because there are only 6 papers in the book, but keep plugging away at the NVR 10 min tests to keep it familiar (if that makes sense).

Yes, think you're right about learning the timestables but applying them all the time in other ways, through fractions etc. Will take a look at CV's website.

All but one of the GS's round here have dropped any kind of reasoning element, but that one GS is our nearest; though it will probably change it's mind next year, after all our prep! And all the indies we will probably try for have a reasoning paper. Funnily enough, when DS did the NVR paper yesterday, he commented on how he'd had to do a similar sort of thing at school just before Christmas. Are CATS tests NVR tests? We had a note at the beginning of year 4, saying they would be done in the spring term, so I'm a bit confused.