Should my Child attend School Readiness Classes?

 

Should my Child attend School Readiness?

Written by Donna Botfield on July 7, 2015. Posted in About Us, Parent Tips, School Readiness

 

Probably one of my most asked questions before I enrol a new student is ‘Does my child need to attend School Readiness?’ Of course I fully believe that our School Readiness program is an essential start to school, and yes I am biased but let me tell you why.

My child attends preschool/long day care

Whenever I discuss school readiness with parents I make it extremely clear that children should attend preschool and day care before they start school.  In this setting, children learn the very important social and emotional skills that are required for the rest of their lives.  Children learn how to interact with same aged peers.  Preschool/long day care is an essential start to schooling in Australia.  A one hour a week School Readiness Class does not prepare your child socially and emotionally for BIG school; however preschool/long day care settings do not always prepare students for the academic learning required at school.  

What benefits do School Readiness Classes provide?

The reason that I established School Readiness Classes 8 years ago was due to my own children.  As a primary school teacher, I understood that school will provide your children with the structured learning skills, and all of the curriculum that your child will require.  Unfortunately the demands of the curriculum in schools now requires that children go to school ‘ready to learn’.  From the moment your child starts BIG school they will be required to learn many new facts and rules.  For the child who is not adequately prepared, school requires a lot of a young mind.  I tried to not be a ‘teacher mummy’ to my children.  I did recognise that I was able to offer my children a start to school that was not available to a ‘non-teacher mummy’. I am a strong believer in the strength of the teachers and schools in NSW and was confident that my children would learn quickly.  I soon realised that with good preparation, children confidently start school and start learning the day they enter primary school.  

What does the ED Specially 4U School Readiness Program offer:

• Structured learning in one session per week to prepare children in a gentle and confidence building atmosphere
• Classes that start from the age of 2 to allow students to be very familiar with a structured learning environment
• Classes and teachers that follow a structured program in the same way a primary school program is taught
• An environment where letters, numbers, fine motor/writing skills are developed so that the child can start school confidently knowing these beginning skills
• Another setting (outside the play environment) in which students recognise the importance of following instructions
• Confidence to follow instructions of  a teacher
• Confidence to work within a small group and achieve new skills
• Confidence to try new skills
• Confidence to learn

  Another benefit of joining our program is the importance we play on early detection if your child has any learning concerns.  We regularly are able to advise parents that a student may need a speech therapy or occupational therapy assessment if there are any issues that may be preventing their development in these areas.

 

With honesty I can say that our students and teachers alike, love our programs.  Happy children enjoy the structured learning program and the success they are achieving.  My personal favourite teaching moment is when I first say to one of our students ‘I didn’t know you could read!’  Our students quickly learn the letters and sight words required to sound out simple sentences, and they are thrilled to hear that this skill enables them to read!!

 

  Please visit our parent testimonial page (found on our website under the ‘about us’ tab) and facebook pages to read how other parents value our program.  Each year I send out a questionnaire in which parents are allowed to comment anonymously.  I relish constructive feedback as I passionately believe in what we do, and I want it to be the very best program I can offer.  I have honestly never received a negative comment in the 8 years we have been offering this program.  In fact, the questionnaires often come back months later when the students have started BIG school, and parents are glowing about the easy adjustment to school their children were able to make following the guidance of our program.

For the Love of Learning

Donna

 

www.edspecially4u.com.au

www.edspecially4u.com.au

Learning Numerals the ED Specially 4U way

Using the ED Specially 4U number cards- www.edspecially4u.com.au, allows our students so many interesting learning opportunities.  We have a strong philosophy of 'hands on' learning using concrete objects.  These activities are enhanced through the use of our number cards.

Numeral flashcards 1-20 use our unique ED Specially 4U colour system.  Each numeral has been given it's own colour which is then used throughout all of our numeracy resources.  Students are able to use the additional colour cue for visual reinforcement of the number.  This set also includes numbers on a white background, so that the learning programs can gradually fade the use of the colour cue.

First step to learning numerals with ED Specially 4U:  

We introduce the numerals by matching

(for the parents of our School Readiness Program, this is particularly well used in our 'Learn 4 School' classes as the initial step to numeracy acquisition)

Step 2, 

to consolidate the students skills and ensure they have formed understanding of the numerals 1-10

PLAY GAMES AND HAVE FUN WITH NUMERALS
this part of learning about numerals is SOOOOO FUN

The 1-10 memory match game is lots of fun to reinforce the numeral learning.  We play this game at this point by only matching the numeral cards to the numeral cards.  Kids love to try to find the MOST pairs!!

Step 3: REINFORCE NUMERALS USING SONGS

Who doesn't enjoy singing these songs and reinforcing our numerals at the same time!

5 Little Ducks

6 Little Ducks

5 Little Speckled Frogs

 

5 Cheeky Monkeys

5 Red Apples

10 in the Bed

A small look at teaching teen numerals at our 'Ready 4 School', school readiness program

We believe in explicitly teaching the numerals to develop a deeper understanding of numbers 

'from the beginning'

Thank you to Ms Victoria and the Wednesday morning School Readiness Class

 

  

Step 4: SEQUENCING

Using the number cards we are able to teach sequencing skills of the numerals

This fun sequencing game - TRAIN SEQUENCING, is very popular in our classes
Children enjoy putting the velcro numerals into the correct sequence for  
                                                       numerals 1-20

                                                    
 FORMING NUMERALS
              To introduce our students to writing numerals we do lots of fine motor preparation.
Students use playdough to strengthen their fingers and create a hands on numeral experience

These clever people were able to copy the numerals 1-10 using the numeral cards as a model.
They then use the fine motor cards to practice writing the numerals

Don't forget the fabulous sensory activity of shaving cream writing

and numeral stamping

When our students are able to correctly recognise and name the numerals it is great fun to add the 'Dinosaur Number Bingo' game to our teaching

http://www.edspecially4u.com.au/shop/123-4-me/number-games/

We love extending our numeral knowledge by using the 'Number Smart Mat' by Smart Kids to reinforce numerals 1-30
  (photo from the product)

There are so many great activities to reinforce numeral skill development.  We believe in using as many hands on/concrete learning materials as possible, however we also believe in consolidating our students' learning with worksheet reinforcement.  This blog is only a brief overview of ways that we teach numerals, and we will speak later about how we teach number concepts of counting with one to one correspondence, and counting to a given number group, as well as how we teach the deeper understanding of numerals and number groups .....(again just to name a few) but that is for another blog.......... Don't forget to visit the website www.edspecially4u.com.au to view all of our products to teach numeral recognition.

I hope you have enjoyed reading how we develop our students skills
 

For the Love of Learning

Donna