Ideas to help at home
Writing Box idea!
Spelling is harder than reading words – children need so much praise!
You could put together a box of the following for them to play with...
• Whiteboards and pens are a good way for children to try out spellings and practise their handwriting.
• Make or buy an alphabet poster or sound mat.
• Magnet letters
• Pens/gel pens/pencils/crayons etc to write with.
• Different coloured paper/paper with lines etc.
• Notepads – could even start a diary!
• Old birthday cards.
What to do if your child is reluctant to read or write at home.
Reading
• Make sure your child sees you reading.
• Read to your child. Show you like the book. Bring stories to life by using loud, soft, scary voices – let yourself go!
• Leave books around the house for your child to dip into.
• Let your child choose what they would like to read – books, comics, occasional reading on the ipad.
• Look out for words in the environment, such as on food packaging, which your child will find easy to read, for example, lunch, fresh milk, fish and chips, jam
. • Work on reading words together, for example, a street name such as Park Road, captions on buses and lorries, street signs such as bus stop.
• Games – Scrabble, Boggle, word search etc
Writing
• Make sure your child sees you writing.
• Compose an email together inviting a friend over to tea.
• Continue to make words together, using magnetic letters.
• Leave a message on the fridge door and encourage them to write a response.
• Write a shopping list together.
Maths @ Home
• Count on and back in ones, twos, fives and tens from any given number – challenge to see how far you can count. Can you describe the patterns? You can also do timed counts.
• How many steps is it to ...? (Count your steps as you walk)
• How many numbers in a sequence can you write in 30 seconds?
• Find out when everyone in the family has their birthday – write them in order. Whose birthday is on an odd numbered date? Whose is on an even numbered date?
• Which day of the week am I thinking of? It is the day before..., after ... etc. Can you say the days of the week in order starting from ...?
• Play ‘What’s the time Mr Wolf?’ Keep asking them the time. Buy an analogue watch as a present!
• Make up number or pattern sequences – challenge someone else to spot the pattern.
• Multiple of 10s speed signs on the road challenge – take it in turns to add up the value of two (or 3) speed limit signs ‐ the person with the higher value gets a point. e.g. Person 1 spots 20 and 40 ( Total 60) Person 2 spots 30 and 40 (total 70) Person 2 scores 1 point. First to 10 points wins (good for car journeys!)
• Total all the numbers you see on road signs on the way to school.
• Street number patterns – count the numbers on doors – What is the sequence? What do you think the next number will be? Why do you think that?
• Roaming robots – give someone in the family instructions to get round the house – they have to do exactly what they are told! (NB. Do not try this in the kitchen in case there are hot appliances people could knock into)
• Play ‘Simon Says’ (using positional language – e.g. put your left hand on your right shoulder)
• Mirrors ‐ stand opposite someone and copy exactly what they do to make a mirror image.
• I have 6 coins in my purse – what is the most money I could have? The least? If 3 coins are silver and 3 are copper – how would that change my answers? I have 5 coins totalling e.g. 23p ‐ what coins could they be? (Make sure that the total you suggest can be made in at least 1 way!)
• When out shopping ask the children to find out the cost of different items in an aisle. Which are cheaper, Shreddies or Cornflakes etc – how do you know? What fruit could I buy for less than £1?
• If your child is becoming more confident with money, let children select coins to pay for small items at the corner shop or newsagent e.g. for newspaper, sweets or milk. Encourage them to start counting on from the larger coins first e.g. 50p 20p 10p 2p.
• Draw a line down the centre of squared paper (or crossed lines to make more difficult) – colour in a symmetrical pattern.
• Symmetry spotter – how many can you find? E.g. on a walk – ladybirds, butterflies, faces, etc.
• Shapes around us – what shapes can you see? (E.g. bricks ‐ rectangles, chicken wire fence – hexagons, road sign – circle and for 3d shapes, tinned tomatoes – cylinder, ice cream ‐ cone!)
• Cut a sandwich in half, eat half, then cut the half into quarters, eat a quarter and so on – how many times will you be able to cut the part that is left in half?
• Measuring – before you recycle bottles and containers – why not line them up in order of size – look at the labels. See how many containers of different shapes you can find that hold exactly 500ml or 1 litre. When baking etc. ask the children to weigh out the ingredients. How tall is everyone in the family? How will you measure
Credits:
Created with an image by Cagkan - "Concept of positive or negative decision making or choice of approval or rejection. Tick mark and cross mark on wooden cubes."