Being learner is a lifelong exercise

Do you enjoy being exposed to new information? Do you show your child all the new things you have learnt over the day? Are you excited about new information that comes your way?

The more we show our children that learning is ongoing and that it is a life long journey, the more they will engage with new experiences, be less fearful of new concepts and be driven to learn.

The good news about living in a technologically driven world is that children are exposed to new information constantly and whilst this comes with its own set of problems, we cannot bemoan the fact that they can access so much information in a heartbeat. The trick here is to establish how useful the information is to their learning. This is all about learning to be discerning with information.

This blog is simply about encouraging your child to see learning as a wonderful life-giving experience. It is not just a five hour a day, classroom experience.

This article is also about encouraging your child to read books, magazines, use internet to gather information etc. There are many sources of learning that involve listening, as well as reading. Developing an insatiable appetite for learning is what it is all about.

If you, the parent demonstrate that you are a learner and enjoy the experience of gathering and reflecting on new information, this will impact on your child’s perception of what learning is all about.

Learning is more than 5 hours in the classroom

 Consider what you teach your child:

• Is your home scattered with books, sources of information and is it an environment where conversation and debate are present and encouraged?

• Children begin to see learning as a mental habit, something done regularly so that knowledge is built upon. Once starved of new information, the child feels vulnerable.

• They grow to look forward to learning new concepts. They see it as a natural process to simply keep learning.

• Your child once hungry for knowledge has become a lifelong learner. They see and crave new knowledge.  They come to appreciate that knowledge is power.

• You teach them that having an inquiring mind exposes you to so much learning. You are the mentor in developing their thirst for learning.

• Your constant inquiry, asking questions, probing ideas etc. will demonstrate to your child that being inquisitive is healthy. You encourage its presence in your children.

Children who love gaining knowledge feel strengthened by the experience and are not easily disengaged. The knowledge they gain builds mental stamina and gives them credibility amongst peers. Their emotional intelligence is accelerated as they feel more in touch with mentally being in control.

“Once you stop learning, you start dying.”

— Albert Einstein

Let’s look at Naplan or is it Noplan?

The purpose of the Naplan testing was always about the Government gaining data that they could use in planning for educational improvements. Whilst there have been many theories and beliefs in the latter years about why Naplan, the question now is whether it has relevance in helping your child in their learning?

There are many questionable factors that have made the overall data to some degree invalid and worthless. For example, some schools may teach to the test, thereby disadvantaging those children who are not specifically working towards the test. Of course, the question is also whether more independent schools will approach the test with rigour to ensure the best results for the school. Also, what if your child was unwell the day of the test. How relevant are the results?

What are your thoughts on Naplan?

Consider that teachers will teach the curriculum in different ways across a year. What if they have not as yet taught what was on the test? Does this discriminate against your child?

Does my child feel the anxiety of these very formal tests at a young age?

Certainly, in my experience, there was a good percentage of children who felt the pressure. They would be anxious about their results being interpreted in the light of everyone else in the state. Also, consider the disruption to teaching and to teachers as they prepare and organise the children to sit the tests. Do the test results reflect their teaching? And so, the general concerns go on.

 A big factor in this discussion is that if this is about the results of the individual child, we need to remember that teachers are testing constantly. It is a normal part of their work. They already have a collection of data in a range of areas that reflect the child’s progress. Therefore, does the Naplan guide their teaching? I believe not!

In today’s world of increasing anxiety in children, not the least of which has been the pandemic disruptions and related worries, why do we need a standardised test? Simply ask your child’s teacher to show their results which are cumulative, given under less stressful conditions and a normal part of a teacher’s week. The teachers know your child. A standardised test does not tell you much about your child.

I encourage the debate about the relevance of Naplan and recognise that the best evaluation of your child’s progress comes directly from the classroom teacher.

 After all, we do not want:

• Increased anxiety in our children about their performance in a standardised test.

• Developing competition between schools.

• The building up of pressure in teachers and compromising how they teach to suit a test.

Educating children is a broad and complex issue. It should be built around developing their strengths and not dotting in bold their weaknesses. How can we educate if we are constrained to such limitations as a standardised test?

“Whatever an education is, it should make you a unique individual not a conformist.”

— -John Taylor Gatto

Keep the start of the year on a positive note

What a busy time for all as you prepare to pack away the Summer fun holiday items and get ready for the regularity of school. We can all get a little overwhelmed and irritable about getting back to routine especially given the unease of last year.

Your child will be mentally getting ready for school challenges and of course, will have in mind the journey of 2020. My advice here is to not get caught up in making the start of the school year too perfect. Let the child gently ease into the school and discover along the way what their new environment will offer. There may be school rules and discussion about hygiene etc. Your child needs to understand what the new norm is in the school and they will begin to adopt to changes and shifts in how the school may be operating.

Here are some thoughts about how to keep the beginning of the school year upbeat and optimistic.

• Talk positively about the new year. Discuss as a family something that you are all looking forward to in the near future. This could be some event that wasn’t possible last year.

• Listen well to what the child tells you about school and if there are changes talk about how you applaud the school’s effort to keep everyone safe and healthy.

• Check in with your child to make sure anxious gossip about health matters regarding CO-VID 19 is accurate and that your child is not anxious about what they hear around the schoolyard.

• If your child is not in prep and you are not in the habit of dropping them off, I recommend being with them before school a few times. This gives them extra reassurance and that reassurance helps at this stage of the year. Remember that there are still some residual anxieties around from last year.

• If your child is a little anxious about full-time school and missing you, show them on a calendar the school holidays and that there will be plenty of occasions to just be family once again. 

• For some children being home for so long last year was a comfort and they will need time to adjust to a regular school schedule. A day working online at home does not equate to a full active day at school.

• Talk positively about their friendships and encourage your child to be friendly to all class members. Take an in inclusive approach to the matter of friends. Often at the beginning of the year it can be divide and conquer with regard to establishing friendships in the class. The less confident child may take more time to establish friends or perhaps lose confidence in re-establishing themselves with friends.

• A great tool at this stage of the year is to set up a chat box in your child’s room. If they have anything, they want to talk about they can include this in the box. At special times probably bedtime together you can talk about these issues.

• If you are busy working, school can slip easily from your thoughts. Check their bags each night for notes and of course emails from teachers. An occasional email to the teacher to check-in is also a good idea.

 Above all, keep the term optimistic and affirm your child’s steady progress into the life of the school in 2021.

“Optimism. It’s not just a mind-set. It is behaviour.”

— Larry Elder

That strange sense of finishing school

Children will be feeling that strange sense of leaving school, disengaging with friends and getting mentally ready for Christmas and the New Year.

It seems such a rush. After all they have only been at school for such a short recovery time. However, this has been 2020 and for all in the family, change and shifting normalities are the norm.

What to do about it:

• Accept it! You can’t change what has been an extraordinary year for everyone. It still comes with its challenges of wearing masks in shops etc. Embrace it with the children.

• Keep the family talk up about the year and allow the children to freely talk about their challenges across that time. Do this in a positive, reassuring way.

• Understand that behaviour may be different with your child and tolerate a little more when it comes to changed behaviour.

• Keep up the play and allow your child to enjoy free time. Remember that COVID-19 normal was so different and the child is adjusting to getting back to routine. Perhaps with some trepidation of that change.

• Letting go of friends for the year can cause some distress as in some cases. Children may not have had great experiences when they briefly returned to school. Remember that after a whole year of school, children are in and out of friendships and build solid relationships. For some this takes lots of reassurance and time.

• Christmas should be a wonderful time just to gather and offer nurture and support to the children and the whole family. It may be a time of reconnection with more people for the first time. A time to heal and a time to rest from anxious 2020.

• As the child thinks and plans for Christmas and the New Year, it is a time when you can just talk about the growth and changes you have seen in your child over the year. Perhaps you have noticed their growing patience with younger siblings or their growing interest in cooking. Talk about the skills that have acquired in those difficult times. Focus on the skills and little successes your child has made during the lockdown. Talk about how you may have learnt more about yourself.

Whist this whole year has had its ups and downs it is still a rich opportunity to highlight the initiatives and growth you have seen in your child. Make the most of it. Turn it into an amazing family journey. Oh what an adventure!

                  “A problem is a chance for you to do your best.”

Ten general thoughts about school life

1.    Make it inclusive. Ensure school is seen as an important factor in your family. It should not sit as an added extra but be seen as an integral part of family life across the year. Talk often about school as a family. Discuss the activities and events that are present in the life of the school.

2.    If you become more actively engaged with school activities you will have more understanding of the internal structure of the school. This brings home and school much closer together. It puts your child at ease. They are proud to have the presence of their parents in their school environment.

3.     Invite your child to read newsletters to you and to talk about forthcoming events.

4.    Ensure you have a presence in the school. Playgrounds are great places to chat with other families and talk about the events at school.

5.    Consider the number of hours per day a child spends at school. This cannot be dismissed at the end of the day if the child is keen to talk about school. Let it all flow.

6.    Ask yourself what can I learn as apparent from the school? If you keep your focus on what is happening you will be amazed at the learning you gain.

7.    As your child connects to the school, you will also discover new networks of parents who often become great friends over the years. Afterall you are sharing a journey together with these families.

8.    School life for your child may bring back nostalgic memories of your time at school both positive and negative. Take care to keep in mind that this is your child’s journey in a different era and will present different challenges and opportunities that should not be clouded by your own memories.

9.    Children will come home influenced by so many varied opinions and attitudes. They will challenge us as we may hear them expressing views that are contradictory to our own. A school must be open to differences and will educate inviting your child to consider optional points of view. We need to be ready for this. It may challenge us to discuss other values, beliefs etc. with our child.

10.  Make your home a space where the influences of school are present. For example, display children’s work on fridges, leave school newsletters around the home, ensure the child has a comfortable space to do homework etc. Leave school notes visible to read for all. School is a definite way of life and the more the child can move comfortably between home and school, the easier the process for all.

Ten thoughts about school life

Thirteen myths about schools

1. Schools are very closed in the way they operate

No! When your child starts school, the environment needs to be welcoming, friendly and inclusive. Schools recognise that without the support and encouragement of parents their work will not be effective. Schools understand that for a child to feel connected and in a safe learning environment they need to be working in partnership with the parents. Children become very unsettled if there is no harmony between school and home.

2. Schools all work in the same way with the learning process

No! It is true that schools are required to follow the National Curriculum. However, how they interpret the curriculum and how they work in teams planning can be quite different from school to school. Also, there may be set policies in schools on how certain curriculum areas are taught. Generally, most schools try to be consistent in how they teach and much professional development goes into their work and planning techniques. If you need clarification, ask the school about what pedagogy they use and how they follow the curriculum. Of course, schools will offer curriculum nights for you to learn about what happens in the classroom. These are highly valuable to attend

Myths v’s Facts about Schools

3. Teachers only invite parents into the classroom when necessary

Really? Parents are generally invited into the classroom on most occasions. They sometimes set up classes for parents to visit. However, you should feel welcome to sit into a class at any time.

4. Only certain parents are chosen to be part of excursions

This is not the case. Teachers recognise the importance of being inclusive and try to balance the presence of parents on excursions etc. You play such an important role in the life of the child and should be included when you feel you want to learn more about the process of learning for your child.

5. Changing schools is damaging for your child’s emotional development.

This is not generally the case. However, when you need to change schools for whatever reason ensure that your child gets involved in meeting the teachers and being active in learning about the school. Of course, there is some adjustment time in meeting new friends, feeling welcomed and adjusting to a new teacher and school culture. However, in my experience if it is handled well by the new school and family the child grows emotionally and recognises their capacity to form new friends in a new setting. This teaches resilience and reinforces to the child that they can be flexible.

6. The child’s teacher for the year is solely responsible for their learning.  

This is definitely not the case. Children learn in different ways and from different people and experiences.

The parent is actually the first educator followed by all the influences of the school, various specialist teachers and life activities. No one aspect is responsible for their growth intellectually, emotionally, socially and physically.

7. If my child does not like the teachers, it is a wasted school year.

As the above myth says learning happens in many forms. When the relationship with the teacher is a not a strong one, the child is still capable of learning and if they learn to value the qualities of the teacher, the child grows in working with different types of people. This is such a valuable skill to work and appreciate differences in teachers.

8.  It is the school’s responsibility to ensure my child has friends.

This is not the case. It is true that teachers will work on social skills and negotiate with children about matters where poor behaviour interrupts their friendships. Ultimately, it is the child who must work though the emotional journey of finding and establishing friends. The school will and can deal with inappropriate behaviour linked to breakdowns in friendships but ultimately through trial and error, success and failure, a child learns to negotiate their way through the social web of relationship with other children.

9.  If a child is finding school difficult it is the total responsibility of the school to fix the problem.

This is not the case. It certainly is the responsibility of the school to work with the child in improving their learning. Some schools offer more in this area with remedial support. Each school is different in how this issue is handled. However, encouragement from the parents, working in collaboration with the school and support at home are all necessary for the child to feel that learning is a success for them. It is best to keep in frequent touch with the teacher to learn how best your child learns and what support you can offer at home. This is a delicate area and needs both school and home working together in trust to ensure that the child’s self-esteem is intact.

10. When a school rings the parent, it is always bad news.

This is definitely not the case. Schools often ring parents about a range of matters and sometimes the teachers love to talk to the parent about how the child has improved. It is common practice for Principals to be in contact with parents for many reasons and to discuss matters that are not peculiar to their child.

I would keep a journal of parents I contacted to ensure that the school was keeping in touch with families.

Of course, calls may come to discuss school issues but they are done with understanding and genuine support for the child. They believe the more communication,the better for the child

11. If my child repeats a class they will suffer socially and the child will feel unsuccessful.

This is a delicate issue and is very much about the specific needs of the child. In my experience, children who repeat have shown considerable improvement in their capacity to learn and engage socially with their classmates. They start to gain success and feel that they are a capable learner. This is a topic very debatable in educational circles, I simply operate out of my own experiences here as an educator and school Principal of twenty-nine years.  I also appreciate that many would disagree with me in this matter. Of course, repeating a child requires careful planning and collaboration between the parents, the child and school.

12. A child in a composite class is disadvantaged in learning compared to straight class.

This is definitely not true. The quality of a child’s learning rests heavily with the skill of the teaching. A composite environment provides a broad climate of learning for the child. What happens in the classroom is the key to the learning and not the age distribution of the children. I have seen this over many years and test results prove the case.

13. There are some schools that have no bullying at all.

Bullying occurs in all schools. What is the key component to managing bullying is how the school handles situations and what programs they have in place to educate children on the issue?  Some schools have a major focus in their social and emotional learning and teachers are given considerable professional learning on how to teach children about managing bullying.

Bullying occurs as children are at various stages of emotional growth and some need assistance to understand how to socially engage with each other. Parents should monitor how their child is coping with this issue and feel comfortable to approach the school as soon as there is evidence of your child feeling unsafe. Read the schools’ anti bullying policies to gauge how they manage the issue.