Recommended Reading
I believe that innovation, creativity and imagination can often be stifled throughout childhood, dampening a child’s capacity to reach their potential and make the most of their experiences in life. Certain aspects of modern day life including excessive television watching and video games can dull a child’s creativity. Whilst the education system does what it can to develop the intellect of young people today, we cannot rely on it to stimulate creativity and express originality. That is our responsibility as parents, teachers and adults.
It is a well known fact that confidence and a high self esteem are key foundations to a bright mind and a bright future. Without self belief and motivation, a child cannot be expected to exude creativity. “The most rewarding aspect of my role as a private tutor to date has been the visible rise in confidence of those tutees who suffer from low self esteem. A large part of my job is to teach young children to value their uniqueness, skills and potential. I aim to instil a sense of self worth in my tutees, allowing their creativity to flourish and giving them the necessary support at an early age to be inspired by learning.” It is up to us to discover, encourage and nurture the talents and abilities of young children. Every child has the ability to express themselves; it is simply a matter of finding the right key to unlock their creative potential.
Whilst children need support from parents and tutors alike, knowing when to stand back and let a child take over is equally important. Striking this balance ensures that a child’s creativity is not suppressed. A good tutor will be dynamic and adaptable enough to supply the necessary prompts whilst ultimately allowing the child to take charge and feel a sense of pride and responsibility in their learning.
Although there is no universal rule over how to get children motivated in English, there are numerous ways in which parents can help inspire their children to enjoy reading, playing with words and thinking creatively. If you would like to be more involved in your child's English progress, here are some ideas to get you started.
Encourage reading by sharing, not forcing. Go book shopping together and encourage them to make their own choice.
Suggest books in areas which match his/her interests. Make a note of any favourite stories and find other books by the same author or find out if there is a series.
Start the book off by reading the first few chapters to the child yourself. When reading together, pick out words they may not know and discuss their meanings. It is far better to learn words in context than from a boring looking word list.
Chat to your child regularly about the books that you are both reading. What is good or bad about the stories? How could they be improved? How catchy is the title? Does the summary sound interesting? Why? What is the opening sentence/paragraph? What does it tell us? What does it not tell us? Would you like to change the characters or introduce new ones? What other endings could have worked? What other locations could have been used? etc. Have fun with introducing new characters, settings or events.
Don’t worry too much about the calibre of the book. Easy books with illustrations are good practice and may provide the necessary enthusiasm to attempt more challenging stories. Never force a child to read a novel they are not enjoying because you think it is something they ‘should’ read; you might well put them off words for life!
Introduce your child to a variety of different genres of books, until one strikes interest. You could begin by selecting some story tapes of interest to play in the car or at bedtime. Reading as widely as possible will be crucial to their verbal reasoning development, vocab expansion and general understanding of words in context. Try to discuss a good mix of fictional and non-fictional pieces of writing.
Subscribe to magazines of interest and First News. First News is a fantastic children’s newspaper full of current issues and appealing articles; it is a fantastic resource to spark a discussion on a topic between you both. First News can be bought online or in some large newsagents.
Set aside quality time to book shopping. Rather than presenting it as another chore on the rushed to-do list, offer it up as a quest in search of a gripping adventure. Squeezing a visit to a bookshop in between uniform shopping and a haircut will do little to inspire a reluctant reader! If possible, make it the only reason for going out and get them excited by chatting about the tales they could discover within the book they choose. Nearing the end of term is always a good time to promise a book outing as they will begin to associate book shopping with fun and holiday season!
Try to make regular visits to your local library or join a school or local book club. Waterstones stores often have book clubs or book related events going on for a wide range of age groups. Do an internet search to find book clubs in your area. Also, find out whether the school or any local organisations partake in a book swap.
Establish a regular reading routine whether it’s half an hour before supper time or before bed. If you have a suitably quiet space, you could make a cosy hammock or comfy chair the nominated reading zone! A good habit to get them into is 15 minutes reading before lights out. You could offer them 15 minutes extra staying up time assuming this is spent reading! Alternatively, you could set up a reward chart and set them a challenge of completing a book in a set period of time. If they complete it by the due date and can talk about it in detail, then they get their CD, cinema ticket or t-shirt etc. Again, make sure they are getting some enjoyment from the chosen book. Forcing them into completing a novel which is too complex for their age or simply not interesting can have a very adverse effect!
Develop your child’s aptitude for logic through puzzles and problem solving. Encourage them to complete crosswords and wordsearch puzzles. Search your library, local bookstore (Waterstones is a good bet) or Amazon for riddles, brainteasers and cryptograms (text written in code). There are also plenty of games (both online or offline) games that require tactical thinking and rapid reactions. Try Rush Hour and Shape by Shape both of which can become addictive!
Money is well spent on a good dictionary and thesaurus. Children’s versions are often available which tend to be more colourful and appealing to pick up. Get them to pick a word a day randomly, learn it and challenge them to use it three times that day in conversation! Other dictionary tasks include:
- providing a list of words starting with the same letter and time them to re-write them in alphabetical order. Check that your child knows their alphabet really well, starting from any letter within it. This will make alphabetical order questions a breeze in the exam.
- writing five or more words on a sheet of paper with gaps between them. Ask the child to use a thesaurus to find five similar meaning words and write them alongside.
- check that they know what a prefix/suffix is and then ask them to find ten words each with different prefixes or suffixes.
Encourage your child to construct lists of synonyms, antonyms, new words as they come across them. Have these lists next to them whenever they are doing homework or other English assignments so that they don’t just get used once and then mysteriously disappear!
Buy them a colourful covered pad (or better still let them choose their own in a large WHS or Rymans) in which to keep these lists rather than a boring plain one. They are more likely to get inspired and let their imagination flow if the writing pad itself looks appealing to pick up!
Reinforce knowledge of prefixes, suffixes, word roots, antonyms and compound words. If you as the parent are aware of the areas which will be tested at the 11+, then you can look out for them in everyday conversation and point them out which is a more natural way of learning than making them learn from a long list.
Spotting key words within a passage is a hugely important, and often underpractised, skill. Learning to identify key words and phrases will aid a child’s ability to tackle comprehensions (and also become a lasting life skill). When looking at any written piece together, encourage your child to spot the key bits of information, or ask them to give a summary of the passage (written or spoken) in three main points.
Try and also prompt them to spot words within words which will aid their knowledge of word construction and expand their vocab.
Practise commonly misspelt words eg: acceptable, accommodation, achieve, melancholy, assess, believe, communicate, convenient, definite, desperate, disappear, disappoint, necessary, permanent, persuade, physical, receive, recommend, responsible, separate, stationary, stationery, success, surprise, weird. Use word games/rhymes to help them remember tricky spellings eg There is a rat in sep‘a rat’e. Or there is a bus in ‘bus’iness. Necessary – one collar and two sleeves (one c, two s’s). Receive – i before e except after c.
Pictures, photos, postcards, etc are fantastic imagination starters. Use them as the basis for writing a story or simply discuss what is going in the picture. Get them into the habit of thinking outside of the box and exploring more abstract things, such as how people in the picture might be feeling, what might happen next, what has just happened, what the atmosphere is like etc.
Make use of car journeys:
- Do a ‘Newsround’ session on the way back from school; ask them to recall 5 things they learnt that day. Or make a game of it and ask them to speak for 30 seconds without hesitation on anything they have learnt that day.
- Highlight the importance (and fun) of using of all 5 senses, questioning them on what smells, sights, tastes, textures and sounds they can pick out from a scene outside or within a picture.
- Try introducing them to a new word each day which they have to try and use in conversation three times that day.
- Play “Don’t finish the word”. The objective is to force the other person to finish a word. Say a letter at a time each whilst both having a real word in mind (you may have the same word in your head or different ones which makes it fun). The aim of the game is to make the other person have to finish a word. For example the first person might say ‘a’ and the second person might say ‘p’. Person one might be thinking of apple but person 2 might be thinking of applaud.
- Learn 3 new feelings/emotions words each day and add them to the creative writing word lists.
- Point out and explain everyday idioms/sayings. See if they recognise any or can think of their own eg It’s raining cats and dogs.
- Practise coming up with synonyms for words such as big, small, nice, said.
If your child learns visually then another useful habit to get into will be word webs/spider diagrams/mind maps (all the same idea). Put the subject or story title in the centre of the page and then draw branches off the central topic with related words or phrases. This is a fantastic brainstorming exercise that can be used in a variety of subjects and is a good habit to get them into.
Make creative writing tasks varied and fun:
– Ask them to create a poster to attract people to a new show in the West End. They must add all the crucial information that potential visitors might need to know.
- Ask them to select a pet of choice and write a detailed advert encouraging people to buy this animal from the pet shop. For an extended challenge, explain that they must use at least ten adjectives, 5 adverbs, 2 similes/metaphors and refer to as many of the senses as they can.
-If you are short on time, get them to write an opening paragraph/conclusion to a story title you provide or just write a plan with a clear beginning, middle and end. Children often fall down on their story structure so writing plans is another useful habit to follow.
- Create a character profile to make a Wanted poster. As well as the usual physical features, try brainstorming their habits, hobbies, ambitions, fears, pets, secrets etc. See who can make the most interesting characters. If it’s easier to visualise the character, it might help (and be fun) to draw a picture.
- Encourage a holiday diary/scrapbook. Collect tickets, pictures and leaflets to stick in and make it more of a creative project than a simple diary entry.
Try not to be too harsh on grammar/spelling corrections - this should be the school’s responsibility and your priority should be encouraging a love of words not a fear of making mistakes. Instead, discuss with them how they could have improved their writing eg what adverbs they could have used to liven up a sentence. Ask them to select the best sentence in story; discuss why it is the best and then do the same for the sentence which could be most improved. Check for language devices eg alliteration, metaphors, similes, speech, imagery, colour, use of the senses, alternative ‘said’ words etc. Encourage future use of these devices if they are absent.
If you notice that they are using the same words time and time again in their descriptions, introduce them to a thesaurus. Encourage them to seek more ambitious alternatives and don’t forget to get them to add any new found words or synonyms to the relevant pages of their creative writing word lists.
Encourage confidence in speaking out loud by playing ‘The Neverending Story’. Get someone to begin a story whilst holding a ball or another object of choice. When they have come to a stopping point, they /throw the object to another person and that person must continue where they left. You can make the aim to be as creative as possible or impose rules to keep it realistic eg only 3 characters allowed in total, two locations etc. There is no time limit so they can just add one extra sentence and pass the ball or elaborate. It often ends up being a highly amusing game with some hilarious plots - a good way of slowly building up confidence in public speaking as well as sparking imagination.
Have fun with retelling a familiar story eg Cindarella. Perhaps you could change the characters, setting, time period or ending.
Use fun games to inspire a love of words. Introduce your child to games such as Junior Scrabble, Boggle, Junior Articulate and Hangman. You can share the fun together and they may not realise they are doing anything educational!
Above all, encourage but don’t preach. In the closest of families, the parent/child relationship can prove to be a very tricky dynamic when it comes to academic work. Both parties can end up getting frustrated so it is important to strike a balance between guiding/encouraging and preaching. Leave the latter to the school/tutor and just do your best to foster an interest in playing with words. Many of the tips above can be integrated into play or at least be made into a more fun work activity.
