If I ask a reception child what shape a triangular puzzle piece is, they might say ‘red’ — some don’t even have the concept of shape,” says Carole Johnston, head of early years at a primary school in southwest London. “We have children in school who don’t understand ‘under’ and ‘over’ and don’t know that you start counting from the number one.”
And it isn’t just intellectual skills that are missing, she says. “We have one little boy who has never left his mum and isn’t used to interacting with other children. Quite a few arrive unable to go to the loo by themselves or put on their coats, and without the communication skills to ask for help.”
Organisations including Ofsted, the Institute for Education, local education authorities and the National Association of Head Teachers have noted that a significant number of children are now arriving at school, aged 4 going on 5, not ready for classroom life and without the foundations needed for learning to read, write and understand numbers.
Dr Helen Likierman and Dr Valerie Muter, both practising child psychologists, have seen the problem in their work and written a book that they hope will help. Prepare Your Child for School: How to Give your child a Flying Start (Vermilion, £8.99) covers the full range of early skills that are necessary for a successful start to a child’s school career.
The authors believe that parents need to play an active role in getting their children ready for school, and that a slightly more focused and methodical approach will achieve a much happier transition. “The vast majority of parents are trying to do the best for their children,” says Dr Likierman, “but sometimes they don’t know what is expected or how best to help in the time — perhaps limited — that they have available.
Advertisement
“As clinicians, we often see problems picked up very late in the day when they have already had a ‘snowball effect’. We want to empower parents to spot problems early.”
The authors stress that they are not advocating “hothousing”. In fact, the first half of the book is not about specifically educational issues at all. “It’s not just your child’s ability to learn to read, write and do sums that’s important for success at school,” they say. “There is also the little matter of sitting still for long enough to take in what a teacher has to say. There are classmates to contend with — and authority.”
Teachers, they point out, cannot be expected to view or treat your child exactly as you do. A boy “full of energy” or a girl who “thinks all the time” may be something to smile about at home, but in a class of 20 or 30 they can rapidly become “that disruptive child” or “the one we can’t get through to”. And their peers may be even less forgiving.
“Preparing your child to be socially competent before starting school pays massive dividends and is far too important to be left to chance,” says Dr Likierman. “Your child does not need to be ‘popular’ to be happy in school, she adds — that is always the preserve of the few. But he or she does need to be generally accepted (ie, not actively disliked) and preferably to have some friends.
Children can benefit from contact with other children from as young as 1, and as they get older they should have the opportunity to socialise at home, at other children’s houses and at parent/carer and toddler groups. The secret is finding the balance between allowing children to play together and learn for themselves, and judicious intervention before problems arise.
Advertisement
It is especially difficult for young children (and, let’s face it, some adults) to find a way into an existing group. The authors suggest showing your child how to ask to join in, perhaps by saying something nice about what the other children are doing (“that’s a good tower”) or making a suggestion for their game.
Several studies have also shown that children treat their peers as their parents treat them (food for thought, perhaps), so we need to model the behaviour that we want to see as well as “teach” it.
To address any specific issues, Dr Likierman and Dr Muter recommend that parents do what they, as psychologists, would do: assessment (using simple questionnaires), focused observation and, if necessary, action. This might include activities such as role-playing with soft toys or dolls (useful for improving social skills and empathy) or starting a “reward chart” to change or develop a particular behaviour.
The child gets instant praise and a sticker on the chart whenever he/she gets it right, and an extra reward for a pre-agreed number of stickers. This encourages the child and ensures that parents give attention for good behaviour rather than noticing only the bad. Consistency is important and, crucially, reward charts should never be used for punishment — removing stickers misses the point.
Although all aspects of school readiness interact, it is generally agreed by teachers and psychologists that the most vital skill of all is language — so much else, both social and educational, depends on it.
Advertisement
“Children’s language skills have diminished,” says Johnston, who has been teaching for 20 years, “and a child who can’t understand what a teacher is saying can’t learn.” She believes that too much television and computer gaming is at least partly to blame: “They don’t require real communication.”
Dr Likierman and Dr Muter agree that television and computer games should be limited and human contact put first. Children do not need to be taught language; they acquire it by hearing, imitating and experimenting, mostly in the pre-school years. By the age of 5 most can use almost all the grammatical structures that they will need for the rest of their lives, and by 6 they have a vocabulary of about 10,000 words.
The message to parents is: talk to, listen to and read to your child. Have conversations. Discuss the things around you (cars, flowers, people); ask questions (what do you think she’s doing?) and answer them, too. “Why? why?” may be infuriating but it is vital.
Don’t correct children’s language, advise Dr Likierman and Dr Muter — just reply correctly, perhaps with something extra. If your child says “I gotted new coat”, you might reply “Yes, you got a new blue coat with shiny buttons”.
There is great variation in how quickly we learn to speak. A normal 16-month-old may be able to say 130 words or none. Even a two-year-old who isn’t talking is not necessarily a worry, as long as he or she understands plenty of words.
Advertisement
Clarity of speech is also important as the first day of school approaches. Few things are more frustrating for a child than not being understood, so if your four-year-old is comprehensible only within the family, consider speech therapy, which is usually highly effective.
Spoken language is also crucial for learning to read — and that, the authors say, is “the single most important educational skill that children learn during their first two years of school”.
You need not teach your child to read, write or do arithmetic before they go to school, but the foundation skills on which the three Rs are built should be in place.
By the time a child starts school, Dr Muter says, he or she should be able to recognise a few letters of the alphabet, blend or join two or three sounds to make a word (c-a-t, cat), break a spoken word into syllables, copy lines and circles and write his/her first name. A child will also, it is hoped, understand relative size, be able to name and match simple shapes, colours and pictures, and count objects up to ten.
Most of these skills can be developed through games and fun activities. Only if there is a particular problem might a more formal programme be needed, and even then learning should not become a battleground.
Advertisement
Praise and encouragement are the keys. Only if this approach really doesn’t work might your child need professional help.
PRE-READING
Share books with your child
Point to the words as you read
Discuss stories: what happened?
What will happen next?
What is the point of the story?
Play rhyming games
Clap syllables (spi-der, clap-clap)
Teach letter sounds
Play “I spy”
Sound out spoken words (b-a-t, bat)
Find the first and last sounds in words (dog, d-g)
PRE-WRITING
Do lots of drawing, painting, colouring, tracing and copying.
Let your child choose which hand to use. Over the age of 3, encourage him/her to hold the pencil properly.
Start writing letters only once handedness is set and your child can hold a pencil correctly and draw recognisable shapes/pictures.
Teach a child his/her name first. Start with lower-case letters (t,l,i,f are easiest)
PRE-MATHS
Sing number songs
Point out shapes, colours and patterns
Get your child to copy patterns (eg, lay another table place).
Match and sort (eg, laundry by colour)
Count out biscuits, counters, anything
“Read” door numbers
Measure (eg, length)
Compare (bigger/ smaller, more/fewer)
Count out a given number and remove one/add one
Prepare Your Child for School: How to Give your child a Flying Start: RRP £8.99, available from Times Books First for £8.54, free P&P. Call 0870 1608080