Helping Kids with their Work

presentation by Annabel Desira

Programmes’ Co-ordinator

Foundation for Educational Services

November 2012

Why are children given ?

• It is one way to re-inforce what they do at day-

school level.

• It is beneficial because they learn to tackle their

difficulties hence problem-solving.

• They revise and practise learnt concepts.

• It instils curiosity and hence the urge to learn

new things.

• In the meantime they’re brushing up their

skills – skills they that they need later on in life!

Whose responsibility is it to finish the work?

• It is the child’s responsibility to finish the work.

• Parents are responsible for monitoring that the work is done.

• Teachers are responsible for making sure that the work that is being assigned is relevant to the child’s world and within the child’s capabilities.

• How can we help? To get there we don’t need any magic keys but Attitude & Praise can make a big difference.

• Ownership from the learners side can do the trick!

How do I stop Fido

from eating my delicious homework?

Whose homework is it? Is s/he working in the

right environment?

Who are we working with?

Are we aware of any learning patterns?

Which tasks does this work entail?

• Reading & Comprehension of what is being asked.

• Answering correctly most commonly in written form.

Breaking it down into manageable bits!

• Plan the way ahead together!

• Time Cards – children need help in

visualising time.

• Mini Rewards – a rewarding activity at the

end of every part.

• Don’t always start with the most difficult!

• Take a short break but not many breaks!

Reading Strategies

• Popcorn Reading

• Sequencing Game

• Guided Reading & Questioning

• Anticipation & Prediction

• Paired Reading

• Different Genres of Reading

• A Story Bag / A Story Box

• Role-Play Games

Skill Cards!

When children are doing

the same task on their own,

you might not be around,

what do they do?

They need to be independent learners.

Find skill cards like these on the internet

and share them with them!

Attractive and useful cards

could be laminated and

used as a future reference.

This way they learn to refer to:

•Dictionaries

•Thesaurus

•Encyclopedia / Wikipedia etc…

because you’re instiling the idea!

Writing Strategies

• Pre-Writing

• Drafting

• Sharing & Peer Response

• Re-drafting

• Editing & Revising

• Publishing