Parents! Help Your Kids Learn ANYTHING Better!
Kids learn in many different ways, and helping them learn new things can be hard for both parents and teachers. But here are some time honored tips and tricks to keep in your back pocket that can help children learn just about anything new! These tips can help kids learn the alphabet, numbers, shapes, reading, math, and well, just about anything!
How to Help Your Kids Learn ANYTHING better!
1. Sing it!
This is my favorite activity to help kids learn things that need to be memorized, because music triggers memories in the brain like nothing else! And add movement to it, and you have a winning combination that can't be beat! There are tons of songs with movements all over the internet, and especially on YouTube! Here is our Hexagon song as an example:
2. Use a Mnemonic (Memory) Trick!
Remember learning things like "Every Good Boy Does Fine" to help you remember the notes on a musical staff (EGBDF)? Or "I before E, except after C, Or when sounded "A," as in "neighbor" or "weigh?" Those are mnemonics- memory tricks to help you remember things. There are tons of them all over the internet. All you have to do is search! We use pictures for mnemonics for phonics here at HeidiSongs; just take a look at the Sounds Fun poster below! The monkey says "Oo-oo!" and he has "oo" written on the card. This helps children remember that the spelling "oo" makes the monkey's "oo-oo" sound.
3. Try Multi-Sensory Instruction!
Multi-Sensory instruction is a mouthful to say, but not as hard as it sounds! All it means is that you try to use all of the senses that you possibly can while teaching kids. So ideally, they would see, hear, say, and move all at the same time while learning. Here is a great example of how to teach kids to identify numbers and shapes from our own collection.
4. Use pictures or some type of visual aid.
You know the old saying, "A picture is worth a thousand words"? It's really true! Pictures can help children visualize in their heads what it is you are trying to teach them. So pull up pictures online of that new vehicle you are describing, or find some illustrations of kids getting along nicely if you are teaching children to follow the rules, etc., as you see below. I am a big believer in the power of a visual aid!
For pictures of animals or nature, I especially recommend the magazine called "Nature's Best Photography." It has absolutely GORGEOUS and truly fascinating pictures of animals that kids really love to look at, and that will inspire lots of great conversations. Real photos of real objects are especially great for second language learners, because there is no confusion regarding what you are talking about, too. I ordered a bunch of back copies (depending on the theme of the issue) to build up my picture/photo library. Take a look below at the pictures of the lions that I was able to collect, mostly just from this one magazine! I always post pictures of whatever animal we are studying, and the kids LOVE it!
5. My Turn, Our Turn, Your Turn
This is a great little technique that I picked up from using a a scripted language arts series called SIPPS. (I HATE teaching from scripts, but this idea really seems to work for a lot of things!) When a child is struggling with something, (such as sound out a word,) first have them only watch you do it twice through. Then have them do it with you twice. Then have the child do it alone twice. (This would be with the SAME word- SIX times in a row! Yes, you read that right: SIX times in a row!) Yes, it seems a bit like over-kill, but for a struggling learner, it seems to work much of the time. I have seen it work in other subjects, such as counting out quantities in sets of ten, and then counting on from there.
6. Try a Little Extra Motivation
Sometimes an extra little bit of motivation never hurt anybody! I will admit to having "promised myself" a massage or something special when I finish up all of my report cards, or some other task that seems daunting. So why should children be any different? Find out what your child or your students that are struggling want to work for, and set a reward in place. Then work towards it! One of the most clever systems I have seen is a mom from my class several years ago that pinned all of the color words to a special Spiderman T-shirt that her son really wanted. Each time he mastered a word, she unpinned it from the shirt. When all of the words were gone, he got to have the shirt! Love it!
7. Let Another Child Explain it
Sometimes, we adults just can't figure out what a child doesn't understand, simply because we are adults! However, another child may see right away what his friend doesn't understand and be able to clear things up immediately! I have seen this happen many, many times! It's also good to note that the child that gets to be "the teacher" is also solidifying his or her own learning just from the experience of teaching it to someone else! In fact, if you want to challenge a gifted child, have him or her try to teach what they know to someone who doesn't get it. It's great practice and a wonderful way to develop language skills!
8. Let Them Watch Another Child Doing It
Learning by example is powerful. Just think about the younger siblings that somehow wind up being toilet trained a year earlier than their older siblings, simply because they have been watching their big brothers or sisters learn? And I hear all of the time from parents that buy our HeidiSongs DVD's that the younger siblings are learning the alphabet or numbers right along with their older children, simply by watching the older ones as they learn and by joining in and singing along! And enthusiasm is especially contagious where learning is concerned! If one child is excited about learning something new, chances are the children around him or her will also get excited as well. (Unfortunately, bad attitudes can be just as contagious, so if you have a strong willed child that HATES to learn new things, you might want to consider working with him or her out of view of your younger children.)
9. Do "Spiral" Reviews To Make Sure Kids Don't Forget What They Have Learned
A "spiral" review is what teachers call it; an instruction that continually repeats itself over time. So, if your child needs to learn rhyme, sounding out words, sight words, letter sounds, numbers, counting to 100, comparing sets, and patterning, then you may wish to work on two of these things per day, but rotate through the skills each day. So maybe on Monday you would work on rhyme and sounding out words, and then on Tuesday work on sight words and letter sounds. Then on Wednesday, work on numbers and counting to 100, etc. You just keep rotating through the skills until you have covered them all.
10. Break down instruction into small chunks of 10-15 minutes per hour, followed by 45 minutes of play time. Then repeat!
When children fall behind in one area, they are often behind in several areas! This can be quite overwhelming to parents, who really cannot get their children to sit through so much review at home- even if they DO have the time to help them! I often suggest to parents that if possible, they work with their child for shorter periods of time- such as 10 minutes or so- whatever the child's attention span will allow for. Then let the child go play and do something else. Set a timer, or do something to establish another time to work again so that your child knows it is coming again. Then repeat this routine with the next set of skills. You may wish to work on all of the skills your child needs to work on in a "spiral" fashion as described above, or perhaps just ask your child's teacher what the most important thing to focus on would be and work on that first.
Break your instructional review time down into small chunks. A little dab will do ya!
11. Make It Useful.
Children tend to learn what they need to learn. If they need to speak a foreign language, they will pick it up, but only if it is necessary for them. I think that sometimes, if learning is hard for us, we tend to avoid it unless we really NEED to know something. Then we will put forth the effort to learn it. So, how shall we translate this to teaching children letters and numbers at home? Mark things that your child will need to get for you with letters or numbers, such as plastic cups or utensils, or toys like Legos or blocks. Then when you want something, ask your child, "Will you please hand me the cup with the capital A on it?" Or, "Will you please hand me the fork with the number two on it?" Or, "Let's build a tower! I want the blocks with the letters on them. You take the blocks with the numbers on them!" Or, if your child knows all of the numbers except the number nine, mark as many things as you can with a nine and continually ask your child for "that thing with a nine on it." Have your child sit in the chair with a nine on it for dinner, or use the pencil with a nine on it. Get it? As soon as you make it totally necessary for your child to know what a nine is, he or she will probably learn it. (If the problem is that your child mixes up two similar looking numbers or letters, make sure that you mark objects with BOTH of those numbers or letters so that he can practice telling the difference between the two, also.
And one last word of advice...
12. Keep it fun!
No one wants to be pressured endlessly, and that includes children. Remember, although you may feel that your child's teacher is judging YOU because your child needs help, that is probably not the case! And although you may think that if your child needs extra help learning this or that, this is a poor reflection on you, it is probably not the case either! I have seen a ton of children from wonderful families with great mommies and daddies that just needed a little extra help learning this or that in Kindergarten. Your child's teacher wants to see you try to help your child as best you can, once you realize that your child needs some extra help. That's all!
Good luck to you fellow parents, and teachers too!
-Heidi
----------------------------------
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How to Help Your Kids Learn ANYTHING better!
1. Sing it!
This is my favorite activity to help kids learn things that need to be memorized, because music triggers memories in the brain like nothing else! And add movement to it, and you have a winning combination that can't be beat! There are tons of songs with movements all over the internet, and especially on YouTube! Here is our Hexagon song as an example:
2. Use a Mnemonic (Memory) Trick!
Remember learning things like "Every Good Boy Does Fine" to help you remember the notes on a musical staff (EGBDF)? Or "I before E, except after C, Or when sounded "A," as in "neighbor" or "weigh?" Those are mnemonics- memory tricks to help you remember things. There are tons of them all over the internet. All you have to do is search! We use pictures for mnemonics for phonics here at HeidiSongs; just take a look at the Sounds Fun poster below! The monkey says "Oo-oo!" and he has "oo" written on the card. This helps children remember that the spelling "oo" makes the monkey's "oo-oo" sound.
3. Try Multi-Sensory Instruction!
Multi-Sensory instruction is a mouthful to say, but not as hard as it sounds! All it means is that you try to use all of the senses that you possibly can while teaching kids. So ideally, they would see, hear, say, and move all at the same time while learning. Here is a great example of how to teach kids to identify numbers and shapes from our own collection.
4. Use pictures or some type of visual aid.
You know the old saying, "A picture is worth a thousand words"? It's really true! Pictures can help children visualize in their heads what it is you are trying to teach them. So pull up pictures online of that new vehicle you are describing, or find some illustrations of kids getting along nicely if you are teaching children to follow the rules, etc., as you see below. I am a big believer in the power of a visual aid!
For pictures of animals or nature, I especially recommend the magazine called "Nature's Best Photography." It has absolutely GORGEOUS and truly fascinating pictures of animals that kids really love to look at, and that will inspire lots of great conversations. Real photos of real objects are especially great for second language learners, because there is no confusion regarding what you are talking about, too. I ordered a bunch of back copies (depending on the theme of the issue) to build up my picture/photo library. Take a look below at the pictures of the lions that I was able to collect, mostly just from this one magazine! I always post pictures of whatever animal we are studying, and the kids LOVE it!
5. My Turn, Our Turn, Your Turn
This is a great little technique that I picked up from using a a scripted language arts series called SIPPS. (I HATE teaching from scripts, but this idea really seems to work for a lot of things!) When a child is struggling with something, (such as sound out a word,) first have them only watch you do it twice through. Then have them do it with you twice. Then have the child do it alone twice. (This would be with the SAME word- SIX times in a row! Yes, you read that right: SIX times in a row!) Yes, it seems a bit like over-kill, but for a struggling learner, it seems to work much of the time. I have seen it work in other subjects, such as counting out quantities in sets of ten, and then counting on from there.
6. Try a Little Extra Motivation
Sometimes an extra little bit of motivation never hurt anybody! I will admit to having "promised myself" a massage or something special when I finish up all of my report cards, or some other task that seems daunting. So why should children be any different? Find out what your child or your students that are struggling want to work for, and set a reward in place. Then work towards it! One of the most clever systems I have seen is a mom from my class several years ago that pinned all of the color words to a special Spiderman T-shirt that her son really wanted. Each time he mastered a word, she unpinned it from the shirt. When all of the words were gone, he got to have the shirt! Love it!
7. Let Another Child Explain it
Sometimes, we adults just can't figure out what a child doesn't understand, simply because we are adults! However, another child may see right away what his friend doesn't understand and be able to clear things up immediately! I have seen this happen many, many times! It's also good to note that the child that gets to be "the teacher" is also solidifying his or her own learning just from the experience of teaching it to someone else! In fact, if you want to challenge a gifted child, have him or her try to teach what they know to someone who doesn't get it. It's great practice and a wonderful way to develop language skills!
8. Let Them Watch Another Child Doing It
Learning by example is powerful. Just think about the younger siblings that somehow wind up being toilet trained a year earlier than their older siblings, simply because they have been watching their big brothers or sisters learn? And I hear all of the time from parents that buy our HeidiSongs DVD's that the younger siblings are learning the alphabet or numbers right along with their older children, simply by watching the older ones as they learn and by joining in and singing along! And enthusiasm is especially contagious where learning is concerned! If one child is excited about learning something new, chances are the children around him or her will also get excited as well. (Unfortunately, bad attitudes can be just as contagious, so if you have a strong willed child that HATES to learn new things, you might want to consider working with him or her out of view of your younger children.)
9. Do "Spiral" Reviews To Make Sure Kids Don't Forget What They Have Learned
A "spiral" review is what teachers call it; an instruction that continually repeats itself over time. So, if your child needs to learn rhyme, sounding out words, sight words, letter sounds, numbers, counting to 100, comparing sets, and patterning, then you may wish to work on two of these things per day, but rotate through the skills each day. So maybe on Monday you would work on rhyme and sounding out words, and then on Tuesday work on sight words and letter sounds. Then on Wednesday, work on numbers and counting to 100, etc. You just keep rotating through the skills until you have covered them all.
10. Break down instruction into small chunks of 10-15 minutes per hour, followed by 45 minutes of play time. Then repeat!
When children fall behind in one area, they are often behind in several areas! This can be quite overwhelming to parents, who really cannot get their children to sit through so much review at home- even if they DO have the time to help them! I often suggest to parents that if possible, they work with their child for shorter periods of time- such as 10 minutes or so- whatever the child's attention span will allow for. Then let the child go play and do something else. Set a timer, or do something to establish another time to work again so that your child knows it is coming again. Then repeat this routine with the next set of skills. You may wish to work on all of the skills your child needs to work on in a "spiral" fashion as described above, or perhaps just ask your child's teacher what the most important thing to focus on would be and work on that first.
11. Make It Useful.
Children tend to learn what they need to learn. If they need to speak a foreign language, they will pick it up, but only if it is necessary for them. I think that sometimes, if learning is hard for us, we tend to avoid it unless we really NEED to know something. Then we will put forth the effort to learn it. So, how shall we translate this to teaching children letters and numbers at home? Mark things that your child will need to get for you with letters or numbers, such as plastic cups or utensils, or toys like Legos or blocks. Then when you want something, ask your child, "Will you please hand me the cup with the capital A on it?" Or, "Will you please hand me the fork with the number two on it?" Or, "Let's build a tower! I want the blocks with the letters on them. You take the blocks with the numbers on them!" Or, if your child knows all of the numbers except the number nine, mark as many things as you can with a nine and continually ask your child for "that thing with a nine on it." Have your child sit in the chair with a nine on it for dinner, or use the pencil with a nine on it. Get it? As soon as you make it totally necessary for your child to know what a nine is, he or she will probably learn it. (If the problem is that your child mixes up two similar looking numbers or letters, make sure that you mark objects with BOTH of those numbers or letters so that he can practice telling the difference between the two, also.
And one last word of advice...
12. Keep it fun!
No one wants to be pressured endlessly, and that includes children. Remember, although you may feel that your child's teacher is judging YOU because your child needs help, that is probably not the case! And although you may think that if your child needs extra help learning this or that, this is a poor reflection on you, it is probably not the case either! I have seen a ton of children from wonderful families with great mommies and daddies that just needed a little extra help learning this or that in Kindergarten. Your child's teacher wants to see you try to help your child as best you can, once you realize that your child needs some extra help. That's all!
Good luck to you fellow parents, and teachers too!
-Heidi
----------------------------------
Follow me! Did you enjoy this post? Do me a favor and share it with your friends! And follow this blog by signing up for my email updates here, or follow on Bloglovin', or follow me on TPT! I'm also on Pinterest, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Google+ and YouTube, too! Don't forget to sign up for our email newsletter for special deals and promo codes that you won't find out about anywhere else.
