Tanja Cilia joins us again for another post on going back to school.

Thank you Tanja for joining us today.

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The First Day Of School. A phrase that must be written like that, because it is such an important milestone for the child -and for the parents too.

School is the place where a child may spend more of his waking time than he does in his home, not counting sleep. It is the place where he will make and break friendships; where he will mould his character further – and decide upon his future.

School is the place where parents have little or no influence over the daily interaction of a child with his peers and superiors. They may try to tell him what to do and what to say – but when push comes to shove, he must face the music alone. Talk about performance anxiety!

Education and learning are stressful enough as it is – and combined with a cocktail of new emotion, rituals and situations, the trauma and strain felt by the child, who may not be prepared for them, increases. All too often, the promised fun and games take second place. What the child sees in Orientation Day is a nice, smiling teacher – not one who is worn to a frazzle by spilled water-colors and miniature wars over toys.

To top it all, the parents’ attitudes, and feelings of anxiety, guilt or fear may be subliminally transferred to the child, who assumes that being uprooted from his home environment into the alien one is somehow “his fault” for not being “good”.

Children must never be compared with others; they absorb skills at their own rate, using their innate learning styles. It is wrong to expect a child to conform to a set of milestones, at such a tender aged. Moreover, different children bring different skills, at different levels, to the same class. Some children barely know how to put their shoes on the right feet – others can tie their laces into a perfect bow. Some may not even know numbers exist, whereas others can count to 100.

Psychotherapist David Grillo explains it in this manner:

One of the best things about staring a child off with playschool or kindergarten or pres-school is that they are not thrown in at the deep end. The fact that they don’t have to take notebooks and stuff eases them gently into the world of learning.

For some kids, especially those who fall under the youngest age bracket, the first few days can be traumatic. It is the first time that they separate for a ‘long’ period from the parents. Separation anxiety is normal, and is also a part of growing up. But supporting them and ensuring that the parents, or someone with whom they identify, are home when they come back will help. It is also a good idea for both parents and not one to accompany the child to the door the first time.

These days, most teachers or kindergarten assistants are very well trained. And that makes a lot of difference.

Preparing a child for school psychologically goes hand-in-glove with the mundane preparations of uniforms (if applicable). Getting this must be a ‘special event’, with an emphasis on ‘school clothes for children who are no longer babies.’

If possible, take him with you too when you purchase his painting tabard, his lunch box, napkins and enough socks to have a clean pair each day. This is not the moment to worry that your child is gifted and will be “kept back” by the hoi polloi. That comes later.

• Some children like to be alone with the person who is taking them to school, for the journey there. Others would prefer to be with a peer. See what works best for your child and take it from there. If the child has to take the school van, because of distances or time constraints, make sure to prepare him for this.
• Never cajole a child into behaving like a “big boy” (i.e. ‘no tears’) because the “others” will laugh at him. This puts him on the defensive. Say, instead, that you are proud of him for actually being a good boy, even if he is bawling his eyes out.
• Gradually change the child’s routine so that a week before school begins, he will be getting up and going to bed at approximately the times he will be doing when school commences. This gets him used to the routine.
• Tell the child inasmuch as he is able to comprehend, that it is normal to have butterflies when starting a new school moving to a new house, or starting an new job. The idea is to get he butterflies flying in formation.
• Getting to school should not be rush-scuttle-dash-sprint. The child can set his own alarm clock and fold his clothes neatly over the back of the chair, and make sure any stationery needed is in his bag, on the eve of each school day.
• If you have to refer to your own childhood experiences, make sure the child cannot read anything negative in your attitude or tone of voice.
• If the child’s school requires a packed lunch, allow the child to select what he wants to eat, and perhaps to help prepare it.

Angele Licari, psychologist, has this to say about the above:

Firstly check if you, as a parent, are psychologically prepared for your child to be leaving home to start school. I would sooner begin with preparing the parents, and not the child about the loss and attachment issues affecting both.

If you have any anxieties of your own, these can be non-verbally be transmitted to the child and become his own. If your own move to school as a child was tarnished with any negative connections, then you might assume the child would be passing through the same experiences, thus finding it hard to let go in a healthy way. Come to terms with your own un-finished past.

Every so often, check how your child interacts with other children. Check if he is clingy, jealous, rough, intimidated, insecure, or perhaps too confident, and how s/he behaves towards others in general. Consider whether the source for negative behaviors is sibling rivalry; or having a younger sibling who is allowed to stay home whilst s/he is being sent to school. Address these matters before they escalate and compound the child’s stress.

Go through the daily routine with your child so that he can visualize what school means, while at home. You can help him understand that how he leaves home, (transport etc), what things he might be doing throughout the day at school, (games, reading, playing, etc), that he would be brought back home or picked up. This is especially important. It will help him feel he can cope with new things as a matter of course.

Discuss openly how you feel; ask your child how s/he feels about the whole thing. You can say that you will miss him but that you are happy that he will now be learning new things and enjoying the company of his friends. You can ask whether he has any thoughts about the whole experience.

In a matter-of-fact way, without any drama, remind the child that if there is anything with which he cannot cope, the teacher is replacing the parent or carers during school time, until he come back to ‘home sweet home’.

Some schools allow parents to stay in the building for an hour or two during the first weeks of school, just in case anything untoward happens. Ironically, this sometimes makes the parents feel more bereft than ever; it’s as if they are extraneous – because since the child has not thrown a wobbly, it must mean that he has “forgotten all about them”.

by Tanja Cilia

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Thanks again Tanja for joining us.

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“Yoghurt!” my son David shouted. He was not even one year old at the time.

We were on our way to the beach, and I assumed he wanted a frozen tub of the stuff to eat until we arrived. But as I turned around in my seat to give it to him, reminding him that he ought to have said ‘please’, I noticed that he was pointing a chubby finger at the vehicle right in front of us.

There, on the tail-gate of the pickup truck, was the word “Toyota”.

Before formal schooling begins, literacy skills are picked up in subtle means, before they are actually “taught” to a child. And that ought to be an indication that the “look and learn” method does not suit each and every child.

We know that learning styles differ:

• Aural (auditory-musical) indicates a preference for music and sounds;
• Logical (mathematical) utilizes logic, reasoning and systematic methods;
• Physical (kinesthetic) bring into play the body, hands and sense of touch;
• Social (interpersonal) opts for learning when in the company of others;
• Solitary (intrapersonal) is the decision to work alone;
• Verbal (linguistic) plumps for the use of words, both in writing and speech.
• Visual (spatial) chooses graphics, images, pictures, and spatial perception.

Despite this, most parents and teachers “expect” a child to follow the praxis obtaining with the peer group, be it recitation by rote or point-and-say. No allowances are made for children who could, and would, learn faster and better in their own preferred style and method of learning.

Having said this, it is worth pointing out that for most children, a combination of learning styles is by far the best technique to use. The idea is to make his grasp of the alphabet fun, albeit being didactic.

Games

“Learning Through Play” is a concept that is as old as the hills.

And one of the first methods that come to mind is giving new life to a pack of cards. All you have to do is cover the front of the cards with blank paper, stick a picture on the top two-thirds of each card (two for each letter), and write the initial at the bottom.

Unlike a look-but-don’t-touch wall frieze, this will give ‘tangible’ and ‘tactile’ results – and may also be used to play an interminable game of “Snap”… These cards could also be placed, face down, on a flat surface and used for a “Memory Game.”

If whole words are written on the cards, they may be utilized as flash cards, too.

You can also purchase or make, “first” books, called so because they are made of cloth or plastic. These are safer to use in the bath or in the cot, since unlike paper volumes, they do not disintegrate and pose a danger to a child who could swallow bits of the latter.

If you find fabric or plastic sheeting (of the type used for tablecloths) that incorporates an alphabet design, all you have to do is attach the “pages” at the side, by sewing them. This is the safest method, since glue, tape and staples may pose dangers if gnawed at. I found this out, myself, when my son Robert plugged his nostrils with gobs of chewed paper he had peeled off his Alphabet Jig-saw Puzzle.

High Class?

There is the question of whether children ought to be taught the upper- or lower-case letters first, or whether “the big one and the little one” must be presented together to facilitate assimilation.

Some educators even go as far as insisting that letters must be taught ion sequence, so that the child will not find difficulty in reciting the alphabet when this is required of him.

However, opinions differ on this one too.

When I worked as a Kindergarten Assistant, it was the norm to teach the children (3-4 years of age) the vowels first and foremost. We made a game of it; someone would pretend to pick up the phone and reply with exaggerated phonetic sounds of the vowels to whatever the person on the other end of the line was supposed to be saying.

Then followed 5 other letters – b, s, t, l and m, so that the children could get a cross-section of “shapes” (curves and straight lines and combinations), with the upper case letter being written after the lower case one.

All ten would have their own “scrapbook” – made up of collages, pre-writing exercises, potato prints, and pictures, colors, and shapes with a connection to the consonant or vowel for that month, so by the end of the scholastic year, they would hopefully have mastered them.

The ideal way to show children that a proper noun starts with a capital letter is to have their name and surname spelled out in separate letters – with practice they will be able to put it together correctly; even more so if you first write it down on a strip and then cut out each letter separately in a jigsaw-puzzle style, so that the parts fit together.

If you use sandpaper, or corrugated cardboard, you will literally add another dimension to this exercise. This game may also be done with letter fridge magnets.

A child would also love to write his name in the sand – on the beach, in a sandpit at the playground, or in a sand tray at home – according to the opportunities he has. He would also enjoy “painting” his name in water with a brush, on a slate or chalkboard.

Laminated paper and a water-based felt-tip pen provide another source of fun… if he wears an orphan sock on his “free” hand, he can erase and re-write without missing a beat.

Touch and Go!

Most children will absorb information when the way it is given involves some kind of mess; a pile of magazines, glue, glitter and stickers will encourage children to make their own Alphabet Book. If this is given a theme, rather than being a haphazard collection of pictures, the child will be learning how to organize information too; and this will be in good stead later. It does not matter of the child cannot pronounce the words properly, as yet.

• An Animal Book would have alligator, beaver, cow, donkey… this will also increase a child’s vocabulary, especially if you steer away from the common cat, dog, and fish creatures.
• The Food Book would have asparagus, broccoli, cucumber, damson… again; try to avoid oranges, apples and tomatoes.
• The Things Book would have anchor, bridge, climber… and in this case you avoid airplane, ball and chair.

This is another reason why you must haunt rummage sales and stock up on old magazines!

Children will encounter the printed word wherever they go: street signs, television, food cans, birthday cards, newspapers… each of these is an intrinsically unique learning opportunity.

Song and Dance

Children love rhythm. Most of them love repetition. A good number of them insist on consistency. This is where alphabet songs come in. You can use the tried-and-tested ones handed down in specialized books – or you can make up silly songs that will have the child giggling gleefully along in no time at all, even if he does not understand all the words. This is especially important, because if a child “knows” the Alphabet Song it does not necessarily mean that he understands what the alphabet is.

Alliteration and onomatopoeia sound especially funny to children.

Action songs and rhymes are other learning tools worth trying. Memory games such as The Clergyman’s Cat prepare the way for teaching abstract concepts as well as encouraging lateral thinking skills.

Always keep in mind that a laptop is not a lap; don’t delegate the teaching of letters to a machine. Not only because of the insidious fashion of misspelling “on purpose” in order to appear hip, or to “save time”, but because otherwise you will be missing out on “us” time, too.

by Tanja Cilia

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So starting us off with a very interesting post is Tanja Cilia. You can read her wonderful bio here. Thank you Tanja for joining us today.

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“Are we very nearly almost there yet?” is the question that emanates from the back-seat of a car the minute we set off on a journey with the kids.

Tweaked somewhat, it becomes a mother’s plaintive cry about whether the long summer holidays are anywhere near over yet.

It is a moot point whether or not she asks this because she knows she’s going to miss the kids – or because she wants them out of her hair.

There is a poem called The Lesson, by Roger McGough, in which a teacher murders his pupils in order to “teach them a lesson” about behaviour and obedience. This poem is supposed to be funny – and contains such stanzas as;

Then sword in hand he hacked his way
between the chattering rows
“First come, first severed” he declared
“fingers, feet or toes”

and

He threw the sword at a latecomer
it struck with deadly aim
then pulling out a shotgun
he continued with his game…

To a child who has never been to a school, this prospect is not the stuff of nightmares.
He is in awe that that dreary, depressing, desolate place his older friends disappear into when the holidays are over.

And now it’s his turn. And the Fear of the Unknown raises its ugly head.

He does not know what to expect -although he may have heard his siblings grumble about their inordinate amounts of homework, followed by the fateful words “I hate school!”

Moreover, he may have heard you heave a sigh of relief the minute the school doors closed upon his sibling(s) and anyone else on your school run – so to him, this translates into the sentiment that “School is a juvenile prison where kids are kept while adults have peace and quiet, watch television or perhaps go shopping, and meet friends for coffee…”

There are, however, some things that may be done in order to counteract this outlook – beginning from the Boy Scout Movement’s “Be Prepared”. This includes, but is not limited to, role-play, where the child acts the teacher, and you are the pupil.

The Ten-Point Plan starts here:

1. Be Prepared. Before you utter one word against a teacher, a teaching method, a school, a textbook, or thea homework, of an older child, twist your head around as far as it will go, in both directions. Look under the beds and inside the cupboards. If there are no children in the room, give vent. If there is a toddler within earshot, hold your horses. But be lavish with praise about anything that is school-related.
2. Read with the child. It does not matter what you read – the name of a vehicle; the label on a bottle of water; the motto on a t-shirt; the street signs or posters for a play or a film; the headlines of a newspaper. The child will associate the squiggly signs with sounds, and may even begin to recognise some of them, especially if they “belong” to his name. For more information on reading, please read our Encouraging Reading series
3. Sing. Even if you cannot carry a tune in a bucket, you have you sing. This encourages the child to do likewise – and consequently builds her vocabulary and auditory capabilities.
4. Talk. Even when you can’t stand the combined chatter of a radio, a television set or two, and the dog’s irrational yelping, you have to talk to the child, and give him the confidence to reply. Do not accept monosyllabic answers.
5. Make it clear to the child that he lives within a community; this prepares him to share things with his peers, and also teaches him that the world does not revolve around him. Make sure he knows how to sit at one place for a period of time, since structured learning requires this.
6. Go for walks in your immediate neighbourhood, and ask him to lead you back home. Show him the homes of friends, and talk about them (nicely!) This, too, builds language and inter-personal skills.
7. Count. Apples in the crate, people in a queue, eggs in the basket, colours in the box, fingers and toes, ants on the garden wall – this is a fun introduction to numeracy.
8. Be messy. Playing with water, sand, or paints teaches dexterity and eye-to-hand co-ordination. It also gives a rudimentary sense of volume, length, and area.
9. Be creative. Talk about other uses for ordinary things (you can make a necklace out of pasta or cereal hoops), and encourage the child to use his imagination to create projects with as little help from you as possible. If a child knows how to use a paint brush, it will help him use a pencil and a fork better, later.
10. Make sure the child knows how to interact with peers as well as with the adults he’s so far used to, in his immediate circle. Being sociable is very different from being cheeky. A shy child may be teased or shunned in class, reinforcing the feeling that school is an unpleasant, lonely place to be.

Then, once the toddler is safely ensconced in class, you may guilelessly, gleefully and guiltlessly…watch television, go shopping, or stop by at your friend’s for coffee… or simply relish your new-found peace and quiet…. unless you have a baby in the house!

by Tanja Cilia

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Mothers’ Day Gift Booklets

What you need: 

• A4 paper, coloured or white

• Glue

• Transparent tape

• Good scissors

• Old cards

• Old Magazines

• Wrapping paper

• Stickers, glitter, and rubber-stamps (optional)

Method:

1. Go through magazines and find pictures, prayers, quotations, puzzles, that you like.

2. “Cover” one sheet with wrapping paper on either side.

3. Bind the edges with tape, and set aside.

4. Fold each sheet, including the ‘cover’, in half.

5. On each page, stick a picture and a recipe, or quote, or puzzle; the latter may overlap the former.

6. When you are ready, attach sheets on top of one another down the centre to form booklet; attach cover last.

7. Find letters from feature articles that spell out the message you want to convey, and use as necessary.

8. If you want, you can decorate further with stickers, rubber-stamps and glitter.

9. It is vital to include the occasion and the year on the front of the card, and optional to include the name of the recipient and the date.

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Tanja Cilia is an Allied Newspapers (Malta) columnist, freelance journalist, writer and poet who lives in Fleur de Lys, a hamlet in the beautiful Island Republic of Malta, Europe, bang in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea. She is married, and has three children. Tanja lives to write and reads to breathe, and karaokes off-key to Elton John and Katie Melua records as she two-finger thumps on the pc… her excuse is that she had chilblains when she was learning to type, and this prevented her from being able to place her digits in the correct position on the keyboard… In the past, she has worked as a clerk, a Kindergarten Teacher, and a Facilitator for children who have different needs; all three jobs have rewarded her with experiences and characters that often worm their way into her stories without warning. She loves cooking, mainly traditional Maltese food, but is also partial to Chinese dishes.  Sometimes, she even thinks and speaks in haiku – but she prefers to read science fiction.  Tanja is currently compiling stories for a children’s book, which will consist partly of her own original tales, and also some adaptations of foreign ones. Contact her at tanjachilja@hotmail.com

On one other note, if you have any questions or would like to see specific topics, please email me at sirena.van@sympatico.ca.

Thank you,

Sirena

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