Helpful tips and advice for home learning

Like the majority of our parents at St Helen's, you are not alone suddenly finding yourself plunged into the world of home education. The current situation may feel a bit daunting for some at the moment, but hopefully these helpful tips and advice for home learning will help you through in the coming weeks. As a school community, we have continued to develop a strengthened partnership and this will be important now more than ever. Below are some things to consider when supporting your child's learning from home.

Know when your children are at their best

Like adults, children work better at certain times of the day. Many are at the their best first thing, so perhaps as soon as breakfast is done it would be a good idea to get the formal work done and dusted. It might be that you use the children’s best time to focus on any work that the school or class teacher has provided, and you’ll probably want the children to keep on top of maths and English. There’s plenty of resources online to help our children, and these have been included on St Helen's school's website to help you. Teachers will also be developing year group website links to help tailor learning opportunities to your child's needs further. You will also be able to contact class teachers directly through e-mail to ask questions, get advice and share your child's learning.

Focus on their interests

Running with your children’s interests is the best way to hook them in to their learning. For example a particular  interest in a football player could lead to a project on them. You could cover so much in this project including the geography of their home country, other countries they have played in as well as their current club!

Being prepared

If you’re doing a project on something, then it pays to have information, activities and online resources ready to hand. You may also want to provide a simple timetable for the day, in order to maintain a routine.

Remember, not every minute needs to be filled!

One of the biggest things is to remember that it’s OK for children to be bored! They don’t need every minute of the day scheduling for them. There may well be natural lulls in energy and giving the children a break to do something else works really well. They can always come back to their work 20-30 minutes later, much more refreshed and better focussed. It’s OK as well to just be and enjoy something like making a cake, playing a game or sharing a story together. Not every minute needs to be covering a learning goal and objective. You’ll be amazed at just how much children learn from reading and playing.

Most of all try not to worry

Don’t worry! Children are adaptable and they’ll soon settle into the new routine. As a school, we are still here to support you and to make home learning a success for you and your family.