International Sign Language Day: Five Top Tips for Learning Makaton

Friday 23rd September is the International Day of Sign Languages. To celebrate this day, language experts at Preply have shared their top tips on how to learn and understand Makaton. What is Makaton? Makaton is a unique language programme that uses symbols, signs and speech to enable people to communicate. It supports the development of essential

Pros and Cons of Home Learning During MCO

Since MCO began, the kids have had 26 days of home learning. As I reflect on those days and the changes that have been made to the home learning program, I feel that it has been a positive experience. Now that we are moving into a conditional MCO, I feel almost regretful that they will

Digital Learning for Young Children – Math Skills

When the boys were younger, I used apps and online math games to support their math skills development. Admittedly, it was a little experimental since we couldn’t be sure how effective digital learning was. Most importantly, we didn’t know how well it could translate to physical math learning. The following study takes a closer look

Parent Cheat Sheet: Metacognitive Questions

At the end of every enquiry unit, parents are invited to school to observe what our children have done. We are also encouraged to ask the kids questions about their work. This is something I’ve always struggled with because I never know what to ask to make it meaningful. How can you make it meaningful?

Reciprocal Reading – How to Support Your Child with Reading

Reading with children is important and this is something parents are encouraged to do quite often to support the children at school. In the early years, it’s just about learning to read and understanding the reading code. As the children advance into upper primary, they start moving into something called Reciprocal Reading. What is Reciprocal

Talk for Writing – How to Support Your Child with Reading and Writing

The Word Gap The Word Gap refers to the startling findings from the groundbreaking study by University of Kansas researchers Betty Hart and Todd R. Risley, titled “The Early Catastrophe: The 30 Million Word Gap by Age 3“. By 3 years of age, there is a 30 million word gap between children from the wealthiest and poorest families.

Story-Based Education for Engaging Student Learning

G2 came home recently and told me that his classroom had been trashed by a troll who came in the middle of the night. If I hadn’t been pre-warned by a teacher from school, I probably would have thought he was telling porky pies. And who could’ve blamed me? It sounded like a scene out

Enquiry Learning – Raising the Next Generation of Problem Solvers

There is a subject at school that the kids do which is called “enquiry learning”. It’s another term I’ve heard floating around but never deeply understood what it meant in the context of learning at school. Sure, I understand what “enquiry” means – it’s asking questions. It conjures the image of a science class where

I Think, I Thought, I Thunk

I learned a new word today – “thunk”. It is but not really related to the past tense for the word “think”. I’ve seen it floating around our school news letters but I didn’t really dig into the significance of it until today. So what’s a “thunk”? Define: Thunk A thunk is an unusual question

Making Learning Count: 32 Ways to Learn Better

When I was in school, the only way we knew how to learn was to put your head down and study. If you had trouble, you needed to work harder. There may have been individuals who used specific techniques to help them study, but I doubt they could have pointed out the scientific reasoning for