A Parent’s Guide: What’s Important to Teach Your Child at Home and How to Do it.

The relation between parents and children is essentially based on teaching. Gilbert Highet

Before I dive in, go ahead and check out my NEW writing guide, full of tangible tips for supporting young writers at home. Download for free here: Supporting Children’s Writing: A Parent’s Guide to Creating Lifelong Writers.

Here’s what you need to know: Teachers matter, parents matter more.

“School” is often thought of as the work we do in a specific place in order to graduate so we can get a job so we can earn money. “Learning” is a broader way of looking at things. It is also more important, practical, meaningful, and realistic.

Learning means that you are engaging with the world around you to gain new skills and a deeper understanding. You are deepening your ability to make things happen for yourself and your people.

Kids can go to school, check all the boxes, and be done. They may not transfer these skills to LIFE. Luckily, if your child is in a good school, the focus is on learning and not on grades or testing. If your child is being raised in a home that values learning, they will be in great shape to transfer their skills to the "real world." They will be ready to use all the have learned to create a life they love.

As a parent, you are the natural tie between school and home. Between school and life.

I think it is our responsibility, as parents, to support and spearhead true learning.

I wrote a whole post on how to be an advocate for your child's learning and you can check that out here. What I want to focus on here is the practical and tangible strategies you can put in place at home to guide learning. Using these ideas, you'll be able to deepen your child's skills out of the classroom.

Some general things to note before jumping into some specific strategies:

Children have an innate curiosity and desire to learn. Young learners, especially, are like sponges. Our interactions can encourage this or diminish this special quality.

Weave learning into daily activities. Model your own learning, curiosity, and mistakes. Talk about mistakes out loud and model your thinking processes. Initiate your own learning for fun (and include them). Encourage their questions and curiosity and capitalize on them to enrich learning.

Plan the home environment to support learning and independence.

I’m going to break down some of my favorite tips by subject. Please know that this guide is NOT comprehensive, and really just scratches the surface of what you can (not have to) do at home to encourage your learner.

Reading

Reading starts with your ears!

Before a child is ever ready to start reading words, they need to be comfortable with reading with their eyes closed!

Yes! Really. Eyes closed.Our brains ARE wired to discriminate and understand sounds.

Our brains are NOT wired to read and comprehend symbols or words. We rewire and train our brains to translate letters and words into the sounds that our brain IS wired to understand.

Your child has been listening to the sound of your voice since the day they were born. By narrating your days and talking to them, they are exposed to SO much language, and it’s so important to do that!

Read and talk to them starting in these early days.

Set early foundations by including lots of sound play into your day. Talking, singing, nursery rhymes and finger-plays all encourage language development and comprehension.

Play sound games such as listening for the first sounds in words, clapping the “beats” or syllables in words, and listening for rhymes. These are easy things to do while reading books, driving in the car, or walking in the park! Turn it into a playful game.

Have lots of conversations, practice sequencing events, and ask your child’s opinion on things.

Reading aloud & book access

Read aloud, and read aloud often - even after your child is reading independently. Listening to a fluent reader is so beneficial, and so is the natural bond and connection that happens during reading time.

Check your expectations during read aloud - kids listen when fiddling or fidgeting, they ask lots of questions, they talk. All normal!

Have lots of easy access to books and print. Keep books and baskets of books all over the home. Visit the library, create a book budget, listen to audio books, look for words while you are out and about, and let your child see YOU read.

Getting ready for reading and beyond

Teach letters and letter sounds together! My preference is also to teach upper and lowercase letters together. The sound, truthfully, is most important. But they also need to know the letter.

Consider the order you teach letters - ABC order is not the easiest for many reasons. Start with the letters of their name, and letters that make the sound in their name (for example, the letter d says its sound in its name).

Teach the letter sound relationship, and begin to blend sounds together into words (b…a…t…bat!)

Model reading with fluency, and encourage rereading to “smooth out” phrases and sentences. Pay attention to punctuation and inflection. Ask, “how might the character say that?”

Don’t forget vocabulary. Weave in vocabulary instruction by simply explaining what a word means as you read a page. Use a wide variety of words in your daily life to enrich your child's vocabulary and contextual understanding of the world. Vocabulary and comprehension are HUGE. Reading goes far beyond the ability to read the words on the page.

Don’t: Wait for learning to just “happen” or count on 7 being a magical age when a child learns to read. That’s not always the case. Remember- our brains are not wired to read. We need to do that rewiring in the form of instruction. Waiting can be dangerous - especially if your child has dyslexia or another learning challenge.

Lots of parents are unsure of what to do when a child gets stuck on a world. Instead of just telling them, show them how to decode the word (briefly). If they make an error, instead of telling the word, I like to simply say, “check that” and point under the word. If they continue to misread the word, I pay point them to where the error is: “hmm, what is that last sound? Read it again.”

This early learning can happen during short, intentional, playful pockets of your day!

Writing

I’ve probably said this before, but I LOVE teaching writing to little ones. It is so imperfectly messy, funny, and paints such a picture of a learner’s growth and development.

When encouraging your little learner’s writing at home, my biggest tips are to keep it informal, fun, and engaging.

Incorporate authentic writing opportunities.

Looking for more support with children’s writing? Check out my NEW writing guide, full of tangible tips for supporting young writers at home. Download for free here: Supporting Children’s Writing: A Parent’s Guide to Creating Lifelong Writers.

Making writing practice authentic and fun is especially important for reluctant writers. Some ideas include:

• Journals

• To-do lists

• Shopping lists (while you make your grocery list, let your child make their own next to you! They can write or draw).

• Letters to friends

• Art for loved ones

• Stories

• Fun facts about topics they are interested in

• Free writing without rules

Pre-Writing Tips for the Early Years:

Please do not focus on handwriting and writing letters before your child has developed hand and finger strength. There are so many fun and easy ways to support these fine motor s kills.

Develop fine motor skills with play-doh, tweezers, crafts, coloring, building, playing with small objects like buttons (use your judgement in terms of age and safety), snaps, buttons, buckles, beading, pipe cleaners, and so much more.

Drawing: Work on strokes, lines, coloring. When they can grasp crayons and pencils, let them scribble away. Eventually they will show interest in creating lines and shapes. Encourage them to create strokes moving from top-down and left-right movement. This sets the stage for correct letter formation later (always pull from top down!).

Preschool & Kindergarten Age

As your child starts writing letters, continue to encourage proper formation. Reinforce pulling letters down from the top, and moving left to right. Little ones can start with writing their name.

As your child becomes proficient with letter sounds AND letter formation, they can label their pictures with the first sound they hear in a word.

Do not focus on spelling. Focus on creating representational drawings (a picture that represents something). Teach them how to use shapes to draw (oval for a body, circle for head, smaller circles for eyes, etc). When modeling, don’t be perfect. Make mistakes. You don’t want them to feel intimidated by your “grown-up” work.

Then label with those first sounds. Avoid spelling words for your child or making them feel like spelling has to be correct. They might get nervous about spelling incorrectly, which creates reluctant writers. We want to encourage children to have confidence in their own ability to hear sounds in words.

As kindergarten continues, they will add more and more sounds to the words. Again, don’t focus on correct spelling. As phonemic awareness and phonics skills develop, spelling will get stronger and stronger. English is hard, but learnable over time.

• A prompt you can use is: “check that” or “put your finger under that word. Reread it. Do you have all the sounds you hear?”

• Spelling with your child is like a volleyball game! They ask you how to spell, and you say, “Let’s stretch it. What sounds do you hear?”

• Rereading writing is extremely important and powerful. I encourage learners to put their finger under words as they reread.

Your child may show interest in writing more stories or books all about their favorite topics. I like to put out paper and let kids staple “booklets” together. Display these where you keep your books like you would for a real author!

When your child is getting ready to write a story, have them plan it out on their fingers (first, next, then, after that, finally). Talk about the character, setting, problem, obstacles, and solution. Doing these things avoids stories that sound like lists (First I woke up, then I had breakfast, then we went to soccer, then we ate dinner. The End.)

Reading and writing are interwoven. Reading benefits writing skills, writing benefits reading skills. Read a lot as a reader, and read like a writer, too. Notice special qualities of books or writing. When does an author use bold words, and could you try that, too?

Math - See and Talk Numbers

Math in the Early Years

The easiest way to practice math in the early years is to weave math into your daily conversations. The more you try to notice math around you, the more it will come naturally to your conversations.

Here are a few basic prompts:

• How many? Now how many?

• What would happen if I (add 2 more, take 2 away, double the amount?)

• Notice and estimate numbers (hmm how many brownies do you think are in this tray? What could we do to figure it out?)

• What patterns do you see? Can we make a pattern with this?

Connect math thinking with their interests (animals, hockey, nature, cereal, etc)

We often think of math as the four basic operations (addition, subtraction, division, and multiplication). There are so many other math skills, too.

• Graphing - can you graph the number of sunny days in a week?

• Measurement and size - help your child measure ingredients for muffins, or use a stick to practice measuring in units (my sister is as tall as 4 of these sticks!)

• Shapes - find shapes in the environment, build shapes with magnatiles or blocks

• Directional/Spatial awareness - The cereal is ON the shelf, your shirt is NEXT to your sneakers. Can you climb UNDER the monkey bars?

• Time - discuss seasons, time of day, have a calendar at eye level, and use timers to increase time awareness

• Problem-solving - ask, “how could we solve this problem?”

• Money - practice identifying and adding coins

Counting is usually what we start to gravitate to in the later toddler-early preschool days.

Remember that counting extends beyond saying the numbers in order (“number word sequencing”). Counting also includes 1:1 correspondence, or the idea that each number in a group can be counted only once. I have my kiddos “touch and count” by touching each item as they count. Arranging in a line is helpful, and if they are counting pictures I encourage them to cross an item out as they count. Finally, counting includes the understanding of the quantity of a number (5 means there are 5 of this thing).

Math Later On, and Always

Avoid saying “I’m bad at math” or “I’m not a math person.” This goes for any subject. An alternative could be “Oh this skill is hard for me, too. Let’s practice.”

Be open to “new math.” There is a reason for the madness. The goal of “new math,” to put in simply is to increase number sense and flexibility rather than memorization and worksheets. I found math to be a lot more fun once I learned “new math” in my teacher prep program.

Playful math is for big kids, too! Include your children in grocery shopping, and encourage them to save their money for something special. They can do the math to figure out how much more they need to save, or count their money once they think they have enough!

Play lots of board games! These are great for strategic thinking, mathematical operations, and more. Have you ever been the banker in Monopoly? Whew.

Ask, “how did you get that” or “can you show me how to do that?” The ability to explain mathematical thinking is paramount.

Finally, use math vocabulary like “sum” and “product.” This will help your child more accurately and precisely describe their mathematical thinking.

Learning outside the "3 R's"

As a teacher, you know I love reading, writing, and math. However, I firmly believe in teaching the whole child. We need to equip children with academic skills AND life skills. We want them to fall in love with learning and be prepared to all the tricky situations life deals us. Here are some other important facets of childhood development and learning

• Outside, physical activity

• Art and creative outlets

• Cores and responsibility

• Listening

• Mindfulness

• Social Emotional Learning

• So much more!

Tactical Tips

What are your goals? prioritize and be realistic.

It is helpful to think about what your child is capable of NOW, what they are expected to be able to do during this time of their development, and what the appropriate next step is. Maybe they are “expected” to be reading simple sentences, but they don’t know all the sounds yet. Don’t stress about reading yet. Let’s focus on sounds, and then blending those sounds together. Baby steps! Track your child’s progress in learning various skills.

Do not recreate school

Instruction at home is way more efficient (because it’s 1:1) and SHOULD be more playful. Whether you are homeschooling or not, your own teaching should not take nearly as much time. 5 purposeful minutes a day are so impactful (along with reading, of course).

Remember that children learn from their environment

Experiences teach, both positive and negative. Remember that children learn best when they are feeling safe, respected, comfortable, and validated. Be a good listener without imposing judgment.

Expose children to a variety of experiences, and use children’s interests to choose and develop experiences

Use a variety of mediums to expose children to new experiences and vocabulary (ie. trip to the zoo, books about the zoo, animal figurines, building a zoo for animals with magnatiles, animal themed sensory bin, etc).

Get outside, include LOTS of free play and exploration, do art - both crafts AND free process “whatever goes” art.

Leave lots of time for both unstructured and structured play.

Be resourceful

Learning doesn’t have to be expensive or time consuming

If you are not sure about something, find a tutor, expert, friend, or youtube video that does. Hire an expert if necessary. If something doesn’t feel right, and you suspect something might be wrong, reach out to a teacher, doctor, or another helpful specialist. Be an advocate.

Give specific feedback

When teaching something new, give clear and explicit, and give feedback for continued growth. Do, however, be mindful about your feedback. Give lots of positive reinforcement and specific praise, and give 1 small quick tip for improvement. Avoid bogging your child down with criticism.

Example: “Wow! You read so many new words on this page! Let’s read the page again smooth out our voices like this ....”

Remember that new skills often require lots of repeated practice.

Education is not solely about earning a great living. It means living a great life. - Brad Henry, American lawyer and politician

When we break away from thinking about learning as synonymous with school, we are able to give our children so many more opportunities. We can work to opening their eyes towards a life-long pursuit of knowledge, and maintain their inclination for curiosity.

By being a partner in their learning journey, they know that learning matters to us. Not A+s or great test scores, but real, actual, learning. And it will matter to them, too. Even if they don’t show it now.

Go ahead and check out my NEW writing guide, full of tangible tips for supporting young writers at home.

Download for free here: Supporting Children’s Writing: A Parent’s Guide to Creating Lifelong Writers.

This guide will help you set your child up for success as a writer from the early days and beyond.