This is a collaborative post.
Whether you home-educate your child or simply help them with their learning alongside school you can use some of the same tricks that teachers use. Here I want to share with you five tricks teachers use that would benefit you too and you may not have considered.
Teaching resources
Are you aware that most teaching resources are actually available to everyone, not just teachers? The Creative Fabrica website, for example, has access to more than 10 thousand digital teaching resources and costs just $2.99 for the whole year.
This deal is available with their Teacher Club Card but you are able to buy this too and it allows you to download 5 digital downloads a week. With everything from maths workbooks to toddler busy books, there is something for all ages.
Teachers, or those keen on making teaching resources can also upload resources they have made so the content grows daily.
This is a great way of supporting your children’s learning and using all the same sorts of resources that teachers use!
Self-evaluation or self-assessment
Something a lot of teachers now use is self-evaluation or self-assessment. This is where the students mark their own work and evaluate what they have done well, could have done better, how they could improve next time etc. This can be seen as lazy but it is one of the tricks teachers use that you can do too!
This is a great method to adopt as a parent because it gives you less to do but also if they have struggled a bit with work they can be positive and still share the bits they enjoyed about it whilst also learning what they did wrong.
I absolutely love this method and can see why teachers use it so frequently. I mean after all, why would they mark 30 books if they didn’t have to?
Youtube
Explaining things can be really hard for teachers and even more so as a parent so YouTube really is a lifesaver when this is the case. There are videos for everything from the water cycle to simultaneous equations so whatever it is you are struggling to explain or even understand yourself there is sure to be a video explaining it for you.
Teachers often use this because it helps them to explain more effectively and some youngsters need to go back and rewatch it over and over again. This is a much easier method than explaining something three times while they slowly grasp the concept.
Encourage independent thinking
There is a huge benefit in giving students free time to think about something or work on something. They learn to help themselves and solve their own problems. By leaving them to their own devices sometimes to see if they can solve a problem before talking it through can be really beneficial and help them grow into well-rounded adults.
This is something as a parent you can do if they are struggling with following instructions and feeling like you are there all the time solving their problems. Simply give them a task, for example, what ingredients do we need to make a spaghetti bolognese and go into another room and leave them to write a list or get out ingredients. If you are always telling them what they need they think for themselves less.
Letter writing
If you have been working with them on a subject and want to ensure they fully understand it, sometimes letter writing is perfect. It is also a great way for them to practice writing in a fun way. This is one of the tricks teachers use that I think is also a great way of preparing them for adulthood.
You could write to the zoo to ask about an animal they have been learning about or perhaps to the council to ask why there are not more youth groups for children in the area. Whatever you are working on there is sure to be a way to build letter writing into that!
What will you do? Will you be getting the teaching resources subscription? Perhaps you have some stamps left over from Christmas card writing that you could put to good use or put your feet up while a video on YouTube helps them understand that tricky subject?
Are there any other tricks teachers use that you can recommend? Let me know what works for you in the comments below.
