All About Preparing For Primary One

[fann]

HiHi,


Can any one share with how to help a child to get use to no afternoon nap when he starts his P1 next year?

Currently, my child is used to 2 hrs nap at his childcare. Comes to weekend, he will can sleep for 3 to 4 hrs in the afternoon.

Worried that he will fall in asleep when he starts P1 next year plus intend to put him in student care.

Thanks for your advise.

Cheers.

[janet88]

buds,

First kids are ‘guinea pigs’ bcos a lot of trial and error used. With subsequent kids, we apply our prev experiences - the things to do and what not to do. My son is not intelligent but willing to do more practices when asked to (with complaints sometimes).

With my son, hubby & I didn’t know about RC thing. We coached him ourselves but he had group tuition for Chinese. P1 preparatory for Eng and Math is $30 each. 1 hour for each subject. The Malay lady conducts the classes from K1 to P2. We are thinking of letting her continue for P1 to give her a headstart. But we will still be coaching her.

[buds]

janet_lee88:

buds,

First kids are 'guinea pigs' bcos a lot of trial and error used.

Yes! Yes! :lol: Hehee.. cute how you say it!

janet_lee88:

With subsequent kids, we apply our prev experiences - the things to do and what not to do. My son is not intelligent but willing to do more practices when asked to (with complaints sometimes).

Same same here dear..

My DD1 oso.. but i sure appreciate her extra effort since she really does
need it. Not intelligent is fine cos all children born different. :hugs: So,
no choice but to make up for it with more practice. As long effort is
there, i don't mind more work for myself oso.

janet_lee88:

With my son, hubby & I didn't know about RC thing. We coached him ourselves but he had group tuition for Chinese. P1 preparatory for Eng and Math is $30 each. 1 hour for each subject. The Malay lady conducts the classes from K1 to P2. We are thinking of letting her continue for P1 to give her a headstart. But we will still be coaching her.

Good and value for money. :celebrate:
Happy to know your daughter is doing well. :hugs:

[janet88]

Hi buds,

With my son, he needs more time to learn and absorb comparing him at 6 and my daughter now. She is more willing to think harder and grasp concepts faster rather than giving up. My son will give up if he is required to think harder. A lot of differences bet the 2 kids.

With my boy, I've spent quite a bit of time preparing his Science notes as well as practices in assessment books. It's worth the time marking and explaining his mistakes bcos we know what his weaknesses are.

For daughter's RC homework, she has Eng and Math every week. She has spelling too, as such she should be comfortable with it when her school teacher starts spelling in Term 3. Last term was terrible bcos I was busy with son's SA1 and neglected her. I foresee another tough term in Oct when son has SA2. Jelak, next year x2.

[Jav]

Hi Janet,


Which RC you signed up your kids for the preparatory class?

[Pen88n]

hquek:

buds:

Hi Pen88n, i have not been to Bras Basah before.. it's far lah. :oops:
Is it worth the travel down to get books there? Any particular store u
patronize more often than others? Thanks for sharing this lobang.

I've been there also, and I think depends on luck. I go to the bookshop on the 2nd floor (first shop facing the wee escalator) - not very inspiring really when you see the clutter etc. But so far I have managed to score good chinese books for $1 a piece!!! Some of those are readers (akin to the odinata series, not many), and recently a 'set' of hardcover ones (yes, also $1 a book!) that are quite fun to read. These are for the younger readers (big words, repetitive words, colourful pictures). Supply really depends on who's just offloaded her stash there.

Still have yet to trawl through the other stores. Typically after I'm done here, DH will be tsk-tsk-ing all the way and lamenting why I need to buy MORE books (yup, he'll complain even if it's $1 a book, sigh).

Textbooks I saw was from one bookstore at the ground level, just across the road from National Library. There is also 2nd hand bookstore at 2nd and 3rd levels.

I visit the place now and then, and sometimes I get some pretty good bargains from there - story books are mostly $1 each and sometimes when there are sets of readers, quite worthwhile. I just went there yesterday and got >10 books of My Secret Unicorn at $1@. Pretty new and good condition. :lol: Another time got a set of >6 books of Rainbow Magic at that price too. Like hquek says, depend on luck - does not mean you get these every time, but makes me happy whenever I get a nice set! :lol:

I'm very particular and will only choose the newer and good condition books as I've already had many books at home - doesn't make a difference with 1 more or 1 less, but love to get new and nice set :love:

[janet88]

Jav:

Hi Janet,


Which RC you signed up your kids for the preparatory class?

Toh Yi RC. Block 4.

[janet88]

fann:

HiHi,


Can any one share with how to help a child to get use to no afternoon nap when he starts his P1 next year?

Currently, my child is used to 2 hrs nap at his childcare. Comes to weekend, he will can sleep for 3 to 4 hrs in the afternoon.

Worried that he will fall in asleep when he starts P1 next year plus intend to put him in student care.

Thanks for your advise.

Cheers.

Sleep earlier (lights out at 930pm) and maybe let him sleep a little later on weekends (8am). In the afternoon, let him sleep at most 1 to 1.5 hours or else he is too energized to sleep early. I guess most kids will have problems staying awake in P1. My son told me his classmates slept in class after recess. Should be able to adjust slowly as time goes by.

[buds]

My girls have to sleep later or else they'll wake up too early in the

morning. This routine gives them more play time in the morning
only to exhaust them by mid afternoon... somewhere after lunch...

As they gotta avoid afternoon naps of any kind and also lethargy by
afternoon & since i sleep only wee hours of the morning sometimes
only around 5am (i turn in)... i do stuff with my girls in the later part
of the evening/night. Need to avoid tiring outdoor play in the afternn.
Too much active play in the afternoon say, playground time or bike
riding and swimming will make them doze off after dinner. They will
be awake by 7am the following day. So, not too good.

They get to sleep around 11pm weekdays. Weekends like today, mid-
night. :lol: We ended our family game of Monopoly with the girls while
watching World Cup match and they immediately went to bed after the
Monopoly game was over before 12am.

So far with this routine for me, the girls wake up around 10am to 10:30am.
Plus minus an hour like that on certain days. In the night they can watch
some tv and we will also look through some books. At times we play or
work with materials... i have a lot of materials. They won't need aft
nap since they woke up much later in the morning.

On school days, they do their homework after shower and dinner which
can be btwn 8:00pm to 8:30pm... followed by Channel 8 Chinese drama
serial, some play time, followed by reading time and sleep time. All bags
are packed for the next day prior to sleep time. Swapping their kindy
hours to the last session also helps. Our last kindy session ended at 5pm.
Transport took abt half an hour. One full year in afternoon kindy, plus
slightly delayed sleeping time helped a lot to see the girls through afternn
session pretty well.

My girls never complained being tired in school. In my case though, it
helps that i am a stay home parent so i can work their routine anyhow i
deem fit. For FTW parents may be a bit of a challenge, cos early sleep
time is required for the daily productive days. Cannot afford to sleep
on the job, especially after lunch hour lidat. Tummy full, eyes will start to
droop and can yawn until eyes water wan! I know... i've been there.. :lol:

[buds]

janet_lee88:

Hi buds,

With my son, he needs more time to learn and absorb comparing him at 6 and my daughter now. She is more willing to think harder and grasp concepts faster rather than giving up. My son will give up if he is required to think harder. A lot of differences bet the 2 kids.

With my boy, I've spent quite a bit of time preparing his Science notes as well as practices in assessment books. It's worth the time marking and explaining his mistakes bcos we know what his weaknesses are.

Both our #1s seem to have same pattern, janet_lee88. :lol:
Science notes are done this way for me so that i will not be the one
preparing it. We read a topic together... going over the facts a few
times. After which i give her lined study cards and get her to write
down all the notes concisely in point forms going by category.

Each category will be written in different colour lined cards. The cards
will be used again for exam revision purposes. It works better for me
when SHE does the writing of notes instead of me... so she remembers
them better since she has to do them a few times before she gets them
correct. I believe what goes through the hands goes to the mind. Casual
reading for revision doesn't work for my #1 cos she cannot absorb. So,
i get her to write. She used to complain tired fingers la.. why must write
so many times la.. but when she realised those practice activity enabled
her to indirectly recall facts better than just reading through the books...
these days she offers to write while i check the books if what she wrote
were right.

We run through the application part of what we have learnt through
assessment bks and also short tests. I bought the Enrichment Science
stack that has topic by topic mini test to gauge their understanding and
it has worked pretty good. Same publisher as the sch science books...

We go out to the park and during hols we visit either the zoo, bird park,
botanical gardens (etc) as part of our own family learning journey. We
will go on a hunt for stuff we have learnt in the books and indicate them
in our lists. I also have picture cards and science games for her.

janet_lee88:

For daughter's RC homework, she has Eng and Math every week. She has spelling too, as such she should be comfortable with it when her school teacher starts spelling in Term 3. Last term was terrible bcos I was busy with son's SA1 and neglected her. I foresee another tough term in Oct when son has SA2. Jelak, next year x2.

My girls had spelling since 3rd week of school in P1 unlike your children's
school in Term 3. In fact, not just spelling but also dictation and written
expression. Spelling and dictation are taken from their Stellar books
done in school and the teacher hands out the spelling list on the 1st week
of school for the whole term for the P1. The P3's spelling & dictation from
their textbook.

As both of them are currently in different sessions, it is a blessing that i
get to spend quality individual time with each to prepare for P3s SA1 &
P1's formative assessments. Both did well especially the P1. My #1 P3
did ok too considering the fact that the papers were set according to P4
standard. :shock: The sch is up-ping the difficulty to prepare them much
earlier and also no more pity marks during marking to prepare for strict
PSLE styled marking! :faint: We're expecting the SA2 to be even more
challenging, so gotta really make first semester revision really concrete
before going into coming 2nd semester.