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Term two is in full swing in the house of KATcapers. Oldest KAT is in year 7 and Middle KAT in Year 5 so that also means we have NAPLAN hanging over our heads.
Each time we've gone through this we get the blurb from the school reminding us that the children shouldn't feel stressed or anxious about NAPLAN.
Heeeeelllo! What parallel universe do these teachers live in! Oh and can I join them there!?
There's simply no getting away from this locomotive as it steams down the track towards them!! Regardless of Saint Mike and I keeping the focus off it at home, there is more than enough discussion about it amongst their peers and at school generally.
Oldest KAT is not anxious about it. She's more concerned with the assessments she's undergoing for subjects like Science, History and Design & Technology which is all new to her! She is going from strength to strength academically and reading, writing and arithmetic is like breathing to her.
Middle KAT on the other hand is a different kettle of fish. Year 5 is truly turning into an emotional year for her. She's had the usual surge of hormones (and feet growth) that signals her commencing her passage into young womanhood and this makes for an emotional time whenever any hurdle presents itself. Unfortunately, schoolwork is a hurdle that is not getting any easier.
Her ability to focus (or lack thereof) has always been a source of worry for us. ADHD is an acronym that we've toyed with over the years and even had her tested to see if there was anything that needed to be diagnosed. Our concern has never been about behaviour as she's not disruptive, it's more to do with the feeling that she can lack focus and be "off with the pixies" which affects her learning.
How funny then that just when we're preparing for these weeks of high tension in our house I received an email from Allison wanting to know if I'd be interested in sharing the following information from OnlinePsychologyDegree.net:
For better or worse we're past the point of implementing this advice for toddlers and babies but I think it's got real merit in terms of the way we are trying to raise our KATs to be resilient and equipped to be emotionally mature, independent young people ready to take on the world in whatever way, shape or form their hearts and minds tell them to!Saint Mike and I make a good team when it comes to adopting stretegies to help get the best out of our KATs. I'm really lucky that way! For example we decided that we really needed to curb the amount of TV viewing and general screen time that's been going on in our house. This chart talks about it for babies but it's soooo much harder when they can verbally complain about the no TV or games during the school week!!!
I'd love to know what you think of these pointers? Do you prescribe to this approach or are following a different one?
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My boys spend far too much time looking at screens but I've come to accept that they're indoor kids who rarely read books. If we'd reduced the TV and computer games and we'd insisted they stuck with piano lessons they'd probably both get higher ATARs, but we didn't, and they're happy, so that's that!
ReplyDeleteWhat a cool poster (and hello! I've sure missed dropping by!).
ReplyDeleteMax sits the year 3 Naps next week. We keep forgetting they are on and I hope we keep that up! I did have a mum at the school tell me today that my "attitude" will "drag the school's ranking down". Sheesh. I'm powerful, huh?!? (And she's just a little bit mental. Poor kids.) x
lucky for me the Naplan isnt a stress here at home, both are doing it Year 5 &9 -. We have to produce the grade 5 one for the highschool before admittance but more for classroom planning than entry to the school, and he isnt even aware of that element. i did find that poster interesting. We have had periods of way too much screen time, sometimes due to our lack of intervention- We have had to lift our game and our own penchant for tv viewing and set some more boundaries. Even when its nice and quiet otherwise. It was highlighted when my youngest was having to wait until screen time was allowed and used the words " how can i waste my time until i am allowed on electronics". We really had to work on changing his perspective on how all activities are valuable and not a waste while awaiting the one truly valued activity of electronics.( still a work in progress)
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