U.S. Elementary education - what parents need to be aware of

Thanks for the tag @PavithraS

1. Handwriting - no matter how much we teach them to hold the pen properly at home, as they start spending 6 hours in school not many retain the way they have been taught at home. If they did then you are lucky. I still have to emphasis my children to hold the pencil properly at home. But with use of Computers writing is coming down.

2. Lang/arts - only thing we can do is to read(help the child pick) different genre of books. more library visits and more participation in the local library will help a lot. Libraries will have lots of group activities, summer reading, book discussion and so on. It's the best resource we could use for free. When we go on a long road trips we pick audio books too and they love to listen to the audio books.

Writing(expository/narrative/descriptive/persuasive/informatory) - School does a very good job of teaching kids to write. It's enough to just follow what is taught in school.

3. Math - this can be enriched at home. I tried Kumon, Abacus math etc but didnt help much. hands-on math was the point of interest. @hrastro I believe teaches vedic maths and so she can give some pointers. There are lot of workbooks available and we can very well slowly teach them at home. but multiplication and division becomes confusing with our way and the way they learn at school (lattice method). So we need to be careful there.

4. Science - Again reading science books or doing more hands-on experiments will help them to learn well. Science curriculum is not strong until they come to middle/high school. Enrichment at home helps. There are many simple experiments that can be done at home through which science concepts can be explained. Also participating in school science fairs helps. Not many school offer science fair at elementary level and even if they do, it should be something that kid can do. It should not be a parent project which defeats the purpose of learning.

5. Arts - I usually find some summer programs where they can explore different arts like pot painting, glass painting, ceramic painting etc. It's no stress and whatever they do at school if they are interested can find online. For eg, my LO looks up youtube for Origami, knitting, rainbow loom etc.

6. Parent-Teacher conferences - We need to go prepared; know what our child is good at or struggling at and see how it can be improved. Usually we get only 10-15 minutes in the conference and constant interaction between teachers will help.

7. Standardized testing - This is more a test for the teacher than the student. Whatever they do in school is just enough. Based on the students performance, it's teacher's effective way of teaching, school performance at district level are all evaluated. So need to worry at elementary level. If the children do just fine in classroom tests/assessments that is good enough.

Any extra curricular activity can be explored 5 and above. sports, music/dance and if instrument above 7 yrs, whatever interests them. Kumon is too repetitive and may not suit every child.

Social skills is too important and making play-dates for less social kid will help. They should also be taught about bullying and should know to stand up when bullied. Usually school educates the children in these aspect but our regular interaction of how the day was with the kid will throw light if any issues are there.

Sorry for a long post and maybe many are aware of all that has been mentioned here.

 

@jskls,
Wow ! Great information .Thank you for responding quickly .:exactly::thankyou2:

Regards,
Pavithra.

@ramyav_cse , hope this helps...

 

@jskls, Great information .Thank you
@Rihana Thank you for starting this wonderful thread.

My DD is 3.5 and I will be watching this for more information. Like others we are also going through a lot of questioning and understanding phase. We live in an average school district (as per greatschools) so debating on private vs. public. So some of my questions -
1. If we decide on private school, would it be better to start from kindergarten or sometime during elementary level?
2. If we move and switch kid from private to public would the difference be too much for the kid to adjust, same question if we have to do it other way round
3. How important are the Magnet/Advanced programs at elementary level

 

Very nice thread..the biggest concern/issue I have is inconsistency between class rooms.
In most elementary schools there is just one primary teacher who handles all the subjects. How the class is designed is left to the discretion of the teacher with some guidelines and curriculum. Some autonomy is good and its nice to see the personality of the teacher reflected but at times this goes a bit too far and I have seen two kids at the same grade level receiving very diff quality of education just because of the way their teachers are ..this is something that needs to be addressed.

 

Vedic maths works for kids who already are familiar with factors, multiples and multiplication and division basics...
I have detailed some games and activities for maths basics for younger kids here in this thread

http://www.indusladies.com/forums/s...sian-school-of-mathematics-2.html#post3524641

 

Thanks @hrastro. Very useful info in Russian School of Mathematics link

 

Good thread @Rihana :thumbsup