Teaching kid to write Teaching, kid, write

fm9610

How do u encourage kid to write?  I read a lot of books with my 5 yrs old.  But, she only interest in story books.  She can read L3 books on her own but only from memory.  She is not willing to memorize the spelling.   When she writes, it is in random big cap and small cap.  Not in straight line at all.  Nowadays, she is not willing to write at all.  I ask her to draw, she only draw princess.  (There are too much princess in the daycare.)  Asking her to write Chinese is even more difficult.  She basically hate Chinese characters and is not willing to read the Chinese books at all.  It makes me very sad.  Anybody has idea how to raise a kid's interest in writing?

MyOMy

In my experience, daycare don't teach read or write. If you want her to start read or write or phonics, send her to a montessori. May be you need to send her to Chinese school (2 or 3 hours each week)  also, she may act differently in a class environment.

Retro

Writing in mixed lower and upper case is age appropriate for a 5 year old, I wouldn't be too worried at this point.

The best way to encourage young children to write and read, is to let them read and write whatever they want on their free time.  You can allot a small time frame in a day, for a 5 year old I'd say about 15 minutes max, where they write about the topic of your choice, and praise them for whatever they can come up with.  At this age you want to build up interest - so the priority is the act of reading and writing, and not so much on the content.  If your child likes princess, perhaps you can have her write about princesses.  There's absolutely nothing wrong with that for a 5 year old!  She will one day grow out of princesses, and have the skills to write about other things. Primary school teachers nowadays mostly teach on this philosophy.   There is a risk that if you push too hard on content that she has no interest in, she will not enjoy reading and writing in the future, regardless of the content.

As for spelling, have you tried playing spelling games? Write some vocab on little sheets of paper.  Play games like Memory, or do sorting with them.  (ie, games like sorting by sound, or sorting by first letter of the words, last letter of the words, etc) Just memorizing words unrelated to anything is boring, quite frankly!  Try to make everything as fun as possible, no kid likes to feel like they are doing homework.  

I understand every parent want their child to be academically successful, but remember, at this age, you are still building a good foundation on interest, not on content!  

That's my 2 cents, wish you all the success!

阿邊個邊個

oops, please delete this duplicated post. i clicked the button twice.

[ 本帖最後由 阿邊個邊個 於 2008-8-9 00:17 編輯 ]

阿邊個邊個

i agree with retro.

In canada, Children are not taught to write until they have entered grade 1. certain kindergartens have taught children to write, but only the alphabets and the arabic numbers. Let alone preschool-aged children, they dun even learn to write yet.
it sounds like u are eager to teach your child to write, but remember, at this stage, the children's fingers are not yet fully developed to grasp the pen firmly to write.

If you want your children to learn Chinese, u can expose some chinese children's literature with basic chinese words on it. The more exposure your child received, the more your child is willing to write Chinese. After your child have certain exposure, in your everyday lives (ie: grocery shopping), if u see your child is looking at a product, ask him or her what they think the word means, and reward them.

Ask questions, listen to what your child have to say.

hope that helps!!