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In light of the pandemic, schools have shifted their lessons to home-based learning for a period of time. After the resumption of face-to-face classes, some classes remain hybrid, where lessons are delivered both in-person and online. If anything, home-based learning has disrupted our education system and is here to stay. How can a JC student get used to this new normal without compromising their learning?

Find a Conducive Environment

At the heart of learning is a good study environment – one must find a quiet place where they can fully concentrate on the lesson. This means moving yourself away from all possible distractions, including other people if necessary. Lounging on your bed in pyjamas while attending an online lecture might sound tempting, but is also the perfect set-up for complacency and tardiness. Remind yourself that each online class you attend is meant to be like a face-to-face lesson, so discipline is paramount even if your teachers and classmates cannot see you. Treat each class as if it is a normal school day, participating wherever possible to involve yourself in the lesson.

It is also important to ensure that your online lesson can carry on without any interruptions. This includes having a stable internet connection, as well as quality audio and video. You probably would not get the full benefit of a face-to-face class while sitting too far back to see the board, nor would you enjoy the lesson if you are unable to hear the teacher consistently. The same goes for an online learning environment – make sure that your study space is set up so that you can make the most of your home-based learning. If your class requires student participation, it is a good idea to set yourself up with a decent microphone and webcam beforehand and test them before the lesson to avoid any technical difficulties. That JC Maths class can feel so much more enjoyable if you are not straining to understand the teacher or make yourself heard every few minutes.

Make Use of Recorded Lessons

One of the greatest boons of online lessons is that they can be recorded and watched at your own pace. Some teachers record their lessons and upload them for students to re-watch – if you have this luxury, great! If not, you could always try asking your teacher if they mind you recording the lecture. Your teachers may drop important tidbits of information throughout a lecture that you would be hard-pressed to miss. In any case, there is no harm rewinding through a lecture recording to reinforce the concepts taught, which can be extremely beneficial when studying for your exams.

Recorded lessons are also available anytime. Home-based learning should make it possible for students to attend the majority of their classes, but even if you are unwell or unable to attend a class, be sure to watch the lesson recording if there is one, or ask a classmate to help you record it. There should be no reason to skip out on any lessons, especially for content-heavy subjects such as JC Economics. If need be, make full use of recorded lectures to revisit the lesson and refresh your memory.

Identify Your Goals for Each Day

Without a physical class, some teachers may grant their students some autonomy over the topics they plan to study each day. It can also be more difficult for some students to keep track of their progress when they are left to their own devices. Developing a study plan each day is key to staying on top of the competition.

To get started on your day’s goals, look at the lesson outlines for all your upcoming classes. It is even better if you do this a few days or even a week in advance, giving yourself ample time to plan the days ahead. Read up on the topics that will be covered in your upcoming lessons and try to understand them by yourself, so that you do not go to class blindly. If you come across any concept you are unsure about, jot it down first. It can be much easier to follow the lesson and understand the concepts covered if you already have an idea of them beforehand. Pay close attention to the parts you were unsure about and use the opportunity to clarify your doubts with your teacher.

We all have 24 hours in a day, but are we putting them to full use?

Although we may start the day with ambitious visions of what we could achieve, many of us are no stranger to ending the day with only a fraction of our goals completed. It is all too easy to get distracted along the way and lose track of time. It is even more crucial when your child is studying for their PSLE examinations to stay on task. The lengthy syllabus of Primary Science or Primary Maths requires a great deal of time and dedication if your child is to internalise every concept and prepare for the exams, especially within the tight timeframe they are afforded.

This may raise a pressing issue: if your child is prone to procrastination, what can you do to keep them productive? Well, here are some of our suggestions.

Remove All Distractions

Your child may enjoy studying in the comforts of their room, but are they studying efficiently? Some of the biggest culprits behind frequent procrastination could be that TV or video game in the corner. It is important to set some ground rules for studying hours, such as disallowing phones at the table. Find a quiet spot where your child can revise without distractions or interruptions. If the home environment is noisy, moving to a more conducive spot or location such as the library may be a good idea. Some students also like to stay back in school after their lessons to revise. It all depends on the ideal environment for your child to concentrate without turning their attention to other things.

Settle on a Schedule

Discipline is a key factor in avoiding procrastination. A student without a schedule is like a ship without a captain – planning each day’s revision topics beforehand is crucial in giving your child a clear direction to follow. Apart from preventing them from wasting more time on figuring out what to do next, a well-planned outline also helps your child visualise how much they need to get done for the day, enabling them to pace themselves accordingly. You can plan a schedule together with your child and decide what to focus on each day. For instance, perhaps you want to reserve Mondays and Wednesdays to revise Primary Maths, especially if it is your child’s weakest subject. Start with that and sketch up a plan detailing which topics should be revised on each day. Any plan is a great start – it is alright to change the plan later on if you or your child feels the need to.

Set Small, Realistic Milestones

Many people like to aim big, but in doing so, they are also setting themselves up for procrastination. It is usually much easier to focus on a job and get it done when you have the end in sight, rather than looking at a large pile of work to be done and feeling the inertia kick in.

If you are already setting goals for your child but they are having trouble accomplishing these milestones, it may be time to re-evaluate your plans. Perhaps you might need to set the bar a little lower so that it is in better reach for your child. For instance, if your child is struggling with finishing an entire test paper in one sitting, try breaking it into more manageable sections for a start. Have your child attempt Section A first and come back to the other sections later. As they get more comfortable with the questions, you can gradually add on the rest of the paper until they are able to complete everything without wearing out. At the end of the day, nothing beats the sense of accomplishment that you have knocked everything off the day’s to-do list.

Take Well-Deserved Breaks

Everyone has a limit, and it is important not to push your child too hard. It may seem counterintuitive to speed up revision progress by encouraging breaks, but a respite is sometimes necessary. Allow your child to take a breather if they have been going at a good pace. The prospect of a timely break can also help to spur a person on to complete their tasks more efficiently.

Revise With Your Child

It can be difficult to stay focused on one’s own. Tackling the revision together with your child can help them to keep on track. Not only will you be able to guide your child along the way, but it will also mean the world to them for their parents to take interest in and work together with them on their goals. You do not have to be an expert in a subject to tutor your child in it, the experience can even be better when you learn together.

Are your children bored out of their minds at home? With schools and education centres shifting to home-based learning, you may find yourself having to take on an additional role of teacher for your child. Unfortunately, there are far fewer textbooks and guides for teaching preschool-level children and younger. If you have little to no experience in coaching your child, it may seem to be a daunting task. You may be wondering: how do I know what kind of content to teach my child? How can I scale it to a level that is easy for them to understand? Can I make it entertaining enough to capture their attention? Add these challenges on to a regular work schedule, and the problem intensifies.

If this sounds like you, we have some good news. We know just the topic you can use to teach your kids that will keep them occupied for hours on end. They will be able to pick up valuable problem-solving and critical thinking skills, while exercising their imagination and creativity. What’s best, this fun activity can provide them with valuable skills relevant to the times that might just secure them a job in the future? This activity is none other than coding.

Why Coding?

This gem has only surfaced in recent years as an enrichment class for kids, but has made its mark on numerous children of all ages, from pre-schoolers to teenagers. No kid is too young to learn coding – if they can read and write, they can learn coding too!

Coding is a unique enrichment subject in that it trains both the left and right brain at once. While kids learn about logic and processing when coding, they are also able to build applications out of their own imagination. There is no single correct answer in coding, which enables children to think out of the box and apply their own understanding to solve the problem.

Additionally, having a coding background gives one a valuable advantage when they enter the job market in the future. In today’s digital world, coding is a highly prized skill. You don’t have to have formal qualifications in coding to prove your worth in the field. In fact, many professional coders are self-taught, and it is completely possible to provide your children with such an opportunity in the comfort of your home.

Teaching your children to code is usually much less difficult than most parents expect. Contrary to popular belief, you do not have to be an experienced programmer to guide your children in their coding journey.

Read Up on the Basics

If you plan to personally teach your children, it never hurts to get some basic knowledge on coding, especially if this is your first time touching programming. One easy way to pick up coding is to read up on beginner guides, many of which are available both online and in programming books at any library. If you prefer video tutorials, there are plenty of them on the web. You’ll also have to decide on what programming language you plan to teach your kids. For a complete newbie to coding, we recommend going with Python or JavaScript, both of which are easy to pick up and highly transferrable.

Start Small

Nobody expects a complete programming novice to come up with a full-fledged application on the spot, so don’t sweat it. You can begin by giving your child a simple task to code, such as a “hello world” message. Start with the basics to test the waters. We find that most children struggle most with getting started on coding, because they probably do not even know what it is all about. Once your child is comfortable enough finding their way around a text editor, you can then progress on to introducing more coding techniques and problems and perhaps enrol them in a coding class for kids.

Use Analogies

Is your child having a difficult time wrapping their head around a particular concept? You may have to break the concept down into bite-sized tidbits of information for them to have an easier time digesting. One great way to do this is to use analogies and examples. If you need a list of popular analogies for different coding concepts, there are plenty of online resources to help with that.

Consider an Online Coding Class for Kids

Perhaps you’ve decided that coding is not really your thing, or maybe you just don’t have the time to devote to preparing coding lessons for your child. Don’t worry, as there are still plenty of ways your child can learn coding! For older kids such as teenagers, signing them up for an online coding class for teens can be a viable idea. It not only keeps them busy, but also encourages them to be independent and study on their own!

Many people associate tuition classes with primary or secondary school. Even at those levels, tuition classes are often considered to be either a luxury service or for those who are really falling behind. However, is tuition still relevant in JC? What can tuition help JC students with? Are tuition classes actually beneficial or just an added commodity for the kiasu?

There are no clear answers to these question as the need for JC tuition depends on each individual. To help you out, we have listed down some reasons why you may want to consider tuition for JC.

The JC Curriculum is Tight

The JC syllabus like JC chemistry is crafted to span three years, but for most JC students, it is crammed into a period of less than two years. This is on top of CCA and external commitments that can really take up a student’s time. Most JC students can attest to the fact that they barely have enough time to complete their homework, much less revise their work. In JC, students must quickly get used to their new packed schedules and sort out time management to survive.

Students are also required to take more in-depth subjects than in primary or secondary school. Often, these subjects require a full understanding and application of the subject matter, which means that studying is of even more importance since one cannot simply memorise the model answers without absorbing the content. Multiply the time required to study each subject by the number of subjects each student is expected to take, and one tends to wonder how a student can squeeze out enough time for everything.

The JC Environment is Competitive

It is not uncommon to start a fresh year in JC and notice that a number of your classmates already know topics that have yet to be covered. Since students realise that they will likely be hard-pressed for time in JC, they may take it upon themselves to obtain studying material and revise in advance, especially for content-heavy subjects such as JC economics and JC chemistry.

One option to keep pace with those peers would be to follow suit and make use of your holidays to study as well. However, what if you have other commitments during the holidays? What if you have also been revising but find it difficult to understand the content on your own? In such a case, you may want to consider going for JC tuition. Some tuition classes are held during the term breaks or before the academic year begins, so you can get a head start on your schoolwork.

The JC Style May Not Cater to Different Individuals

In JC economics for example, lessons typically consist of lectures and tutorials, which are often held in large groups. It can be difficult to get one-to-one time with a teacher, especially if you find yourself lagging behind the rest. Certain topics may be tougher for some people to grasp, but the school curriculum cannot wait for a minority. While classes are conducted to guide students, students are mostly expected to be independent and self-study to brush up on their understanding. As such, the JC teaching style and pace may not be suitable for everyone.

If you find JC lessons less than ideal for you, it may be time to look for a class that better suits your learning style and helps you pick up the subjects with more ease. JC students who attend tuition often find that they have ample time and opportunities to clarify their doubts with their tutors. They can also get tips and tricks that may not be taught to them in school. If you find yourself in such a situation, signing up for JC tuition may be the key to enjoying an easier time in school.

To sum it up, whether one needs tuition in JC is a highly subjective matter. Plenty of JC students have done well without needing any help from tuition, while others swear by supplementary sessions to help them catch up on schoolwork. That being said, having a good tutor can be invaluable in helping to pull up your grades for a particularly subject.

A good number of primary school students are seeking help from tuition teachers for their studies. These days, it would be uncommon for top students not to have a helping hand in order to keep up with the increasing difficulty of the primary school syllabus. For instance, the PSLE standard for Primary Maths is getting tougher each year, with even teachers scratching their heads over some of the problems. You may be wondering if it is time to get in touch with a tuition teacher for your child. Well, here are some observations that may mean that your child requires tuition.

Your Child is Having Difficulties with Homework

Teachers often assign homework to help students practise what they have learned in class. If a student has been keeping up with their classes without problems, they should also be able to complete their homework most of the time without requiring help. However, if your child frequently asks for homework help or does not know how to do most of the questions, this is usually a sign that they are having difficulties keeping up to speed with the topics that are being taught in class. Since primary school class sizes typically range from 30 to 40 students, teachers usually cannot afford to slow down for a select few.

Your Child is Scoring Poorly in Tests

Tuition classes ideally start in conjunction with the beginning of the school year, as students will have more hours of practice and the tuition teacher can clear up any doubts before moving on to the next topic. Unfortunately, some students only realise too late that they have difficulties with their schoolwork, such as when they receive a poor grade on a test. Even if it may be disheartening, getting a low score is not the end of the world. Your child may have missed out on the added benefit of attending tuition classes for the first part of the year, but it is never too late to seek help for their studies. A good tuition teacher will be able to work with your child to iron out any pitfalls and misconceptions. Addressing outstanding problem is a huge step towards achieving a better score.

Your Child Runs Out of Time during Exams

While exam papers can be gruelling, they are crafted to be completed within the stipulated time frame, if assuming students are familiar enough with the question types and answering techniques. If your child is frequently running out of time to finish their exam paper, this may be an indicator that they lack familiarity with some of the concepts or techniques. One can practise with any amount of assessment books and papers, but sometimes, it takes a good tuition teacher to suggest easy techniques that students can use to answer their test questions more efficiently. The more your child practices with the new methods they are taught, the more familiar they will be with common question types likely to come out in the exams, and the faster they will be able to answer each question. Once your child has mastered the art of working through test papers, they will be surprised how easy it is to finish everything within the time limit – with extra time for checking!

Your Child is a Precocious Learner

Since parents often associate tuition classes with catching up on the school syllabus, this may come as a surprise. However, if your child is ahead of their peers and has been breezing through their schoolwork, it may be a good idea to sign them up for some enrichment classes to promote further mental stimulation. Unlike tuition for revision, enrichment programmes are aimed at stretching your child’s mental capacity and inspiring them to realise their full potential. Students will also be provided with opportunities in school to use this extra knowledge, such as in the Gifted Education Programme, Maths and Science Olympiads, spelling bees, and other special competitions. Moreover, allowing your child to keep on learning beyond the classroom teaches them that there is always room for improvement and encourages them to continually better themselves.

Coding certainly teaches teens how to find their way around a computer, but can there be more to it? Why are top educators advocating coding classes in Singapore for young students? Does coding really benefit teens who aren’t planning to delve into the technological route anyway?

As it turns out, there are actually many benefits to picking up coding early on, from reinforcing the development of problem-solving skills to giving teens an edge in the job market later on. Nearly everything we touch these days involves some form of coding, including mobile phones, smart home systems, exercise machines, electronic signboards and more. Coding is all around us and it’s clear it is here to stay. To survive in a technologically enhanced world, teens need to be equipped with relevant skills way before they hit the working world. Read on to find out why we believe every teen should have an opportunity to learn to code.

Coding Develops Critical Thinking

Critical thinking is a valuable skill, useful across subjects in the school curriculum and in real-life situations. While you can develop critical thinking through other means, coding remains an excellent subject to get teens thinking about how they can solve a problem with the tools at hand. In coding, there is often no model answer. It’s all up to how each individual wishes to approach the situation and how they make use of what they have available. All this helps teens to develop a deeper understanding of logic, problem-solving, and the most efficient ways to get a job done – skills which can be applied to just about any other aspect of their lives.

Coding Builds Creativity and Imagination

When it comes to coding, the sky is the limit. One may marvel at the amazing inventions coding has brought us, from the smartphones we use every day to the specialised equipment automating mundane tasks. Coding is a great way to teach math concepts and logical reasoning to teens beyond the confines of a syllabus or curriculum. In a coding class for teens, they are given these building blocks and instructed to create an end product, but however they wish to go about it can be entirely up to them. This premise is ripe for some creativity and imagination to go a long way. When teens get to showcase their solutions to the class, everyone is able to appreciate how a single problem can inspire so many different ideas.

Coding is Relevant to the Times

These days, industries are volving to incorporate big data and artificial intelligence. Many new jobs have blossomed in the span of the past few years, and may not have existed previously. In the years to come, it is likely that more jobs will be phased out as technology and automation takes over routine tasks, and industry demands shift.

What does this mean for our youth? Well, technology is their future, and it may no longer be optional for them to be equipped with 21^st century programming competencies. Learning to code also involves a process of developing soft skills like collaborative problem solving, patience, creativity and critical thinking. This will be prized by employers, and simply cannot be learned from a textbook.

Coding is learning a New Language

Speaking a new language opens+ new doors. In fact, it is believed that learning a new language while one is still young helps stimulate mental processing, making it easier for children to pick up new languages later on. Sure, coding may not be your average Spanish, French or German class, but coding is very much a universal language. Although programmers from different locales may not speak the same human language, they are still able to work together on the same project because they speak a common programming language. What’s even better is that teens are not just limited to the coding languages they learn in class. As long as they are able to grasp the basics of coding, they can apply their knowledge to any other programming language and pick it up with a little practice, which will definitely come in handy with the continuous changing of industry-standard programming languages.

Having a colourful vocabulary does not only impress one’s teachers but also gives a student more ways to express themselves. Instead of being limited to a few common phrases and expressions, students who use more complex words and idioms are able to craft their essays and long answers in a succinct, flavourful manner that is pleasurable to read.

Why Learn Vocabulary?

English is full of synonyms, but each one has its own nuances and uses. For example, “nice” is often referred to as a meaningless adjective. It can be used in place of other adjectives such as “delicious” and “beautiful”, but the difference is that the latter two adjectives give more information about the subject or object they are applied to. One can say that they had a “nice dinner” or a “delicious dinner”, but not a “beautiful dinner”. Likewise, a dress can be called beautiful, but not a steak. As such, by saying that something is delicious, another party can infer that the speaker is referring to an edible thing. This makes a sentence more descriptive and informative than simply describing the object as “nice”.

Building up one’s vocabulary is paramount to attaining a high score in the Primary and Secondary English examinations. Regardless of whether a student is taking Primary English or Secondary English, they will definitely be expected to write essays as part of their assessment. In addition, their personal dictionary will be assessed in various other components such as cloze passage, reading comprehension, and multiple choice.

Vocabulary is also especially useful in other language arts subjects, such as literature. Students may be exposed to literature as early as at secondary school level and up till their higher education. Unless one is pursuing a completely technical education route, it is almost impossible to avoid encountering vocabulary in humanities subjects.

Learning vocabulary has clear benefits, but it can be challenging for those who are less linguistically inclined. For some, perusing a dictionary and penning down words is simply too boring and ineffective. They may find it difficult to remember the meanings of so many words or how to spell them. If your child is struggling with keeping their vocabulary fresh, here are some tips for sharpening their language skills and boosting their vocabulary repertoire.

Communicate with English Speakers

The advantage of learning vocabulary by talking to English speakers is that one can always ask them to clarify an unfamiliar word. For best results, students should try their hand at writing as well, instead of simply engaging them in verbal communication. People tend to speak in simpler terms in colloquial speech, but in writing, one has more time to carefully pen down their thoughts and reflect on the vocabulary used before the other party gets to see their message.

Finding native English speakers to write to should not be a problem. Students can always approach their language arts teachers for some practice in sharpening their vocabulary. Alternatively, they can also make use of online forums and message boards to exchange messages with other English speakers from around the world. Some platforms are even created especially for such a purpose.

Through communicating with English speakers who use unfamiliar vocabulary, students can infer the meaning of words they do not recognise even without looking them up in a dictionary. This is an especially effective way of picking up new words and keeping them in one’s memory, instead of just reading them off a list and later forgetting their meanings.

Read Advanced Books and Articles

It may sound cliché, but advanced reading materials such as novels, journal articles, and even Shakespearean plays are gold mines for rich vocabulary. If your child enjoys reading stories, try to introduce them to young adult fiction. This genre is not only relatable and relevant to students, it typically also contains plenty of flavourful vocabulary that your child can learn to use in their own writing. Non-fiction articles also make for great learning material, especially those that focus on describing things, such as a travel blog or a gourmet review. Have your child keep a dictionary close by so that they can look up any words if necessary. By reading in context, they should be able to make an educated guess of the meaning of unfamiliar words and remember how such vocabulary there are used in a sentence.

Practice Writing

Lastly, the best way for a student to incorporate new vocabulary into their daily usage is to practice writing with those words! Perhaps even get their English teacher to review the writing and give feedback on their vocabulary usage. As the saying goes, practice makes perfect. By keeping their personal vocabulary notes close by and looking for opportunities to show off their newly acquired words and expressions, students will be able to incorporate advanced vocabulary into their writing in no time!

The subject of science is only introduced to students starting from Primary 3, instead of from Primary 1 like English, Maths or their mother tongue. As such, it is natural that some students may feel less confident when it comes to tackling primary science questions.

PSLE science is a unique subject compared to other primary school subjects. While scoring well in primary science requires logical reasoning and deduction, students are also expected to be able to phrase their answers in a clear and concise manner. In this way, primary science effectively combines the challenges of both maths and language. When doing a science paper, it is crucial for students to read the questions carefully to ensure that they do not misinterpret anything. What are some of the most common mistakes made by students?

Misreading the Question

Not all questions are clear-cut, even in a primary science paper. These days, science questions are becoming increasingly lengthy; making it more likely that students will skim through them and pick up only a few keywords. Some questions are structured in a misleading way on purpose, in order to test students’ ability to pick out the real objective of the question. Students are also expected to read the question carefully and decide which concepts are being tested. Combine these difficulties with the harrowing time limit for the exam, and you have a recipe for disaster.

When reading through a question, it pays to be generous with annotations. Be sure to underline or highlight the important keywords in each question so that the answering techniques become clear. The moment a student identifies the topic wrongly, they will almost certainly use the wrong keywords and concepts to answer the question, leading to a massive loss of marks. To be able to identify question topics without error, students should do more practice papers and familiarise themselves with the different question structures.

Misreading the Answer Options

Similarly, reading the multiple-choice answer options carefully is imperative to answer each question correctly. The multiple-choice section of the PSLE science paper is an excellent way to score easy marks as there are only four possible answers to each question. For anyone looking to score well in the primary science paper, they should aim to get full marks in the multiple-choice section. However, the multiple-choice options are often structured in a tricky manner to really test a student’s mettle. Individual careless mistakes can easily add up to cost a student greatly, resulting in a major downgrade.
One common twist is a negation of the question by adding the word “not”, meaning that out of the four possible options, three are correct and the student has to pick the one that is incorrect. A variation of this is asking which one of the options is false instead of true. Some students fail to read the question and the answers carefully, instead of settling for the first correct option they find.
It is important for students to remember that multiple-choice questions do not necessarily ask for the correct answer, but for the best answer. In some cases, all of the answers may seem vague, incorrect, or inaccurate, but one of them has to be correct. One of the best ways to be sure of a multiple-choice answer is to use the elimination method. If three of the answers can be proven wrong, the last one would definitely be correct even if it may not be a perfect answer.

Being Unable to Finish in Time

Even if a student is hard-pressed for time, it always pays to read the question carefully before penning an answer. To avoid inadvertently running out of time to complete the paper, it is good practice for students to pace themselves according to the length of the paper and the number of questions. Before simply starting on the first question, students should look through the whole paper and estimate the number of questions they would need to spend more time on. For instance, they can divide the allocated duration by the number of questions to get a rough gauge of how much time they should spend on each question. If the student has spent enough time trying to answer a question to no avail, it is usually best to save the question for later and move on. This also decreases the chances that students will be pressured to skim through questions and thus misunderstand them.
Has your child been experiencing any of these pitfalls? Fortunately, these are simple mistakes that can be easily corrected given some coaching and dedication. With our award-winning tuition program, your child will be able to ace their PSLE science paper in no time!

Science is often best learned via hands-on experiments. The primary science curriculum includes exploration of concepts through simulations and real demonstrations, such as watching the process of germination through growing beans and observing how we inherit traits from our parents. Why is there so much of a focus on experiments, and what does hands-on learning do for students?

Inspire Inquisitiveness

Experiments prompt students to consider the different possibilities and outcomes of a scientific hypothesis. It is one thing to learn about the experiments that have been conducted, but another thing to actually carry out the experiment and witness the results. Students can even get more involved in the experiment by making a hypothesis – predicting what they think the outcome will be. This can be a good test for them to see if they have mastered the concepts well enough by making an accurate prediction.

By building on a child’s curiosity, they may even become interested enough in the pursuit of science to come up with their own hypotheses and design their own experiments to test them.

Learn Through Experience

One of the major benefits of hands-on learning is that it allows students to observe for themselves the scientific concepts they learn about. For instance, teaching students that plants transport water through the xylem and food through the phloem is just another fact that they have to memorise. However, if the students are given the chance to observe the process of food and water transportation by placing a celery stick in a bowl of colored water, they can then see how the color travels through the plant and even cut up a cross-section of the stalk to see which parts of the plant became stained with color.

Learning by experiencing a scenario often helps students to retain information better, as they have a clear memory of the experiment conducted, its conditions, and its outcome. If such an experiment is described in their PSLE science paper, they can then recall it and answer the question with ease. Students often learn even more effectively if they make mistakes in their hypothesis when conducting the experiments and realise where they went wrong. After all, it is much better to make mistakes during learning than during the examination.

Cater to Kinaesthetic Learners

According to the three primary styles of learning, there are visual learners, auditory learners, and kinaesthetic learners. Most people are attuned to one or two of these learning styles, which means that they absorb information and learn skills better when they are taught in a way that fits their learning style. Auditory learners learn best by listening, visual learners learn best by seeing, and kinesthetic learners learn best by doing. Unfortunately, many classroom-based teaching methods used in schools today are not enough to fulfill the needs of kinaesthetic learners. While textbook learning, watching videos, or listening to lectures may be helpful for some percentage of students, the best way to involve all students in the learning process is to cater to kinaesthetic learners as well – those who learn most effectively by physically doing the task. In this way, those who are auditory or visual are still able to apply their learning skills through observing or listening to the teacher, while kinaesthetic learners also get the opportunity to shine by practicing the experiment themselves.

Benjamin Franklin once said, “Tell me and I forget, teach me and I may remember, involve me and I learn.” This statement may hold true not only for kinaesthetic learners but also for those with learning difficulties. Some children with special needs may find it difficult to concentrate in a classroom setting, effectively learning better when they are directly involved in hands-on techniques. Incorporating science experiments into the primary science curriculum create an opportunity for different types of students to learn and levels the playing field across students of all capabilities.

Promote Groupwork

Not all experiments can be conducted alone. Some require a team to work together, especially for larger undertakings. Teamwork and interpersonal skills are highly valued soft skills in the working world these days, which can only be learned through experience. By working on hands-on tasks in a team, students can pick up the valuable skills of working in a team and cooperating with each other. They can also get a chance to appreciate the greater heights that combined efforts can achieve. Additionally, students can take turns leading their own groups to hone their leadership and communication skills. In this way, the students are introduced to group activities as early as primary school, building the foundation for the teamwork that higher education and the working world will require.

Conclusion

As we have seen, there are numerous benefits to hands-on learning for primary school science. In addition to promoting teamwork and cooperation with one’s peers, hands-on learning in the form of science experiments is also a great way to involve all types of students in the lesson. Most students will be able to absorb and retain science concepts much better if they get to experience it themselves in an experiment, and even more, if they are able to make hypotheses and predictions, and draw conclusions from the results of each experiment.

One of the best ways for children to pick up primary maths easily is to show them how maths is used in the world around them. For instance, one can teach a child to count money by taking them along on grocery shopping trips. However, with the pandemic these days, people are staying home more often than usual and not all classes are back to normal, severely limiting the opportunities you may have to teach your child primary maths. Even so, this does not mean that your child has to lose out on valuable avenues to learn while awaiting normal life to resume. There are numerous ways through which one can still teach their child math in a fun and engaging way while at home.

Playing Board Games

It may be obvious that board games involving play money can be a great way to boost children’s addition, subtraction, and mental summing skills. Is your child bored of doing repetitive textbook exercises? If you are looking for an engaging way to get your child to exercise their mental skills, bringing out money- or a point-based board game is a great start. Have your child act as the scorekeeper or banker, and have them showcase their maths skills! You can also use this method to teach your child handy concepts such as algebra, statistics, and word problems. By learning ways to apply their textbook knowledge to a fun game scenario, your child can enjoy better memory retention, leading to more effective learning. For an added challenge, give a multiplier to each unit of the game’s currency – for instance, every dollar in the game is multiplied by two.

Even though money or points provides an ideal opportunity for your child to learn maths, other problem-solving board games should not be overlooked either. Maths is far more than just counting numbers – it is important to build a strong foundation on analytical thinking so that one can pick up higher levels of maths with greater ease in higher education.

Shop Online with Your Child

Online shopping often makes it easy to forget all about counting totals as the prices are automatically calculated for you. With the right approach though, you can turn an online shopping spree into a great educational experience for your child.

Instead of simply adding items to your cart and allowing the system to tally the prices automatically, let your child practice their money and decimal calculations. Tell them the prices of each item you are adding to your cart, and have them manually calculate the total cost. You can even join in and test your mental calculations as well! Finally, double-check the answers with the actual system-calculated total and see if you are both correct.

The great thing about online shopping is that you can also teach your child about percentages by applying the idea of discounts, which are very widely used in the real world. This way, your child will be better able to appreciate the applications of percentages in real life.

Playing Online Educational Games

While board games provide a great way for children to learn the basics of counting, it may feel limiting for older children, especially those who are studying PSLE maths. These children may benefit more from playing online educational games to enhance their maths skills. A quick online search for educational games can yield numerous options for your child to try out. Through fun and engagement, your child will absorb the maths concepts easier and apply their newfound knowledge to their studies more efficiently.

Playing online educational games also paves the way to get children interested in programming and development, a very useful skill later in life. This interest can help to improve their future maths and problem-solving aptitude.

Keep Track of Time

Some children may find it difficult to calculate the time when they are first learning it. If your child is struggling with learning time, what about helping them understand it in a real-time scenario? Instead of directly telling your child the time, try giving them a relative measure, such as “a hundred minutes from now”. You can also quiz them periodically on time. For instance, ask them to tell you what time it was “three hours earlier”.

Getting your child a watch, if they do not already have one, is an excellent way to teach them about time. In addition to boosting their maths textbook knowledge, watching the time also gets children to be more mindful of their time management, leading to better self-discipline and performance in their other studies.

Practice Questions

While there are creative ways to assist your child in their maths learning, you can always still go back to the time-tested practice questions and papers to drill your child on important maths concepts. These books are readily available from any bookstore, making practice questions a great go-to exercise if you need to change up any activities.

Practice questions often come as a cohesive learning tool incorporating all major primary maths topics, allowing your child to focus on the topic they are weakest in. Alternatively, you can also find past-year maths papers from other schools and the time your child to simulate a real assessment. This also helps the child to practice good time management and complete each question as quickly as possible. Remember to have them use the remaining time to check their answers to prevent careless mistakes.

Boost Your Child’s Primary Maths Prowess!

Fortunately, one does not have to feel short-changed by the current pandemic restrictions, as there are still numerous ways to enhance one’s maths learning at home. Is your child having difficulties with their primary maths or PSLE maths? Give some of these creative learning opportunities a try and watch your child become proficient at maths!