Assesment books

Like many Singaporean parents, I buy assessment books and assigned them to Sonshine to work on. In fact, I consider myself an assessment books warrior! My weekly pilgrimage is to walk into Popular book store and leave with an assessment book. Needless to say, I buy so many that there is no way he can finish them all by year end.

 

Over time, I wonder how effective assessment books are. The questions in the assessment books won't even appear in the school exams, so even if the child aces the assessment books, does it mean he will do well in school exams? I really doubt so.

 

Yet, most of us are still obsessed with assessment books. I have seen mothers like me scouring through the shelves for assessment books at Popular book store. I suppose, assessment books give that extra revision and practise that our child needs. That makes sense, 'practise makes perfect' doesn't it?

 

But I think most of us, me included, have lost focus on the role of the assessment books. We think number is the the key, the more they do the better. Really? I have heard of kids who do truck loads of assessment books but still get average results or still 'lose' out to others who did no or little extra work outside of school. Of course, there are also students who benefit from, and even enjoy, doing them. So are assessment books the magical formula to good grades?

 

I look at Sonshine and myself. I suspect with or without assessment books, he will do just the same. His standard would probably remain status quo even if I don't assign him extra work. Yet I do see that it helps him a little at times. For instance, when working on English assessment books, he sometimes come across new words that he is unaware of. I learn to see that as an opportunity for him to boost his vocabulary. Still, sometimes, it comes out to nothing. He would learn the new word there and then but completely forgets about it the next round. Days like these, I wonder 'what's the use?'. In general it doesn't seem to make him 'smarter', even so, it would be just a wee wee bit, negligible really.

Then it dawned on me it is not the assessment books that will help Sonshine. For him particularly, it is the quality of the teaching that helps him the most. Sonshine is attentive and absorbs well during lessons. When the teacher is very clear, concise and precise in her lessons, Sonshine will retain and know how to apply accurately in his work. For example, maths, I observed that all I have to do is to explain very clearly to him all the basic concepts of the topic. After which, he can fly solo and tackle the tedious & complicated questions on his own based on his understanding of the basics. But, first the teaching must be very clear and detailed. So ultimately, for Sonshine, it all boils down to the teacher, absolutely nothing to do with the number of assessment books he does.

So now, I've to change my mindset. That's not to say I have stop buying assessment books. I still do. But I try not to equate his grades with doing assessment books. My strategy now is to teach and then use the assessment books as a revision or practise. In the past, I would simply throw the assessment books to him and expect the books to teach him or that he would magically learn on his own by doing them. So now i choose assessment books that comes with some guidelines. It is more for me to use them as a 'textbook' to teach Sonshine especially for english where there is no school textbook for us to follow unlike mandarin.

Having said that, with the wide selection of assessment books here, it is very hard to ward off the temptation to buy. I hope to constantly remind myself that it is not about the amount of assessment books Sonshine does but it is how well he can understand from what he is taught. Hopefully that will help me stay on track!
 

Of Sonshine & English assessment books

 

What's up with Sonshine's home learning? Well....

 

 

It's assessment books after assessment books!

 

I have no energy nor time to think up of an activity for him. I think the fastest way to get him on home learning with me is doing assessment books. I can't say he enjoys it :I. But still, i want him to get use to doing work-something which he will have to face next year. However, i try not to tax him too heavily, i only give about 20 minute work max a day.

 

On a side note, I find myself buying and buying AND buying assessment books. I don't know why it is so addictive! But the other reason why i do that is because i learnt that each assessment books focus on different areas. I can't rely on one to touch on all areas within a subject even if i can, it means the exercises are very brief and not as detailed as i would like it to be.

So i find myself buying an assessment book JUST for comprehension, another one for Grammar, then another one for Vocabulary and on and on and on... *Sweat* And i am just talking about English subject alone mind you.

 

I also learnt that assessment books differ in their level of difficulty. Some are designed to boost your child's confidence, others are out to tell your child that he is erm, 'not so clever'. So my advice is, choose your assessments books very very carefully. Find one that matches to your child's learning ability: not too easy and not too hard.

 

 

 

Moving along...This may bore the living daylights of you but some have asked me about what assessment books i used. So i'll start with English- part one.

 

I have two (ok maybe more) comprehension assessment books for sonshine. These two books are like day and night for sonshine. One is too easy and the other is a tad tough for him. The one above is the easy one.

 

 

I don't know if it is just my son, but the above book has proven to be quite challenging for SOnshine. I think some of its questions are not straight forward but yet i think it shouldn't be too tough for a child who reads regularly. It got me worried about Sonshine comprehension skills after seeing how he sort of struggle with some of the questions from this book. It has also caused alot of rift between me and him *ooops*. And this book is the main culprit why he tells me " I don't want to do comprehension!".

 

That's why i say, find an assessment book that is not too tough for your kid. Otherwise he/she will be totally put off and it may be hard to get the child to like the topic. :P

 

This book is relatively easy; it is set to be like a revision test each week. It is divided into 4 terms and 10 weeks in each term. So the child is suppose to one chapter a week. Each chapter is relatively short so it doesn't tax the child too much.

 

Lastly, nothing to do with assessment books but a small activity i did with him this week.

 

I stuff a couple of household stuff in an unused pillow case; wrote some adjectives on post it pad and lay them down. The game goes like this. Sonshine has pick an object from the pillow case but before he draws it out, he has to describe the object using adjectives. The list of post it pads was to help him & also to help him categorised the adjectives (blue post it pad were size adjectives, yellow was on texture and pink was shapes). He also used other adjectives that were not listed on the post it pads.

 

It was a simple game but Sonshine enjoyed it alot...much better than assessment books for sure!