Thanx all for the advice and recommendations! I guess I will continue to personally coach her for the time being as I got lots of time on my hand the moment, just quit my job and yet to find anything interesting. But I will source for some extra Chinese or hypy classes for her as my Chinese is 1/2 pail water so to speak. Hope to find some classes in the weekend as weekdays don’t seem possible. P1 & 2 for TNS is afternoon session at the moment, her school bus picks her up at 11am and she reaches home after 730pm.

Thanx for the replies, my 1st dd, really quite lost preparing her for P1.

spicyblackpepper:

Dear trex72, my heart goes with you. I formed a watsapp group for my kid's form class parents. The school is nice enough to invite all parents to sit in same class to exchange contact nos. I took a picture of the parents' name/tel no. list. My kid is a loner, doesn't want to ask for classmates phone nos During K2, in newly changed school, teacher was so worried, told me that my kid couldn't remember how to spell own name 0 - 0 . And you know what, my kid is now in year 1 of IP secondary school. Very normal kid, except needs help in social area. I am sure your kid will be ok too.

Thanx for the kind words, another thing that worries me, she was very sociable and well liked in PCF by her peers and teachers. But in P1 she only have 2 friends in her class of 30 and they are not the 2 sitting beside her( who was assigned by FT to help her). Hopefully it's not some stress of P1 getting to her, making her more withdrawn.

slmkhoo:

How did she cope in K2? Did her teachers there give you any feedback about weaknesses or difficulties? Can she read hypy and English? You may want to teach her to read both instead of concentrating on spelling. She will cope better with spelling when she can read and make sense of the words rather than just rote memorisation.


For copying issues, do you think she has any vision or coordination problems? Or is she a slow writer? You can teach her what are the key things to write down (page no., question nos) rather than copy down whole sentences. You will be able to guess better that way.

You can ask her FT if there is a parents' support group for her class, or whether you can start one (if you are willing).

She was placed into some Flair class in PCF and her Chinese teacher told us to converse with her in Chinese more frequently. Her reading and writing is quite weak, and I agree with you, I should strengthen her in that area. Thanx for the advice!

BlueBells:

Besides the Whatsapp group, suggest you also touch base with her teachers to hear their observations. Don't panic just yet.


If she has no improvements by next term, then there are a couple of things you can do:

1. Get in touch with the learning support teacher in school and see if any help can be rendered (can also get in touch with them now, no harm);

2. Put her through selected enrichment classes.

Passing her spellings (EL and CL) is no indication whether she has any learning challenges in school.

I have been in touch with her FT, FT already placed 2 \"better\" students beside her to help her and also put her is some learning support class already. Didn't help that my dd thinks her FT is strict and unapproachable, quite fearful of her in fact.

As for the 2 better students, 1 of them seems to be a MC queen. The other does help her by doing some of her work and letting her copy some assignment, I'm grateful but I think it does more harm than help unintentionally. Then when she wants to copy instructions for her guidebook, her was told that she is not allow to copy by the students. :slapshead:

Pen88n:

Is you DD able to read and write (like write in a diary about happenings of the day - need not be long, 5-10 sentences will do.) in English and at least read in Chinese when she enters P1? If yes, she should not have a problem coping with P1.


HYPY is a little like phonics. I did not teach both my kids HYPY before they enter P1. Like your DD, my kids have no enrichment classes before P1 or even in lower primary, but I encourage reading, so both of them can read well by the time they enter P1. Both learnt HYPY in P1 and are able to grasp that. If really need to, suggest you consider Tien Hsia for your DD.

She cant read and write that well yet and her Chinese.... lets just say you speak to her in Chinese and she'll reply you in English. PCF didn't really prepare her that well for P1

Dear fellow parents,


My elder daughter started P1 this year in TNS. Prior to this she did not attend any form of enrichment class or tution. Now I think its a huge mistake as she don’t seems to be coping well in school.

I’m teaching her personally at the moment but it’s mainly coaching her on her weekly spelling and hypy spelling as well as homework. Got a shock yesterday when I discovered that she has been mainly copying her classmate’s hypy assignment as she has no idea on how to do her assignments. She also has trouble copying instructions on her pupil’s handwork and most of the time I have to guess what homework she has.

Should I sign her up for tution or enrichment class( especially for her Chinese)? Any good recommendation for sengkang area? Kumon? Kent ridge?