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As I sit writing this blog entry, it is the final Bank Holiday Monday before the ‘big’ return to school after the long summer holidays. This time of year always elicits a variety of responses from children, including those who can’t wait to get back and see their friends, those who might be a little indifferent, and, of course, those who will be rather anxious about the return to school. Looking back at my own childhood, I think for the most part I fell into the second camp – Stephen King (yes, that Stephen King!) said it best in his novella ‘The Body’ (published in 1982 and turned into one of my favourite films, ‘Stand By Me’, in 1986). I actually use this short story as a teaching text towards the end of Year 6 – it’s a great ‘coming-of-age’ tale that is very appropriate for encouraging children discuss their hopes and fears for entering Secondary School.
“You got a little excited about going back and seeing your friends; you were curious about your new teachers and what they would be like. In a strange way you could even get excited about the long, boring lessons, because by the time the summer holidays were nearly over you sometimes got bored enough to believe you could learn something at school.”
The above quote may be a little cynical, but I do believe that this year there will be more children than ever that may be a little reticent to return to school, especially given the disruption that Covid has caused for the past two academic years. There may be some that are feeling rather anxious about what is expected of them given that they may well have missed large chunks of the curriculum and simply don’t have the knowledge base expected of them for their particular year group. Children are very good at understanding ‘what they should know’ and even better at knowing where that gaps in their knowledge exist, even if they don’t really like to discuss these (as it means acknowledging a weakness for which they feel they might get into trouble for).
If you feel that your child has missed out on any aspect of their learning during the past two years due to the Covid-19 pandemic, please do get in touch as individual, personalised private tutoring really can make an enormous difference to a child’s knowledge and subsequently to their confidence. I would be happy to discuss any aspect of the curriculum with which your child would benefit from an extra boost, and I am sure that working as a team we can fill in those knowledge gaps, and move past the last two disruptive years with renewed vigour and enthusiasm!
