Is it suppose to be this hard?

[Antheia]

I'm teaching Lily how to write. But she just isn't listening. None of it is getting through. I get her to trace letters and then do her own next to it. And no matter how many times i show her she never gets it right. Ok thats an over exageration. She does sometimes get it right but then the next one she does next to it she does it wrong even if i get her to follow my pencil she just doesn't. she just goes off on her own tangent. For eg. She knows how to draw a circle so for the letter b i get her to draw the line which she can do but when it comes to the circle part she'll start the circle and either half draw it, or half draw it and then cut it off with a line the other way so they never join up (if this is making any sense at all!) I'm not sure what to do. I just keep getting her to repeat it and she is getting worse with each one. Plus she isn't listen to me at all. Starts rolling her eyes at me or singing and not looking at me and i swear she is purposly doing it wrong since she can do it right sometimes. And its not like i am forcing her to do this, she is the one who asks me to teach her. I'm starting to pull my hair out!! It's just so frustrating.

[Roryrory]

Antheia I would stongly recommend you get a hold of a book called "Einstein Never Used Flash Cards: How Our Children Really Learn-- And Why They Need to Play More and Memorize Less". You will quickly be convinced that you don't need to worry about what DD is doing. Kids' brains are just wired differently, and often not wired at all to do the things adults take for granted.
Don't stress - HTH.......

[Epacris]

It sounds like she's just not interested, perhaps leave it for a while and try again later if you both really want to.

And FWIW, my DH went to one of those arty-farty Rudolf Steiner schools and he didn't read or write untill he was 12 (waaay to busy playing with sticks and dirt) and he's done really well in life, at uni and in his career. Your DD is only 4, she's got plenty of time yet

[Phteven]

If it's frustrating you I'd put the pencils away and go and do something else.
Yasin is the same age and I'm too lazy to teach him to read or write. If he picks it up that's great but if he doesn't I don't mind - that's what school is for.

[2CheekyMonkeys]

i reckon you should pull back a bit too. however, you could add a few things to her room or a quiet area that she can find and use at her own leisure, interest. eg, you can get a piece of paper with each letter on it, laminate the paper and then give her a whiteboard marker to trace over. it can be easily wiped off and done again. try and make it fun, like get her to help you with the shopping list, give her her own pad of paper to do her own list as well. umm.. use her current interests, eg, if she likes fairies or princesses you could write a 'letter' to them or just show her the letters in their names, etc.

but yeah, just make it playful and in everyday situations rather than sitting down to do a writing lesson for a while :-)

also, at first childrens writing may not look exactly like the letters they are copying so any attempt is a good start!

[Bathsheba]

Developmentally a child doesn't really (usually) get the hang of writing until in about grade 1 or 2. I'm not a qualified teacher yet but i worked in an Early Learning Centre for 5 years and heard the teachers there console many parents. We had children from 0 - 5 in our centre and very few could legibly write their names. The ones that could (from what I observed) were also proficient at many other fine motor skills. If I was you I would simply encourage a love of drawing. These skills are best learnt at the child's pace too Believe me, I had a mother who was very determined that I become a top mathematician so she drilled me constantly and it always ended it tears. To this day I have a bit of a psychological issue with maths. It saddens me now that looking back my mum seemed to ignore the fact that I was the most literate child in my year... I was an excellent reader for instance but never once did I receive any praise for this infact I was told to "get out of your room... go outside... it's not healthy to read all day". She actually used to complain that I read too much Is there really such a thing??? Anyhow, this isn't about me.

Getting back to what I heard at the ELC: first at foremost has to come a natural curiosity and therefore a love of learning. Like Rory said: through play a child's natural curiosity will be stimulated and after a while the child will require and demand a more complex set of tools in which to grow their understanding of the world. Reading and writing are tools that your DD will naturally seek when she is ready. Maths will be another tool that will follow too. If you look at a child's learning holistically then you will see that everything is interlinked and lots of skills are dependant on another set of skills coming first. The Steiner and Regio Emilia learning philosophies (amongst others) acknowledge that learning is stronger when child-led. I also believe this to be true.

I hope this hasn't come across as a lecture darl. I know that your intentions are good Maybe just go out and buy your DD a whole array of mark-making tools... chalks, crayons, fine textas, paints and let her explore and master the first step of writing: mark-making. You say that she can make a circle... that's great and more than most children her age are capable of doing. Maybe instead of showing her how to do something just sit next to her and doodle on a piece of paper... make lots of marks... zig zags, loops, squiggly lines.... don't show her how, just let her observe. When I worked with children I was told never to teach a child how to draw... I could make my own marks but not to impose them on a child because my proficiency can so easily discourage a child which often leads to anger and frustration that they can't do it straight away. The time to be instructed for educational purposes is a long way off... some say that often it is never necessary if the child maintains enough natural curiosity to instigate the learning process themselves. The best time to instruct is when they ASK. A willing brain is always going to be more receptive. Anyhow... I could babble on about this all day... bit of a passion of mine. I hope at least I provided some food for thought

[bon]

I agree with the others - just let it go for a while hun. Grace is at kindy this year, and they aren't teaching them to write at all - the most they do is encourage them to recognise letters, particularly those in their own name, but they don't push it if the child isn't engaging with it. Grace does what the teachers call "kid writing", which is basically just scribble. When Harry started primary school last year, the teacher essentially started from scratch with the class - there is no assumed prior knowledge, they just start from the beginning with all the children. Some might pick things up quicker than others, but it's not a race - they all get there at their own pace.

[Antheia]

The thing i am more frustrated at is what if she is like this at school? Not willing to listen to the teacher etc.

Plus like i said, she asks me to teach her. So we don't do it everyday just when she asks. So i woulda thought that she wanted to learn.

Anyway, i will take on all your advice and tips etc. Thankyou so much. I feel better about it now. I think it's just that fact i had such a hard time at school and i don't want her to as well.

[~Saram~]

Maybe try some other types of letter formations if she is interested in writing/letter. Try making them out of playdough or writing them in a sand tray or rice or flour, writing them on the shower screen in coloured water - try and make it fun. Go outside and make a letter out of flowers and leaves they collect or go to the beach and write messages in the sand.

Is she interested in writing cause she has seen you do it - what about letting her use texta over the top of a letter you write to her like decoding a message and then you can read it to her

PS - we posted at the same time. You will probably find she will be fine at school, I find (as a teacher and a parent) most kids give their parents a much harder time than the teacher. It's great that she wants to learn - but you might find that she's not interested so much in "writing" like we do it as she is in understanding how writing works - sending messages and decoding what the letters mean and say??? Does that make sense?

[Bathsheba]

Yep, sometimes they ask but it's more like; "let's do this mum... together... like playing". Often when they ask it has a slightly different meaning to when two adults ask each other for help. Your DD is probably asking in the same context of show me how to paint... more open ended... not too exact. IYKWIM? And with your worry about her struggling at school: the best insurance you have against that is to develop her natural curiosity by helping her to play in a way that reveals new ideas. Grab a copy of the book Rory recommended and I think you will be really inspired ETA: I second what Saram said about kids often giving their parents a harder time than their teachers... don't fret about it too much

[Antheia]

I think she is more interested cause she wants to write her daddy a letter since he is away until September and they cant really talk on the phone.

[Bathsheba]

Get her to draw a letter darl... like a cartoon strip Ask her if she would like you to label what she draws. Drawing is a much more natural "language" for children of her age than the language of letters.

[Trillian]

Trust me when I say even the most incourrigible child always turns on a spectacular show once at school It's a different environment at school and I'm sure once she is there she will be fine (cause she knows every last one of your buttons and exactly how to push them) but with teachers it is different - plus they have 3-4 years at Uni and endless amounts of classroom experience to know how to engage a child in learning. Paige was 5 a few days ago and has been able to write her own name for a fair while now, but it started with her writing gibberish on a page and calling it letters. She would take her note book and pencil and just sit and write pages and pages of what looked to me like scribble across the page but to her it was a story. I did all the *right* things with #1 child and would sit for hours with work books that I brought, but by the time I got to DD2, I didn't have the time and she just wasn't into *formal* type stuff like that. It is hard enough at times to get her to do her speechie homework but this was the one thing she really liked to do - still does like - and it was the basis of her being able to write properly using proper words. She will get there, and one thing to remember is that with her speech issues, it could also be making it hard for it all to gel inside her head kwim?

[2CheekyMonkeys]

yep i agree with bathsbea, get her to do a drawing and you can write her words for her. if she wants to get her to try to do the first letter of her name or she can do the 'scribble/pretend' writing on the page too. just go with the flow of what she seems happy to do.

[bon]

DS's prep teacher last year told me that the scribbling thing is actually an important first step in learning to write real words - if a child scribbles something on a page and attaches a meaning to it, then they are starting to learn the concept of writing and also the fine motor skills attached to that, like pencil grip. She would actually encourage the kids to do it - after they had painted a picture, or drawn something, she would ask them to "write" down what it was, and she would write underneath what the child had told her it means. By the end of the year, the kids were writing real words along with their scribble - as their knowledge of letters and how to form them grew.

[Floweryfields]

If she's not interested - don't force it, she's still young and she's got a pile of years of formal learning ahead of her. She will want to when the time is right - let her learn through play for now.

[Ca Plane Pour Moi]

She's 4. If she makes a scribble and tells you it is a letter to Daddy, put it in an envelope with your letter and post it. If she can translate what she has written, put that translation in your letter.

Can she recognise letters yet? If not, don't even think about formal writing!

[Inertia]

The thing i am more frustrated at is what if she is like this at school? Not willing to listen to the teacher etc.

You just described my Lyta. She is driving the school nuts. She just isnt interested in their teaching style. They obviously want her to conform to it - but as the counselor himself said, he knows that shy of medicating her, there is little hope of that. I refuse to medicate a difference of opinion!

For now I am just getting the school to send back what she has missed and work through it with her in a way that she finds fun. Perhaps try a different approach with your DD. Rather than a seated pencils and paper - go write in the sand with sticks or pull out some finger paints. Maybe even do it mr squiggle style and give her a page of odd lines and half circles and ask see how many letters she can make from the page.

Mix it up. Its not that they are failing to learn at all. We are. Wouldn't you have loved school to have been more fun too?