Three tips to help encourage children to learn.

By BERN MORLEY.

Jack just didn’t get it. And it wasn’t from lack of trying on our part. He just didn’t understand the letters and words that swam around in front of him. Or why on earth he’d necessarily want to waste his time learning what they meant when there was still daylight and he could be kicking a ball.

Just as an FYI, you should know that this post is brought to you by Australian Scholarships Group. But all opinions expressed by the author are 100% authentic and written in their own words.

See Jack is one of those kids that just needs to be moving. He is stop or go. I didn’t know that this kind of child existed before I had him. I guess I got lucky the first time around, almost spoilt in a way. My daughter just went ahead and did everything that she was meant to do. She read, she wrote and she just ‘got it’ with very little help from us at all. So I suppose we thought that was just the norm. Yet when our two boys came along we were in for quite the rude awakening. It was partly because they found it difficult, but more so, they were just NOT interested. It’s like anything I suppose. In life, as adults, we choose to use our leisure on activities that interest us. It might be netball, football, reading, quilting or French literature. Whatever it is, we get to choose. When you’re a child however, there are some very fundamental activities that you must participate in and conquer if you are to succeed in adult life. Reading is one of these.

There were so, so many nights that were spent with both myself and Jack getting just extremely frustrated and upset. I knew he was trying yet he couldn’t remember a word he knew 3 minutes ago and I could not for the life of me understand why not. These books about Uncle Ken coming for a visit held no interest for him. And why would they? Who CARES what Uncle Ken does in his spare time.

There came a day when he raced home from school with some AFL Football trading cards. He was super excited because he’d managed to trade a card for his ultimate hero, Buddy Franklin. He sat down and added it to his burgeoning collection and started to ask me the players’ names on each card. I answered him a few times but it was then that I had my light bulb moment – his need to know would also be his motivation to learn to read. I just had to tap into his interests.

So before long, he was sounding out ‘Sidebottom’ and ‘Roughead’ and all kinds of words. But then something amazing happened. Wherever we’d be driving, he’d start to sound out and read whatever was surrounding him. T-at-too. OH, Mum, that’s a tattoo shop!! Yes son, you can forget about those for quite some time. If he couldn’t work it out himself, he’d spell it out and we’d learn it together.

And from then on, he hasn’t stopped. He sits down and writes his footy heroes letters of encouragement or requests in hopes they’ll visit his school.

For me, as a child I remember it being about competition. We had this colour coding on our reading levels, purple being the ULTIMATE. And there was only myself and one other girl vying for top spot. I guess I already loved to read, it was in me from conception I reckon, but the motivation to learn more came from a completely competitive level. I never did reach the purple level in year 2 but my motivation to do so could not be questioned.

When you want to encourage children to learn, in my experience, it will come down to pinpointing their particular interests and then helping guide and resource them for whatever it is they have an affinity towards.

They need to love to learn. Then the rest will fall into place.

Some other tips to help encourage children to learn are:

• Incorporate reading, counting, and colours into games with your children

• Praise children for their efforts even if they don’t get the correct answer. Trying, importantly the motivation to keep trying, is what will empower a child to keep learning new things

• Create a distraction-free, clean area with plenty of light to help your child focus on the activity at hand

A full range of helpful tips on how to encourage children to learn can be found HERE.

The Australian Scholarships Group (ASG) offers a proven and proactive way to help parents nurture and offset the cost of their children’s education. In almost 40 years, more than 509,000 children have been enrolled with ASG and more than $1.8 billion in education benefits have been returned to our Members and their children.  ASG also offers a wide range of resources designed to help the many day-to-day challenges parents face in providing their children the best education possible.

For more information visit their website or download your free copy of ASG’s e-guide on “Motivating children to learn”.

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