June 2nd, 2010
The long summer holidays will soon be upon us. But those endless warm afternoons of childhood may conceal a hidden menace – ’summer learning loss’.
Policy wonks have found that summer learning loss, an established side-effect of long school holidays, is particularly pronounced in some groups:
…children from the poorest backgrounds suffered most with ’summer learning loss’ because they were the least likely to practise reading and writing during the six-week break.
The Education Guardian has reported on plans from think-tank The Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) to shorten the long summer holidays. This should interest parents from any wealth bracket – without the right attention even the most expensively educated can suffer.
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May 24th, 2010
For those of our UK Whizzers living under a rock, we have a new coalition government.
The new government has pledged to reduce the UK’s deficit by £6bn in the short term, with further savings to follow. This amount is relatively trivial in relation to the size of the deficit, but seen by some as an important first step.
1.3% of that six billion will – according to today’s news – be Becta-shaped (page 3 in the PDF linked above). The Department for Children, Schools, and Families has already changed to the more Ronseal Department for Education.
We’re still figuring out exactly what the demise of Becta means for us at Whizz, but with the organisation’s (or ‘quango’s’) remit to increase awareness and uptake of educational technology in state schools, there may be some negative effects.
Despite this, its our users and our staff who do the most work to spread the word about Maths-Whizz, and so the appearance or disappearance of government-funded bodies we hope will not affect our fortunes too greatly…
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April 20th, 2010
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March 25th, 2010
More than 80 per cent of parents struggle with their children’s homework, and more than half actually make homework worse for their children, according to research by our favourite Educational Tech organisation – Becta.
Tim Muffett of BBC Breakfast interviewed students and teachers at north London’s Anson Primary School, which has a novel solution to the problem – teach the parents!
Teachers at Anson School have produced short video snippets outlining key principles that parents can watch with their offspring and so become a constructive part of the homework process.
The idea that Anson Primary School is teaching the wrong people is wide of the mark. As we know well at Maths-Whizz – the most engaged and motivated students have engaged and motivated parents.
A child whose mother enjoys a subject, or is confidently able to assist him with homework, will be more inclined to see value in the subject, to do well at school, and to ask for constructive help.
This is something we’ve been fostering with Maths-Whizz for some time.
The circle of learning with Maths-Whizz
Our home and schools maths tutoring services promote communication between parents, teachers, and students – parents experience our animated tutor with their children, teachers discuss student reports with parents, and kids tend to talk to one another about toys, pets, and our Challenge feature.
[BBC News]
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