The pressure to be smart.

Hi Huggies Girls.

Well my DD is in year 3. Since starting school she has never been smart.
It is breaking my heart. As what she is going through I did.
Even today I have trouble with spelling reading & marths. So I can only write
what I can spell.

I have tried doing more marths & getting her to read to me.
Also have talked to her teacher I think they don't care about the dum kids they
care about the smart ones.
It also hard when you have kids in her class that there mum's are school teachers at the
school.

I feel so sick from thinking about DD with school.

Next year my DS starts prep so I am already stressing about it cause I know what they have to do.
Also in prep they have to learn sight words & read books.
He can write his name but not very good. He know some numbers, colours, shapes.
I also do ABC with him so I am trying.

Thanks for reading Amanda.

Its heart breaking when you see your children struggle. I have enroled DS1 aged three into a three year old program and am concerned that because of a speach delay he is having problems socially. It breaks my heart to think he will be picked on by the other children. He goes to speach therapy weekly and we work intensly with him at home, so I feel your pain. All you can do is try to encourage them to be confident and strong.

first of all i don't think you should not class your dd as dumb. maybe she is picking up on that and your own insecurities and it is being reflected in her school work. i think you should try teaching her to be confident in the things she is good at and i'm sure that she excels in some area. and praise her efforts on the things she isn't as good at.

maybe a tutor or some sort of out of school program might help her.

Hi thanks for your reply. My DS also went to speach therapy. He alot
better with his talking. One thing I think help was TV. I know that does'nt
sound good.
I worry about my kids being lonely as in no friends as I have no friends at all.
I was picked on at school .

I hate to say it but I know I am dumb. It hard everyday knowing
I have to try & help my kids learn when I have so much trouble myself.
Even writing out the shopping list .
I don't have a job. Which I would like to but just can't cause of my learning.
I feel bad cause it all my fault they are not smart.

Thanks for reading.

there is your problem. nothing good will come out of calling yourself dumb. would you like your daughter to say that about herself? i think you need to work on your self assteem issuse more than anything.

just because you can't spell doesn't make you dumb or restricts you from getting a job. the only thing doing that is you. i really think that you are doing your children a lot of harm by having that train of though. stop that i'm dumb mentality and start focusing on what you are good at and what you can achieve when you put your mind to it.

as i suggested earlier maybe consider a tutor for your dd. and for yourself some counselling and a visit to a government job agency they can help get you on track and get you some sort of training to develop some skills.

Perhaps you could look into a few ideas for learning at home, for you and the kids smile

You could go to a local second hand shop, for example the Salvos or Good Sammys. And buy some children's books. Reading is a form of self-education, and frequent exposure to language helps a lot to develop proficiency in it.

For maths, maybe ask the teachers if you can buy some practical maths tools. When I was at school, they had big blocks and it was for sorting out and viewing multiples of 10, up to 10 000. It helped a lot of kids. You could also buy some times tables posters and put them in your house, so your kids can notice it. There are calculator books you can buy that have sums and then they make words, that is a fun way to learn about numbers.

You may struggle because you did not get opportunities to learn. That doesn't mean you are dumb! And your kids probably just need a few more opportunities as well.

Maybe you could let them write the shopping list, or let them keep some food labels to read so that they can choose food with you at the shops. Maybe if you ask a doctor, you could obtain some resources for home learning opportunities like this kind of thing. I know Department of Education probably have a lot of simple ideas.

I will look for some websire links and see if I can find anything that you could look at. smile

I know how you feel. I have a child who is not academic at all.
She is 11 and is reading at a level of a 6 yr old and has trouble grasping maths concepts.
BUT she can build all sorts of things out of cardboard boxes -like cool dolls houses etc. She understands basic food science and can is able to formulate recipes. She is hands on and learns by doing things so therefore works with DH in the shed very well. She loves organising things and although she drives me crazy it is nice to know that if I got sick she would just about be able to organise a birthday party for me with a bit of help. She has a very witty sense of humor and makes the whole room light up just by walking into it.
So my DD is out of her depth at the moment in the school sector but one day soon she is going to be knocking the socks off people who doubt her.... she is one to watch.

She has had extra help, lots of extra help and continues to do so but I have accepted the fact that not all people are equal and thats okay.
I am sure that there is something that you are good at and im sure that you know what it is. I think that in life you need to focus on what you can do not what you cant do.... and you need to take up this attitude with your DD because if you are feeling sorry for her how is she going to learn to hold her head high and tap into her god given talents smile

Sorry I just press the report on one of the post. I did not mean to do it so sorry so sorry.

Thank you all so much for your reply's.

When I was teaching I had a sign up in my class that read "If, at the end of the day, you can say 'I have done my best', then you have succeeded.".

I think that you need to take some of the pressure off your daughter, and yourself. If she is trying her best at her work then you should be proud of that and the effort she is putting in to her work at school. Encourage her to keep doing her best because, at the end of the day, its all you can ask of her (and yourself). Giving her that encouragement and letting her know that you're proud of her for doing the best she can is going to give her confidence to keep working at her best and, over time, things that are currently challenging will start to become easier because she'll have the confidence to keep trying until she has success.

Try different ways of doing things at home too because people have different styles of learning. Even now I can still remember Mum and Dad getting us to practice our spelling in ways that weren't just writing them in books or spelling them out loud. Sometimes they'd take us out into the backyard just before bed time and give us sparklers and we'd get to practice "writing" our spelling words with the sparklers. Other times we'd go down to the beach for the day and they'd get us to write our spelling words in the sand. We were still "writing" but taking away the whole pencil and paper approach made it so much more meaningful. When I had to write the words, I was picturing how they looked in the after image from the sparklers or the sensations I felt as I wrote the letters out in the sand and it helped me to remember how to spell them.

Leisa.

I know it's a bit late, but it's probably still an issue.

I agree with others that putting yourself down is a huge hurdle you're making for yourself and can reflect back onto your kids. Counselling would be fantastic to consider and I know it's kind of stupid but telling yourself daily you're not dumb will actually sink in after a while!

If it makes you feel any better I've been at university for three years, have seen an amazing amount of crap spelling, bad pronunciations and social ineptness ... and They are at university! so really, I'm sure you could do anything if you just gave yourself a chance! The only difference is the people at uni have confidence smile

I also agree that a tutor would be the best idea for your kids, might be able to get a decent deal on a primary tutor to help both your DD and DS?
It's sad to hear the school doesn't sound very supportive. I have a DD who is struggling a bit at school and the school have done everything in their power, including outside care and counsellors! I think the best advice I ever got though was from the support teacher who told me to let mistakes slide (But the teacher was correcting them at school). The point was to enjoy and celebrate doing the work at home despite any problems. It made my DD a lot more interested in her work, she loves doing it now!

The only other thing I can think (if I was in your position) would be the push the school for more assistance instead of having your DD slip through the cracks. The second choice after that I'd do is search for another school that is more supportive and have better resources - I know that is difficult but there is a lot of school based programs out there that can and do help students... to the point I'm a little surprised she hasn't seen any of them sad ...yet!

Amanda, stop being so hard on yourself. There are many different types of intelligence - not just reading, writing and maths smile Some people are good at music, others have great interpersonal skills and are "people smart". There are people who can learn foreign languages really quickly, or paint amazing paintings or are great swimmers. There are also people who can get 5 kids ready for school, make sure they're all dressed and have their lunches ready on time. They can put the washing on, and clean the house whilst looking after a baby and still get dinner ready - most scientist wouldn't be able to do that.

Have you ever been tested for dyslexia? It's a learning disability. People with dyslexia can still learn - they just learn differently so they need to be taught differently.
If your little girl is having learning problems have her assessed so she can get extra help. If her teachers aren't willing to help speak to a CYH nurse or your GP. smile