Maximising my child’s academic performance: the early school years

Many people believe that learning the alphabet and basic counting before they get to school is critical for long-term academic success.

Truth is its not an essential requirement of starting primary school, they will go through it all once they get there. What is critical however it that they enjoy school and having a little headstart may help to lessen the risk of them struggling early on. Kids don’t tend to enjoy things if they are struggling to understand them. Be careful of trying to teach them too much though before they go to school. Teachers still have to teach the basics and if kids already know a lot of it they risk being bored, which is likely to create behavioural problems and is an academic killer.

Also critical is the self-image that is established early in their academic career. If kids think they are capable, they will expect themselves to do well and do the work to make sure that they do.

Research suggests that the best predictor of long-term academic success when they enter school has nothing to do with academics. It is all about their sociability skills or how well they get along with everybody. So, make sure they have plenty of practice playing with other kids and that they learn how to share, not to fight and to follow instructions. Again, much of this relates to their enjoyment of their early experiences which are critical.

As they go through school the active interest that you take in what they are doing, whether its academically, kicking a ball or trying to play a tune will encourage them to do better at that thing. Basically, a child will do their best to do things that please you, particularly if your relationship is really positive.

Lastly, it is worth noting that working really hard to follow all of these guidelines and encouraging them to do really well at one or more things creates the potential to create a child prodigy. However, the more narrow their focus becomes on any one thing the more likely the more they are likely to miss out on critical other areas for development, including down time – time to sit, to process all that they are experiencing and rejuvenate. The more singular their focus, the more a child will struggle to maintain good balance in their lives physically and mentally. They may also struggle with life if they feel too much pressure to perform. Giving them a grounding in lots of things through lots and lots of play gives them a good basis to be successful at what most interests them as they mature.