How to help your child learn faster

This page has information and advice about how parents can help their child develop their English at home.

Introduction

In this article I would like to make suggestions to parents who wish to help their child develop her English at home. Supportive and knowledgeable parents play an important role in the child learning English enjoyably and effectively.

Reading

In my opinion, @ the single most effective thing a student can do at home is to read regularly. ~ If this is done over a long period, it will benefit your child in various ways.

It will obviously develop her general ability to understand what she reads. But it will also increase her vocabulary and provide models of grammar and sentence structure that will help her in her own writing.

Listening and speaking

Your child can develop her listening skills at home by borrowing e-books or DVDs from the school library. For speaking practice your child could give a summary of the main events in the stories she has read or heard. Or she could state some of the important information she has learned from non-fiction sources.

Writing

Writing can be practised if your child keeps a journal. For example, she could record her response to the books she has read or movies or TV programmes she has seen. She could also create her own fiction stories.

Grammar and vocabulary

In the opinion of many researchers in second language learning, @@ grammar and vocabulary are best learned in the contexts of reading or listening ~~. However, there are numerous grammar and vocabulary practice books available, as well as a large number of online resources. If your child has practice materials that she enjoys using, there is no reason why she should not spend an hour or so a week on such exercises.

School subject help

The suggestions made above will help your child to improve her general English proficiency. And this of course will have a beneficial effect on her other school work.

You may, however, wish to help her more directly with her assignments in her other subjects, such as science, history, mathematics, etc. In this case the best thing you can do is to have at home good reference materials*, in your own language.

Your child can consult these to increase her general understanding of the topic she is learning. It would also help very much if you could discuss with her what she has read, again in your own language.

This will deepen her background knowledge and prepare her to understand the difficult English she will hear and read in school.

Final important advice

The final piece of advice here is perhaps the most important. @@@ If your child does not herself have the desire to do extra practice at home as suggested above, then it is best not to force her. ~~~

She is probably working hard enough already and may prefer to spend her free time just doing nothing, or in a sporting or musical activity. This mental and physical relaxation is the best way to prepare her for the hard work of the next school day.

In fact, being involved in an after-school activity is a great way for your child to mix with native-speakers of English and develop her speaking and listening skills.

Note: I don't consider reading for pleasure to be extra practice. So I will repeat a sentence from above: The single most effective thing a student can do at home is to read regularly.

This advice also applies to reading in your own language.

List of reference materials

*Reference materials include encyclopedias, atlases, bilingual dictionaries, and textbooks from your child's native school system.

Wikipedia is a good source of information in all the world's major languages.

Wikipedia also has a version for non-native English speakers, called Simple English Wikipedia. I recommend this as the English resource to consult when reading up on the topics that are covered in mainstream subjects such as science or history.

Here is a brief video on the same topic. And here is a video on the related topic: Should I speak English with my child?