ASSESSMENT books - children pout at the sight of them while parents remain their ardent supporters through the years, swearing on them for academic success and performance. I have yet to met a parent who dares to challenge this norm - that pages of drillings on a daily basis to improve the grades is a MUST to scoring.
Questions to ponder
Much discussion happens in every home about whether there's any creative learning taking place during drilling. So, is drilling by assessment books bad? Without careful planning, I would think so. But the more pertinent questions may be "how much?" and "what type of drills?". In the latter context, my question: Can we not afford to be more selective about the drill types instead of shoving a dozen assorted assessment books at our children? As a parent who had struggled with this issue before, I hope you might want to consider the following points when you next visit to the bookstore to bag assessment titles for your child's practice:
Establish the objective
Children vary in their learning abilities and styles, not to mention their different schedules or commitments to extra curricula and the environment in which they are brought up. With your child being a unique individual, it would be hard to "mainstream" his learning process. This may happen at institutional level, perhaps as a guide for easier management in the larger scheme of things. But that need not be so at home.
In the same vein, one parent's objective for the use of assessment books should technically differ from another. This is because not all such use of assessment materials guarantee performance. Purchasing the most challenging assessment book in the market may not meet your objective if you are unclear of what you truly hope to achieve from the exercise. It might just lead to more stress in the family and more importantly, lower your child's self esteem. Other than academic performance, think about the following possible outcomes for your child when using assessment books:
- Build interest and confidence for a genre or subject
Selecting challenging assessment titles do not help in fulfilling this objective especially when the child has demonstrated little affinity for the subject. Therefore, start with a book that your child can manage within his capacity. This will help to build his or her confidence. Look for materials that are able to facilitate engaging learning. Be guided by your common sense; for example, don't purchase a comprehension book loaded with passages of boring fairy tales if your child is a pragmatic not inclined to such literature.
- Cultivate study discipline
This is an essential attribute. I think parents can best help their child to nurture this objective through the use of assessment books. However, if the schedule is too demanding, lasting hour after hour with no rest and play (and I mean real play), then it will not meet your objective. The child will eventually reject the drill. So it is important not to overload and pile the study table with assessment books. Remember how you would feel if your table was being piled up with unpaid bills!
- Improve a skill; not perfect a score
Assessment books serve to strengthen areas in which a child is relatively weak. Through the work completed by the child, his problem areas are surfaced, offering opportunities for us to correct, teach and improve. Hence, expect mistakes (if you have indeed chosen the right material) as part of learning and skill enhancement for your child. It would be unnecessarily stressful if one needs a child to perfect his score even in the use of assessment books.
Identify/know your child's area of weakness
Most parents who coach their children would be able to ascertain their area of weaknesses. This knowledge can then be used to select the appropriate assessment books that address specific needs. For example, there is no need to continuously drill a child in assessment books based on general test-paper format if instead the child has specific difficulties in comprehension and cloze passages. In the case of mathematics, I found books that drill by topics rather dry and boring for our children who mostly would have more than sufficient practice in such areas through the workbooks and worksheets provided by their school teachers.
As there is limited time, apply the 80-20 rule.
- If practice through assessment books is a form of discipline, then have your child to work only on his areas of weakness daily.
- To strengthen his command over a subject as a whole, use test papers only on a weekly or fortnightly basis.
This will permit your child the time to relax, enjoy a movie with you and most importantly not bore him. By this considered approach, you would be helping to enhance his interest in the subject for the long run and avoid straining the parent-child relationship.
Go through your child's homework from school and/or tuition class
At school, children are provided worksheets and workbooks for practice. Make it a point to find out what your child is being provided by the school teachers and avoid duplication that will bore your child. If your child is being tutored, the materials provided by the tutor should be sufficient without you having to purchase more to add to the load. However, do peruse the resources used by the tutor to ensure they are indeed suitable for your child.
Determine the strength of the publisher
Remember that most publishers strive to put out as many titles as they can to achieve the critical mass that is essential to sustain their business model. It is a daunting task selecting from the many assessment books out there but try to make discerning purchase decisions by noting the following:
- Do not assume a new book that's published is completely new. Know that there is lots of repackaging of old titles/materials and changes of book covers.
- Note that some publishers specialise in certain subjects while others attempt to be master of all.
Be content (not price) sensitive when it comes to picking the appropriate material.
