The Transition From Year 6 to Year 7

The Transition From Year 6 to Year 7

Waking up on the first day of year seven can be a very daunting experience. There are many different challenges the young people face in high school nowadays including but not limited to cyber bullying, issues with resilience, anxiety and depression and myriad others.

Many of your child’s subjects will change and adapt from a primary school curriculum to high school curriculum. The English curriculum in the transition from primary school to high school changes, however many of those foundational skills will still be tested. Students must be able to use grammar, punctuation, spelling, diction, syntax and many of the other language devices that make our writing soar.

When you are looking at helping your child transition from Year 6 to Year seven and studying English there are a few things that you need to know.

1. Find Your Reading Mojo

There is nothing worse than coming to school on the first day of year seven and not knowing what is going on. Usually your school will give you your booklist in advance of going into year seven and all of the required reading will be on that booklist. This gives your child a chance to get a head start on any of the reading that they will need to do during the year. If not, there are plenty of other options available to students but the most important thing is that they start reading as soon as possible.

Reading is the one skill that you can’t just pick up in your 11 and be really, really good at it. Many of my students wish that they had started reading earlier and many of my parents just don’t know how to make their child read. The biggest thing about choosing a book in the transition from year 6 to 7 is helping your child choose coming-of-age stories to help them navigate this difficult period in their lives. 

2. Learn Your Grammar and Punctuation

There is nothing that a high school teacher dislikes more and students who do not have the basic grasp of English grammar and punctuation. Over the term break, have your child do some simple activities on commas, possessive, apostrophes, contractions, plurals and capital letters and how to structure a good sentence.

There are many sites online that give simple activities for year six year seven level that should be suited to your child. 

3. Get Out There and Have Some Experiences

Having options and activities outside of school work actually helps your child to learn to plan their day and find other experiences to talk about when they are doing. English requires a lot of creative writing in year 7 to year 12 and when they don’t have fulfilling experiences outside of the classroom it can become difficult to imagine what they should write about in their stories in their feature articles and memoirs.

One thing you can do is make an effort to sit down with your family every Friday night and watch a film together and discuss the plot and ask them some simple questions after watching the film to encourage your child to think about how films are structured and how narratives are structured this will help come up with fantastic ideas when they are then in their classroom and having to think about a story.

Some other things you can do is send them to drama lessons, coding camp or other classes during the holidays that will give them fresh experiences of the world and allow them to flex their creativity. Finally, a free way to do this is to get out and experience nature – go down to the beach and describe what you say, go into the hills and describe all the nature that’s around you. There are things all around us in our lives and we have to help children open their eyes to the different experiences.

Education For All Girls Helps Us All

Education For All Girls Helps Us All

At the end of every successful year in my business, I like to pay it forward and help other young women to find upward mobility in their lives. 

I believe education is the greatest gift we can give young women to allow them to be financially independent and proud of their achievements. And yet, there are still 130 million girls around the world who are denied an education. 

When we support young women, the whole world benefits. 

I have supported Plan International for many years as they do such a fantastic job of supporting and bettering the lives of young women. 

This year I have donated to allow five girls to access a legal identity. 

According to Plan International: 

Millions of girls grow up without formal recognition of their existence. By helping provide essential items like a girl’s birth certificate, you could protect her from early marriage, exploitation and trafficking, and secure a future where she can vote, work and claim her rights.

When girls are educated, the barriers to equality are much easier to break – both for themselves and future generations.

For every additional year of school that a girl completes, infant mortality rates are reduced by 5 to 10%. And 12 years of education for every girl would reduce child marriage worldwide by 64 percent.

A girl who can stay in school is more likely to grow into a woman who marries later, has a smaller and healthier family, earn better income and pursue the life she wants. Plus, she’ll go on to educate her family and her community – and she’ll break the cycle of poverty.

So what’s the impact?

Before discovering Plan International’s vocational training, Faith, now 21, was stuck in an abusive marriage. This is the power of your support:

“Just like I was, many of these girls are trapped in violent marriages and simply cannot leave their husbands because they are financially dependent on them. But vocational training can give these young women skills with which they can support themselves so they are no longer reliant on their husbands. Thanks to this vocational training, I can become financially independent.”

To help the work of Plan International, donate here.