Page 14 - Dainfern Precinct Living August Issue 2025

ESTATE MATTERS
TTERS
T
A
TE MA
ESTATE MATTERS
ES
TODAY'S CHILD
HOME FRONT

WHEN SCHOOL

SUDDENLY GETS SERIOUS

AND HOW TO HELP YOUR CHILD HANDLE IT

WHY GRADE 4 FEELS LIKE A panic. best by pacing the room and talking to
CLIFF-EDGE themselves like they’re giving a TED Talk to
Grade 4 is when the rules change: If you want your child to handle the traffic of the dog.
• They’re no longer learning how to senior school (and eventually university or
read — they’re expected to read to work), you lay the groundwork long before Pay attention early to what actually sticks:
learn. the freeway. • Visual thinkers: mind maps, colour
• Teachers start speaking in rubrics, That means: codes, diagrams.
not just reminders. • Tiny planners in little hands: • Talkers: explaining concepts out
• “Revise” stops meaning “look Choosing which homework to loud, teaching you (or the cat) what
over your notes” and starts tackle first is the start of time they’ve learned.
meaning “extract, condense, and management. • Hands-on learners: turning work
apply knowledge under timed • Same spot, same time: A study into games, building models, acting
conditions.” space that says “we mean things out.
It’s also when parents realise that the old business” — even if it’s the corner
“wing it the night before” approach won’t cut of the kitchen table — builds a work Your job isn’t to make them study your way.
it anymore — and that if we don’t teach study mindset. It’s to help them find their way — and trust it.
skills now, we’re setting our kids up for a • Timers, not tension: Short, focused Critical Thinking: The Secret Sauce
much harder climb later. study bursts beat long, grumpy School doesn’t always make space for
marathons. “why?” — but life depends on it.
TEXT AND PHOTOS BY ANTHONY CAVANAGH
THE CASE FOR STARTING EARLY
Think of study skills like learning to drive. FINDING THEIR ‘BEST WAY’ At dinner, in the car, wherever you can, drop
You don’t hand someone keys on their 18th (BECAUSE YOURS WON’T ALWAYS in little mental curveballs:
birthday and say, “Right, it’s all instinct from WORK) • “Do you think that’s always true?”
here.” You start in the quiet streets, you stall Some kids make rainbow-highlighted notes • “How would you explain this to a
a few times, you learn to reverse without worthy of Instagram. Others remember five-year-old?”

20 Kyalami Estates • CONNECT • Issue 2 • 2025
12 DPL issue 7 2025