Worksheet activities --- "Jumbo Book"

"Are you kidding me? These are homework, not games or toys." I am sure most people will react this way. However, I really mean that worksheets can be a "game" to any child. Learning the concept of encouragement from "Hooked on Phonics" set, I created a set of progress sheet that he can put a sticker whenever he finishes a chapter. I always give him a lot of praises and encouragement, following what I learned from the books.

Most of the time, my son likes to do worksheets. He understands that he learns something. I can see that he enjoys learning. I have made it clear to my son that everyone has "work" to be done. If he wants to play with his other toys, he must do 20 minutes of "work". To me, the goal is achieved when he does the worksheet. I seldom correct or check his work because my intention is to cultivate a habit in him to do the worksheets, and I learned that correcting his mistakes in a wrong way may discourage him.



I did not pay much attention on which books he should work on. I selected "Jumbo Book" because that was the only Singapore Syllabus worksheet available to me when I was in Malayisa. Someone told me that this was a Singapore textbook. You should be able to find this in major Popular Bookstores (but not every Popular Bookstore has it). In Penang, you can find this in Popular Gurney Plaza and perhaps Queensbay Mall. Please call up to make inquiry before you make the trip.

To state the fact right, most Singapore kindergartens do not use text book and it's wrong to think that Jumbo Book is a text book for Singapore kindergartens. I bought the Grammar book later as it is specifically fine tuned to improve skills on grammar. By the way, over 2.5years, my son has completed 4 Jumbo Books - nursery, K1 and K2 levels (for the ages of 4, 5 and 6 respectively), plus the Grammar worksheet.



Let me show you a few snapshots of his work. The "Jumbo Book" contents include science, numbers, grammar, creative writing, vocabulary etc. I won't reproduce too much here but show you a few pages that I like best to let you have a feel of how it looks like.





I like my son's work on creative writing. I am amazed by his ability to write sentences together to form a paragraph.





I admit that sometimes my son is reluctant to do the worksheets. He hates creative writing because he usually does not know what to write. The trick to overcome this is that I let him do less worksheets, and I always keep the time short. The stickers and the praises/encouragements that I gave also played an important role.

My son was going to attend primary school then. Realizing that, he volunteered to go extra miles to complete all his English related worksheets. I did not think that he could complete those worksheet last year, but he did.

Thanks to all the materials he did and the kindergarten's teacher, I am confident that my son would be able to cope with English language when he is in primary one in 2010.

P/S :
1) I can send you the progress sheets (Nursery, K1 and K2 for Jumbo Book) that I created if you want. Just let me know.
2) I wrote part of this in 2009.