Ideas to help with reading, writing and maths

You can help your child's learning every day, by supporting and encouraging them and being excited by their learning. Here are some ideas to keep them developing their reading, writing and maths skills at home. Have a look at the year group for your child and have fun.

Year 1

Reading at home

Make reading fun

Reading at home should be fun and easy. It should be something you both look forward to and a time for laughter and talk. 

  • Share the reading, take turns, or see whether your child wants to read or be read to today. 
  • All children like to be read to, so keep reading to them. You can read in your first language. 
  • Visit the library together and help them choose books to share. 
  • Read messages from family or whānau aloud. 
  • Play games together and discuss any unfamiliar words that come up during them. 

Here's a tip: talk a lot to your child while you are doing things together. Use the language that works best for you and your child. Praise their effort. 

Talk about reading 

  • Talk about pictures in books. 
  • Sing waiata and songs, read poems, say nursery rhymes, and make up rhymes together (the funnier the better). 
  • Be a role model. Let your child see you enjoying reading and talk about what you are reading. 
  • Talk about content that you both might read or watch or that your child reads and watches, ask about characters personalities, storylines, and events. 
  • Point out words on signs, shops, and labels. 
  • Play word games like "I spy" and "Simon says". 

Make it a special time together 

Reading is a great chance for you and your child to spend special time together. Make reading: 

  • quiet and relaxing. 
  • a time to sit close to your child. 
  • interruption-free for 10 to 15 minutes. 
  • an enjoyable, interesting, and special time. 
  • a time to praise your child for making an effort. 

Here’s a tip: if your child is stuck on a word, wait a few seconds then ask them to sound out the word. Get them to break the word up into each sound e.g. c-a-t then blend the word together. Ask them if that word then makes sense in the sentence. If they miss a sound, get them to try again and get all the sounds in the word. If they don’t know what the word means talk to them about the meaning.  

Help your child to link stories to their own life. Remind them about what they have done when a similar thing happens in the story. 

Writing at home 

Make writing fun 

  • Help your child write an alphabet letter, then go letter hunting in your house or in a book to find that letter. 
  • Let your child see you writing – you can use your first language. 
  • Encourage them to write shopping lists or make birthday cards. 
  • Water and a paintbrush on a dry path or a stick in the sand are fun ways to write letters and words. 
  • Support the learning of letters and sounds using appropriate apps.  

Here's a tip: it is important that they have fun when writing at home and that they keep trying.  If they get letters or words backwards or misspelt, praise them for trying and encourage them to have another look at it.  If letters are backwards, you can write the correct letter somewhere for them to copy.

Give them reasons to write 

  • Write to each other. Write notes to your child and leave them in interesting places, like their lunch box. Ask them to write a reply. 
  • Help them message family, whānau or friends.
  • Work with them to put labels on special things – like the door to their room or their toy box. 

Here's a tip: display their work. Put it on the fridge. Be proud of it. Share it with others. 

Talk about their writing 

  • Talk about the letters in your child’s name and where the name comes from. 
  • Help them create a scrapbook with pictures. Encourage them to write stories under the pictures and talk to you about them. 
  • Ask them to write about pictures they draw on paper or on a device. Or get them to tell you the story and you write or type it under the picture. 

Here's a tip: talk to your child about what they write. Be interested. If you don’t understand what your child’s picture or story is about, ask them to tell you about it. 

Encourage writing 

  • Have felt pens, pencils, crayons, paper, or a device available. 
  • Use milk bottle tops with letters on them to create words. 
  • Put magnetic letters on the fridge and ask what words they can make with the letters. 

Maths at home 

Talk together and have fun with numbers, shapes, games, and patterns 

Help your child to: 

  • find numbers and shapes around your home and neighbourhood, (clocks, letterboxes, signs etc.) 
  • count forwards and backwards starting with different numbers, for example, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62, then back again  (use clocks, fingers and toes, letterboxes, action rhymes) 
  • copy, continue and make patterns when counting "clap 1, stamp 2, clap 3, stamp 4, clap 5 …" 
  • do sums using objects such as stones or marbles eg 6 + 2, 4 + 4, 5 + 3 
  • make up number stories, for example, "You have 2 brothers and 2 sisters. There are 4 of them". 
  • compare objects side by side (shorter/longer, shorter/taller, lighter/heavier, or holds less/more) 
  • connect days of the week to activities on those days 
  • connect time of the day to activities at that time (we go to school at 8 am, we go to bed at 8 pm) 
  • build with blocks and talk about the features 
  • sort objects by feature (find all the yellow socks) 
  • make predictions about what might happen in a story or a game. 

Here's a tip: maths is an important part of everyday life and there are lots of ways you can make it fun for your child. 

Use easy, everyday activities 

Involve your child in: 

  • preparing and sharing out food, for example, "We have eight carrots". Ask, "How can we share them between us?" 
  • talking about time, for example, "lunchtime", "storytime", "bedtime" 
  • using words in everyday play, such as "under", "over", "between", "around", "behind", "up", "down", "heavy", "light", "round", "circle", "yesterday", "tomorrow", “left”, and “right”. You can get books, games, movies or find online content with these words and ideas in them too 
  • asking questions such as "How many apples do we need for lunches? What do you think the weather is going to be like today/tomorrow? What are we going to do next?" 
  • organising books or toys on a shelf from tallest to shortest. 

Here's a tip: use lots of maths words as your child is playing to develop their understanding of early maths (for example, "over", "under", "first, second, third", "round", "through", "before", "after"). Use the language that works best for you and your child. 

For wet afternoons/school holidays/weekends 

Get together with your child and: 

  • play with water using different shaped containers and measuring cups in the sink or bath 
  • bake and talk to your child about the recipe/ingredients using words like "how many?" "how much?" "more". Count how many teaspoons of baking soda are needed, how many cups of flour, how many muffin cases 
  • play dress-ups and getting dressed, use words like "short", "long", and ask questions like "what goes on first?", "what goes on next?", "does it fit?" 
  • create a ‘sorting box’ with all sorts of ‘treasure’, for example, bottle tops, shells, stones, poi, toys, acorns, pounamu (greenstone), cardboard shapes, leaves. Ask questions like "how many?", "which is the biggest group?", "which is the smallest?", "how many for each of us?", “what shape are those?” 
  • do jigsaw puzzles, play cards or board games and build with blocks. 

Here’s a tip: be positive about maths and show your child where you use maths. This will help them build confidence in maths. Praise their effort.  

Year 2 

Reading at home 

Make reading fun 

Reading at home needs to be fun and easy. It should be something you both look forward to, a time for laughter and talk. 

  • Find a comfortable, quiet place for the 2 of you to cosy up and read for 10–15 minutes. 
  • If you or your child start to feel stressed, take a break and read the rest of the story aloud yourself – keep it fun. 
  • Make some puppets (from old socks or cardboard tubes or use cut-outs on sticks etc.) that you and your child can use to act out the story you have read. Or dress up and make it into a play. 
  • Play card games (you can make the cards yourself). 
  • Read songs, waiata, poems and rhymes and sing them together, too. 

Here's a tip: when they are reading, your child will still be coming across words they don’t know. When this happens, you could remind them to think about what they already know to do when they get stuck. Break the word up into individual sounds and then blend the word together e.g. m-i-d-n-igh-t then blended to midnight. If they don’t know what the word means talk to them about the meaning.  

Take your child to the library 

  • Help them choose books to share. 
  • Find other books by the same author or on the same topic (or look for more information online – you might have to be the reader for this one). 

Here's a tip: help your child to link stories to their own life. Remind them about what they have done when a similar thing happens in the story. 

Talk about reading 

  • Talk about the story and the pictures, other stories you have read, and experiences you have both had that are like those in the story. 
  • Sometimes you can be the listener, sometimes the reader and sometimes you can take turns. They might like to read to the cat, their teddy or other whānau members. 
  • Keep reading to them no matter how old they are – they can understand more challenging books than they can read themselves. 
  • Encourage your child to read all sorts of things, for example, online menus for streaming platforms, street signs and food labels. Simple recipes are great, and you get to eat what you’ve read about, too! 

Here's a tip: talk with your child all the time and give them time to talk with you. You can use your first language. 

Writing at home 

Make writing fun 

  • Encourage your child to write whether it is on paper or on a device. It is OK for you to help and share the writing. Praise the effort they are putting into their writing.  
  • Once they have finished writing, encourage them to go back and check what they have written. 
  • Make a physical or digital photo book and get your child to write captions. 
  • Scrapbooks paper and digital scrapbooks are fun, too. Get your child to write captions or stories for photos or pictures found online about a favourite subject, dogs, your family, motorbikes or the latest toy craze. 
  • Play with words. Finding and discussing interesting new words can help increase the words your child uses when they write. Look up words in an online dictionary or talk to family and whānau to find out more about the meaning and the whakapapa (origins) of the words. 

Here's a tip: talk a lot to your child while you are doing things together. Use the language that works best for you and your child. 

Give them reasons to write 

  • Write lists: ‘Things I need from the shop’, ‘Games that I enjoy’, ‘Things I want to do in the holidays’. The last one can be cut up and go into a box or bag for a lucky dip when the holidays finally arrive. 
  • Write out recipes or instructions for other people to follow (especially fun if the instructions are for an adult).
  • Keep a diary, especially if you are doing something different and exciting. Your child can draw the pictures or find photos for the diary. Their diary could be done online too. 
  • Write letters, cards, and messages to friends, family and whānau (you might write replies sometimes, too). 
  • Write secret messages for others to find in their lunch box or under their pillow. 

Here's a tip: display your child’s work. Be proud of it. Put it on the fridge or share it with others. 

Talk about their writing

  • Make up a different ending for a favourite story together and get them to write it down. 
  • Ask them to write about pictures they draw. Get them to tell you the story. 
  • Keep writing fun and use any excuse you can think of to encourage your child to write about anything, any time. 

Here's a tip:  it is important that they have fun when writing at home and that they keep trying. If they get letters or words backwards or misspelt, praise them for trying and encourage them to have another look at it.  If letters are backwards, you can write the correct letter somewhere for them to copy. 

Maths at home 

Talk together and have fun with numbers, shapes, games, and patterns 

Help your child to: 

  • find and connect numbers around your home and neighbourhood, for example, find 15, 17, and 19 on letterboxes, which ones are even and which are odd? 
  • count forwards and backwards in 1’s, 2’s, 5’s, and 10’s starting with different numbers, for example, 58, 60, 62, 64, 66 then back again (count in 5’s and 10’s on a clock) 
  • add and subtract numbers, for example, 53 + 21, 29 + 9, 55 -32 
  • find out the ages of family or whānau members 
  • give step-by-step instructions on how to do something 
  • use language like certain, likely, unlikely and impossible when they are making a prediction. 

Here's a tip: be positive about maths and show your child where you use maths. This will help them build confidence in maths. Praise their effort. 

Use easy, everyday activities

Involve your child in: 

  • making lunch or a meal for a party or a hui. Make sandwiches in different shapes: Can they cut their sandwich in half? Can they cut the other sandwich in half a different way? Find out what sandwiches people like to eat: How many people like cheese, how may like chicken? 
  • sorting (washing, odd socks, toys, cans) while tidying up 
  • remembering and repeating phone numbers they might need 
  • telling the time using language like o’clock, half past and quarter past 
  • a shape and number search together wherever you are, like numbers of shoes, shapes of doors and windows 
  • comparing how long it takes to do different things, for example the amount of time it takes to drive to koro’s house versus walking to koro’s house 
  • helping at the supermarket. Ask your child to get specific items (2 litres of milk, 250g of mince). 

Here's a tip: maths is an important part of everyday life and there are lots of ways you can make it fun for your child. 

For wet afternoons/school holidays/weekends 

Get together with your child and: 

  • use maths words during play (treasure hunts, obstacle courses, building huts). For example, "under', "over", 'between", 'around", "behind", "up", "down', "heavy", "light', 'round", "your turn next", "before", "after", "left" and "right", "square", "triangle". You can use your first language 
  • play with big cardboard boxes using words like "inside", "outside" 
  • play games and do puzzles or jigsaws, "I spy something that is longer, bigger, smaller than ..." 
  • do water play using different shaped containers and measuring cups 
  • bake – talk to your child about the recipe/ingredients and how many pieces you need to feed everyone 
  • dance to music and sing/clap to favourite songs  
  • make and play stick games with tī rākau or newspaper rolls  
  • play with a pack of cards or dice 
  • fold and cut paper dolls and other repeating shapes 
  • make up addition and subtraction problems using numbers to 100 
  • look at a calendar and ask, for example, "how many days/weeks until an event?", "how many days in the month?", "how many weekends?" 
  • trace over repeated patterns (for example, kōwhaiwhai patterns) 
  • encourage your child to look for patterns. 
  • make a play shop with priced items, and take turns paying with pretend money 
  • take turns to make a simple structure with Lego or blocks, and the other person has to replicate it. 

Here's a tip: the way your child is learning to solve maths problems may be different from when you were at school. Get them to show you how they do it and support them in their learning.

Year 3 

Reading at home 

Make reading fun 

  • Have fun singing along to songs or YouTube videos together.
  • Read to your child every day. You can use your first language.
  • Have a pile of reading materials available. For example, library books (non-fiction and fiction), online recipes, simple timetables, magazines, and any other reading that supports your child’s current interest. 
  • Encourage your child to retell favourite stories or parts of stories in their own words.  
  • Play card games (you can make the cards yourself) and video games together. 

Here are some tips: when they are reading, your child will be working at solving unfamiliar words by themselves. If they need help you could ask them to look at groups of letters they know make a sound or sounds to break the word up and then blend it together. If you or your child starts to feel stressed by what they’re reading, take a break and read the rest of the story aloud yourself. Keep it fun. 

Make it real 

  • Reading makes more sense if your child can relate it to their own life. Help them to make connections between what they are reading and their own lives and experiences. For example, "That’s a funny story about a grandad. What does your grandad do that makes you laugh?", "We saw a big mountain in that book, what is our mountain called, and where did the name come from?" 
  • Look for opportunities for your child to read wherever you are, for example, signs, advertising billboards, junk mail, recipes and online content. 
  • Show your child that reading is fun and important to you by letting them see you reading. 

Find out together 

  • Visit the library often and help your child to choose books that interest them.
  • Talk with older people or kaumātua in your family about interesting stories and people from your child’s past that you could find out more about together.  
  • Ask your child questions (and support them to find the answers) to widen their reading experiences. For example, "What’s the quickest biscuit recipe?", "What time is the next bus to town?" 
  • Help your child with any words that they don’t understand. Look them up together in an online dictionary if you need to. 

Writing at home 

Writing for fun 

  • Talk about interesting words with your child, especially ones that are fun to say, like "hippopotamus" or "ringaringa". Short and simple games could involve finding how many little words can be found using the letters in the word ‘elephant’. 
  • Play word games together online or in local newspapers. 
  • Make up a story or think of a pakiwaitara (legend) or traditional tale and act it out with costumes and music, write down the names of the characters or tīpuna (ancestors). 
  • Make up a play with your child. You could help your child to write the play down. Use puppets they design and make themselves to give a performance to the family. 

Here's a tip: keep writing fun and use any excuse to encourage your child to write about anything, any time. 

Writing for a reason 

  • Writing for a real purpose can help your child want to write. For example, messaging an invitation to whānau, or writing thank you notes. 
  • Personalising notes by cutting, decorating, sticking, or stamping are great skills for coordinating fingers and being creative. You can create digital cards with your child too, by helping them find GIFs, filters, and other fun effects.  
  • Encourage your child to write what they need to pack for a holiday, dictate your shopping list to them, or get them to write a list of jobs that need doing. 

Here's a tip: talk about what your child writes. Be interested. If you don’t understand what your child’s picture or story is about, ask them to explain. 

Supporting your child's writing 

  • Talk to your child about what you are writing. Let them see you making lists, typing messages, filling in forms. 
  • When you need to complete a form, ask for or print an extra form so that your child can do their own ‘grown up’ writing. 
  • Display your child’s writing where others can admire and read it. 
  • Play with words. Find and discuss interesting new words (this can help increase the words your child uses when they write). Look words up in an online dictionary or online or talk to family and whānau members to learn the whakapapa (origins) of the words. 

Here's a tip: be a great role model. Show your child that you write for all sorts of reasons. Let them see you enjoying writing. You can use your first language – this helps your child’s learning, too. 

Maths at home 

Talk together and have fun with numbers, shapes, games, and patterns 

Help your child to: 

  • find and connect numbers around your home and neighbourhood – phone numbers, clocks, letterboxes, road signs, sign showing distance 
  • name the number that is 10 more or 10 less than before or after a number up to 1000 
  • make patterns forwards and backwards in 1s, 2s, 5s, 10s and 100s starting with different numbers (for example 13, 23, 33, 43…, …43, 33, 23, 13) 
  • make different types of patterns by drumming, clapping, stamping, dancing or drawing patterns that repeat and describe this pattern for someone else to follow 
  • find out the ages and birth dates of family or whānau members 
  • do addition and subtraction problems using two- and three-digit numbers, for example, 231 + 245, 154 - 23 
  • use groups of 10 that add to 1000 eg 500 + 500, 300 + 700 
  • use and talk about simple fractions (halves to eighths) of groups or shapes, i.e. cutting up a cake into eight pieces for an eighth, or folding napkins into quarters.  

Here’s a tip: be positive about maths and show your child where you use maths. This will help them build confidence in maths. Praise their effort. 

Use easy, everyday activities 

Involve your child in: 

  • telling the time using words like half past, quarter past and quarter to.
  • learning their 2, 5 and 10 times tables.
  • reading and sharing a book. Ask them questions about numbers in the story and use the number of pages as a way to practise number facts, too.
  • doing a shape and number search when you are reading a book or looking at art (such as carvings and sculpture).
  • Using a calendar to work out how many days until an important event. 
  • using kitchen scales to weigh ingredients for cooking or baking. 

Here’s a tip: be positive about maths and show your child where you use maths. This will help them build confidence in maths. Praise their effort. 

For wet afternoons/school holidays/weekends 

Get together with your child and: 

  • play games, for example, board games, games with dice, card games, jigsaw puzzles 
  • make your own advertising pamphlet. Cut out and sort images to go on it, make pretend money to spend 
  • make a play shop and take turns ‘buying’ things, and giving change for simple amounts of money 
  • grow seeds or sprouts and measure the growth each week
  • create a repeating pattern  
  • go on a treasure hunt. Make a map with clues and see who can get to the treasure first 
  • dance to music and sing/clap to favourite songs, make up a dance sequence each – can you copy each other? 
  • both take turns closing your eyes and describing how to get from the front gate to the kitchen, from the kitchen to their bedroom, from home to school 
  • do timed activities. You hold the watch, and they count how many times they can bounce a ball in a minute 
  • play guess-and-check games using different shaped jars. How many beans, buttons, pegs in the container? 
  • help your child weigh or measure ingredients as you cook together.

Here's a tip: the way your child is learning to solve maths problems may be different to when you were at school. Get them to show you how they do it and support them in their learning. 

Year 4 

Reading at home 

Read and talk together 

  • Get your child to tell you about what they are reading. Who is their favourite character and why? Is there anyone like that in your family? What do they think is going to happen? What have they learnt from their reading? Does it remind them of any of their own experiences? 
  • Help your child with any words they don’t understand – look them up together in an online dictionary if you need to. 
  • Read recipes, instructions, maps, diagrams, signs and text messages. It will help your child to understand that words can be organised in different ways on a page, depending on what it’s for. 
  • Read junk mail or look at online ads – your child could compare costs, make their own ‘advertisements’ by cutting up junk mail or come up with clever sentences for a product they like. 

Here's a tip: talk a lot with your child while you are doing things together. Use the language that works best for you and your child. 

Read with others 

  • If your child has chosen something to read that is too hard at the moment, take turns and read it together. 
  • Reading to younger brothers or sisters, whānau or grandparents will give your child an opportunity to practise reading out loud. 
  • Encourage other family and whānau members (Aunty, Grandma, Koro) to read to and with your child.  
  • Playing board games and video games is important, too. 
  • Choose games that everyone wants to play. Make them challenging, not too easy. 

Here are some tips: keep the magic of listening to a good story alive by reading either made-up, retold or read-aloud stories to your child – with lots of excitement through the use of your voice! 

When they are reading, the most common difficulty your child is likely to have is working out the meaning of new words, phrases and expressions. To do this your child will use their knowledge of words and word patterns (eg prefixes, suffixes and root words) to help build meaning. You may need to remind your child to read back and forward for clues to help their understanding of what they are reading. Talk with your child about the meaning of new words. 

Take your child to the library 

  • Help your child to choose a variety of books they want to read. 
  • Help them look for books about topics they’re learning about at school. 
  • Get your child to choose a book that you can read to them (listening to you read helps them with their reading). 
  • Encourage your child to retell favourite stories or parts of stories in their own words. 

Here's a tip: help your child link stories to their own life. Remind them about what they have done when a similar thing happens in the story. 

Writing at home 

Write for fun 

  • Writing about their heroes, sports events, tīpuna (ancestors), hobbies and interests helps your child to stay interested in what they are writing about. 
  • Help your child to leave messages in sand on the beach, send a message in a bottle, do code crackers, word puzzles, crosswords, word finds online – these are all fun to do together. 
  • Make up a story or think of a pakiwaitara (legend) and act it out with costumes and music. Write down the names of the characters or tīpuna (ancestors). 
  • Using a digital device, encourage your child to write, email, message and publish or print for pleasure (emails, birthday cards, poems, jokes, letters, pictures with captions).  

Here's a tip: keep writing fun and use any excuse you can think of to encourage your child to write about anything, any time. 

Talk about your child's writing 

  • Get your child to talk about their writing and share it 
  • Either physically or digitally cut out words and letters to make stories, codes, poems, puzzles and more… 
  • Play with words. Thinking of interesting words and discussing new ones can help increase the words your child uses when they write – look words up in an online dictionary or talk with family and whānau to find out more about where the words come from. 

Here's a tip: talk about what your child writes. Be interested. If you don’t understand what their story is about, ask them to tell you more about it. Use questions they will want to answer. 

Write for a reason 

  • Get your child to help write the shopping list, invitation lists for family events, menus for special dinners, thank-you cards when someone does something nice. 
  • Postcards are a good size for a sentence or two and they are cheap to post, too.  
  • Have a special place to keep your child’s writing at home (notice board, fridge, folder). You might frame a piece of writing and hang it up, too. 

Here's a tip: be a great role model. Show your child that you write for all sorts of reasons. Let them see you enjoying writing. Write to them sometimes, too. You can use your first language – this helps your child’s learning, too. 

Maths at home 

Talk together and have fun with numbers, shapes, games, and patterns 

Help your child to: 

  • find and read large numbers in your environment eg nine thousand, three hundred and twenty three  
  • count forwards and backwards (starting with numbers like 1098, 1099,1100,1101 then back again) 
  • make patterns when counting – forwards and backwards, starting with different numbers (73, 83, 93, 103… or 118, 108, 98, 88…) 
  • find families of facts when multiplying and dividing with 3 and 4, for example, if your child knows 3 × 4 = 12, then they will also know that 4 × 3 = 12, 12 ÷ 4 = 3 and 12 ÷ 3 = 4 
  • estimate the size of objects using tools they have available, like the width of their hand or the length of their foot 
  • work out patterns – make codes from numbers 
  • notice the right angles and lines around you 

Here’s a tip: be positive about maths and show your child where you use maths. This will help them build confidence in maths. Praise their effort. 

Use easy, everyday activities 

Involve your child in: 

  • making and organising lunch or a meal for a party or a hui, including equal sharing of fruit/biscuits/sandwiches/drinks 
  • helping at the supermarket – choose items to weigh – how many apples/bananas weigh a kilo? Look for the best buy between different makes of the same items (eg blocks of cheese) – check on the amount of sugar or salt per serving 
  • telling the time to the nearest 5 minutes 
  • deciding how much money to pay the parking meter and what time you will need to be back before the meter expires 
  • thinking about how many phone numbers they can remember – talk about what they do to help them remember the series of numbers 
  • reading together – help them look for numbers, shapes, measurements, graphs and other maths ideas 
  • using a map or app to plan a route to a new location  
  • Looking at a weather forecast and talking about the chance of rain, sun etc.  
  • Wrapping up presents, or packaging items to be posted 

Here's a tip: maths is an important part of everyday life and there are lots of ways you can make it fun for your child. 

For wet afternoons/school holidays/weekends 

Get together with your child and: 

  • play card and board games that use guessing and checking 
  • look at junk mail or online shops – which is the best value? Ask your child what they would buy if they had $10/$100/$1,000 to spend 
  • do complicated jigsaw puzzles 
  • cook or bake – get them to select the appropriate measuring cups, spoons (½ and ¼ teaspoon) and scales to use 
  • collect boxes – undo and see if you can make them up again or make it into something else 
  • make paper darts and change the weight so that they fly differently, work out which is the best design 
  • create a repeating pattern (eg kōwhaiwhai patterns) to fill up a page or decorate a card 
  • play maths "I Spy" – something that is ½ a km away, something that has 5 parts hide something from each other and draw a map or hide several clues – can you follow the map or the clues and find it? 
  • do skipping ropes/elastics – how long will it take to jump 20 times? 
  • look at paper or online maps to find important locations, i.e. where were you born, where does Nana live?  

Here's a tip - the way your child is learning to solve maths problems may be different to when you were at school. Get them to show you how they do it and support them in their learning. 

Year 5 

Reading at home 

Talk about their reading 

  • Ask your child what they are reading and talk about their ideas: What is the ‘picture’ they have of particular characters? Are there people like that in your family or whānau? What do they want to find out from the book? What are the important messages? What do they think is going to happen next? What else do they need to know to understand the story or topic? 
  • Talk about books on similar topics. This helps your child to pull together ideas from different places. 
  • Talk about different types of stories that are read or spoken. Articles or stories online, whakataukī (proverbs), comics, stories, songs, waiata, non-fiction books or novels will each have different points you can talk about together.  
  • Help your child to share their thinking. Get them to share opinions and talk about why they think that. Listen, even when you don’t agree with their ideas. 

Here's a tip: give your child space and time to read. Reading longer books they have chosen needs plenty of time and encouragement. 

Read together 

  • Find out information together from different places. For example, online dictionaries, magazines, family trees, whakapapa 
  • Play games that involve reading in a fun way. 
  • Encourage your child to read to others. Younger brothers and sisters, whānau or grandparents are great audiences for practising smooth and interesting reading out loud. 
  • Visit the library regularly. Help your child choose books they’re interested in (about hobbies, interests or who they are and where they come from) or encourage them to get books out that are about what they are studying at school. They may need you to help by reading to them, as well. 
  • Find books of movies or TV programmes. It can help your child to learn different ways to tell the same story if they read the ‘stories’ they have watched. 

Here's a tip: help your child to link stories to their own life. Remind them about what they have done when a similar thing happens in the story. 

Be a reader yourself 

  • Talk about what you are reading and why you are enjoying it or what is challenging about it. Read a book to your child that they might find difficult but want to read and talk about it as you read. Use your first language whenever you can – it can help your child’s learning. 
  • Read the same book, magazine, or online content as your child. You can then share your ideas about what you have read. You could talk about why the authors made the choices they did in their writing. 

Here's a tip: keep the magic of listening to a good story alive by reading either made up, retold or read-aloud stories to your child – with lots of excitement through the use of your voice. 

Writing at home 

Make writing fun 

  • Help your child write about their heroes, sports events, tīpuna (ancestors), hobbies and interests. This helps them stay interested in what they are writing about. 
  • Play word games and do puzzles together to help your child learn more about words and spelling. 
  • Have interesting paper and pens available to help them make a special book to write in or create a digital book together of special events.  
  • Write to your child, or share jokes, cartoons, or short articles they might like to read.  
  • Play with words. Thinking of interesting words and discussing new ones can help increase the words your child uses when they write – look words up in an online dictionary or talk to family and whānau members to learn more about the background and the whakapapa (origins) of the words. 

Here's a tip: be a great role model. Show your child that you write for all sorts of reasons. Let them see you enjoy writing. You can use your first language – this helps your child’s learning, too. 

Talk about your child's writing 

  • Talk about ideas and information they are going to write about. Talk about experiences, diagrams, graphs, pictures, photos and material that your child is planning to use for school. Discussing the information and main ideas can help their planning for writing and their understanding, too. 
  • Share enjoyment of their writing. Read and talk about the writing that your child does. Give praise for things they have put effort into to support their learning. 
  • Play with words. Thinking of interesting words and discussing new ones can help increase the words your child uses when they write. 
  • Share your own writing with your child – lists, planning for family events or an email. You can help them to see that you too use writing for different purposes. 

Here's a tip: keep writing fun and use any excuse you can think of to encourage your child to write about anything, anytime. 

Write for a reason 

  • Encourage your child to write messages, invitations, thank you letters, poems, stories or postcards to friends, family and whānau – make it fun. 
  • Ask your child who they would like to write to. It is helpful if what they write is given or sent to others. 
  • Ask them to write a story to read to a whānau member. 
  • A diary or journal – on paper or online – can help your child to write about their experiences and their own feelings about things that have happened at school, at home, in the world, on the marae, at sports events and on TV. 

Here's a tip: talk about what your child writes. Be interested. If you don’t understand something they are writing about, ask them to explain. 

Maths at home 

Talk together and have fun with numbers, shapes, games, and patterns 

Help your child to: 

  • count forwards and backwards (starting with numbers like these fractions: ¼ , ½ , ¾ , 1, 1¼ , 1½ then back again) 
  • talk about large numbers in your environment e.g., gaming scores, distances 
  • find families of facts when multiplying and dividing with 6, 8 and 9, for example, if your child knows 6 × 8 = 48, then they will also know that 8 × 6 = 48, 48 ÷ 6 = 8 and 48 ÷ 8 = 6 
  • estimate the cost of a weekly shop to the nearest dollar 
  • read car number plates, look at the car’s odometer to see how far you’ve gone 
  • talk about graphs and tables that are in your local newspapers or online 
  • use an app or a map to find North, and discuss the compass points, and familiar locations at each point
  • notice angles around you that are smaller than, equal to or larger than a right angle. 

Here's a tip: be positive about maths and show your child where you use maths. This will help them build confidence in maths. Praise their effort. 

Use easy, everyday activities 

Involve your child in: 

  • making dinner at home, at camp or on a marae – look at how many and how much is needed for the people eating (potatoes, bok choy, carrots, sausages). Talk about fractions (half, quarter, fourth) to calculate how much to cook and cooking times 
  • helping at the supermarket – choose items to weigh. Look for the best buy between different brands of the same items (breakfast cereal, spreads like jam or honey) 
  • practising times tables – check with your child or their teacher which times tables you could help your child with 
  • finding out how long an event is when the start and finish times are known, or working out ‘how long until..’, i.e. how many minutes until the movie/until we have to leave the park. 

Here's a tip: maths is an important part of everyday life and there are lots of ways you can make it fun for your child. 

For wet afternoon/school holidays/weekends 

Get together with your child and: 

  • play card and board games that use guessing and checking 
  • do complicated jigsaw puzzles 
  • do paper folding (origami) by following written instructions or a video 
  • look through junk mail or online shops – find the most expensive and cheapest item advertised  
  • use junk mail or other strips of paper to make a woven mat 
  • make a roster for jobs around the house 
  • plan for a special event on a budget; eg afternoon tea for a grandparent, teacher or family friend 
  • play outside games – cricket, basketball, mini-golf and soccer 
  • bake – follow a simple recipe (scones, pikelets) 
  • use blocks that fit together to make a model. Draw what it looks like from each side and above. Then draw what they think it looks like from underneath. Once finished, check the underneath of the real object against the drawing 
  • make water balloons and see how far you could throw them (outside!) and how far the water splatters 
  • collect and put in order the birthdays of family and whānau– make a reminder calendar for the year. 

Here's a tip: the way your child is learning to solve maths problems may be different to when you were at school. Get them to show you how they do it and support them in their learning. 

Year 6 

Reading at home 

Make reading fun 

  • Have discussions together about books – read the books your child is reading. 
  • Encourage online research about topics of interest – notice what they are keen on. 
  • Make your home a reader-friendly home with plenty of books and magazines that everyone can read – look for books and magazines at fairs and second-hand shops. Ask your family or whānau if they have any they no longer want. 
  • Share what you think and how you feel about the characters, the story or the opinions in online articles, magazines, and newspapers you are reading. It is important that your child sees you as a reader and you talk about what you are reading. 

Here's a tip: encourage your child to read every day. Make reading fun and praise your child’s efforts, all the time. 

Read together 

  • Reading to your child is one of the most important things you can do, no matter how old they are. You can use your first language. 
  • When you are reading to your child, you can talk about words or ideas that your child might not have come across before. 
  • Children are often interested in new words and what they mean – encourage them to look them up in an online dictionary or ask family/whānau about the meaning and origin. 

Here's a tip: keep the magic of listening to a good story alive by reading either made up, retold or read-aloud stories to your child – with lots of excitement through the use of your voice! 

Keep them interested 

  • Help your child identify an author, character or series of books they particularly like and find more in the series or by the author. 
  • Talk about the lyrics of songs or waiata, or the words of poems your child is learning, and see if there are any links to who they are, and where they come from. 
  • Subscribe to websites that have content that builds your child’s special interest, eg animals, their iwi, kapa haka or disc golf. 
  • Go to your local library to choose books together. These might be books your child can read easily by themselves. They might be books your child wants to read but are a bit hard - you can help by reading a page to them, then helping them read the next one. 
  • Play video and board games together – the more challenging the better. 

Here's a tip: be a great role model. Let your child see you enjoying reading – whether it’s on a device or a novel. Read in the language that works best for you. 

Writing at home 

Make writing fun 

  • Encourage your child to write about their heroes, tīpuna (ancestors), sports events, hobbies and interests to help keep them interested in what they are writing about. 
  • Play word games and do puzzles together. Games and puzzles such as crosswords, tongue twisters and word puzzles help build your child’s knowledge of words, spelling, thinking and planning skills. 
  • Start a blog or build a website using a free website builder about a family interest. Find a topic you’re both interested in. 

Here's a tip: be a great role model. Show your child that you write for all sorts of reasons. Let them see you enjoying writing. Use your first language – this helps your child’s learning, too. 

Write for a reason 

Encourage your child to write: 

  • Suggest your child is responsible for the weekly shopping list, equipment list for weekends away and holidays, task lists for the week. 
  • Encourage your child to write to others - emails, texts, messages on apps with parental controls turned on. It will help if some of what your child writes about is for others. 
  • Short stories or a blog – this can help them to write about their experiences and their own feelings about things that have happened at school, in their family, on the marae, in the world, at sports events and on TV. 
  • Report on a new baby or pet addition to the family. This might be a slide show, digital scrapbook or message to wider whānau members. 
  • Make an argument in writing for a special request – trip, event, present etc. 
  • Draw up written contracts for agreed jobs; e.g. Every day I will… (make my bed, do one lot of dishes, and when I complete the contract I can choose…). 

Here's a tip: keep writing fun and use any excuse you can think of to encourage your child to write about anything, anytime. 

Talk about your child's writing 

  • Talk about ideas and information they are going to write about. Talk about experiences, diagrams, graphs, photos, treasures and taonga, waiata, pictures, whakapapa and material that your child is planning to use for school. Discussing the information and main ideas can help their planning for writing and their understanding, too. 
  • Share enjoyment of their writing. Read and talk about the writing that your child does. Give praise for things they have done well and say what you liked and why – this all supports their learning. 
  • Play with words. Thinking of interesting words and discussing new ones can help increase the words your child uses when they write – look words up in an online dictionary to find out more about what they mean. Talk to family and whānau members to learn more about the background and the whakapapa (origins) of the words. 
  • Share your own writing with your child – lists, planning for family events, song lyrics or letters and messages. You can help them to see that you too use writing for different purposes. 

Here's a tip: talk about what your child writes. Be interested. Use it as a way of starting conversations. Listen to their opinion, even if you don’t agree with it. 

Maths at home 

Talk together and have fun with numbers and patterns 

Help your child: 

  • multiply 2 and 3-digit numbers, like 29 × 36 
  • use rounding and estimating to check the answer to their calculations  
  • find percentages in shops or online sales – talk about how much they would have to pay if an item is 50% off or half price.  
  • talk about the phases of the moon and link these to the best times for fishing/planting 
  • talk about the patterns in the night sky – summer and winter. What changes and why? 
  • talk about where the data in a graph might have come from. 

Here’s a tip: be positive about maths and show your child where you use maths. This will help them build confidence in maths. Praise their effort. 

Use easy, everyday activities 

Involve your child in: 

  • helping at the supermarket – look for the best buy between different brands of the same item and different sizes of the same item (e.g., toilet paper, cans of spaghetti, bottles of milk) 
  • working out how many servings we could get from a bottle of juice, packet of pasta etc 
  • looking at the nutrition table on food labels – how much fat, sugar, salt - and deciding on the healthiest choice 
  • reading other tables, i.e TV schedule, events or activities schedules. 
  • practising times tables – check with your child or their teacher which tables you could help them with. 
  • on a journey -estimating how far away, and how long it might take to get to your destination. 

For wet afternoons/school holidays/weekends 

Get together with your child and: 

  • play card and board games using guessing and checking 
  • play games with dice and talk about how likely it is to roll a certain number 
  • cook – make a pizza, working out who likes what toppings, making and cooking it, and making sure the pizza is shared fairly – make a paper or cardboard container to hold a piece of pizza to take for lunch 
  • mix a drink for the family – measuring cordial, fruit and water 
  • make kites or manu aute using a variety of shapes and materials. How high can it go, how long can it fly for? 
  • make a family/whānau tree or whakapapa – number of cousins, aunts and uncles, grandparents and their relationships to you 
  • plan out the holidays. Look at each day’s fun time, kai time, TV time, helping time, family time and bedtime 
  • plan to make bead necklaces and friendship bracelets – calculate the cost of the materials, the length of stringing material 
  • play outdoor games – frisbee, touch rugby, kilikiti, cricket, soccer, bowls 
  • do complicated jigsaw puzzles 
  • explain to a family or whānau member how to do paper folding (origami) 
  • go on scavenger hunts – make a map with clues and see who can get there first. 

Here is a tip: maths is an important part of everyday life and there are lots of ways you can make it fun for your child. The way your child is learning to solve maths problems may be different to when you were at school. Get them to show you how they do it and support them in their learning. 

Year 7 

Reading at home 

Make reading fun 

  • Help your child to follow a recipe and cook for the family. 
  • Encourage your child to read and follow instructions for playing a game, making or using a piece of equipment, or completing a competition entry form. 
  • Remember their reading doesn’t have to be a book – it could be online content, magazines or newspapers. 

Here's a tip: talk a lot to your child while you are doing things together. Use the language that works best for you and your child. 

Talk about it 

  • Ask your child to talk about parts of a story they liked and why. 
  • Talk about the key facts, characters, plot, setting, theme and author’s purpose. 
  • Have them retell the main ideas or describe characters, events or facts they were interested in. 
  • Ask them to show you where the story supports their thinking. 
  • Be a role model. Show you read for a variety of reasons; e.g. to compare products advertised online, to be informed on current issues, to relax etc. 
  • Try reading the same book as your child so you can talk about it together. 
  • Talk about TV shows or online content you are watching. What were the main ideas? Talk about the order events happen in – practising this skill is important as children can find this difficult to learn. What did they like/dislike and why? 

Here are some tips: encourage your child to read every day. Make reading fun and praise your child’s efforts, all the time. 

Help your child to link stories to their own life. Remind them about what they have done when a similar thing happens in the story. 

Read to your child 

  • Just because your child can read doesn’t mean that they don’t enjoy listening to someone else reading. It could be a non-fiction book on a topic they like or a short story or a longer book read in instalments. It could also be a more difficult book/article that your child needs your help to read and understand. 
  • You could also listen to audio stories together – you can borrow these from the library or download them. 
  • Encourage your child to read the lyrics to their favourite songs, waiata or haka. Talk about why the composer wrote the song. What were they trying to say?  

Here's a tip: keep the magic of just listening to a good story alive by reading either made up, retold or read-aloud stories – with lots of excitement through the use of your voice. 

Keep them interested 

  • Find books, magazines or online content about your child’s interests. Reading about their favourite sport, player, team or kapa haka group or an issue they are interested in will help them to be an expert on a particular subject. 
  • Find books that relate to TV shows, movies or videos they know, or the area they come from. Knowing some of the ideas, characters or ancestors/tīpuna before you start reading can make it easier to understand a book. Talk about how the book differs from the TV show, movie or video and how it builds on what they already know. 
  • Join the library and visit regularly to help your child choose books that interest them – you may want to encourage your child to read different types of books including non-fiction stories. 

Here's a tip: be positive whenever your child is reading, no matter what they are reading. Respect your child’s opinion as it shows they are thinking about what they read. 

Writing at home 

Make writing fun 

  • Encourage your child to listen for and use interesting words. Having a wide range of words will help your child create stories which will increase in complexity. 
  • Use technology. Messaging using apps with appropriate parental supervision is a form of writing even if the language is not always standard. 
  • Use a laptop or other device if your child isn’t keen on writing. They don’t have to think about the presentation of their work and editing does not require a complete re-write. Spell-check helps, too. 
  • Play video and board games and complete difficult crosswords and word puzzles. 
  • Create a message board such as a white board, blackboard or pin board.  The messages might be instructions, reminders, or praise for a job well done, as well as examples of work. Encourage your child and other family members to respond with messages, too. 

Here's a tip: make writing fun and use any excuse you can think of to encourage your child to write about anything, any time. 

Talk about writing with your child 

  • Talk with your child about their day. Talking helps them to organise their thinking and is an important first step for any writing. 
  • Talk about new words your child is not familiar with, using an online dictionary to find out more. 
  • Be a positive audience for your child. Always respond to the effort behind the message and the message content first (regardless of how the message is written) and the presentation second. Keep in mind what your child is currently learning to do and comment just on that. 
  • Keep a holiday journal. Before the holidays ask your child to write a list of possible activities they want to do that keep to your budget and get them to draw up an activity plan. Remember to include any events or activities you have to attend; e.g. school camp, noho marae, church, doctor, sports training, family/whānau reunion. Your child could write a list of what to pack. 

Here's a tip: talk about what your child writes. Be interested. Use it as a way of starting conversations. Listen to your child’s opinion, even if you don’t agree with it. 

Keep them interested 

  • Encourage your child to read. Reading and writing are linked and success in one is likely to lead to success in the other. 
  • Buy interesting stationery for your child to use. Coloured pens and pencils can be an incentive to write together with special paper or books. Give a diary, book or notebook as a present. 
  • Set up an email account together where they can write to friends and family. Support them online using guidance from NetSafe(external link). 
  • Plan for them to be able to use a device for writing either at home, at school or at a library. 
  • Look for real reasons for writing. Encourage your child to read and write letters, messages, postcards, invitations, lists, rosters, thank-you notes and recipes.  
  • Make lists for a particular reason; eg shopping lists or jobs to be completed. 
  • Encourage your child to write on their own - on paper or on a device. Poems, songs, waiata, short stories or a diary or journal. A journal can be a way for your child to keep track of their thoughts, ideas or a particular interest. For example, keep a journal of their sports training, kapa haka practice or compile favourite recipes. 
  • It might be fun to write to a favourite author or kaumātua to ask what helps them to write their stories and compositions. 

Here's a tip: be a great role model. Show your child that you write for lots of reasons, eg replying to an email, writing a shopping list, invitation or letter, writing for your work or your own study. Use your first language – this helps your child’s learning, too. 

Maths at home 

Talk together and have fun with numbers, shapes, games, and patterns 

Help your child to: 

  • talk about sales in town – 25% off, 30%, 10%, half price. Look for the best value and make a game of calculating the savings on items your child is interested in 
  • identify and describe how 2D shapes have been moved within kōwhaiwhai and tukutuku panels, and how 3D shapes have been moved in carvings 
  • budget pocket money and/or plan ahead to open a savings account. Talk about earning interest and investigate with them which bank account will give them the best return for their money 
  • talk about current prices for items that interest your child and investigate which store offers the best price
  • notice angles, parallel and perpendicular lines around you.

Here’s a tip: be positive about maths and show your child where you use maths. This will help them build confidence in maths. Praise their effort.  

Encourage your child to find out more about maths at the library and on the Internet. 

For wet afternoons/school holidays/weekends 

Get together with your child and: 

  • play games – find a new board or card game that uses strategy 
  • plan and budget the family holiday (or a day trip) – look online for the best transport method in terms of time and money, accommodation, and activities to do.  
  • guess how many times you use your cell phone a day/week/month and predict the cost. Work out the best price, pre-paid versus a plan 
  • play travel games – invent maths games to play while walking with friends, travelling in the car, at the park 
  • plan for a family event, like a dinner. What is the cheapest option – cooking at home or getting takeaways? 
  • make bead necklaces and friendship bracelets – calculate the cost of the materials needed and the time needed to make them. Is it cheaper to just buy them already made? 
  • play outdoor and indoor games – frisbee, touch rugby, netball, kilikiti, cricket, soccer, bowls, snooker and darts 
  • build a fort – plan, design, collect the materials and build it. 
  • design and create a piece of art using patterns, shape and line 
  • plan and create simple household objects using recycled materials, i.e. placemats, a gift box, birdfeeders, pet toys.  

Here's a tip: the way your child is learning to solve maths problems may be different to when you were at school. Get them to show you how they do it and support them in their learning. 

Use easy, everyday activities 

Involve your child in: 

  • cooking – explore recipes and amounts of food and costs within a budget when catering for larger numbers eg school camp 
  • making a shopping list for the week within a budget 
  • revising times tables – check with your child/their teacher which tables you could help your child practise 
  • investigating which supermarket offers the best deal on petrol eg 10 cents off a litre. 

Year 8 

Reading at home 

Support their learning 

  • Help your child to find suitable material to read online for a topic of interest at school.   
  • Talk to your child about what they have been reading online. What have they learnt? What questions do they still have? How do they know the information is reliable? 
  • Talk to your child’s teacher about available books and resources that relate to your child’s interests. 
  • Read through your child’s homework tasks and questions together and talk about what they are planning to do to finish the homework. 
  • Play video games and board games as a family. Increase the challenge – it really helps children’s learning. 

Here's a tip: be a great role model. Let your child see you enjoying reading, including reading in your first language. 

Read together 

  • Read your child a children’s novel that they are interested in – try one or two chapters each day. 
  • Get your child to listen to younger siblings doing their reading homework (this is a good chance for them to practise some of their own reading skills). 
  • You can remind them about pausing while the younger child thinks about a word they don’t know, giving them help to sound out the word, checking it makes sense, and giving them praise for their reading. 
  • Have books, magazines, comics, online articles and other information available for everyone in your family to read on topics that interest your child – eg skateboarding, surfing, fashion. 
  • Listen together to audiobooks of your child’s favourite stories, books and songs. 

Here's a tip: be positive whenever your child is reading, no matter what they are reading. Respect your child’s opinion as it shows they are thinking about what they read. 

Hunt out things to read 

  • Take a trip to the library and help your child to find books, audiobooks and magazines that they will enjoy reading – eg books about their favourite musician, movie star, sports celebrity or other role model. 
  • Find books, magazines, websites or videos that tell stories about who your child is and where they have come from. 
  • Read and talk about advertising signs you see – talk about how the company decided on the words and the design, and who they are trying to appeal to with the advertising. 
  • Use a map to find directions for a trip you are going on, or follow the journeys of people on travel and adventure programmes. 
  • Get some instruction books from the library on how to plan for and make food, gifts, or toys, for family birthdays, Matariki or other culturally significant events. Work through the instructions with your child. 
  • Find some recipes together that your child might like to cook for a family treat. Be there to help your child as they read through the recipe, get all the ingredients and create the final result. 

Writing at home 

Write for a reason 

Help your child to: 

  • Write a letter or an email to their teacher or principal, local council or their favourite influencer, sharing your child’s opinion on a topic of interest.  
  • Start a blog and get your child to record thoughts about their day to share with their friends and family. 
  • Write a proverb, family motto or pepeha and illustrate it with online images or photos. 
  • Develop a spreadsheet to record the progress of your child’s sports team or kapa haka group (or one they follow), including games played, performances given, penalties, scores, player/performer of the day. 
  • Start a writing journal to record trips and weekend activities. 
  • Take some photos and write a picture book for a younger child using the photos. 
  • Write a comic using drawings, or pictures to present an idea or story. 
  • Make some birthday cards, thank you notes or letters to friends and family. 

Here's a tip: be a great role model. Show your child that you write for lots of reasons, eg replying to an email, writing a shopping list, invitation or letter, writing a story about your early life for your child to read. 

Make writing fun 

Get together with your child to: 

  • Play strategy games and do word puzzles like word search puzzles and crosswords – you can find these online. 
  • Make the weekly shopping list using supermarket flyers or supermarket website and find all the bargains and savings to fit the budget. 
  • Write some descriptions for items you may wish to sell online. 
  • Find out about some of your family history (whakapapa) and/or family stories (pakiwaitara) and record these stories to share with other family/whānau members. 

Here's a tip: make writing fun and use any excuse you can think of to encourage your child to write about anything, anytime. 

Talk about writing with your child 

  • Ask them about a piece of writing they are doing at school and/or for their homework. 
  • Tell them about some writing you are currently doing – a letter, a poem, a list for the holidays, a scrapbook, something you are doing for work or study. 
  • Help them to use an online dictionaries and thesaurus.  

Here's a tip: talk about what your child writes. Be interested. Use it as a way of starting conversations. Listen to your child's opinion, even if you don’t agree with it. 

Maths at home 

Talk together and have fun with numbers, shapes, games, and patterns 

Help your child: 

  • find and connect numbers around your home and on family outings, eg read the odometer on the car to see how many kilometres the car can go on a tank of petrol.  Get them to note how much it costs to refill, then work out how much it costs per kilometre 
  • talk about sales in town – 15% off, 33% off, 20% off, half price. Look for the best value. What would the price of the item be after the discount? Is it better to buy two items and get one free or get 25% off the price of the items? 
  • budget pocket money and/or plan ahead to open a savings account or reach a savings target. Talk about earning interest. Calculate what interest would be earned using different savings schemes 
  • work out the amount of fabric needed to make a piece of clothing – how many square metres is needed? 
  • talk about goals and plan ahead to budget for items for themselves or for others 
  • do complicated number puzzles. 

Here’s a tip: the way your child is learning to solve maths problems may be different to when you were at school. Get them to show you how they do it and support them in their learning. 

Use easy, everyday activities 

Involve your child in: 

  • planning to help make a dish or a full meal for the family or even a community event at the hall or marae – working out the cost of making it at home versus buying it already made, planning the preparation and cooking time – and focus on the ingredients and the amounts of fat and sugar, too. 
  • planning what proportion of their own, or their brother’s and sister’s, time should be spent on tasks (like homework, sleep, TV, sport, kapa haka) to make sure there’s time left for fun and family 
  • watching documentaries or videos online, which are full of facts and information using maths 
  • reading online articles or advertisements featuring graphs or tables 

Here's a tip: talk with your child’s teacher to understand what they are learning in maths and what the learning is in the homework they’re doing. 

For wet afternoons/school holidays/weekends 

Get together with your child and: 

  • play games: find online games, card games or board games that use strategy 
  • calculate the chance of their favourite team winning a tournament. Investigate how many points they need and work out what their competitors need as well 
  • play outdoor games – skateboarding, frisbee, touch rugby, kilikiti, cricket, soccer, pétanque, netball 
  • plan and perform a rap, dance or waiata a ringa and draw up the outline of the dance steps on graph paper 
  • make a present or gift for someone using a scrapbook, kōwhaiwhai, quilting, doing tivaevae, collage, painting, carving, knitting, sewing or carpentry 
  • plan for when you have saved $10/$20/$30. What would be the best use of that money for a day out? 
  • draw a Lego structure from front, side, back and top views, break it up, and then a partner uses the drawings to recreate the structure.   

Here’s a tip: be positive about maths and show your child where you use maths. This will help them build confidence in maths. Praise their effort.

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