Brainbuilders

Do you remember homework at primary school? Learn this list of spellings, do this worksheet, finish these sums. Interesting wasn't it? Well that would be a big NO, wouldn't it. Our primary school does homework differently. It is called brainbuilders, and the children get to choose what they do. They are given suggested aims, and some ideas, but then they can go off piste. The idea behind this is that when you are doing something which interests you, which uses skills that you enjoy, then different areas of the brain light up - it literally, builds brains. And it works. Here we have a hobbit house, created by a girl, with help and input from her family. They had chatted about it, designed it, gathered materials (sticks for the door frame etc) little sis had daubed some paint, and got excited about it. And how fab is it? And she was rightly very proud of her work. A little bit of self esteem added to the personal bank of feeling good about yourself. It's one of the many things I really love about this school.

Check out Michael Rosen on his experience of spelling tests .Spelling

and his blog on the peculiarities of the English language... Spelling hell