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Important update from TheSchoolRun

For the past 13 years, TheSchoolRun has been run by a small team of mums working from home, dedicated to providing quality educational resources to primary school parents. Unfortunately, rising supplier costs and falling revenue have made it impossible for us to continue operating, and we’ve had to make the difficult decision to close. The good news: We’ve arranged for another educational provider to take over many of our resources. These will be hosted on a new portal, where the content will be updated and expanded to support your child’s learning.

What this means for subscribers:

  • Your subscription is still active, and for now, you can keep using the website as normal — just log in with your usual details to access all our articles and resources*.
  • In a few months, all resources will move to the new portal. You’ll continue to have access there until your subscription ends. We’ll send you full details nearer the time.
  • As a thank you for your support, we’ll also be sending you 16 primary school eBooks (worth £108.84) to download and keep.

A few changes to be aware of:

  • The Learning Journey weekly email has ended, but your child’s plan will still be updated on your dashboard each Monday. Just log in to see the recommended worksheets.
  • The 11+ weekly emails have now ended. We sent you all the remaining emails in the series at the end of March — please check your inbox (and spam folder) if you haven’t seen them. You can also follow the full programme here: 11+ Learning Journey.

If you have any questions, please contact us at [email protected]. Thank you for being part of our journey it’s been a privilege to support your family’s learning.

*If you need to reset your password, it will still work as usual. Please check your spam folder if the reset email doesn’t appear in your inbox.

The importance of taking time to talk

Smiling family
Kids' coach Naomi Richards shares her advice for keeping the lines of communication open with your children.

We all want the best for our children – we want them to grow up into well adjusted adults who feel valued and respected. Our children also crave to be heard, listened to and not judged.

Our children generally want to talk to us when they fancy but for us parents it is often a matter of, “I’m busy, tell me later”; “Go and do something else and we’ll discuss it at dinnertime”; or “Very nice darling”, dismissing what they are saying to us.

Some of the children I have seen don’t have parents that have the time to listen to them – some hardly see their parents, and I work with them on ways that the child can get the attention of their parent.

Finding time to talk

The best time to talk is during the day when you are both relaxed and not engrossed in making the dinner or juggling three jobs at once. Also find a time when you are not going to be interrupted by other children or anyone else. Find out what your child is doing and then make an appointment with them for when they have finished their activity so you have their attention 100 percent.

I often say to my oldest child, “When you have finished playing that game, could we please sit together so we can talk about your day?” If this is greeted by moans, which are fairly short-lived, I sell the benefits of our time together, boosting his self-esteem by telling him how wonderful he is and how proud I feel to be his mum. We sit and discuss ‘life’ and I help him with his thoughts.

From feedback from mums, they find the best time to do talk properly with their children is before school or before bed, both of which are times in the day when the ‘worry monster’ within the child rears its ugly head. The timing is crucial as it has to be when you feel your child is going to be responsive and a willing participant in your chat.

Successful talking

Take as long as your child needs and don’t rush them. Have your chat at the kitchen table or in your child bedroom. I find that a fifteen-minute chat can do the job but for a complex issue you would need to allow about half an hour.

Read more tips and advice from Naomi at www.thekidscoach.org.uk