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Speaker 1: So more and more children are spending like us, actually

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Speaker 1: spending time in front of their screens, less time reading stories,

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Speaker 1: and perhaps less face to face into action, you know,

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Speaker 1: And that's given some concern to parents and caregivers, and

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Speaker 1: they're trying to figure out, you know, how to shift

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Speaker 1: from the screen time and bringing back children to more

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Speaker 1: meaningful ways without relying on those external aids, the screen times,

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Speaker 1: the phones, the tablets, and all the other new technologies

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Speaker 1: that are coming up. And that's why I think it's

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Speaker 1: so important for us to have this conversation and to

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Speaker 1: have a conversation about how children can develop the capacity

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Speaker 1: to put to put things into their own words, into

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Speaker 1: their own phrases, to build their own ideas in their

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Speaker 1: own heads before they're relying on screen time and what

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Speaker 1: the you know, the devices are telling them and the

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Speaker 1: sort of ideas that they're learning online, and I think

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Speaker 1: those are the sort of foundational skills you know, that

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Speaker 1: set them up for life, lifelong learning, for creativity and independence.

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Speaker 1: So joining us to unpack that and to find creative

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Speaker 1: ways we were teaching kids to express themselves better, whether

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Speaker 1: by speech or by writing. Is Nikki Bush, who's our

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Speaker 1: resident human potential and parenting expert Nikki. A very good

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Speaker 1: morning to you. Thank you so much for joining us.

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Speaker 1: Always a pleasure to have you on the show.

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Speaker 2: Thank you, Kniko Kanya.

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Speaker 1: Nikki, tell me, at what age do you think or

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Speaker 1: should children actually be able to write and speak properly

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Speaker 1: before we get worried about development.

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Speaker 3: So the speaking part, of course, starts from a very

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Speaker 3: early age, and I absolutely love it when I engage

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Speaker 3: with children who are around three years of age because

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Speaker 3: they're starting to learn how to master language and it's

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Speaker 3: a very exciting time for them as well as being

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Speaker 3: a very exciting time for the family because they can

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Speaker 3: now express themselves, they can label things, they can name things,

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Speaker 3: and so encouraging language development is critical for children to

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Speaker 3: learn how to create meaning in their world, because we

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Speaker 3: mustn't forget that we decode our world through language. It's

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Speaker 3: one of the main ways that we as human beings

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Speaker 3: decode our world. When it comes to reading. In the

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Speaker 3: foundation phase, when we're talking children under the age of nine,

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Speaker 3: they're acquiring vocabulary, they're acquiring language, they're acquiring reading and

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Speaker 3: writing skills. They are learning to read and write, and

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Speaker 3: from the age of nine they start using reading to.

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Speaker 2: Learn, so it flips on its head.

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Speaker 3: So by the time they are nine years old, they

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Speaker 3: should be reading fluently and they should be writing well.

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Speaker 3: And so from the age of nine onwards, then we

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Speaker 3: start getting into deep, you know, comprehension skills, like do

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Speaker 3: they actually understand what they're reading and what they're writing.

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Speaker 3: But we can even introduce comprehension skills in the early years,

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Speaker 3: from the time you're reading your toddlers your preschoolers books

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Speaker 3: with lots of pictures, you can actually say to them

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Speaker 3: what's going on in the picture? Having read them the story,

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Speaker 3: you can now point to a picture and say, what's

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Speaker 3: happening in this picture? And once they're about four or

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Speaker 3: five years of age, they should be able to tell

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Speaker 3: you in some simple sentences what's actually going on.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, this one is a bit of a chicken and

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Speaker 1: egg question. But which do you think really is important

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Speaker 1: teaching a child how to think first for themselves or

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Speaker 1: how to you know, speak so they're able to express

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Speaker 1: themselves and then working backwards, or are the two really intertwined.

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Speaker 3: You know, the human brain is so unbelievably smart. Children

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Speaker 3: learn in parallel. So while we talk about learning in

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Speaker 3: stages and phases, the brain can do what the experts

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Speaker 3: say is successive learning, where they're actually doing many things

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Speaker 3: in parallel. And that's why parents are so important in.

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Speaker 2: The learning equation.

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Speaker 3: Keeping up that conversation with your kids when you're in

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Speaker 3: the car instead of hanging off the end of your

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Speaker 3: phone and having conversations with somebody else is of paramount importance.

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Speaker 3: And introducing your child to what's going on in the world,

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Speaker 3: becoming an observer because what they experience and see in

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Speaker 3: the world, they can then relate the words that they're

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Speaker 3: actually reading in books and what they're hearing in the

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Speaker 3: class to what they've experienced in real life. That's how

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Speaker 3: they create meaning. So when you're driving along in the

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Speaker 3: car and you're sitting at a traffic light and say,

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Speaker 3: there is a big building being constructed on the corner,

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Speaker 3: you can have conversations with your preschoolers and primary school

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Speaker 3: children about what can we see what's happening over there? Oh,

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Speaker 3: can you see there's a big tall crane. What is

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Speaker 3: the crane doing? And can you see that cement truck?

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Speaker 3: Can you see that it's you know, it's spinning.

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Speaker 2: Round and round.

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Speaker 3: Now we get to talk about cement, So we can

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Speaker 3: go off on a tangent learning about all sorts of

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Speaker 3: concepts by just sitting observing the world. If you're at

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Speaker 3: the game reserve, for example, you might take your children

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Speaker 3: into a hide, and in a hide, they are going

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Speaker 3: to be observing what's going on at a watering hole,

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Speaker 3: and you might not be able to talk very loudly.

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Speaker 3: So when you get back in the car afterwards, you're

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Speaker 3: going to talk about what did we see?

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Speaker 2: So in this way, we're.

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Speaker 3: Actually stimulating our children's working memory. So what did you

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Speaker 3: see at the watering hole? How many elephants were there?

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Speaker 3: What color was the X, Y Z, And we're therefore

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Speaker 3: stimulating those observation skills. We're stimulating working memory. Can your

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Speaker 3: children hold onto information for a few minutes while you

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Speaker 3: walk back to the car and then discuss what they've seen.

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Speaker 3: And it's the same when we're reading story books to

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Speaker 3: our children. So I really want to encourage parents today,

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Speaker 3: do not stop reading story books to your children because

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Speaker 3: you've got a machine that might be reading stories to

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Speaker 3: your children, or because they're watching TV. And that's how

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Speaker 3: they're getting their stories. The words that your children hear

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Speaker 3: from you through the medium of your voice makes them

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Speaker 3: so much more meaningful because there's an emotional attachment. So

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Speaker 3: to answer your question, your children are learning so many

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Speaker 3: different things in parallel at the same time. The brain

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Speaker 3: is so clever it can pull it all together.

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Speaker 1: In that process of stimulating them, Nikki, where you are

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Speaker 1: out and about with them and say what do you see?

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Speaker 2: Tell me what you see? Explain this to me back.

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Speaker 1: How do you strike a balance where you're teaching them

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Speaker 1: to think and speak for themselves, but without doing it

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Speaker 1: for them, so you're not putting the words into their mouths,

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Speaker 1: so they're able to develop their own thought processes through

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Speaker 1: your own teaching.

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Speaker 2: If that makes any sense. Oh, yeah, absolutely.

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Speaker 3: In the very early years, we can sometimes fall into

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Speaker 3: a trap as parents because our children slowly put their

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Speaker 3: thoughts together and speak them, and we're in a hurry

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Speaker 3: most of the time, and it can be so easy

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Speaker 3: to start finishing your children's sentences for them. So we

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Speaker 3: need to slow down and we need to operate sometimes at.

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Speaker 2: Their pace, not our pace.

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Speaker 3: And then, of course you might have siblings, older siblings

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Speaker 3: who are very verbal, and then a younger sibling who's

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Speaker 3: not quite so verbal, and that older sibling starts speaking

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Speaker 3: for the younger child. So as parents, we need to

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Speaker 3: be aware of these dynamics and give our children the

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Speaker 3: space and the time to express themselves. So we're talking

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Speaker 3: about giving children's brains permission to play with words, to

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Speaker 3: connect concepts, and to create meaning.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, what are some of the other mistakes you mentioned? Now,

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Speaker 1: you know, when there's a sibling in the environment, or

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Speaker 1: when parents start finishing off their own children's sentences and

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Speaker 1: trying to hurry that process along. What do you reckon

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Speaker 1: on some of the other mistakes, maybe even unconsciously, that

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Speaker 1: parents are making in that process so that they're able

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Speaker 1: to shy away from it while teaching their children to

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Speaker 1: be in and thinkers and independent writers.

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Speaker 3: I think we have to be aware of the fact

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Speaker 3: that we live in an era where our children can

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Speaker 3: become lazy learners. And if you just think of AI

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Speaker 3: and adults or even high school children, you don't even

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Speaker 3: have to write something yourself anymore. You just have to

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Speaker 3: prompt AI and it'll write it for you. And I

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Speaker 3: just would like to guard against allowing machine learning to

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Speaker 3: do the learning for your children. Because your children need

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Speaker 3: to learn words, vocabulary, they need to have word power.

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Speaker 3: We need to give them the gift of word power

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Speaker 3: and expressing themselves in words long before they're using AI

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Speaker 3: to write and speak for them, because how are they

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Speaker 3: going to know if AI is doing a good job

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Speaker 3: if we haven't built the foundations for them and with them.

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Speaker 3: And so the things that we need to be doing

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Speaker 3: with our children is teaching them to paraphrase, so teaching

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Speaker 3: them to speak in their own words, and it's a

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Speaker 3: skill that's not acquired overnight, and being able to paraphrase

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Speaker 3: is a real sign of intelligence. To be able to

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Speaker 3: summarize a body of knowledge or a conversation you just

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Speaker 3: heard is such a useful skill whether you're studying, whether

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Speaker 3: you're in business, or parenting a child, and it is

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Speaker 3: the path to critical thinking and creativity. And it must

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Speaker 3: be a well trodden road before long before reaching the TRIK,

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Speaker 3: because you have children who are now doing comprehension tests,

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Speaker 3: and the usually start comprehension tests in school from about

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Speaker 3: the age of nine, So it will be a couple

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Speaker 3: of paragraphs and it should be at an age appropriate level,

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Speaker 3: and then they're going to be five questions that they

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Speaker 3: have to answer to ensure that they understood what they read.

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Speaker 3: So this requires discipline and practice. It's not acquired overnight,

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Speaker 3: and in a world of instant gratification, it's something that

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Speaker 3: we can forget to do with our children. So if

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Speaker 3: they come home with a reader from school, it's really

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Speaker 3: important that parents take reading homework incredibly, incredibly seriously. You

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Speaker 3: need to make time to listen to your children doing

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Speaker 3: the reading aloud. So reading aloud super super important and

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Speaker 3: the connection of my mom my dad is putting aside

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Speaker 3: ten minutes or fifteen minutes to listen to me read. Now,

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Speaker 3: don't think that your children between the ages of kind

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Speaker 3: of four and nine are actually putting those words together.

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Speaker 3: My mom or my dad are making time for me,

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Speaker 3: but they get it on a deeply emotional level. And

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Speaker 3: the message they get then is reading must be really

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Speaker 3: important because my parents are really paying attention. They stopped

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Speaker 3: what they're doing, they're listening to me, and then they

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Speaker 3: asked me questions about what I just read. So that

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Speaker 3: it's the gift of paying attention, and children absolutely lap

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Speaker 3: it up when you give them attention, So make sure

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Speaker 3: that you set aside at that time.

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Speaker 2: It's so important.

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Speaker 3: If children don't think that reading is important to you,

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Speaker 3: it's not going to be important to them.

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Speaker 1: In that process again, Nikki, when you are exchanging ideas

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Speaker 1: and opinions, you know, in trying to teach your children

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Speaker 1: how to be independent thinkers and writers, you know, in

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Speaker 1: that exchange of ideas and opinions between a child and

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Speaker 1: a parent, where there's a difference of opinion on whatever

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Speaker 1: the topic may be. How should a parent handle that?

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Speaker 1: If I have a child who says something that I

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Speaker 1: don't necessarily agree with, but because that's their own thought,

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Speaker 1: how do I know balance out?

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Speaker 2: You know that?

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Speaker 3: Yeah, well, I think you turn it into a conversation.

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Speaker 3: And it's good to have that resistance where we get

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Speaker 3: to debate things. And of course that happens more and

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Speaker 3: more as your children get older, especially into the teenage years.

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Speaker 2: And so a good response.

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Speaker 3: Could be, that's really interesting, now, how did you get

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Speaker 3: to come to that conclusion? So be interested in their

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Speaker 3: thought process, in their critical thinking. Give them the space

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Speaker 3: and the time to explain why they think the way

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Speaker 3: they think. Because there's a lovely line that I use

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Speaker 3: with all of my audiences, both parenting and corporate audiences,

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Speaker 3: and the line is can it be another way? Can

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Speaker 3: it be another way? And so we need to be

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Speaker 3: curious about the world because there's often a third way,

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Speaker 3: and that third way doesn't necessarily have to be wrong.

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Speaker 3: But I'd like to raise something else Knukoconia, that is

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Speaker 3: it really really important the parents need to be aware

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Speaker 3: when their children are reading, whether their children are reading

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Speaker 3: kind of by wrote, are they understanding what they're reading?

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Speaker 3: Are they actually reading? Because you can have children who

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Speaker 3: are very visual. Now I have two boys, and my

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Speaker 3: one child is exceptionally visual. And children learn to do

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Speaker 3: site reading in the early stages of reading.

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Speaker 2: They learn to site read.

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Speaker 3: So the letter, the word, the word cat, the word dog,

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Speaker 3: they actually you can draw a line around the word,

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Speaker 3: a frame around the word. The word has a shape,

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Speaker 3: so long before they even go are it can actually

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Speaker 3: read the shape of the word because the word dog

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Speaker 3: always has the same shape. Now, I pick at during

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Speaker 3: my son's primary school years that he was actually site reading.

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Speaker 3: He wasn't reading properly, and he sounded really fluent, but

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Speaker 3: when you started asking him questions about what he was reading,

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Speaker 3: he couldn't tell you because he wasn't internalizing what he

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Speaker 3: was reading. So I'd like to share a four step

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Speaker 3: plan with parents to help their children to become much

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Speaker 3: better at comprehension skills. And this is what I actually

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Speaker 3: did when my son turned thirteen. I got the help

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Speaker 3: of a few teachers and a few experts in the field,

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Speaker 3: and it worked really well. So step one and you

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Speaker 3: can start doing this from an early age, probably from

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Speaker 3: about five years of age. You can start doing this

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Speaker 3: when you're reading stories to your children. So step one

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Speaker 3: is choose an age appropriate story or novel. And I

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Speaker 3: say novel, not a magazine, not a short story, because

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Speaker 3: you actually want to grow a wide vocabulary and exposure

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Speaker 3: to rich language usage. So I think my son's problem

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Speaker 3: actually came in grade four, where teachers started saying because

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Speaker 3: children didn't want to.

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Speaker 2: Read, well, whatever they're interested in.

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Speaker 3: If they're interested in sport, let them read a sports magazine.

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Speaker 3: If they're interested in fishing, let them read a phishing magazine,

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Speaker 3: et cetera.

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Speaker 2: You get where I'm going with this.

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Speaker 3: But novels actually contain much richer language, lots more adjectives, etc.

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Speaker 3: So choose a novel, choose a story.

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Speaker 2: And when.

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Speaker 3: And we did this when he could read he was thirteen.

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Speaker 3: Obviously he would read four pages of his novel aloud

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Speaker 3: to me because I needed to know what was going

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Speaker 3: on in the story, so that I could see how

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Speaker 3: effective his eventual paraphrasing was in steps three or four.

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Speaker 3: And also children hearing themselves read is important. Many children

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Speaker 3: actually need to read out loud when they study to

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Speaker 3: increase their ability to retain information, So if their auditory learners,

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Speaker 3: reading stuff aloud is important. So step three he would

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Speaker 3: stop the reading, and then he had to tell me

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Speaker 3: in five sentences using his own words.

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Speaker 2: He had to tell me what he'd just read. So

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Speaker 2: we're now paraphrasing.

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Speaker 3: Shortening the story in your own words very important because

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Speaker 3: if it's in your own words, it means you turned

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Speaker 3: it over in your head, you derived meaning from it,

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Speaker 3: and now you're expressing it, not regurgitating it. You are

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Speaker 3: expressing it by putting it together in your own words.

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Speaker 3: Then he had to go and write it down, So

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Speaker 3: we went from speaking it to writing it down in

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Speaker 3: his own words in four or five sentences only, So

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Speaker 3: what he'd read he had to then go and write

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Speaker 3: down in four or five sentences. Then my job, having

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Speaker 3: listened to him, I would then check what he had

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Speaker 3: written to see that it made sense. Then we'd go

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Speaker 3: through it together and we'd fix any language or grammatical errors,

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Speaker 3: and this was an investment of my time and my patients.

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Speaker 3: But you know what, that investment in those foundational skills

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Speaker 3: is going to save hours and perhaps many thousands of

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Speaker 3: rands and extra lessons in the future.

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Speaker 1: Nika, Just in closing and very briefly, please, I mean

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Speaker 1: the kids obviously spend a huge portion of their day

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Speaker 1: at school as well in that setting. In that context

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Speaker 1: as well, I mean you also mentioned extra curricular activities,

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Speaker 1: so you're the learning afterwards as well. How do teachers

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Speaker 1: in school then play into that good and well, you

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Speaker 1: know for you to be able to do that at home,

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Speaker 1: but we know that in South Africa there's also a

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Speaker 1: literacy crisis, so there's something that's also not happening on

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Speaker 1: that front that should be happening that can't be reinforced

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Speaker 1: at home. Well, may not be as effective reinforced at

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Speaker 1: home if it's also not happening at the place where

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Speaker 1: they spend their most time at So how do the

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Speaker 1: two work together on the front of parents at home

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Speaker 1: and from a more formal educational setting.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, So obviously in the classroom, our children should be

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Speaker 3: reading age appropriate readers and they should be answering questions

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Speaker 3: in class about what they're reading, and teachers should be

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Speaker 3: monitoring that. So what you do at home is reinforcing

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Speaker 3: that in case, you know, reading homework is sent home.

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Speaker 3: Support teachers by supporting your child to do that homework.

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Speaker 2: It's so important.

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Speaker 3: But you know, even if your children are teaching you

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Speaker 3: something that you don't know, that's also okay. So you

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Speaker 3: can ask your children questions. And then we've got other

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Speaker 3: ways of learning as well where we can engage different mediums.

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Speaker 3: So children are watching television, for example, you can ask

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Speaker 3: your child to tell you about what they just watched,

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Speaker 3: so we're reinforcing the skill there. And then if they

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Speaker 3: are gaming on your phone or video gaming, and now

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Speaker 3: they come to the dinner table, you can say, tell

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Speaker 3: me about the characters in the game you were just playing,

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Speaker 3: and what level were you on, what problem were you

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Speaker 3: trying to solve. So you see, we can reinforce paraphrasing

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Speaker 3: and comprehension skills in so many different ways all the time,

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Speaker 3: day after day, and it's a skill that is going

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Speaker 3: to last your child a lifetime.

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Speaker 1: Absolutely, Nikki, thank you so much for your time this morning.

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Speaker 1: That's Nicki Bush, who is our resident human potential and

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Speaker 1: parenting expert, giving you a four step plan on how

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Speaker 1: you can get your children to be independent thinkers and

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Speaker 1: independent writers and speakers. That plan four point plan that

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Speaker 1: Nicki mentioned now is choosing age appropriate books and stories,

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Speaker 1: preferably novels as well, because of the richer, you know,

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Speaker 1: vocabulary that's in it versus what you'd find in a magazine.

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Speaker 1: For example, letting them read four pages out loud to you,

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Speaker 1: having them paraphrase what they've just read to you in

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Speaker 1: their own words so that you know that they're understanding it,

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Speaker 1: and then having them write it down. So it's really

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Speaker 1: a comprehension test. I suppose something would usually we would

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Speaker 1: have done at school, having them do that to you

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Speaker 1: so you know they know you're taking interest in it,

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Speaker 1: and at the very same time, when they see that

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Speaker 1: you're taking interest in it, they're more involved and they

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Speaker 1: want to do better. Thank you again to Niki. Please

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Speaker 1: do share with us what it is that you were

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Speaker 1: reading at you know, when you were younger. Do you

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Speaker 1: remember what it is that you were reading your first read?

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Speaker 1: Are you still reading now? What are the sort of

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Speaker 1: book the novels that you're going for and do you

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Speaker 1: think any of what we just spoke about with Nikki

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Speaker 1: would have benefited you if you had known it much earlier,

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Speaker 1: when you were still developing your thought processes, your own

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Speaker 1: opinions and so on. Oh seven two seven oh two

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Speaker 1: one seven oh two, that's our WhatsApp A number or

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Speaker 1: O double one double A three O seven oh two

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Speaker 1: if you want to give us a call