Resources
Supporting a pupil at home
Supporting a pupil means having them describe before calculating, spotting the real block behind the failed exercise, and preferring short, closely spaced sessions to one long weekly session.
The block is rarely where you think
A child failing at mathematics often has the technique and stumbles on reading the problem; a pupil reading aloud correctly may be spending all their attention on decoding, with none left for meaning. Spotting the real block changes all the work that follows: you stop piling up arithmetic drills and start asking them to describe the situation, and results follow quickly. That reading applies subject by subject, each having its characteristic difficulty.
- Have the instruction restated before anything is written
- Check a result another way rather than correcting it
- Short, closely spaced sessions rather than long weekly ones
- A precisely named difficulty, subject by subject
- Support that questions, and leaves the production to the pupil
How the subjects break down
Each subject in the framework carries its characteristic difficulty and the approach that addresses it. The values below are real counts of subjects described per cycle, exactly as they appear in the repository data.
- Primary
- 3 (23 %)
- Lower secondary
- 6 (46 %)
- Upper secondary
- 4 (31 %)
Three subjects, their concepts and the tutor's approach
These wordings come directly from the repository's subject framework. Each subject page states the concepts worked on and the approach the tutor applies, and the session is built on exactly that pair.
| Subject | Concepts worked on | The tutor's approach |
|---|---|---|
| Reading and writing | Decoding and fluency, Understanding a short text, Vocabulary and word meaning, Writing correct sentences, Locating information in a text | Very short daily sessions rather than long weekly ones: fluency comes from closely spaced repetition. The tutor has the child read aloud, then asks them to retell — and immediately spots the gap between the two. |
| Mathematics | Number system and number sense, The four operations, Simple fractions and decimals, Quantities and measurement, Solving word problems | The tutor starts from a concrete situation and asks for a restatement before any calculation. Faced with a mistake, it does not correct: it asks for the result to be checked another way, which surfaces the inconsistency without humiliation. |
| French | Understanding a long text, Grammar and conjugation in service of meaning, Spelling and agreement, Structured writing, Reading works and building an argument | The tutor has them write first and correct afterwards, never both at once. It trains targeted proofreading: one pass for agreements, one for punctuation — rather than a general reread that catches nothing. |
Parents' questions
How long should a session be?
Twenty to thirty minutes, several times a week, carries far further than a two-hour Saturday session. Fluency and automaticity come from closely spaced repetition, and a child's attention holds over short spans.
What should I do about a mistake?
Ask for the result to be checked another way. The inconsistency then surfaces on its own, the pupil corrects it, and confidence stays intact: that is the approach the subject framework describes at every level.
How can I help when we speak another language at home?
By increasing exposure to written French and working on vocabulary, which is where the gap opens. Early bilingualism remains a durable asset, and the subject framework addresses that situation explicitly.
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