Developed in partnership with Education Services Australia

The Australian Curriculum sets the goal for what all students should learn as they progress through their school life. Skills in the Year 5-6 curriculum include:

• reading and finding meaning in a wide variety of text types
• using maps, pictures and other graphic elements to help interpret and understand texts.

It’s easy to help your child practise these skills as part of everyday life – just use these simple ideas.

Facts for fun

Finding, understanding and using facts is an important skill for high school and beyond. To complement the practice your child will be getting at school, make sure your home environment includes non-fiction sources such as books, documentaries and magazines, and encourage your child to dip into them just for pleasure.

It can be hard to know what will pique your child's interest, so use your library to find books, magazines and DVDs on different topics. There are great non-fiction materials for children, but don't be limited to these – kids will also pore over glossy photo books about things they are interested in, even if the text is more advanced. Just borrow a range of topics and materials, bring more of what your child seems interested in, and keep introducing other topics.

If you're stuck for ideas, try looking for things that relate to:

• your child's interests
• your child's leisure activities – eg sports, music, online games
• your child's favourite fiction series – eg 'behind-the-scenes' and fact books related to movies
• your family history or culture
• interests of other family members
• popular topics among your child's peers 
• facts and trivia – eg world records, '1001 facts'.

Get researching

Another way to focus your child on some facts is to get them to research an online purchase. As they look at different products, read reviews and check prices, they'll be interpreting different types of information, considering whether sources are reliable or biased, making financial comparisons – and becoming a savvy shopper! So next time you're researching a new purchase online, involve your child in the process – especially if it's something they are interested in.

Go online

For online reinforcement, Kakadu information display will give your child practice at:

• sorting factual information into categories.

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