Description
The second book in this revolutionary Magic Memory series of books gives Primary School children tried and tested methods for learning spellings. It is packed full of comprehensive ideas from memory expert Dr Sue Whiting. She draws upon her extensive knowledge in this field to offer eight to eleven year olds the most effective strategies for learning spellings while relaxing at home.
She explains the strategies used by expert spellers in a clear, enticing and fun way in her acclaimed cartoon format, so children don’t even realise that this is an educational book. It is designed to be read at home, complementing school work but with minimal parental supervision: hence the relatively wide target age as none of these skills are generally taught in schools.
Along with Bramble, the Wizard’s special cat, and Charlie and Holly the Labradors, the Wizard guides children through games, activities and tricks to help them learn spellings in a much easier way. The book is fun to use with easy to read text, cartoon illustrations, puzzles and quizzes (with rewards), which give children a sense of achievement. Drawing on the latest research and her own experience in memory competitions and teaching children, Sue gives authoritative guidance you can trust, explaining basic educational neuroscience to the reader so they can understand the ‘WHY’ behind these strategies. She also introduces the Heartmath stress transformation technique – this can be used anywhere to get into an optimal state of mind for learning and helping to prevent exam nerves.
Dr Sue Whiting, a Grandmaster of Memory, is a former Women’s World Memory Champion and won the title for five consecutive years. A qualified Chartered Accountant and Chartered Tax Adviser (though no longer practising), Sue now works as a writer, speaker, coach and independent memory consultant, and has more than 20 years’ experience in the field of memory. Sue became interested in how the memory works soon after her own children were born. A career break enabled her to develop her interest, become a Memory Grandmaster and the Women’s World Memory Champion. In doing so, Sue realised that all the hard work she had done to pass her university and professional exams could have been much more effective. Sue spearheaded the first ever UK school’s memory championships where she devised and wrote all the material and training packs for the 2007/2008 Junior Memory Challenge. Her work extended to conducting pre-competition trials as well as being an arbiter for the final, held at Imperial College, London in March 2008. Year 4 children from 60 primary schools participated and the feedback received showed the tremendous demand there was for teaching children how to use their memories effectively. Sue has spoken at primary schools, even teaching some of the teachers, and has also conducted the popular Wizard of Spells lectures held at the Science Museum in August 2012. Her ideas for the children’s Wizard of Spells series of books were developed from these experiences. With Sue’s scientific background (the Dr. refers to D.Phil in Astrophysics from Oxford University), she naturally keeps up to date with recent developments being made in neuroscience.
Dr Sue Whiting is also the author of How to have a Magic Memory and Visual Memory Fun: Visual Memory Puzzles for pre-schoolers
