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Join our Primary Education forum to discuss starting school and helping your child get the most out of it.

Primary education

Years 1 & 2 - how much work do you do at home with your child?

17 replies

dinny · 01/04/2008 08:37

In addition to school-set homework/reading?

And what time of day do you find best? DD (5) is usually tired after school so we don't do much more than reading school book and doing homework/spelling once a week and then loads of bedtime stories.

Thanks Dinny

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sarah293 · 01/04/2008 08:41

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dinny · 01/04/2008 08:49

mmm, yes, that's my instinct, Riven, just worrying haven't been supporting her enough

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mankyscotslass · 01/04/2008 08:51

Nothing apart from his school work.
We still read stories together, or if we are out I get him to do the working out money and stuff, but nothing sat down and concentrated on.
He gets enough with his school work, he has 3 reading books, one library book, 8 spellings and a maths sheet every week. We do his spellings everyday, only takes 5 minutes, and it's also writing practise for him. We read his books as we get them, and do the maths sheet as soon as he gets it so his free time is just that! All his schoolwork is done as soon as we get in from school, then he can chill!

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TheHonEnid · 01/04/2008 08:53

dd2 (5 and in recep) does reading every night, she doesnt get homework but is very keen so I have signed her up to the Maths Whizz website - she has to do the maths games three or four times a week - she loves it!

On the other hand, dd1 is in year 3 and has reading every night and spellings/homework once a week and getting her to do any of it is like pulling teeth...

I tend to buy/get a book out of the library about the topics they are doing that term too.

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sarah293 · 01/04/2008 09:04

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bozza · 01/04/2008 09:20

We don't do much extra with DS who is year 2 really. He does his spellings 4x week (he has 6 and a sheet with 4 practice columns on it) just as and when, usually before/after a meal. Then he gets numeracy, literacy and extra numeracy homework once a week given out on a Friday. We usually try and get these done on a weekend morning, as I find this works best. Other than that it is just daily reading. And we always read to him at bedtime.

We might discuss something, or google something DS has shown an interest in, or do a bit of mental arithmetic, but all this is very ad hoc. We googled the largest city in the world the other week when DH reckoned it was in India, BIL thought a Chinese one, DS thought New York and it turned out to be Tokyo.

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Twiglett · 01/04/2008 09:24

none, why on earth would we?

we do lots of playing and playdates as he is 7 and deserves to be 7 and not some targeted and over-tested mini-teenager

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dinny · 01/04/2008 10:00

God, the blooming school always gets the wind up me. Thanks, makes sense

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SpringSunshine · 01/04/2008 20:24

well said Twiglett! we rarely get to do even the school work - spellings are done in the car on the way to school the day they are due in but then we are always reading with them and they have a fab time paying at home, dressing up as seals , bouncing on the trampoline, and generally running around playing havoc and having fun

time enough for homework and testing when they are 18 14?

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LadyMuck · 01/04/2008 20:51

The only time that I would do anything extra is if the teacher mentioned that they were really struggling with a particular area, or if it seemed appropriate to teach them a life skill which hadn't yet been fully covered in the curriculum, eg teaching ds1 how to tell the time. I think that if they are doing stuff with you (cooking, playing games etc) then you can end up teaching them lots informally. Or perhaps I'm just impatient and expect them to be able to work out by themselves how long the biscuits need to be in the oven.

Tbh I'd be a bit surprised at the idea of regularly needing to do additional work. Wouldn't that suggest that you're fairly unhappy with what is happening at school?Having said all of that, I do try to keep certain things going during the longer holidays as they do seem to slip especially in terms of reading and writing unless we keep up with it regularly. But even then I'd be talking about no more than 10 minutes 3 or 4 days out of 7.

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dinny · 01/04/2008 20:55

mmm, yes, I don't do anything formally with dd other than reading her school book and once-weekly spelling test. once-weekly homework, just wondered if I was being a crap mother by not doing it, iyswim.....

and you are right, I'm not entirely happy with the school, but we have one year left here, so can't really move her at this stage.

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LadyMuck · 01/04/2008 21:00

If she is in Year 1 then reading and spellings/homework sheet is already enough formal work I would have thought. The fact that she is doing spellings indicates that she is doing OK in terms of reading and writing. Personally I'm pretty much only interested in spellings as a way of practising reading/writing at this age, though it becomes more important when they're covering grammar (which for ds1 only properly started in Year 2).

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ReallyTired · 01/04/2008 21:30

I have been doing "Write from the Start" with my son. It has done wonders for his hand writing.

I also try and get my son to read everyday. If you don't learn to read then you can't get anywhere in life these days.

I think a lot depends on the needs of your child. If you have a child with SEN and the school is doing nothing then its better to help your child than let them sink to prove a point.

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ByTheSea · 01/04/2008 21:38

DD2 is in Year 1. We will usually go over her spelling briefly and she will either write them or say them out loud. Then she reads her sight words (She's halfway through the second set of 200 and really can just read them from the first day they're given). Spelling and sight words might take at most two minutes. Then she reads her book, which she changes daily, aloud to me. She's reading pretty well now and enjoys it so it usually doesn't take longer than ten minutes. She usually gets a numeracy sheet and a literacy sheet to complete at the weekend, but is able to do most of these fairly independently. That's it, although we often visit the library and she enjoys reading her library books too. If we leave it until too late in the evening, I find she's too tired, and it goes much smoother and faster if we do it right after she's had a snack after school.

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Sossy · 02/04/2008 00:46

Mine does once weekly homework (usually by the skin of our teeth) and once weekly spelling test. She struggles on a couple of words and the teachers have made comments to her to practise more which annoys me, she gets them right at home but not at school.

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Sossy · 02/04/2008 00:59

oh, plus the reading too. The weekly homework which could be about anything is not needed, imo.

The two words she gets stuck on, aren't spelt how they sound...what's all that about? Aren't they too young to learn those kind of words? She can't even read one of them, despite spending a whole week practising it.

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dinny · 02/04/2008 13:50

Praise the Lord, we finished the fecking sight word torture a few weeks ago, BTS, dd hated it....

think I will just keep doing what I'm doing and try not to worry too much!