My dd is in year 3 and the amount of homework she is bringing home is getting silly. She has to read for a minimum of 15 minutes per day, which is fine, but then she has another task to do each day. A spelling sheet on day 1, with a word search and literacy tasks, then the need to learn the set of spellings to be tested. Then she'll have 2 pages of numeracy, plus 2 days of other stuff, often related to the topic they are working on. Oh and they have to find time to learn their times tables.
Yesterday she spent over 3 hours doing one side of her maths homework. I didn't think it was particularly difficult, but she just couldn't grasp what she was expected to be doing, which made me think it hadn't been covered in class. We ended up with her having a complete meltdown.
I've now decided that from now on, whatever can't be done in 30 minutes, won't get done. Am I being unreasonable, or does this sound like a lot for a 7 year old? I do hate homework and that it eats into their "free" time. It is eroding our children's childhood, which I really resent. I can't even see how it helps them, other than the reading and times tables. I think we are overloading children, which is going to switch them off learning.
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Too much homework?
Badmumof3 · 24/01/2014 11:39
Their perception of 15/20 mins is all wrong too!!
It might be 15/20 mins to a child who has just eaten breakfast and had a run about in the play ground before starting class.
It's not 15/20 mins to a child who spent twenty mums in a car stuck in traffic on way home, has to try and read their book while mummy finishes tea and put up with a baby bro or sis that hasn't seen them all day and wants to play. Add I the fact they are tired hungry and just wanna eat and watch sponge bob and it's a recipe for strss and upset. But hey let's face it, all worth it to measure rain full or make a paper mâché bird 
That's ridiculous. 1/2 hour a week is plenty for yr3s well, 1/2 hr too much for some of them.
Mine are all avid readers, so I've never counted that as 'homework time', but other than that, little children should be relaxing / playing / maybe learning to swim or going to Brownies or Beavers after school, not battling with further work 
when do the kids eat??? :(It sounds like a lot. I don't like homework at all. I hate having to bring work home myself so that probably clouds my thinking! Anyway. I have a yr 5 who has 2 tasks a week (one maths, one English) and we allow 30 mins each. She reads every day and we practice tables on the way to school. DS is in yr 2 and has reading books (but we read every night before bed), spellings and number bonds we spend about 30 mins over the whole week on those. I'd speak to the teacher in your position. The teacher won't know unless you say. 
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30 minutes a night is still far too much. Guideline used to be an hour a week - until Michael Gove abolished the guidelines. Obviously he didn't do that to reduce homework, he did it so that schools could set more and get away with it.
There is no link between primary homework and academic achievement. In secondary the link is no better than tenuous.
But too many parents don't trust schools to teach their children, and they see homework as 'evidence' that their little darlings are learning something.
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