AIBU to think fitting homework in is so hard?

Just don't call it "homework", surely reading, spelling and learning their time tables etc. is basic skills you practice with them anyway.

If a Primary school child has reading homework every single day, complain to the teacher: they should have a chance to read their own books for pleasure, not have to solely focus on the school books who are not always the most fascinating.

Other schools have a reading diary, so they can have "reading homework" but most evening is just read whatever the child want. You would do it even if he wasn't going to school

As it's just ten mins, can you plonk toddler in front of paw patrol so you can focus on your son? I think your worries are founded to be honest, regular homework I don't care about but reading practice is crucial.

No. Bringing up children.

I completely agree with you @purpletick - I read to mine a lot, and that develops a love of books... but they also need to be able to read them! And unfortunately reading books are a bit dull. I read with my son before school for ten mins. We do breakfast, then reading and getting ready, and then play before leaving for school. The faster he settles to read the more time he has to play. I have a four year old and a two year old and the two year old stays in the room playing quietly or sat on my lap to listen too. But it they are loud then they have to go out of the room. They are now really good. Also to make it more interesting I also write my son stories to read (just half a page of A4 in big letters) to add variety. I used the same level of words as the books.

I let one of my DTs get out of their car seat to sit in the front seat next to me to read then when he's finished they swap over. It's not a failsafe solution but they seem to be able to concentrate more in the morning and unlike at home they can't get up and wander off as they are contained in the front seat! Good luck, I know it's not easy trying to persuade them to read when they just don't enjoy it and the books are so boring!

I have an older primary school child, so homework is ramping up.

The long-term solution which seems to be working best for us, especially now that DC is meant to be completing homework semi-independently, is doing homework immediately after school. So either straight through the door and sat down at the kitchen table, while I'm tidying or making dinner, or even in the car after school or waiting for DC's swimming lesson, or (now that the weather is nicer) in the park across the road on a picnic blanket. I prefer getting the homework done out of the house if possible so it doesn't 'taint' our relaxing time at home, but otherwise, as far as I'm concerned, 'home time' doesn't start until homework is completed. I find it much more pain-free for both DC and me to treat homework as an extension of the school day, rather than to start relaxing and have to pick it up again. So it's done before anything else and then packed into the school bag, which is put at the front door for the next day.

I'm hoping that getting DC into the habit of doing homework before anything else after school, and then 'switching off', will significantly reduce stress levels when secondary starts.

Reading is different - the school don't send home regular reading books anymore, but I listen to DC read for a few minutes every evening, and then read a chapter of whatever he's reading to him while he's going to sleep.

op can't you do 5 minutes as part of bed routine? it doesn't need to be a whole book. just a few pages a night

I've never seen reading as homework, more an enjoyable, essential life skill (and non negotiable home activity at primary age). Possibly because I'm a Year 1 teacher, love reading myself and had two boys who enjoyed reading when younger and didn't struggle with it thankfully. My two definitely needed time to chill out when they got home from school, and mornings were always rushed as none of us are keen on getting up so it was part of our bedtime routine. DS would read to us and then we would read to them. Luckily DH was usually home for bedtime so we could divide and conquer (we read to them nightly from being babies....DS2 was maybe nearer 18months before he'd sit still enough to listen... so when they started school we just added their school books in before story).
Little and often really does benefit them and despite what others have said here, most schools dont have the staff for children to be reading 1:1 on a daily basis, so practice at home is invaluable.

Once a week isn’t enough. It needs to be every day.

I wouldn’t class reading as homework it’s just practice but is necessary. Over summer hols I carried on with her reading daily (used reading chest subscription) and her reading absolutely took off.

Mornings definitely worked best for this house. DS would come and get into bed with me and we'd read his book together then I'd read him something else before the others were up for the day. Or we'd do it at breakfast when the younger DD was distracted by eating.

Sometimes reading the book wasn't the best way though. Can make 'snap' cards with the main/tricky words and turn it into a game, or put them around the house and if you find them you read them. Integrate reading into every day activities. 5 minute mum has some great ideas.

Now it's DD's turn and pretty much the only way to do it is to have the book ready at the table to read it once we've finished eating. DS goes and keeps himself busy for a bit or sometimes is the one who listens and helps DD, but we're not as diligent as we were the first time around 🫣

I do agree that little and often works better for most small children.

We used to do it at bedtime: 5 minutes of him reading to me / DH; then adult read to child. (Different books obvs.)

theconversation.com/primary-school-children-get-little-academic-benefit-from-homework-181652

Some used to do in car in mornings at DD’s school. Not sure if that’s an option. If you feel morning would be best can you make any changes like your partner taking 2 year old so you have 10 mins doing reading with him.

Do you have a partner at home?
Unless they leave for work very early can't one do the reading whilst the other wrangles the 2 year old?

A child under the age of 11 really should NOT be required to do homework! It's cruel and unnecessary.
I would just ignore it and let your child be himself and do his own thing when he's at home. Home should be a sanctuary, imo, not an extension of school.

I know several people that could only do so much because of demanding younger siblings. It's possible to catch up later. I don't think it will do any good for OP to beat herself up over something that can't be changed right now.

If it's just reading, then we always did it as part of the bed time routine - DS would read to me for a while, then I would read something different to them. It worked fairly well, although none of my children were great readers - but the tradeoff seemed to work for them.

I wasn't in the mood to do homework when i came home from school, still had to do it before i did anything fun

Similar ages here OP and agree on the ten minute attention span. It’s taken us since Christmas to get up to ‘meeting expectations’ as the academics have been tricky for our oldest.

We have the Reception child do reading during our bedtime routine while the toddler runs around. Some days it could be one page, others the full book - any reading is better than none.

We set up some tricky words practice during our evening reset to be done first thing in the morning over breakfast. Either using flash cards (bought off Amazon) which are read between mouthfuls or a whiteboard. For example we write the tricky words all over the whiteboard and they get wiped off after they’ve been read - we did similar with digraphs and trigraphs etc.

Best endeavours and all that OP.

It sound like you are reading to him. Can you just get him to sound out the odd word relevant to the level he is at in the book you are reading him. Put him in charge of reading a very short simple story to his sibling? Take advantage of any situational reading like menus, street names, etc.

Do you drive? Mind used to read to me in the car and it worked well. Seemed to take the pressure off.

If this is a current reception child they have been at school almost a year and will rapidly fall behind peers if not regularly practising reading themselves.