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Original poster

Y10 Easter homework

31 replies

Jux · 16/04/2014 15:49

So far this holiday dd has had one day off. Every other day has been spent on homework, almost from dawn to dusk, something like 10 hours a day, with small breaks.

She still has half of her ancient history to do, two paintings and a sculpture, a developed answer for RE, French and German.

She wasn't behind. This isn't catch up work. This is all homework set for the holidays.

The only reason she's had one day off was because we took her out. I asked her if she'd like to watch a film yesterday evening, she wanted to but refused as she had homework to do. I wanted to take her out today, but again she said she needed to get on with homework.

According to the school, she is among the brightest in her year. She is expected to do extremely well in her GCSEs. She is quite studious naturally anyway, but I am beginning to think that she may not get through to end of Y11 in a reasonable state of mind at this rate.

Is that much homework normal now? I did O levels in the early 70s, so have no idea.

OP posts:
fourcorneredcircle · 16/04/2014 17:17

Ladies, I give you Gove's Utopia... No, in all seriousness it sounds like your daughter is over doing it. It's quite common in high achieving students. As has been mentioned they put a lot of pressure on themselves. I am an MFL teacher and have sent my students home to prepare for their speaking assessment which is more work than the average piece of homework - but they've had six hours in class so the holidays should be about learning (I know, don't get me started) rather than pens on paper if that makes sense. I explained to them that 30 minutes concentrated work every other day plus getting parents/siblings to test them at random should be enough. I always tell my students that their HWK shouldn't take longer than it would in an exam so, for example I'm history/RS/geography if it is about answering an exam question they should know how long it should take them and limit themselves to that.

Dreamgirls234 · 16/04/2014 16:34

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Nocomet · 16/04/2014 16:31

Sounds utterly ridiculous.
I don't think DD1 did much at all last Easter.

She hasn't revised everyday of the holidays this year either.

Sounds like your DD really needs to step back and ask herself what is actually required by her teachers and how long did they mean it to take.

I don't think they can possibly have meant her to work all holiday.

OddBoots · 16/04/2014 16:27

ds is in y10 and sounds like your dd in terms of ability/grades. he has done some work but not that much, by the end of the holiday he would have done 5 full days, the rest have been rest days. I wouldn't want him to do more than this really, they need some time off.

mistlethrush · 16/04/2014 16:22

Sounds too much to me Jux - I did O'levels too - at a pushy school - and I'm sure that I didn't spend all the time working in Yr10. Even in Yr11 I took time off revision for horseriding and dog walking.

BackforGood · 16/04/2014 16:21

No. Not normal at all.
I have a dd in Yr10 - as all MN children are bright, capable, predicted As and A*s and she's spent most of the holiday so far (we are in our first week here, in our LA), asleep. She will be away on camp for 4 days over the EAster weekend, and then will sleep a lot next week too. She's done a bit of homework, but was outside most of yesterday, and for a long day out on Sunday.
I was at a Parent's Forum at her school last year, and some parents were anxious about ridiculous amounts of homework, and they were adamant that they weren't setting those types of amounts, but there were a few girls in every year who put themselves under undue pressure, and took 3 hours to do a piece of work intended to take 30mins. It would be worth looking into specifics and perhaps talking with her form tutor / Head of Year about it.