Homework, sigh...

landrover It's a technique whereby wind instrument players can play faster. Useful for fiendishly quick passages. You have to train yourself to be able to do it though. DD2 has spent god knows how many hours perfecting her Spock eyebrows so I really don't know what she is complaining about.

I'm much lower rent than you hak. I don't think we have Brahms in the house!

Tbh I hadn't got a very thorough plan. But fortunately DS didn't even want to know. Clearly even the boredom of neutrons and wot not sounded a better bet to him!

What were your "mum approved" activities? Last night ds read King Solomon's Mines while listening to Brahms. And eating chocolate digestives.

I told DS last night that if he didn't have an hours HW I had some 'mum approved' activities.

He decided he would rather revise his physics!

Don't worry. Frogsinapond- I was exagerating slightly with my whip cracking comments!

I really think it's important for them to learn how to fit some "work" into to their after school time, so that's why we've always done the hour as soon as secondary school starts. If there isn't any homework to be done, then what that hour consists of is up for negotiation. Up to a point.

The very best way to measure your DCs' academic strengths and weaknesses is to maintain a firm grip on their performance at school. We have always encouraged all our DC to "share" their questions about homework with us and we are always available to test/rehearse/make suggestions.

It works for us.

Not read whole thread but op what about carrots rather than sticks?

Eg Xbox not used unless homework done, seen and checked against planner? If needs be keep controllers and powers leads hidden, say in the car!

I know this is going to be a huge mindset change and met with lots of strops by the ops child but it's likely going work with his priorities to actually get the work done!

My kids are a bit older - GCSE and up and the way we chose to work things was that big technology eg x box were not a personal up session but a family owned item meaning the adults retained control incase it was needed ( also we couldn't spend that much money on one child).

"If there is one thing I've learned on these threads is that different things work for different children, and that for some children nothing seems to work."

This is so true.

One of mine needed no encouragement or supervision at all (for homework and even music practice, which I know is quite unusual), completely hands-off approach worked brilliantly as instructions from teachers were always adhered to with no checking needed. Was also bright enough to get away with a moderate gaming habit too.

The other was one of those who was highly resistant to doing any homework or music practise right from the start. Music was dropped (pointless without practice) and attempts to supervise homework failed dismally as it simply never came home and the existance of it was denied. Many complaints came from school but enough was done under the desk in the lesson before to mostly prevent major escalations. Noone seemed able to change the habit until at the eleventh hour in year 11 a forced change of school caused enough of a shock to start a moderate amount of work which together with luck of the devil, ability to pull rabbits out of bags, and a very fortuitous exam timetable with well spaced exams allowing much day-before cramming resulted in unexpectedly excellent GCSEs.

Hak, it is possible to do very well at GCSE with very little effort for bright dc. I wonder if you are tending to crack the whip for your ds in a subconscious (or perhaps conscious) attept to compensate for real or imagined deficiencies in his schooling? I would endeavour if you can to get him to the point where he is self motvated and an independent worker if possible (if not then keep on as you are while he is willing). Did you do the same for your dd?

Posted to soon.

She really worked at the RE, because she wanted to show she could do it. No nagging from me.

DD got her C for English (another dyslexic) despite the craziest marking known to man (a,b,a,u)
and her Science and maths As.

To her total delight she got a B for RE, she loves debating moral/philosophical things. Her miserable teacher never ever gave her more than a C.

OK Rabbit wtf is double tongueing?

Sorry Coolas, I wasnt clear. Yr9 I told him it was a good time to relax a little. From here it is four years of bloody hard work if he wants to be a vet.
He had struggled with friendships and by being more relaxed he was able to enjoy his mates company.
He now has a good group of friends, has had the kick up the behind he needed, the realisation that he needs to work and is in a good place in his head to do really well.
I dont know if this approach would work with every dc but it has been positive for ds1.

You do know that GCSEs count for competitive courses like veterinary science, don't you?

Ds1 is in yr 10. He wants to be a vet and knows that to achieve this he needs great results. I dont check his homework, I ask him if he has any homework and when he plans to do it. Then I leave him to it.
Although he started his GCSEs last year I gave him permission to slack during exam time. I told him if ever there was a good time to relax that was it.
His results showed it and he learnt a lesson. This year he is a lot more serious and committed to doing well.
Ds2 is yr8 and needs chasing up at the moment.

God, I feel your pain. My DS 14 has just started yr 10. We've always had issues with him doing homework to a good standard.

Last year I decided my involvement wasn't working - we had loads of conflict and it wasn't helping - so backed off a bit and left it to the school, having made clear to his teachers I'd like a bit more action taken when homework isn't handed in or done poorly. Outcome - several issues about late homework raised when we had the two parents' evenings but no information about these instances when they happened which made it harder to deal with at home. The only detention DS had to my knowledge was when a teacher emailed me to say she was keeping him behind to complete 6 (!) pieces of work he hadn't handed in. Why on earth she hadn't blasted him got tough on the second instance I have no idea but I was not impressed.

This year we have started a new regime. He's agreed that he'll do homework at the weekends, regardless of when it needs handing in (he's the king of the last minute dashed off piece of work the night day before) and I have a list of what's to be done on the fridge. I need to see everything is done by Sunday night or there's no xbox at all for the week ahead.

The plan was discussed and agreed with DS who seems, I hope, to realise that the next two years are important and has asked for 'support, Mum but not nagging'. He's a bit more mature which helps.

I am a supportive and engaged parent but you can only effectively monitor homework when you have the information. DS's school have poorly used and monitored planners and the online portal where all homework should be recorded is patchy - some teachers apparently 'don't like using it' and if it'snot on there I can't check it's done.

I wish DS's teachers had been better earlier at pulling him up on sloppy work - have been appalled in year 7 and 8 by the standards of presentation DS was allowed to get away with and of course my feedback wasn't listened to when teachers were letting it go.

My DD1 is allowed to use a laptop for exams due to the fact her brain stops when she has a pen in her hand. As far as I understand, they use Wordpad (so no spelling, grammar help etc).
For her MFL she is allowed a crib card telling her the shortcuts to get accents.
It is printed off, I think, and she has to sign it as her work or something.
Certainly in controlled assessments she can print as she goes, mark up changes, and then make them. The PC users are in a separate room to others.

She will be using it for essay based subjects.
Not for maths or ICT (!)
And possibly mix and match for science - mainly on the paper, but computerised for the longer wordier questions.

The school or exam centre provides a computer, yes. I don't know what software they use to write their scripts, never occurred to me to ask - but all the usual WP functions are turned off so literally all you can do is type. I also don't know if it;s printed off at the end or submitted to a secure drive - I can ask DD1 though, she did GCSEs last year and some ASs this year.

So can they bring a laptop into an exam then? Or are they expected to suddenly write like fury for 3 hrs non-stop

Even if it isn't online work, most of what mine had to do needs to be typed - which is just as well given his Godawful dyspraxic handwriting.

He rarely brings exercise books home.

All of it. 2 Dyspraxics and 1 dyslexic - they do all their written work on computer. And some of it e.g. maths is computer based anyway. Plus, they have to access their online classroom things etc.

What are they actually doing on a computer? Is it all submitted online now or something?
I get that if you have to research something then t'interweb will be useful, but if you've had to write an essay on symbolism in Hamlet or some such, then you presumably work from a text? or an exam crammer guide so you can avoid reading the play

Or should I crawl back under my early 90's learn by rote educational rock and come back out when my kids are old enough for me to have an opinion

I used to do my homework in front of the telly at their age (well, not DD1's age, but certainly when I was DSs age and younger. I didn't get a desk in my room till I was nearly 16 - like, a week before).

You are probably right (about the temptations posed by computers) but when you have 3 kids all of whom do homework on the computer even if you have an extra room (in our case, the former playroom now music room) you will still have at least one probably 2 kids who have to work in their rooms. Thus, computers in rooms are unavoidable. And they all have phones and tablets anyway so banning a desktop/laptop would be an empty gesture.

DS - the one who needs more whip cracking - is the one most likely to be ordered to do his homework in the playroom/music room. But if theres a lesson going on in there or one of the others is practising then that's that. And of course, mine craft is in the playroom/music room...so it's probably a better idea to have him in his own room unless someone (DH) is actually able to be glancing into the music room on a regular basis.

DD2 would like to do her homework in the living room. But it's not going to happen.