To not agree with this amount of homework or awards for it?

[Skatingonthinice16]

Ds is 7 and a younger year 3. They've just been given their first big project. We have six weeks to do it and there are 15 tasks all of which take at least an hour and some - like the one we did last week - take several hours and a considerable amount of resources. This is on top of spellings, reading, numeracy homework.
So that's my first moan. Too much I think. Plus without significant parental support they aren't going to be able to do it because of the range of the tasks involved.

However my biggest issue is that on top of this school have decided to give prizes to the 'best' three projects - considering creativity, effort and presentation. Now aside from the fact ds is dyspraxic and his presentation is not good (we will use the computer for some of it admittedly) I just feel that a) it ramps up the pressure and b) what about the other 27 kids who've worked hard but don't get a prize? Why can't they have an end of topic celebration for everyone where they look at each other's projects and have some golden time or something? I just think this is too much. Ds is already crying and saying his won't be good enough to get a prize. He's very competitive and a perfectionist (ASD strongly suspected) and he's already decided his project won't be good enough. I've talked to him about effort etc but he said it doesn't matter how much effort he puts in, he won't get a prize and he's more than likely right.
Why bring prizes into it at all?

This is a good state school by the way. Not private or anything.

Aibu?

As Rainy said, let him play to his strengths and see the list of tasks as including extension tasks for those who can do it all more easily than your daughter.

Do be involved. Don't take over. Do encourage him. Do let the school know how your son's feeling about it. Be happy with what he can do relative to his abilities. The school should be too. If they aren't, once you've explained exactly how he's coping (or not) at home then of course it's a much more difficult situation.

Now is the time to teach your child the art of not giving a shit.

Please don't do this. A younger and less jaded version of me would have been saddened to read this. Now, I'd just implore you not to become one of those parents who raise one of those children.

I really don't think it matters about the prize. I think it's common knowledge, certainly amongst our kids that it's the same kids that get these sorts of prizes/get picked for school play etc every time. Can you not offer to get him a prize if he tries his best at it?
We have the same homework but out of the 15 or so tasks, we have to pick at least six. Plus there is an 'impress me' option which involves doing a specific task.
We did the minimum amount, and then I felt bad taking my 8 year old in as lots of her friends had done the whole lot. Quite frankly there's not enough hours in the day!!
I was really shocked though as she still managed to get the maximum amount of points - same as others who had worked through the whole lot. (She hadn't even done the impress me task!!). But she had put a massive amount of effort into the ones she did do. And even though I groan when we get it, it is actually quite nice spending the time together and thinking up creative ways of doing the tasks.

I think Oliversmumsarmy raises some great points.

This is a homework project for a 7 year, not negotiating world peace. Teaching a child to develop a sense of perspective on how important a piece of work is, is a valuable skill that will help them well into adulthood.

You decide between you how much time and energy you want to put into this and do that - he won't win a prize but hey..... I've never won an Olympic medal - its really not that important. What are they going to do expel him???

I'm talking about being lazy or not instilling that hard work can produce rewards but a far more important skill of deciding for yourself what to put that level of work into. Not just blindly doing something because someone in authority tells you to.

Do as much as you want...he won't win a prize and will not even remember this when he is 35 - but he may be able to prioritise his workload so he has time to spend with his own children

My 7 yr old dd homework this week was to build a skeleton and name the bones. Yes that's something she is going to be able to do on her own! Jeez I have yet to come across a homework that doesn't require parental input.

Is 2.5 hours a week really that much - yes, on top of spellings (10 mins) and reading (20).
Yes I think it is. An hour a day of homework for a family where both parents work is too much. By the time I have picked the kids up and got home and cooked tea they now have time for 1/2 hour homework before they go to bed. I would not want to keep them up another 1/2 hour every day just so they can do more homework.
And no they can't just 'get on with their homework' whilst I am cooking - they have to read TO ME for 20mins, they have to do maths on the computer which I like to superviser rather than just giving them free reign to the internet.
It would be completely different if we were getting in at 3:30 but we don't.

Wetunwindee in my experience if your child is not capable of doing something then there has never been any understanding just the repeated statement

This is the curriculum it must be completed. Ds couldn't read yet for homework he was meant to write a letter. He couldn't do it so was kept in every lunch time and break time till I did it for him
In told this teacher in had done it for him and she was quite happy as the work had been completed.

I remember when my own mother went in and told my English teacher that I was struggling and taking hours to do what was supposed to take 30minutes. The teacher said it should do what I could within the time. Next time I had English I was called lazy infront of the class as I hadn't done my homework.

That was my turning point of not giving a shit about teachers. The viking long boat incident was my dss

Get him a prize so his effort is rewarded regardless of who wins in school.
DS had a large project like this at the end of P1. The teacher collected them in during the last week of term and we never heard anything again.

The teacher sounds a bit over excited. 15 hours for a six week project on top of normal homework for seven year olds? Esp a seven year old with SEND?

I'd try first having a word with the teacher and saying this seems an awful lot for such young children, and for your child in particular. I'd also go to your school SENCo and ask for your son's homework to be differentiated so his dyspraxia/possible ASD doesn't mean he has to put in twice the time and effort and anxiety of a non affected child for half the result. That might be reducing the number of tasks expected, cutting writing tasks out or changing them so that they're recorded speech or he uses a scribe to write for him - but tbh this still sounds a bit over the top for year 3 and I'd be querying that (nicely) with the HT if the teacher wasn't responsive when I spoke to them.

Some types of homework require quite significant input from parents, from resources to help holding stuff together, making papier mache and so on. To me, that's what school is for, facilitating all this stuff. I can't think for the life of me why it's essential for 7 year olds to make more stuff with their parents.

I loathe it. Our school can't get homework right. It gets this feedback all the time on their feedback forms.

Tesco sells Viking long boats?? grabs car keys

I have only one rule regarding homework, well 2.

1 - at least attempt it
2 - when it starts to cause distress or upset, stop it immediately and do something else

So sometimes this means the homework gets done, sometimes (often) it goes in incomplete or totally incorrect.

I think the amount of work you are talking about for a 7 year old is outrageous and IIWM I'd apply my rules, and if that meant it wasn't complete then so be it. Ignore the prize, thats not important here.

As a side my 7 yo has been given the most ridiculous piece of maths homework I have ever seen in my life. Using a partitioning grid to multiply? Its the most bizarre and difficult way of working out multiplication I have ever seen!

YANBU.
The amount of h/w is too much regardless.
Dyspraxia can easily at least double the time needed to do any research or craft based activities, or to create things that 'look neat'. (DD1 has dyspraxia).
And actually, general poor motor skills (even without the dyspraxia) can turn these 'fun' activities into stress.

DD2 is in year 7. She has DCD, motor skills bottom 1%.
She has this week had 'draw and label a castle' (for French) and 'make a model of xxxx' (for RE).
The French one took 1hr 45 because she had started in class and the teacher had said it wasn't neat enough so she got stressed and kept try and failing to draw something better. In the end we stuck with her original drawing ...
For RE, we ignored 'model' and did 'collage' instead.

What sort of things d the 15 items include?

wettunwindee not sure about how factually correct your statement is about parental help and kids who do the best....

When I was at school in the 80's/90's there was very little need for parental involvement. Schools didn't set ridiculously large amounts of homework at primary school.....in fact it was just reading and times tables year 4. At middle school, we had weekly vocab for English and French and SMP maths and as we got further up to year 7, we had a few projects to do.

My year group all achieved highly, whether that be at uni or if they left to work after GCSEs but the fact is, there was very little parental involvement at all and we still did very well.

There is really no need to be giving large half term projects to children/parents. It's daft and doesn't achieve anything other than stress.

OP perhaps ask about this in SEN Chat. I think you'll get a lot more useful support from other parents of children with SN.

ps Gah if the multiplying method is either of the 2 I am thinking of, they are actually both very good. Just because it's not like in your day, doesn't mean its is a rubbish method.

We don't generally bother with it. We do our own stuff. I think too often it does end up as the parents doing the stuff and sometimes a parent is not in a position to help much.
I too am fed up with the "build a vocano" model type homework and I think they have very limited teaching value. I'd rather bake a cake with my kids or read a book with them.

"It's Key Stage 2!"

That's all DS's teacher used to say to me!!! Yes I am aware that which key stage he is in!!

DS awaiting a dx of ASD and ADHD. What should take 30 minutes could take hours with all the tantrums. Then he starts with the negativity of how rubbish he is at everything.

We now have just set a time... Di as much as you can ... concentrating for 30 minutes then we put it away so he knows he only has to focus for a short time.

Wetunwindee in my experience if your child is not capable of doing something then there has never been any understanding just the repeated statement

I don't understand this.

The teacher sounds a bit over excited. 15 hours for a six week project on top of normal homework for seven year olds? Esp a seven year old with SEND?

I read this as 15 hours a week for the OPs son (sorry for calling him a daughter earlier - I'm no multi-tasker!). At the OP's estimate, this is 5 hours over 6 weeks for most of his peers.

My 7 yr old dd homework this week was to build a skeleton and name the bones. Yes that's something she is going to be able to do on her own!

Or Year One classes did something similar. Some used pipe cleaners. Some lollipop sticks. Some simply drew. They used words like 'leg' and 'hip' not 'tibula' and ... well... that's the only one I know.

@GahBuggerIt - partitioning is a fantastic method. www.ncetm.org.uk/resources/43774

you're bang on with your 2 'rules' though.

I also have a perfectionist child that age so I know it's easier said than done, but can you encourage him to find some enjoyment in the process, rather than the result? Eg, focus on the skills he is using, when he has finished, tell him "that whole project took 40 hours, that's like a whole week at work for a grown-up, and now you also know how to do xyz".
As other pp's have said, I would also get him a prize, like taking him out for a pizza, when he has finished.
Without knowing more details on the required activities, it's hard to say if it's a ridiculous amount if work or just challenging but I would imagine one of the goals is to show kids how to break a larger project into a series of smller tasks.

Homework should be realistic and for the ability for most children in that age group.

My rules with homework is they have to make a decent attempt at it.

There has been times I have gone to the school because the homework for DS falls way off his IEP.

That's a ridiculous and offputting amount of homework for Year 3. The important thing is that your dc is learning to read, write, and is keeping up with the NC, making friends etc.

I'd arrange a meeting with the teacher and ask what benefits they think the homework will have. How are they linked to the NC? And do they really think that dc will do them on their own? If not, they shouldn't be giving hw that adults have to help with. You could say your ds won't do it all, or that he will do one task per week, not all of them.

I'd also cite this: www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/11140668/Homework-damages-primary-age-pupils.html

Re the prizes, I agree that a lot of the time you're rewarding the parents who have spent a lot of time helping their dc.

But I do think your ds neds to change his mindset and be more resilient: this will help him all through his life.

Maybe you are overestimating what the teacher expects for some of the tasks. For a leaflet - I remember in Years 6/7/8 etc producing leaflets over a few lessons, quite details, printed nicely, pictures, research etc, so my immediate response would be to think that was what was needed, and how many hours it would take with a dyspraxic 7 year old. But there's a chance that actually the teacher expects you to do a bit of research together, fold a piece of paper in 3, let him draw bits on each piece, and that's it. It gets them thinking - what should be on the cover? Should I put the title in big letters? What should I draw on the inside then with more details? And that's enough. Objective accomplished.

yes, some children might have parents that will do the whole works with/for them, and a competitive prize doesn't seem ideal if it's only based on final product, but if they do look at effort and so on, then they might be rewarding for all sorts of other things, not just the ones with parent-perfect presentation.

Given that it is something you have to do, and prizes are involved, you could try to change his view (and possibly yours) about the three prizes being the only thing that matters - "all that effort, and only three get rewarded" - by reminding him that the point of it is to learn about the topic, to have fun making stuff instead of just writing it or doing a test, to be able to show the teacher and other children what they've learned, to be rewarded by the teacher giving him positive feedback about it, other children liking the cooking samples, or whatever they get to do. We used to do science/history fair projects once a year that sounded a bit like this, and while there were prizes, the big thing was the day where we brought them in, looking at each others projects, seeing how they'd done things, trying out samples or activities or watching things they'd made/models/films. Some of them did have loads of parent help, and probably wasn't fair to judge on that, but even still, there was such a variety and we all thought different ones were the best. Perhaps you could keep trying to encourage him to think of ways that it might be rewarding that don't mean having to win a prize.

15 hours+ of work for a 7 year old? Batshit.

That seems too much to me.

Yanbu.

Teen and Wet - It just looks so difficult and long winded compared to the way I was taught? so 43 x 5 breaks down into 40 x 5 (he has no chance of working out 40 x 5 in his head) etc etc

I never said it was rubbish, but compared to the other way its very complicated IMO