AIBU about this homework?

[DressMe]

My son is 5 years old and is in Year 1. A recent change of headteacher has promted a new homework policy, and he now has three lots of homework to do each week.

One is to read three times a week (fine).

Two is to learn 10 given spelling each week for a test. He gets stars depending on how many he gets right. Interestingly, although he passes the test each week, he doesn't retain the spellings and can't recite previous spellings after the week.

Three is to complete a 'phonics activity' each week. This week's is to look at a list of words with the pheneme /ere/ and sort them into groups according to their grapheme (words include adhere, peering, tear, interfere...). He then has to write them in lists in his homework book.

AIBU to think this is an unreasonable expectation from a 5 year old? I have three children (one of which is 10 months old) and work full time. Just getting him to learn the 10 spellings requires 15 minutes or so a night, then reading on top of that, and now a phonics activity too? When do people find time for this?!

I'm happy to do homework with him and think reading is incredibly important, but I worry about the level of expectation. I would prefer homework that encouraged him to work on his handwriting and letter formation - It would be much more useful. He currently has a tiny homework book that is so small he can't write all 10 words on one page!

What homework do your five year old's get?

I find the idea of homework at 5 really sad

Why spend so much time on activities that in the long term make no difference to children's academic achievements.

I'm really glad that my school experience didn't include any homework before secondary - it meant I had much more time for creative play and social interactions.

The amount of homework sounds about right, similar to what we have.
I have twins in Year 2 who are on the top level of reading books in school which means they are 40+ pages long and although half are good stories, half are non fiction and often as dull as dishwater, we alternate reading nights now so I only do it with one twin each night.

Our school is big on 'projects' which is nice but take a lot of time and faff, we've had models of solar systems, making fairytale scenes in a flipping shoe box the week after the shoebox appeal, making posters about our sporting heroes (we didn't do that one and changed the criteria but that's a whole other story), making models of castles and various other things that sound fun but when you're doing them X2 every time get tedious

Our school has spelling zappers. You had to spell words correctly 5 times (different occasions) to get the next set. Worked well in terms of retention.

You kind of find different times as you go along, like spellings at breakfast (put them up on the fridge so you can test them), book while wrapped up in a towel after bath, phonics on Saturday teatime before you play a game. Whatever works for you, but definitely not homework wars of trying to get a tired child to do it when they don't want to and can't concentrate.