Primary school projects - what is the deal?

[LokiBear]

Dd's school held a competition last week. Pupils were invited to make a model of an animal's habitat. Dd6 is bright but lazy, she bought the letter home and was a bit 'nah, can't be bothered'. I talked her into participating. She flies through school academically but doesn't really have to work hard. I know that this will not last (I'm a secondary school teacher) so I'm trying to encourage her to take a pride in what she does and realise the value of hard work. Anyway, took her to a stationary shop to buy the stuff needed. Helped her with the cutting of a box and then let her have at it. I consulted - lots of 'mummy, what do you think to this?' Or 'can you help me cut this out?' But she did most of it herself. She was so proud of herself by the time she finished. We took it into school and put it next to the other entries. Every, single one looked like a professional piece of work. There were projects with moving parts, made from wood, professionally painted. Dd's looked poor by comparison. She was crestfallen - she'd spent ages on it. I felt guilty, clearly other parents had spent much more time working on their kids entries. I feel shit for rail roading her into it. Is this really a thing? Parents do the work for their kids? I thought it was a cliche from a bad American film. What do others do?

Teachers will KNOW which projects kids have done by themselves, and which they had help with...

teachers do not always know - DD when she was 5 had an egg project for Easter - she painted a boiled egg pink, stuck on a button for a nose then drew dots for eyes, and a curly tail - the teacher sneered that mummy did it.

Mummy and DD both felt affronted!

I'm a primary teacher and I hate projects with a passion! I consider them to be time wasting, money wasting and material wasting; they take up an enormous amount of area in the classroom/corridor to display; they are displayed for such a long period of time (other teachers' classes' projects, that is) that they are literally falling apart by the time they are taken down and they become yet more tat that needs to be disposed of, yet the amount of time, effort and money that went into them makes one feel guilty about putting them in the bin...

I'm such an old-fashioned teacher!

Teachers may know the parents helped but still seem to give the prizes to the ones that have clearly been done by the parents. I suppose it is difficult to give 1st prize to something that is clearly inferior.

Sometimes I find the homework projects difficult to understand in terms of what the school expects the learning objectives to be. They make it clear the work should be the child's own but then set tasks that, say, a six- or seven-year-old just couldn't manage without help. Even 'research' requires at least my presence as I was not going to let my seven-year-old loose on the internet unsupervised. Some of the projects for my elder dc have been great opportunities to learn new skills or information and we have enjoyed planning them together, buying materials, doing research, visiting relevant museum's, etc.

A lot of the projects seem to be set the classroom will have a load of ready-made art for the start of the new term but a lot were also written projects that were then put aside and not even looked at by the staff or other children when they were handed in. As these projects are set over the holidays and took up a fair bit of time and effort parents started complaining. The result was a thank you note from the teacher for doing the homework! Following a lot more grumbling last time the children did all get two minutes to show their projects to the class.

My kids have always done their own projects. They don't look great compared to the ones parents have had massive input into, but they do look like a decent age level project which is what they're supposed to be.

Tbh even if I helped I'm sure they would still look like a year 3 project, so I wouldn't really be doing them any favours with my non artsy crafty skills.

At my children's first school, the headteacher judged such projects and he always awarded prizes to the children who had clearly made the creations themselves. Then he retired and the next headteacher always awarded prizes to the children whose parents had either made it or had bought it for them. My children didn't bother thereafter.

DD’s school said they would personally email parents their grades for projects. That it was obvious a child hadn’t done it... obviously tongue in cheek but hopefully they got the message across

In really don't mind parental input. I certainly did that. But it was her idea, her design, her project. I cut bits out that wete too tricky and helped her navigate the internet. I dunno. I think i just feel bad that she feels bad after I made her do it.

Something has definitely changed since I did these projects as a young kid at school. Yes I think more kids made their own in those days, there was the odd project that was clearly done by the parents but I still felt a sense of pride in my work, even if mine looked shabby and "didn't win". Has there been a shift these days where kids have picked up the message it's not worth bothering unless yours is the best?

Therefore I feel like teachers expect parental input!

Nobody is saying there shouldn't be parental input. It's when the whole thing has obviously been done by the parent that it's an issue.

Like we had a bridge open locally a few years ago and the kids' project was to make a bridge as part of a competition to name it. Most of them were wobbly, stuck together with tape jobs. One was made of wood with perfectly cut angles and holes drilled to put screws through to hold it together and it was painted beautifully (obviously with spray paint) - the kids were 6, 7 and 8 years old...

At our painted egg competition last year we had ‘egg sheeran’ complete with guitar and ginger hair, leggo ninjago characters etc - all very good but definitely not created my a reception aged child

At my school the prizes are always given to the children who have completed the work themselves with minimal input from the parents.The project may look awful compared to the others but surely the teacher can see who did things themselves and where it was actually done by an adult?

School is most definately more competative. It makes me sad. Dd is 6 and they are in ability groups for pretty much everything. Kids know that the blue group is top etc. My dd was the only kid who had moved through all of the reading levels and was onto a free choice of books. This lasted for a few weeks, then another pupil also moved up she was a little aggrieved. I found her attitude utterly frustrating and had some serious conversations with her about being supportive of others and how their achievements didn't negate hers. However, I then witnessed a conversation between her and a couple of friends about who was 'top' in PE/maths/dance/art rec and I quickly realised that reading was the thing that dd was best at, the others were better at other things and dd was protective over her status as best reader because they are all so bloody competative. I raised it with the teacher who seemed non plussed. We see it at secondary, but I also see kids who switch off because they don't feel good enough. It's a problem.

Hate this type of homework as it always ends up being a parents that do it and it’s of little benefit to the child. It’s also far too time consuming and often involves buying materials. Funny it’s often the parents who opt out of regular homework like spellings or maths, that will then spend days building elaborate models of castles or a Tudor house

I also find these things are an extra expense. Often need to buy extra craft items... different coloured paper, card, glue, pipe cleaners, lolly sticks blah blah blah. It all adds up.

Problem is they usually let the kids vote for a winner and it's either 'the best' parent made model or the loudest kid making the others vote for theirs

I think teachers should pull out the kids made ones and vote on those!

We scuppered one competition because lego mad DS made his from lego which started a class lego model entries! They stopped doing that one!

My oldest dc is only 4 but we've had a few projects already. I take them as family activities at this age, for parents and kids.

We had a competition recently. ..heard one parent complain "I can't believe we didn't win after all the effort I put in"

Our school were brilliant and always gave the prize to the one that definitely had been done by a child and not the parents. ()reminds me of the French and Saunders sketch).

Another time I was at a friend's house and their youngest son asked - Daddy what's a project? And I nearly choked on my tea when daddy says it is when Mummy tries to see if she can get an A. (Said friend clearly always did the older child's projects, models etc).

I’m confused. Often my Son would spend hours in the shed with his Grandad working on a homework project. Some of them looked amazing. They were done with the help of a skilled joiner. However, my son did the work (supervised closely with tools). Maybe I shouldn’t have allowed it. It was never about competition, just about learning. My son learned an awful lot from the time he spent in the shed. And he treasures the memories too. I certainly was never smug about it. He also did his fair share of cutting and sticking boxes.

Don’t be too sure when you see projects that the child hasn’t done the work. It’s quite possible to give a child instructions how to operate an electric saw, drill etc.

My son also used to take a piece of written work about how it was made, and often photographs of him using the tools.

We had a project where the kids needed to make a model of a building.

One of the Dads got his architectural company to create a prototype model and his son submitted that...