To not do any schoolwork with DC at all?

[HomeSchoolingDodger]

NC as I expect to be completely castigated!

DC is in Yr5, above average in terms of reading, spelling and maths. Just had another excellent school report again. Not behind at all.

School have been posting weekly activities for DC in each year group to do on their website with a small project each week. Work is not handed in but DC ‘can’ bring some of the work into school after lockdown so teacher can look through it.

DC did a bit in the first few weeks but quickly lost interest as he needs class stimulation really and didn’t see the point in doing it if it doesn’t need to be handed in each week and tbh I can’t be arsed to chase him!

I am planning to start getting him into ‘school mode’ on the last few weeks before school goes back by completing all the work set then so we have a timescale and motivation to complete it

AIBU?

He is currently learning a lot from Animal Crossing, which involves setting up home, debts, loans, so he tells me . We also do a daily bike ride or walk, he helps me cook, looks after loads of seedlings we’ve planted for veg, reads, plays Articulate, Monopoly and Mexican dominoes with us.

My primary year 5 and year 7 have happily got on with their work. Year 7 doesn't get marked as yet, but thats changing this week, she calls her friend and they do it together. My year 5 submitts all her work on seesaw and her teachers have been amazing.
The minimum I would be happy with is english and maths. They have an autistic younger brother who is finding lockdown hard and I am doing my dissertation, so have needed to self motivate.
We go on nature walks daily, so as wear their brother out! Its a long time to not do anything, so I would encourage some learning.

I've three teens who are working independently I check what they have got to do help with suggestions they do the opposite so it is mostly down ton them.

You really should be doing an hour a day otherwise you're teaching him it's fine not to try if you're bright. I found this useful as a guide as how much to it.

jonoxtobywrites.wordpress.com/2020/04/21/7-tips-for-home-schooling-your-children-during-lockdown/

Hahaha can always rely on people on these forums to lay into people who think differently from them and tear them apart...probably the same people on facebook preaching about “be kind” and how their “doors always open and the kettles on” haha! Hope you teach your kids a bit more compassion and that it’s ok for others to have a different view or outlook from yourselves 😊p.s I’m not a teacher, people go to uni to study for 4 years how to teach children, not something you can just learn in the middle of a pandemic haha! I’m quite happy if my kid enjoys to sit and read a book with me and we do what work we can 😊 Also to these parents wondering where all the stressed kids are, how very patronising lol does our kids mental health not matter lol? Maybe you too should try and educate yourselves...I’d suggest starting out with Solihull approach and take it from there😉 good day me and DD are off to bake some cakes now hahahah

I'm utterly amazed by how little some people are doing with their children. I have 2 primary age and one toddler, I work 2 shifts a week in our local hospital and have fuck all support at home. However every day off I have I spend the morning schooling the eldest 2.
I'm not some martyr or superwoman, both my children are resistant and hard work at times but I wouldn't dream of not doing it as they need the simulation and to learn. And no - one of my DF's - baking a cake daily with them is not a good enough excuse for not doing anything! (Unable to say it to her in person)

Why will he suddenly be willing to do all the work (9 weeks worth and counting) at the last minute if he won't do an hour a day now? I think you are doing him a disservice by not finding a 'new normal' for the next few months that includes schoolwork. It seems quite likely that when they do go back it will not be full time due to social distancing constraints so having to work semi-independently at home will carry on.

I guess it depends how comfortable you are with him going back to school behind. There is going to be a massive gap between the kids who have been doing sustained, high quality home learning and those who have not. I know which side of the divide I want my children on.

I agree dont create stress and worry about falling behind. Its nice to have a stretch of reading for pleasure and doing life skills. but i think you need to be a little careful about messages you accidently send like 'somethings only worth doing for external reward (teacher praise)' 'or you are clever and dont need to try' or 'mum doesnt value school work' You sound like a lovely mum so you dont think like that but its amazing what children take from situations. I always prioritised nativity play over sports day with my annual leave and my son was worried to tell me he wanted to do pe gcse because i didnt care about sports when actually sports day was a longer event and i risked getting sunburn or wet!

As a teacher (secondary admittedly), I’m not sure your strategy will work... although doing it close to going back to school may be motivating, it will also show him that it’s ok to do things last minute (trust me, you’ll regret this when he’s a teenager!) rather than encouraging good work habits. It’s also possible that by then children will be allowed some limited socialising - how much harder do you have think it’s going to be to keep him in and working when his friends might be having a kick-around in the park?

If you’re stressed and need some time off, be honest with your kid. Tell him that you’re taking half term early. But after that, you need to be firm that some work needs to be done before he can have his screen time. Start off with small chunks - 20 minutes at a time, then a break. Build up your expectations each week.

It doesn’t have to be exactly what the school has set, but it’s important that you cover some of the skills and content - children have wonderfully flexible brains, which means they learn things really quickly, but they also forget things pretty fast too - it’s incredible how much they lose over the summer holidays, so it’s terrifying to think how much some will have forgotten after a 3 month break!

Make sure he’s reading aloud to you as well as you reading to him/him reading to himself. 10 minutes a day is plenty. There are tonnes of comprehension passages appropriate for his age - he reads out a passage (takes two minutes!) and answers 3 questions at the end. It’s not hard, but skills need to be practised to be maintained. 10 or 20 minutes of mental arithmetic each day and half an hour of written questions. Science can be an age appropriate video - there are tonnes online that are 15 minutes long or so. That’s only about an hour across the day, and trust me it will make a big difference to what he retains.

Gardening and board games are both great. It’s wonderful that you do those, keep them up! But a bit of structure will he’ll his transition back to school, and as others have said you are giving messages that you may regret when he is a teenager e.g. that you don’t value school work.

I'm a primary school teacher, and while I wouldn't condone doing NOTHNG that could be counted as traditional school work, I'm completely on-board with parents doing what they think is right for their child.

HOWEVER, I would ask parents to sit for a minute with the thought of "is doing the minimum right for my child? Or is it just right for ME?" AKA: Am I letting my child do nothing, but I'm too stressed/lazy/tired/busy to push them or put in some effort?

Nothing wrong with the latter, per se, but I do believe parents should own the truth of the situation, should there be ramifications later on.

If your kids are bright and you're financially comfortable then it's very likely they'll be do well as adults. If they're happy and content during a global pandemic that's excellent.
Noone is an expert in how best to care for kids during a pandemic.

You know your kids best. I have friends who have taken the time to help their kids catch up with certain things and it's really improved their confidence. Mine are little but very bright and I can really see the benefit in letting them do what they want - I could never have come up with all the creative ideas they have. I know that if I'd forced them to do work it would be a battle and I think there's enough stress at the moment. It's a very short time (and stressful for everyone) out of a looong academic career.

We are doing 1 hour a day of the school work. My son is 9. I think its really important to practice the basics at least.
My 2 aren't going back til September and I worked out that they will have been off school for 21 weeks. That's a really long time to do no work at all

Its only on mumsnet that people are pretending to do schoolwork

This is a bull-shit comment - we are all real people. Some of us are WFH or out of the home even and still managing to supervise some work. I’m lucky that my work is quiet at the moment so I have had opportunity to sit down and do stuff with my DD in year 3. As the weeks have on it has become more difficult to motivate her so we’ve now enrolled her in a home schooling programme. She gets 2 hours teaching a day in an online classroom with 11 other children. She’s even indicated an interest in one to one tuition which I might explore depending on how long this goes on for. The online classroom is £30 a week which is still a lot cheaper than my weekly costs for wraparound care and clubs normally. In addition she reads and we play board games and are growing seeds and all the other things that you’re saying you’re doing. I know what my brain is like after a 2 week holiday and I certainly don’t want my DD to go back into the classroom ( potentially in September) having done nothing. So no... in the real world parents are making an effort.

Not impressed with a lot of the stuff sent through, e.g. Twinkl history modules are full of really basic errors. I am principally using this time to help my kid catch up with maths as she went from Year 3 to halfway through year 4 due to emigration, but she is still doing all the tasks uploaded, save the inane "make a rainbow medal for our MHS heroes" bullshit.

Nhs*

I am struggling to see how you can "home-school" your child if you are working full time. Especially at the Y5 stage - if they are in Y1 it is easy enough to do reading every day.

Some of us are WFH or out of the home even and still managing to supervise some work if you are out of the house how do you supervise schoolwork? Phone home every 5 minutes to check they are working and not playing computer games or running around the garden?

So much self-congratulatory nonsense on here about superior "parenting". There are clearly quite a few people with massive self-esteem issues as they constantly have to go on about how perfect they are (and their "parenting" obvs).

For the avoidance of doubt you do not "parent". You are a parent, and you drag your kids up any old how. Nobody is perfect, not even a MNer. And yes it's easier to do nothing than cajole and nag, but in the end if your child just won't do it, what can you do? There's a reason we send our kids to school and don't home-school - being out of the home environment, peer pressure to learn, having professional teaching, not amateur parent-teaching.

If homeschooling is all that, we don't need schools. But we very clearly do even the online variety Divebar has gone for.

Does he watch any of the educational programmes being provided at the moment? That would at least teach him something

I’ve done nada, but again, child is ahead already like yours. Lock downs great for us. No stress and we’re at the beach every day this week.

I’m gobsmacked that people think others aren’t doing work. We’re not super parents by any means but we’re tagteaming FT WFH to allow us to supervise DS1 (Y2) doing school work. Yes, a lot of it is a bit unscripted and we have had some awful battles over writing sentences (he adores maths but does not love English) but I would be horrified if he wasn’t keeping things ticking over. And yes, I get that everyone’s life is different but please don’t assume that I’m lying when I say we’re doing four or more hours of school work (including the spectacle of DH doing Jo Wicks with both DSs 😀) a day!

So my DD yr3 has had a lot of anxiety and been really lonely over lockdown. After a phone call with the doctor we stopped doing the set schoolwork, and more activity's in the garden around the house etc. Lots of screen time playing minecraft etc.
But for the past two weeks she's been doing little bits of her work each day. We started off with just fifteen minutes, and today we're up to a thirty five.
I've had to put my foot down though, NO screens until her work is done, an empty desk apart from her work and a pencil, and absolutely no casual conversation with me.
I really encourage and praise her when she's done some work though, I go a bit overboard! But it seems to be gradually working.
In conclusion - don't give up! You can do this!

"Hahaha can always rely on people on these forums to lay into people who think differently from them and tear them apart."

To be fair, op is in AIBU asking for opinions.

Most people disagreeing have her child's best interests at heart.

I'm not at all sure that people deserve a pat on the head for doing fuck all.

I haven't seen anyone advocate for six hours of study, but an hour of work here and there should be possible for most and will pay dividends.

And yes family time and good mental health are vitally important, but they are not incompatible with a bit of schoolwork.

I'm not fussed tbh. School haven't sent much through for the Yr 5 child, yr 3 a little more. I know they'll both switch straight back in as and when they go back, and will have to repeat it all anyway.

If it was longer term, and the school formalised their offering in such a way that it wasn't going to be repeated, and they marked or fed back on it then I would.

So at the moment the Yr 5 does the couple of links she is sent (take about 20 mins) and reads voraciously anyway. She bales and gardens and plays.

Yr 3 and I read each day, he does some times tables. He too bakes and gardens, and likes building and experimenting.

@HomeSchoolingDodger,
Hi, haven't read all the thread (CBA) but think I've got the gist of it. I have worked with children in schools and various settings for many years. These are unprecedented times and bloody hard for a lot of us. You need to do what you can and what feels right for you and your children.
I think what you are doing at the moment sounds completely reasonable and not as stressful as it is for many families. Keep to your plan. Stuff people who believe you are not doing the best for your children. IMO you are. 👍💐

We are going to the beach today, will take some paints and a book. Art and reading.

Incidentally - the work from our school has been more or less the same, with no new topics/ideas introduced, or increased difficulty.
This leads me to believe the idea is for our younger kids to stay in practice sitting at a desk and doing formal set work, rather than imparting lots of knowledge.