Could your 10yo do this school assignment?

[HerRoyalNotness]

I had an email to say they were missing an assignment from Monday, so I had a look at what it was. They’d been talking about and I thought they were on top of it.

They had to plan a trip overseas for three days with a budget of $20k. The information they needed to include was:

Destination
Flight and costs
Why you chose destination
Hotel and cost
Amenities at hotel
3 days of 3 meals naming a restaurant, meal choice and cost incl drinks
3 days of 3 activities per day naming activity, cost per person and total
Total cost overall.

It’s for maths.

YABU - yes my 10yo could complete that
YANBU - no, they’d need a lot of help/guidance.

At 10 I would expect them to know how to look up a word they don't know in a dictionary or on google.

I mean they would have been googling everything else?

I think your kid may have taken the easiest way out. I am sure if he wanted to google the latest game, or instructions for a game he would have had no problem doing so.

I remember having to do something like this when I was at primary, but the budget was extremely unrealistic (I suspect they had been setting the same task for years and not upped the budget, which I seem to recall was something like 200 pounds, this was in the 80s). I think I opted for a ferry to the Netherlands and some budget accommodation as it was pretty tricky to fly anywhere.
Teacher suggested we look at travel brochures for ideas. This was a village with one travel agency, which of course all the kids bombarded after school and basically stripped the shelves of brochures. They were not unsurprisingly not happy (especially as it had happened in previous years) and complained to the school.
Yes I think my 10yo could do this. But I would probably interfere with suggestions as I am the main holiday planner in the family

Just shown that to my 10 yr old.
What type of dollars was his question..... How many people is my question. I also suspect he would try to go somewhere that broke the budget, and then give up. So, no. He would need guidance.

9-year-old could manage the maths involved. She’d definitely struggle with the detail of the planning though - how to get to/from activities and the like.

She’d not manage to choose restaurants and meals in advance - she’d be totally thrown by the amount of choice and get upset about “how do I know now what I’ll want for lunch in x weeks time, what if I get there and change my mind”, she’d see that as having got it wrong.

Yup mine would be able to do this as quite good with planning and the Internet. Although, I agree with PP that the assignment seems irrelevant and insensitive

@TierFourTears

Just shown that to my 10 yr old. What type of dollars was his question..... How many people is my question. I also suspect he would try to go somewhere that broke the budget, and then give up. So, no. He would need guidance.

USD and you could take whoever you wanted. He’s taking us. Yay, looking forward to my 3 day holiday!

I did this in year 4 - ignited my passion for travel!

I think she would ask for help in getting all the numbers but then I could leave her to do the maths side of it herself.

did it also say they have to look this up on real websites? Otherwise you could just make the numbers up as long as they work out.

Fish and chips - £250. Flights to Australia £5.99 etc

I do think it probably needs some help for lots of 10 year olds.

Flight and costs - help find a good website for flights
Hotel and cost - as above
Amenities at hotel - explain amenities
3 days of 3 meals naming a restaurant, meal choice and cost incl drinks - help using Something like Google maps to find restaurants and links to menus
3 days of 3 activities per day naming activity, cost per person and total - as above
Total cost overall - guidance on keeping a lost of costs in a spreadsheet.

It also depends on the time, it's quote a big piece of work of its given on a Monday and expected in by Friday

@Comefromaway

Dd would have been able to do that easily.

Ds not a cat in hell's chance.

This. With bells on at aged 10.

DS had a similar project in Yr 7. He needed support. It was in the Spring lockdown. I was a bit at the timing as we (and many others) had just had to cancel our Easter holiday due to travel restrictions so I thought was a little insensitive....

Yes, they could have done it easily but DS probably would have chosen MaccieD's, KFC and Pizza Hut as the restaurants.

I guess it's probably not relevant to you OP, as I assume you aren't in the UK, but from week 1 of Year 7, being able to use the internet to research homework was probably the most important skill that they needed and hadn't used very much in primary school. They also hadn't been taught how to do it in much detail. We did a crash course with the DC in how to choose search terms, identify reliable sources, verifying facts etc and not automatically choosing the first thing that pops up or relying on Wikipedia for everything

@Dippysauceus

At 10 I would expect them to know how to look up a word they don't know in a dictionary or on google.

I mean they would have been googling everything else?

I think your kid may have taken the easiest way out. I am sure if he wanted to google the latest game, or instructions for a game he would have had no problem doing so.

Yes I suspect you’re right. I have shown him and I know he knows how to look up the online dictionary. He seems to hit a wall in certain assignments and then ignores them and hopes they go away. He knows I will help him so I have no clue why he doesn’t speak up. He didn’t in school either.

He’s been home since March learning virtually and I’ve noticed he needs a lot of supervision and encouragement. He does have an education plan at school and they break his work into chunks. He normally gets 30mins of one on one a day. He gets easily distracted as well.

It's great for maths because it's definitely a subject that you need in life and across the curriculum. It's good when maths teacher set a "real" application that isn't quite as dull as a train leaving London at x o clock, travelling x miles per hour will meet a train travelling from blah blah blah.

My current ten year old is not encouraged to Google willy-nilly (!) so I would want to talk to him first about what sites might have this information. I don’t think he would be able to do it without support, no.
I remember doing a similar assignment aged 12ish, we didn’t have internet then so doubly hard! I really can’t remember how we did it - I think we had to go to travel agents and get brochures.

@MrKlaw

did it also say they have to look this up on real websites? Otherwise you could just make the numbers up as long as they work out.

Fish and chips - £250. Flights to Australia £5.99 etc

It didn’t say actually. I was unsure myself if we could make it up or it had to be real. I suppose if the numbers and maths make sense, there is no reason why you couldn’t make it up.

Big mistake to post this OP, it’ll bring out all the boastful parents, telling you that their 3 year old could do it, while simultaneously cooking a meal for 10 and building a conservatory!

@HerRoyalNotness In that case with the update then he may have just been totally overwhelmed by a multi-step task.

Maybe it's more important to show him how to break things down in this case? Or encourage him to ask him he cannot.

I think it's human nature that we all want hard things to just disappear but unfortunately that's not how it works - very important lesson for children to learn!

Mine would have struggled but probably because they've never been on holiday.

@orangenasturtium

Yes, they could have done it easily but DS probably would have chosen MaccieD's, KFC and Pizza Hut as the restaurants.

I guess it's probably not relevant to you OP, as I assume you aren't in the UK, but from week 1 of Year 7, being able to use the internet to research homework was probably the most important skill that they needed and hadn't used very much in primary school. They also hadn't been taught how to do it in much detail. We did a crash course with the DC in how to choose search terms, identify reliable sources, verifying facts etc and not automatically choosing the first thing that pops up or relying on Wikipedia for everything

Haha yes. He’s also doing an 8 page booklet on a geek god. When he gets the search results you can see he is always most interested in the first one. Even if it’s Big Daves potted history of the Greeks blog.

It's great for maths because it's definitely a subject that you need in life

I disagree. There are plenty who will never need to be able to book a holiday abroad, let alone a 20k trip for 3 days.

I'm pretty sure DS did this last year in year 5.he quite enjoyed it but they did it in groups in school and they possibly had price lists provided

My yr 7 did that during last lockdown in year 6 and was fine. My current year 5 not a hope.

This sounds very similar to my 6 year olds maths lesson “plan a holiday. You have x money and these are your choices of hotels and flights” with 5 choices.
“Here’s the choice of local restaurants which ones can you afford to go to?” With 3 choice
“Here’s some local activists in Spain, which one could you afford to go to? Which one would you want to go to? Could you budget better to afford x choice?” With 3 choices.
It’s a watered down version, but my 6 year old did it fine.

[quote Dippysauceus]@HerRoyalNotness In that case with the update then he may have just been totally overwhelmed by a multi-step task.

Maybe it's more important to show him how to break things down in this case? Or encourage him to ask him he cannot.

I think it's human nature that we all want hard things to just disappear but unfortunately that's not how it works - very important lesson for children to learn![/quote]
Yes, I normally will explain a bit and then say to call me back when he has done it, then move on to the next bit. He seemed to have this under control and was excited about it so I didn’t check earlier what was involved. He also thought the due date was at some time in the future. That was my mistake.

I normally check at the end of the day to make sure he heading missed anything. This assignment wasn’t in his electronic to do list either which kind of ‘hid’ it so I missed he hadn’t done it.