AIBU to insist my son does his homework on the day he gets it?

[orangesandlemonssaythebellsofstclements]

DS has just started secondary school. I did make it clear to him that we will be taking homework seriously and that I will be stricter on a few things once he starts secondary school, he will be expected to take more responsibility and in return will get more freedom. I've been slowly trying to get him used to this over the last few months of primary and during the summer holidays.
His primary school didn't give out homework so it's new to him.

He's just been issued with his first piece of homework today. Once he arrived home (he cycles independently) and settled in a bit I reminded him he has homework (the school makes parents aware through an app) and told him that he needs to do it tonight. He was very resistant to this and said he has a week to do it so doesn't need to do it tonight. I said our rule for home, from me and his dad, not from the school, is to do homework on the day you get it so it doesn't mount up. Get it out of the way straight away - that's what I expect of him. He's not happy and says it's a stupid rule.

AIBU?

Op as a mother of 2 secondary school boys both doing reasonably well I agree with every post that has been made so far in the thread ( 1st page). You are clearly determined to go in the opposite direction . I appreciate you are acting out of best interests for your son's education. However 12 is the time when children begin to separate from their parents and forge their own identity. If you persist in "my way or highway " you will either end up with a rebellious teen or a man child. In either scenario school homework will be the least of your problems altogether

Let him learn to manage his own workload.

I think it will be hard to enforce for long. One big project or an evening event can throw it for a few days as it piles up so quickly. Better to get him used to working to a deadline than a on the day approach. That way he can manage around other activities in the week without getting stressed.

Let him sink or swim. Try not to let your anxiety get in the way of him developing his own good habits.

Remind yourself and your DS that he works for himself, not for you or even for the teachers.

If the work doesn't get done, that's on him.

See how he goes between now and mid term. If he blows off his homework, rushes through it at the last minute, hands in sloppy work, or seems to be developing a procrastination habit, then it would be time to sit him down for a solution-oriented conversation.

The one thing I'd ask him now is how he plans to keep track of what needs to be done and when it is due. Try to sound encouraging and tell him you have confidence he'll manage his time well.

Keep track quietly.

The thing I'd focus on where good habits are concerned is making sure he does household chores. He needs to be doing his own laundry, getting his own packed lunch and cleaning up the kitchen afterward, making sure his bag is packed at night and extra gear all ready to walk out the door in the morning. He should be responsible for getting himself up. He should be taking a shower every day and keeping his room tidy. He should be helping to get dinner on the table.

You are catastrophising.

Leave him to figure it out, after asking him if he has what he needs in order to keep track of what might turn out to be multiple assignments. If he says he has a plan, let him be.

Observe quietly.

Did YOU do all your homework the day it was set, @orangesandlemonssaythebellsofstclements ?

I didn’t realise parents were supposed to get so involved with homework. Mine never did!

It seems like a stupid rule to me.

With our kids, once homework ramped up a bit, we had a chat about how to plan their time. They soon get to know which subject set homework when, and how long they had to had it in so they got into a good routine. We kept an eye out for the first few months to make sure they had it under control which they always did.

But how is you telling dc what to do and when, him taking on more responsibility and being given more freedom? It doesn’t make sense.
I’m not saying that he should be left to his own devices completely, but guidance rather than a strict regime may save you a lot of future hassle.
Dc using a timetable to put in homework tasks each week- where he decides which day he is doing each homework task and then sticks to it would be him taking responsibility.

No one is "micro managing" throughout secondary school. When we did it, we only "micro managed" for the first couple of weeks to establish the pattern and good habits. Luckily, for the first few weeks, his teachers were also pretty good with giving homework on the appointed day as per homework calendar, putting it up on the SMH app, and collecting/marking it on the right day. So it was "good habits" from both sides.

That sets the pattern/habit.

After that, we were "helicoptering" his homework, i.e. leaving him to it, but under the general principle of doing it on the day it was set wherever possible. We never checked he'd actually done what he was supposed to each day. Our input was simply a reminder every day after evening meal to do his homework first, before gaming or whatever. We relied on him to do the work and be honest when he said he'd done it, or had nothing to do.

That pattern/habit endured throughout the next five years. Just gentle "nudges" from us to remind him to do it or if there was something going on, like a family gathering, short break, weekend away, we'd warn him in advance to be fully up to date.

As a result of good habits, we never had the "Sunday night panic" of realising there were things he'd forgotten to do, never had him panicking about a revision test he'd forgotten to revise for etc.

Getting the habits/behaviour sorted from the earliest possible time avoids problems later on.

Once they get to secondary other than a 'do you need to do your homework' comment I left dd to it.

I think having a rule about it is a bit OTT tbh, he's old enough to learn the hard way if he has to spend 3 hours doing all the homework on Thursday evening!!

YABU you’re being controlling. I always did mine on a Sunday evening. You don’t need to dictate all of his life

Stupid rule, one you're going to have to back down on in the next few months as the work load increases and he has more things to do of an evening.

Might seem sensible now, when he has only a few things to do and they are piss easy and take five minutes.

But if he comes home tomorrow with 3 assignments, some of which require him to do some further research/study, and he also has some extra curricular stuff, and the next day the same... you're going to get to a point where he's rushing and doing stuff before he has the information needed.

On top of that some teachers set homework that is an ongoing thing, so you do a bit this week then add to it after the next lesson, after some further self-guided study etc..

At my school two of our teachers would set 'block' homework, the whole terms homework in one go. It would have been impossible to do that in even the first week, let alone the first night.

The most I'd do is set aside 'homework time' so theres an hour or so, several nights a week that are clear for homework. If he doesn't have any or there are several more free 'homework periods' left that week, he doesn't have to do it in the first available one.

I try to just allocate a daily set time to do homework rather than deciding what they need to do. So it just becomes a habit. This is quite late for us (7.30pm) as my son hated doing it straight from school and needed time to unwind first. Suits us.

I think you are right. Leaving things is rarely a good strategy and organised people know that. This will help him to manage time in his future career.

YES!

You also aren't allowing him to find his own way. Some kids work better doing a little homework every night, some find they need the pressure of deadlines to motivate them, some prefer to do it in larger but less frequent blocks.

I didn't do homework every night. The nights that I did homework, I did it for the whole evening, or sometimes a day at the weekend, because that worked better for me. I sometimes worked through the night in coursework. I would have gone crazy doing it bit by bit!

Even as an adult I'm much happier working several 18 hour days straight, followed by a break than working at a steady pace.

What works for you doesn't necessarily work for him. He needs to find his own way of working.

Honestly, that's what they said. I didn't ask either, they offered. Via email too so I even have it in writing.

No, it's for the parents. I have my own login and he has his. I can see everything on there, from timetables to what he ate for lunch and also top up his lunch money.

No, my parents were abusive and did not give a flying fuck if I did my homework or not. I wish to God someone had gave enough of a shit to insist I did my homework. Or even if I ate dinner or had shoes that I didn't have to tape back together tbh.

You aren’t really giving him any chance to show initiative here.

I’d leave him to it, if he leaves until the night before I would maybe have words. If it happens again then I would maybe enforce a you need to spend at least half an hour on it the day you got it rule. In this instance it might be a small task, but going forward asking him to get stuff done on the day it was set will seem insane when it’s longer essays etc.

Haven't read the full thread, but the deal I made was that all homework is cleared by the Sunday evening so he would start the next week fresh. So if he has been given it today and doesn't want to do it, fine, but he will waste his Sunday doing it all/catching up. He will only have to do that a few times for it to become boring.

This is way too over to top OP. He's growing up and he needs to learn to manage his time and his workload himself. At this age, you should be pulling away from managing his homework for him, not getting too involved.

With my DS, there are days where he gets loads of homework, and days where he gets very little. He's learned to spread his workload so it's pretty even over the week and he's not completely swamped on any given night.

I understand you came from an a suite home and your parents weren't interested in your schooling, but I actually think you're doing your son a disservice being this involved, it's a bit nuts.

Honestly this would have sucked the joy out of my life and added so much stress for no gain. In fact it's better to have the homework fresh in your mind when you're in class imo...
I think you're being really unreasonable.

You telling him what to do is the opposite of teaching him to take responsibility