In not making child do homework

[Qwerty21]

My child is given spellings to do 4 nights a week, a homework sheet per week and a school reading book. In year 3. I used to battle with them most nights to do that spellings and get the homework sheet done. We occasionally read the school book but that was another fight too. I've got to the point now where I've said enough is enough and I'm not forcing it anymore. Our evenings have drastically improved, there's far less moodiness and raised voices. But I'm wondering if I'm doing them an injustice but not enforcing it. They aren't falling behind at school, in fact in most areas they are ahead. And we read every night before bed, just not the school book.
I'll be honest in saying I found fitting in the homework a pain around my work, and my child's after school activities, there's only one evening a week we're actually free from after school pick up til bedtime. But if the general consensus is that doing the homework is more beneficial than the stress it causes us both then I'll reconsider my decision.

I agree. Reading posts like this makes me realise how out of touch some parents are with the inner workings of schools!

"They aren't falling behind at school, in fact in most areas they are ahead"

There's your answer. If it's not needed and it's causing stress then it's a no brainer.

My poor kids doing dyslexia interventions in two languages (Gaelic and English). And, to be fair, she's bearing like a trooper.
In your position, I wouldn't bother at all.

If I could have a do-over, I’d have opted out of doing homework with ds.
He has high masking autism and having school work crossing over the boundary into home was always a problem.
I thought if I persevered, it would teach discipline etc etc. It did nothing but create misery and conflict.

In secondary one of his teachers said to me that homework has many purposes but creating stress and disrupting the harmony of the home is not on the list. But by that point he wouldn’t step out from the norm and struggled on. It took until he was 16 for him to be capable of sitting down and doing homework. Dd was doing hers by the age of 6.

ND dc need different things than NT dc. Focus on your ds op, and what he needs, rather than trying to hammer a square peg in a round hole. Our ed system was designed to produce a compliant workforce for the Industrial Revolution, and our brilliant ND kids are crashing out, burnt out and broken at a terrifying rate. And it would be tragedy enough but these are the kinds of minds the economy needs in the Digital Revolution.

Doesn’t sound much dd is in yr 3. We have spellings maths and reading every night and then extra maths 2 pages of a book for weekend

teacher says to do all 3 ideally every night for 5mins each. So 15m in all. I think all kids /parents should be able to do this

we have Ed shed and rock stars so the maths and English is done on an iPad and by child alone - she stars near me and reading she does to me

I refused to do my older child’s homework with him, when asking him to complete some work resulted in him grabbing a kitchen knife and trying to stab me and himself.
From that day on, no more homework. He is also autistic and now in year 6.
He has made a pact that when he gets to secondary he will be able to try harder.
My youngest does 2 worksheets most weeks. When they have bothered to upload the sheets to the school server that is.
He is currently year 2 and NT.
I can’t see that it harms a primary school child to not do their homework.

I think the argument about homework being pointless at primary school slightly misses the point.

Yes it’s probably irrelevant in terms of the child’s overall academic journey but it’s about instilling the habit and the self discipline.

I think a commitment to making an attempt to at least complete set homework is important. It shouldn’t come at the expense of free play, hobbies or downtime and if it’s really onerous you should speak to the teacher but setting a precedent that it’s optional is going to shore up problems at the point where homework really starts to become important.

We stopped doing it in year 4. It was make work. Nothing ever fed back, no consequences, the only benefit was from what you got by doing it and like you it was more hassle than it was worth. The only thing I did say was that if you don't do anything you won't have anything to share at the half term showcase. School have now changed to have reading and Complete Maths as the only homework and child is self motivated to do that.

We stopped homework after the first term in reception. Then, like now in year 1, it was a reading book, a huge writing sheet, 3x a week maths app (awful thing that glitches all the time) and termly projects. We stopped because while ds is apparently NT (NHS assessed last year), he's extremely anxious and we had so many tears every night trying to enforce it. Now he is 1 of only 2 kids in the most advanced group for reading, I guess because we read interesting books at home, including ones from other better reading schemes. And he is years ahead in maths, because he absolutely loves it.

We will have to start again at some point, I assume when spellings start, or proper maths. But he's 6 bloody years old, and his teacher is in full support of what we're doing as he's doing so well, I'm not putting him through that just yet when he's struggling with the pressure. I'm not going to make him hate learning.

I haven't answered because I clearly stated in my OP that my child is in year 3. Maybe some posters need extra reading comprehension homework 😬

Ahhh sorry for quoting your other comment in my response.

So my child got their spelling test back yesterday and they got 11/12 correct with no practice on them. Today , having taken on board some comments here, I decided to try this week's with them in the car verbally. Instead of a nice happy chat like we usually have on the way to school, my child was grumpy and frustrated with themselves, the English language and me. How is that better for them, their education or their desire to learn?!

You say the word and they spell it back to you. I don't suppose the words are that difficult you would need to see them written. You memorise a few of them at a time to test, they are usually a sort of set which makes it easy and if you slip in a few not on the list it's all good.

It is easy for children to slip behind without you really noticing, or if they are really good to not be shining as they should. Being average or doing OK is not necessarily doing as well as they are capable of.

I didn't battle junior school homework with my two. We were all too bruised by the relentless months and months of so-called "remote learning" in 2020/21 with an autistic, dyslexic, dyspraxic child blowing into daily meltdowns and an undiagnosed dyslexic child sobbing into my lap. Every. Fucking. Day.

They have both settled into doing it at secondary school because they've matured enough to cope with it. It's managed through an app that I can see and I prompt them to do it, but generally they now have the self-motivation to do it. Or at least fear of after-school detentions when they'd rather get home ASAP.

DS1 worked out that it was more economical to not do homework in y6 as he was rewarded for not spending 30+ mins doing something he hated with spending 15 minutes snug and cosy indoors at break rather than loitering on the playground while the other boys chased a ball. There's no arguing through logic like that!

When you've got ND children (and I include dyslexia in this), the school day is extra hard and extra draining to them. They need more time to relax and regulate at home to catch their energy levels up. With conditions like ASD and ADHD, they often segment their life and struggle when different sections of life clash into each other.

My two are both doing really well at secondary and haven't come to any detriment from not having a daily row over homework through the junior school years. DS2 does go to a tutor weekly which gives him targeted support in his areas of weakness which is more useful than a generic sheet for the whole class about obscure points of grammar. I had always emphisised that the expectations at secondary are more rigorous, but to be fair, the homework is far more interesting, varied and purposeful. It's better that they are now self-motivated than nagged micro-managed into submission.

We did always do reading (inc audio books), but concentrated on reading for pleasure rather than regimented reading and being a slave to the reading record.

Your child is going to fall behind if you don't do spellings and reading at home. I personally think its cruel to do that, given its not a massive amount of wirk/time.

Not forcing your child to do homework is reinforcing to them that they don't need to do anything they don't want to do. Not a good lesson for life imo.

What are they doing instead? I like homework and reading to keep the kids away from screens and TV as much as possible.

Similar things to what I do when I’m not at work. Telly, cooking, reading, piano practise, talking to friends (playing on switch chatting to friends), playing with siblings, tidying their rooms, extra curricular clubs.
Yeah loads of us do extra work after our work hours but generally it’s seen as not ideal - either burning the candle at both ends, or not very capable of your job.

Education and work are two different things.

Education consists of the time spent being taught concepts, which is the school day, and the time spent independently embedding the concepts, which is homework.

A school pupil is attending school around 6 hours a day and the amount of independent learning they do will build up over the years, so at present OP's son is only expected to do 30 minutes a day. By the end of secondary, he would be needed to do at least ~2 hours a day (which is a normal 8 hour day) to be achieving good grades, in preparation for spending most of the day independently directing his own learning at university, if that's his chosen path.

6.5hrs of "work" a day is hardly burning the candles at both ends.

Cool! You do you. I was just answering that poster’s question.

Op we were the same, I have 3 girls, all primary school age.

We didn't do homework but they participated in projects and solo talks.

My kids do a competitive sport which means they train between 15-21 hours a week. We are also really fucking busy.

However when they started primary 6 age 9-10 ( Scottish here so unsure the English year) we then started doing some more homework to prepare for the transition to secondary school and by P7 we made sure they were doing allocated home work.

I absolutely disagree with homework for the first 5 school years, we much more focused on experiences, they were part of the school paper team and alot of other school run activities that would enrich their education more than sitting at a table answering 20 sums.

But most of the time, there are other options. It’s wrong to make children believe they have no automy over their lives. Adults and children should know, if you’re unhappy, there will are other options available that might be better suited. Teaching children they have to do things whether they like it or not just creates a culture of adults stuck in cycles they don’t enjoy. By the way, this doesn’t mean they should do nothing - it means go and find something you do enjoy and learn that way organically.

Mine just copy their spellings out each night. Bit of hw sheet - it's done in 10 mins.
They are only going to get more hw as they go up the school so setting schedule now can help

Mine loved writing springs with chalk on pavement or huge whiteboard sheet that sticks to wall or using finger on ipad app

On the contrary, it potentially teaches all sorts of helpful things about choices, responsibilities, consequences, extrinsic and intrinsic motivation and different ways of surviving in irrational bureaucracies.