To think academic success is 90% of the time down to the parents

[TameSacha]

Sparked by a conversation I had at the school gates last week about how another parent wouldn’t be bothering with half term homework (which was making a collage).

I have DS8 and DD6. I read with each of them daily (they read to me and vice versa, takes about ten minutes per child), we do five minutes on their maths apps each day, and things like times tables songs in the car. We try to do at least one educational trip a term that matches with what one of them is learning about (think looking at and drawing a bridge or going to the local museum for Victorians, not going to Egypt for Egyptians). I read their syllabus each term so we can talk about the topics at home.

To me this is a perfectly normal part of child-rearing and supports the education they get at school, where underpaid teachers are on crowd control with thirty kids, some of whom don’t want to or aren’t able to learn.

AIBU to think it’s a parent’s responsibility to support their child’s learning outside of school?

You are giving very little credit to schools and teachers with this 90%.
It is certainly possible for kids to do well if they engage with their school work and as they get older do homework independently.

I agree that parents should provide a supportive environment and personally I would engage with homework (even collages).
Is it possible in the household you are talking about that the other parent does homework with the child?

I 100% disagree with you that *academic success is 90% of the time down to the parents. *My DS is dyslexic, ADHD. He does homework twice a day with me, has a private tutor and works through the holidays. He is very behind at school.

Opposed to another child in his class, who has a feckless dad (no mum) who does no homework, ever with his child. BUT his child is naturally bright and is at least 2 years ahead of my son.

You're lucky you've got bright children. Stop being so smug and just try some quiet gratitude.

This. I've treated mine the same - one is excelling and would do it without my input as well, one is barely scraping by.

I think some children are massively self-motivated to work hard and try to do well. Others could go either way - without parental support (showing an interest, helping with homework, bothering with cultural capital) will give up and flounder, but with parental support will do as well as is possible for that child.

Your title and post don’t match.

Parents should support academics at home. 10 minutes a day of reading is over an hour of practice a week which is going to be super helpful.

I have 3 kids so this is anecdotal but academic success requires some ability in the first place. All of my kids have visited museums and had the same amount of reading practice with me etc but only one went to a (RG) university which I presume is your idea of academic success. She enjoys learning and studying from books and achieved top grades thanks to her motivation. I haven’t told her to do some homework or reading after Reception year - she did it automatically. It would be completely unfair on her if I took credit for her achievements. I answered questions when I could but she is the one who put the effort in and I think that’s an admirable quality.

One is age 23 and earning 40k, the other is on a career path where he’ll be on 6 figures by age 32. They didn’t go to uni but they both should end up being able to buy a house without my help thanks to their own earnings which is probably what their generation sees as success. The one who will be on 6 figures by she 32 has ADHD and dyslexia so school was difficult but he worked hard and managed to pass his GCSEs. Considering his start at school, that is academic success for him.

You've a point but will pee a lot of folks off on here. We had 3 DS1 bright but lazy, DS2, not bright but hard worker, DD, disciplined, intelligent, hard working. All had the same upbringing and parental support but DD came out tops of everything, DS1&2 did very well in consideration.
So yes parents pay a huge part, students are the other 10% you mention

100% wrong here too. Other child currently on page 102 in her chapter book. Mum doesn't read with her. My son reads twice daily. Still on picture books.

Come back when your kids are adults … the proof you are seeking for being sooooo righteous is not to be found in the primary school years.

I didn't make my kids do homework. If they wanted to that was fine and I supported them, but most of the time they didn't want to do more school work after a day at school, and I had no problem with that.

We read every day, and they read on their own. Like you we did lots of trips and bought our own books on topics they were doing, so they really got into them and understood them. I had a lot of fun too and learned a lot!

They're adults now, and doing well in their chosen areas.

My parents didn't give a monkeys about my education or learning, and I'm now a scientist. Meanwhile, the undergraduates I teach are becoming more fragile and less capable every year.

The vast majority of academic success is determined by genetics. Environment plays a role, but you're not moving the needle by anything like as much as you think.

This is so cringe OP. The naughty kids with the lazy parents are holding back your son from his "stretch".

Sure read to your kids and create a supportive environment at home and that will help them in whatever they do but you do seem completely oblivious to what life is like for some people.

Your kids academic performance will be affected by very many things as they get older and there will be bugger all you can do about a lot of those things. Frankly taking the credit for it yourself because read them some books is ludicrous.

Its great to get in while they're young and impressionable and create good habits but I suggest you prepare yourself for the time when they discover they have free will and choose whether or not to do their homework or make an effort at school.

Do you have a source for that? I’d be very interested to read.

No, I don't think making a collage (that your kid should be doing themselves) is the be all and end all of academic success.

There are differing thoughts on homework for primary school children, and all are valid.

Your post is worded really weirdly and sort of smugly. Lots of parents do what you do without blowing smoke up their own arse. And if your kid isn't interested in museums, no amount of taking them is going to change it. They're all individual with their own likes and capabilities, and all respond to different styles of learning.

And finally, I don't think academic success should be the only measure. I've known people who aren't academically gifted (despite having parents who were fully engaged) but were brilliant artists, chefs, musicians, sportspeople etc.

Parental engagement with education is important but not the deciding factor. My mum was at home and did lots with me and my sibling - one of us is very academic, top exam results and uni the other left school with average results and didn't progress their education further.
I wouldn't be doing a half term collage either it's not something my child would enjoy but we will go to museum, read every night so YABU to judge the other parent

I'm a big believer in sport, creative and outdoor play, and teaching resilience/independence as a greater predictor of a happy adulthood. I grew up in an Asian family where life revolves around academics and structured learning - and think it just leads to a lot of anxiety and neuroses in later life. I was fortunate to leave home at 18 for uni and threw myself into sport, and learning more practical skills which were much better for my confidence and helped me secure jobs even when i didn't get the best grades. For my own DC, I refuse to let them be defined by their academics in a world where information is available at their finger tips and AI is taking over so much - what they need is people skills, resilience and risk taking/problem solving. Even at 25 someone can learn about history or biology by just accessing the internet - it's a lot harder to learn other skills when you're older.

As a hiring manager now, uni doesn't matter to me - it's their experience, how they problem solve in the assessment and whether i think they will be resilient. I had one direct report from a top London uni, strong grades/top performer in her private school but crumbled when the smallest thing didn't go her way and couldn't handle any feedback that wasn't glowing. Also struggled to work in teams and think quickly on her feet. The other person I hired who had an average degree and more practical experience has been a delight.

I often tell my parents it wasn't the homework and maths/reading practice they made me do that benefited me - but them encouraging me to go out and make my own mistakes, and take risks, without the helicopter parenting my peers faced.

If any parent isn’t, at least, doing regular reading and maths practice outside of school, that’s just lazy and bad parenting.

Ugh, it's too early in this day for this sort of smug, goady shite, surely?

This is utter nonsense. There is no way your child has made that connection 😂

As I said I have a teenage SD who we don’t read with or drag around museums if she doesn’t want to go. But we do make sure she’s done her homework and we have given her a good grounding through primary with reading and maths which I think has set her on her path. If we hadn’t done that, she’d be finding secondary much harder, regardless of her eventual outcomes.

My DC struggled in early primary - they often couldn't access support in school as not quite bad enough and when they coudl not all the support was worth having.

If we had not stepped in at home they'd have continued to struggle and unlike my time in school - I struggled early on and then caught up - I think current school system makes the catching up much harder than it once was.

It was eye opening when we moved primary school - how much HW from first school was often busy work - and how little second had with no drop in kids performaces. We suddenly had so much more time for their fun projects and just to be.

Often with first school the HW wasn't well planned - sometimes not even looked at - and apparently many teachers couldn't tell when parents had entirely done the craft projects.

Weekly - often not well grouped words - spelling tests did not help my DC learn to spell but did damage their confidence - they needed a well planned program to help them learn patterns - same with reading at earlier ages. A lot of the school HW cut into time that could be better spent on actual help they needed - but they worried about not doing it.

I could also understand full time working parents who had to put kids in childcare all day getting annoyed at big topic projects to be researched every half term and produce something from it - it meant more fraught and tired kids than in term time.

A good attitude to learning - valuing education - parents are very important for that and that is important for kids to do well.

My kids success is 90% down to them (and their teachers) - I support them, but I don't nag them to do their homework, I haven't listened to them read since they were confident readers.. in fact, past about 7 I've done very little for them school-wise, they've been pretty independent.

So was I TBH, my parents left me to it.

I think that environment matters, but the child matters the most - do they actually want to be doing it. If you have to force the child, then they're not going to put in the effort anyway.

If a child is bright and gifted then doing homework won't make a difference. They will still score highly on standardized tests and do well.

For a middle achiever, having an engaged parent will help with their attitude towards their learning and encourage them to try more.

For a lower achiever, parents doing interventions could keep them on track and not falling so far behind.

Interesting how many posters say things like "I read with them, but we don't/didn't do collage crap". I know reading is a huge factor in overall outcomes, but why do so many people place so little value on the creativity of collage?

I did quite a lot the same as you, OP, but it's not all about the parents. DC1 loves reading, has been doing schoolwork independently for ages, and I haven't been able to do much to support their favourite subjects (now Y11) for a while, because I preferred humanities and they're into sciences. DC2 struggles with reading, organisation, confidence, social skills... Getting them to do anything they're not interested in in the first place is very hard, but they will go all out for something they do find interesting.

I don't agree with parents doing homework for children. Or even helping much. It's homework for the child, not the parent. If the child can't do it themselves, the teacher needs to be aware of that. If I did help DC2 and they couldn't have done it without me, I put a note on it for the teacher. Absolutely no point in the teacher thinking the child has grasped it if they didn't and only got the answer with parental help.

Parents supporting children is obviously great for their academic success, sure. But I think taking 90% of the credit because you read with them for 10 minutes a day and let them play on a math app is a bit rediculous to be honest.

Completely agree that it’s hard to catch up now. When SD was younger she was behind on reading and it took a lot of effort to catch her up. Once she was at the expected level, she’s stayed there and enjoyed school a lot more.

I disagree that number of books is correlated with wealth.

We are not high earners at all but have hundreds of books. Most of them are from charity shops and were bought for 50p-£1 each, and they have been collected over years.

I know some quite well-off families who have barely any books. They could easily afford books but they just don't care much about books.

I also disagree that private primary school isn't worth it. We can't afford it, but are lucky to have a very small school with an off-beat ethos close to us. Having a small class with a happy teacher in a well resourced school, and a flexible curriculum allowing children to explore their own interests, leads to a lifelong love of learning. Stepping away from the modern state school obsession with SATS and looking like a corporate entity gives children space to experience joy in education, which sets them up for the rest of their time in school.