Why do some parents not engage with school?! Asking as a teacher!

[Purpleturtle43]

I teach a Y1 class and have been a teacher for 20 years. Never have I experienced a class where parents are so unsupportive with regards to homework and providing what they need for class!

The majority of kids don't do their homework or do a really poor job of it. Most days when I ask the children to bring their reading books out at least 5 don't have them despite parents being told weekly the children need their books in school every day as we do daily reading. Many children also so they don't read their reading books at home.

Many parents don't provide their children when the necessary stuff for school for example pencils, indoor shoes, gym kits etc. meaning so much time is spent searching for spare things and we don't have enough supplies to go around.

I am a parent of 3 school aged children and totally understand the struggle, believe me the last thing I feel like doing when I get home all day from teaching kids is to do homework with my own but I always make sure it's done and kids have what they need for school.

I am just getting to the point where I wonder why I am bothering. It takes ages to look out reading books and to prepare homework and upload it online, it all just feels like a big waste of time.

If you don't engage with school can I ask why to give me some insight so I can think of some strategies that may work. I teach in an affluent area so money isn't usually a problem and the school I work in is very mindful of not asking for much, just the basics and we would definitely provide assistance when required.

I have done everything asked of me with my eldest but my youngest is different and requires a different type of parenting. He’s absolutely exhausted after nursery. I wouldn’t push reading or spellings on him but I would read to him before bed (as I already do).

I can totally see why a single parent working full time wouldn’t do it or a parent with disability. Some children are neurodivergent and their parents might be too. My nephew has a disabled sibling with a profound learning disability and I’m not sure how much he has read with his parents. People have other stuff to do basically.

I’ll go against many comments and will say it’s the new generational issue. I’m somewhat mature student at uni and most of the students don’t bring a pen or a notebook. I’m shocked every time it happens. You are coming to study, how can you not bring a pen? You can’t rely on your phone only. In addition, I know life is hard and many things happen at the same time, I have a son myself, but really you can’t prepare the basic for your child for school? A book? A pen? Cmon, that’s lazy! I know many parents like to watch tik tok too much. I don’t have an opinion about homework though because I don’t know exactly how much they have to do at home and at school.

For all of those who ignore homework : think about your child feeling bad the next day in school. I'm not talking about parents who have SEN children, who are sick/have major problems. But the rest of you surely have 10 minutes to give your child and encourage their learning? So glad I'm not a teacher.

I'd say it was rather the opposite. The teachers are being rude, ThriveAT is a particular delight, and the others are pretty irritating with their “I don't know what's going on <wail>” as if they're not neck deep in a system broken by government agenda.

She replied and said it was a typo..Many schools are now using online books as parents won't return them.

Several people have talked about home school.

Can I please point out that home school is an oxymoron.

Home education is the term used in the UK.

Because education is far far bigger than school. It starts even before birth and continues throughout life.

My youngest is in year 2 and I also have 2 secondary age children. I try my best to engage with all the demands of infant school but I'm naturally disorganised so I struggle and forget things sometimes.

But a few things to comment on from your post...

Homework for young ones can be a real headache. Sometimes they are tired and don't engage.

I also don't think they should be doing more than minimal homework at that age. Reading, absolutely, and my DD gets spellings too.

Personally I hate it when the homework is uploaded online. I don't want my 6yo doing their homework online. I also don't want the faff of me having to sit down at a computer to try and find it online and print things off. When my older kids were at infant school they were given spellings at the start of the week on a small piece of paper that they stuck in their home-school diary. I preferred it because everything I needed was in their bag/in their diary. My DD's teacher has now started sending the whole half terms spellings home in a letter at the end of the previous half term so I'm guessing she's had feedback on the list being online. The first thing I do is write them her diary for each week. We can then practice them on the way to school.

Our school doesn't require kids to take in a pencil case. All stationery is in their class room.

One thing I'm crap at is remembering to put their reading book in their bag on the right days. But in my defence, the fact that it is not in her bag means I have taken it out of her bag and read with her! And I do this every day.

PS Im a single mum with a formerly great career, and did have to quit a well paid job I loved, as it just wasn’t possible to do everything I feel is necessary at home and hold down a responsible role. Childcare providers were very difficult to find, as most didn’t pay much attention to the childrens learning. I take my hat off to single parents or families with two full time working parents who manage to figure this out. There must be a playbook, please share it!!

My DC doesn't do homework because frankly I expect the 30 hours a week that he spends at school to be enough. If it isn't, I think there's something wrong with the education system.

I’m sorry but this screams organisational issues to me - the school aren’t being realistic.

Why are year 1s having to complete homework on top of reading? My kids are excelling in a no homework in KS1 school, and thriving. I’m glad because I also have three kids and with clubs, full time working and multiple needs to fulfil, I have zero time to do homework with three kids.

Why don’t you send different books home? How dull for the kids to have to read the same books at school and home daily! And you’re obviously going to have some who forget to back it back in their bag.

Pencils? Stationary? Why? Our school provides it all. The only thing I need to remember is once a week PE kit and luckily they go into school wearing their kit, so we don’t need to remember another bag.

We aren’t in the 90s. Most households have two working parents and little family support. Reduce the requirements on families, it doesn’t reduce their educational attainment and it bridges the gap between families who prioritise school organisation etc with those who don’t - after all, why create rules that make kids with disengaged parents feel bad?

I'm a bit baffled youce made it to 20 years without knowing there's so many reasons?

Lack of understanding. EAL. Bad experiences themselves. Poor mental health. Poor home life. A growing culture of it being schools responsibility to educate.

Also... I am an eyfs teacher and I won't be putting pressure on my chilsren to complete homework beyond qhta they can do independently 😁. Research shows it doesn't have a long term impact.

Sorry, I only just realized you asked for strategies on what might work:

• One type of communication so that I can check this systematically. Ideally it's a physical thing in my kids bag so the kid, too, is in the loop and has ownership.
• No bloody projects that require more parent creativity than kids creativity.
• Day trips within normal hours. Don't change starting and ending hours.
• A calendar in the beginning of the year with the dates on it.
• Homework with weekly deadlines, not from one day to another.
• No rules about what I do in my house (what language my kid ought to speak to its own parent, what to eat or not to eat, bed time)
• No symbolic actions to do good that don't change anything. I don't want my kid to bring garbage to the school to learn to sort it. Your come-to-school-by-foot day is stupid. We improve the world by structural measures, not by massively inconveniencing parents to make some senseless point.
• Don't foist on me responsibilities I wouldn't take on myself. I don't want your school fish, hamster, plant.
• Leave the gym bags in school and send them home at term time. They are not sweating in them anyway.
• Don't give homework that requires other steps to be done. Write each word in all the colours of the rainbow just means we now need to spend 20 minutes looking for coloured pens.

To the OP you sound like a really dedicated teacher. Don’t take the lack of engagement personally. They’ve either got too much on or they don’t care. You can’t change either of those things.

Every single parent has their own individual circumstances though, which go some way to explain whether they engage effectively with homework or whether they take a different route.

The way the world is now is difficult, the pressures on parents huge compared to the lack of pressure on our parents when we were young. Rates of mental illness in adults and children are skyrocketing. You can’t know all of this and then blame people who are equally being hurt by everything that’s going on.

We all need a break. Including parents who aren’t meeting their children’s teachers’ expectations. It’s hard.

I'm not sure I see the need to set 5/6 year olds home work, mine never had any and I'm sure I didn't either. Also why are you letting them take school books home ?. In my day school books were just that, they stayed in school for all pupils to use. If you wanted them at home you bought them yourself and I can't imagine basic reading books are that expensive.

Does your child not take a pencil case to school?

At our school it's specifically not allowed! They all use the pencils etc that are there. Otherwise - apparently - it's more faff as kids take other kids special pencils and then they get upset and that causes more drama 🤷🏻‍♀️

I practice sight words and the reading book (which realistic he recites from memory rather than reads as he’s already read it with the teacher and it’s so basic) with my 5 year old once a week and that’s it.
He gets a story every night and always has a go at reading me the first page (an actual story, not “the cat sat on a mat” type stuff.
When the gap between him getting home and going to bed is longer than 2 piddly little hours, I’ll consider maybe getting involved in all the hugely faffy and elaborate homework tasks set on the equally faffy app.
I like to engage DS interests independently of what school issues.If at the weekend he wants to read a book about space and then make playdoh models of the planets, that’s what we will be doing. If he wants to play in the garden with his brother then mooch about watching a movie - equally fine. I don’t work at the weekend either.

Wow, what an aggressive response! The teacher posting here is not the institution - she's being directed by the institution. Meaning that she is being told to set a certain amount of homework: likewise, she is being given goals to meet for the children.

I do understand parents not forcing kids to do homework to a certain extent, as this only affects the child (their loss). However, not bothering to help the child with any work puts THEM at a disadvantage, education-wise, so it's kind of like cutting off your nose to spite your face. Furthermore, not making sure that the kid has the right equipment (pencils etc), or books for school most definitely puts an unfair parental responsibility on the teacher, taking up their time and money. Schools are so strapped for cash that most teachers have to buy classroom resources with their own money. Furthermore, say that the homework is to complete a story, in time for the next lesson - if the child hasn't completed the story, it wastes the teacher's time having to bring them up to speed. This means it's not just affecting your kid, but the education of other children, which most definitely is not fair at all.

Because I’d have no interest in doing any sort of homework with my 5 year old. I didn’t even want my DC to be in school at that age, DC didn’t want to be at school at that age. The school day was way too long. School at that age was purely for socialising. DC learnt went to a fluent reading and speller after a summer when they were ready at about 8. Happened naturally. But then I come from the continent where primary schools is structured differently. I hate UK primary education with a passion and didn’t see the point of introducing any sort of additional stress into our family life because national curriculum wants 5 year olds to be able to read and write.

My daughter has SEND and goes to a specialist school where they don't do homework. But I didn't do homework when she was in mainstream either.

Kids need time to be kids. They deserve to be able to relax, and play. And not spend 5 days a week doing work, home, dinner, more work, bath and bed. Beyond reading , why should we force them to do more work at home? They're not mini adults, and to be fair most adults don't bring their work home.
If the curriculum isn't being covered in class then maybe it needs to be more efficient or more appropriate.

I worked full time (term time only) with 3 DC, one autistic who school refused, a DH who worked away for much of the week and many Saturdays. My DC were always in school on time (be use they went to before school club) Homework was almost always done (except one Christmas when dyslexic DD was given 10 Christmas word searches to complete and due to family illness we didn't bother - cue her teacher getting very cross with her, and so I paid her autistic brother to complete them in about 1/2 an hour) .I made sure they all knew their spellings for tests. Not easy with two dyslexic DC. We one the Victoria sponge competition at the summer gayer every year (I'm actually quite proud of this).

BUT I can see why parents don't have the time or energy to force over tired DC to do pointless homework. and forget about indoor shoes and pencils (never heard of a school in England asking for parents to provide pencils in primary) - Life is really, really hard for some people, for so many possible reasons.
I'm never going to judge a non perfect parent, even if I managed to ace the primary school years myself. I don't think this is a modern / post Covid thing. Parents have always had to deal with life.

So many parents are lazy these days. There are so many excuses but when you have a child you owe them a decent upbringing. Many of them probably can't spell the words.

Come on, you know why. You work with families every day.
We work late, we're all exhausted, kids included. Time is money.
Parents just want an hour to eat and relax with their kids. I'm not stressing over homework.

Also, I would expect school to supply pencils. Surely whoever came up with the idea of small children supplying their own stationery realised by the end of the week that actually, they might need to buy some pens in.

I am so disorganised, I even send mine with a multipack of snacks for the week, and ask teachers for it to live at school. I WILL forget to send a snack every morning.

My kids are now teenagers so no longer relevant but some simple tips that would hopefully reduce the headache for both you OP and the parents:

-keep a box of sharpened and ready to use pencils in the classroom. Get every kid to grab one when needed. Put pencil back in the box afterwards so they don’t go missing. Surely the school can afford pencils ??!
-keep a box of plastic shoe covers for the kids who don’t bring slippers/ change of shoes. Some parents might not be able to afford to buy them or keep replacing things when they go missing. Uniforms are already too expensive as they are. Use plastic covers, no drama.
-send homework on a piece of paper rather than encouraging device use after school. Make homework non -compulsory for primary age children
-reading logs and reading books are just a tickbox exercise for the benefit of ofsted . Families who read with children will continue reading regardless and so logging a book in a notebook is just an added admin task for most. For children whose parents don’t read with them it only adds upset and embarrassment in front of others when their reading log is empty.
I think modern life is stressful enough for families without schools being the source of additional stress and pressure because boxes have to ticked, forms signed, logs updated etc.

I don’t know but it’s the same at my school. Any parent information meetings are attended by parents of children that don’t need any tips. We recently had a SATS info evening and out of 25 families, only 8 came.

I disagree with parents providing stationery. Our school provides everything.