How am I ever going to get my kid to do homework ??

[srslhw]

I know, a universal challenge..

my DD is 5. Just finishing reception. So far it’s been a light introduction to homework and OMG. It’s so hard to get her to do it. I’m dreading what’s to come.

at the moment she just needs to do some reading and she protests, refuses, tells me it’s boring. It’s an awful experience.

we have a reward jar that I use and she gets stars if she does her reading / writing and when it’s full, she gets to choose something she wants. It works a bit, but it’s still really tiring.

I just did my work at that age and enjoyed it. No arguing or saying it’s boring.

any tips here ? I try to make it fun, get her to read to her teddies / pretend I’m stumbling over words etc etc but when she doesn’t want to, she just doesn’t want to. I’m dreading next year, where there will be even more homework.

She’s only 5. You’re getting nowhere with your current approach and the teacher has advised you to leave well alone. A solid routine of reading bedtime stories is more than enough. There is plenty of guidance online about how to read bedtime stories. If you want to make it more enriching and help her reading and comprehension, there are ways of reading stories with her that go beyond just reading the words aloud to her.

We did it in the morning and when we got onto stuff like numbots, the deal was three good tries (because attitude is key to success amd more important than ticking something off).

We never do TV on school days either because we found that episodes was a hiding to a poor attention span and tantrums because they just want to get to that.

So it was a mix of setting expectations, routine and consequences for poor behaviour. Rewards were for longer effort milestones e.g. completing the reading challenge (with a book!), a stage of numbots etc.

As reading improved, we modelled the behaviour of reading for pleasure and instilled a quiet time after getting home, snacks and getting changed, of sitting down to read our respective books together.

Even with all this positive sounding stuff, there were still hellish days with battles of will.

Hang in there and don't pressure yourself, most kids aren't doing times tables til year 2 or 3 😆

After school, drink and snack, 15 mins max doing bits of reading etc. Any book she likes. Or sums or chatting about a topic.
Ask her if she wants to get changed first, or after. Set the timer. Then get the school and pe bag ready together and that's it. Time extends as they get older but the habit is there.

My dd hated the school books. So did I. We always treated ourselves with a better one afterwards:)

We have a set routine and it's non negotiable. We have tea, then DS stays at the table to complete reading. Keep it short and positive. Sticker in the reading journal. He can only leave the table, have pudding, watch tv etc. after this is done.

I had no idea that children got homework at such an early age nowadays. Homework started in secondary school when I was a kid.

I feel quite sorry for them.

Get into a routine, it becomes a habit.

start with a snack first. A hungryish child will not concentrate. Then move on to sitting at the table with doing some sort of work.

do the reading as part of bedtime routine so it doesn’t feel like work, and becomes something she looks forward to.

Buy the comics that follow the phonics, I used to buy ds the Cbeebies one, there were stories with stickers, characters he would be familiar with, puzzles things to learn to form letters. Reading doesn't just have to be school reading books.

She’s 5! I thought you were going to say year 7. At thus age you need to inspire a love of learning, so just read to her books she enjoys. Eventually she will want to read herself. Pressure wont help.

Sometimes they’re just not ready, and when they are it just snaps into place.

I had one that hated phonics, with an unparalleled passion, and just didn’t seem to make the connection at all. I read all the books that were sent home, cuddling on the sofa, without any particular demand on him. One day, he took the book out, flipped through it, and announced there was no need for me to read it because he’d read it himself. I turned a blind eye the first time, but he kept doing it. I was sure he was pretending, so I’d ask him a couple of questions about it, which he answered confidently. He’d gone from baffled to being a flipping speed reader. Went on to be a complete bookworm.

My other one hated worksheets and colouring in preschool. She would just drop the crayon or pencil and go “searching” under the table to drag it out. She was a master of avoidance tactics. We reduced hours, so she got more of the play, music and social activities and spread her entitlement across two years. People told me she’d never be ready for a full school day, etc but she just needed a slower start. Once she was ready for it, she flew, She has a shelf of notebooks of her hand written short stories and half finished novels.

There’s more than one way of supporting dc, and sometimes reducing the pressure for a while is what they need.

We struggled getting our DD to read. In reception and Y1 the books are just so simple they are also boring. Our DD complained massively about reading, it was getting to be a bit too much of a battle so we backed off, and hoped that she'd get better and eventually would be able to read something actually interesting and would start to enjoy it.

Fortunately, that's pretty much happened. I think she's still a bit behind in reading vs where I'd like her to be, but she doesn't resist it any more and her reading is basically ok - and presumably will get better with more practice.

If she is reluctant to read, the books are probably too hard/long. It should only take her 5-10 mins, if its taking longer its too hard.

Try asking the teacher for a couple of easier ones, better easy reading than no reading or a battle.

When it is pitched at the right level there should be a lot less resistance.

Definitely just 10 minutes@srslhw. It needs to be an easy win to get the treat. You can very gradually increase it by a tiny little bit once she's used to the routine.

But the treat needs to be the thing. A reward. (Not that I use this technique on MYSELF at all 🙄)

I had (still have!) reluctant (dyslexic) readers. One also has other ND issues. Reading is hard work for their brains and school frazzled them enough.

I did lots of reading with them. Reading to them. Different types of books and texts. Poetry was great for nights when everyone was burned out.

For DS1, reading clicked when I bought some Star Wars easy readers when he was 6. It was the first time books had really piqued his interest. Being autistic, he favours non-fiction and niche subjects. DS2 loves stories and being read to, but just struggles to do it himself. By later junior years we did a lot of audio books to get through novels that he could understand but found too mind-blowing to read himself.

Both are thriving at secondary school. Homework in general was a struggle at primary, and a totally lost cause after the torture of months and months and months of battling "home learning". They just weren't mature enough to cope. But they have both got to grips with it at secondary. DS1 has a reading age of 16 (goodness knows how!) and DS2 has now caught up to average and has had tutoring to support his English skills that through dyslexia and 6 months of lost learning were still gappy.

The biggest thing is that we tried to keep reading light, interesting and fun to their needs. It wasn't ideal, but they've still got a lot from what we did. They love learning and have curious minds and great vocabularies, fed by a variety of media, conversation and going to varied places. I can't make reading easy for them and magic them into bookworms like I was, but I have fed their brains.

The odds were stacked against us and we did our best with our circumstances.

Most reluctant 5 year olds are tired and not quite mature enough rather than a major issue. The most important thing is to keep reading pleasurable. If that means reading to her or using audio, that's still beneficial. Just don't turn it into a miserable slog.

My son hated homework in primary school and the quality of it was awful so he never really did any. Now he's in secondary he does his homework fine as it's sensible homework, research this, make a poster on that. Don't worry, the less pressure the better do what your child prefers in terms of extra curricular work. Also my issue with primary homework is the teachers don't mark or check it.

Please take the teacher's advice and stop forcing it.

Read books with your child that have interesting stories and decent vocabulary. Run your finger along under the text as you read. Make your delivery engaging, with different voices and plenty of expression.

Reading daily should be standard. Don't use the words homework and read with her when suits. So if she's tired before bed do it when she gets in from school or before dinner. Do a max of 2 pages even if you read one yourself. She's only 5, I'd keep it light with no pressure at this stage. If the school books are boring then read other books. I bought the Biff, Chip and Kipper books ( oxford teading tree?) for my son and he engaged with them much better. He enjoyed reading about the adventures the kids got up to.

It’s not really homework at that age, it’s just the school reminding everyone what good parenting looks like (reading with their child, etc). FWIW, I broke it down into bite sized chunks, 10 minutes here, 10 minutes there (particularly made her do it just before something she wanted to do, such as watch a bit of TV, go to the playground, etc). Also, you sort of need to find a book she’s interested in.

I don’t have any tips really. Dsd, her mum bangs on at her about her homework so much that she is in a constant state of anxiety about doing home work. I’m not that mum but I think her example makes me way too lax. I do think children will find their own rhythm on their own.

I never revised for an exam until I was in my thirties and only ever did homework in detention. Never practiced my spellings in primary school (still can’t spell). That being said I did ok. I still earn more than double the national average in a steady civil service role. Will never set the world on fire but steady plod. DH had 20% school attendance from year 8-11 still got his 7 gcse grade c and above and again earns more than the national average. Firmly believe life skills are more important.

Maybe you worrying about her reading etc makes it feel more like a chore. Maybe try a different location? Like outside so it feels less like work. Maybe change the time of day you’re trying to do the reading. Don’t overly worry about it. It will be fine.

Mine are now adults but the ‘homework argument’ was not one I was ever going to have at home continually with mine. So I just replied brightly with things like ‘ that’s fine, don’t worry, we will just explain to your teacher tomorrow together why it wasn’t done’ etc on a theme.
They were so much more bothered by what their teachers thought/ wanted to impress them way more than impressing me.
We didn’t have any arguments, they just knew that I wouldn’t be making excuses for them not doing it to their teachers on their behalf.
It really didn’t take them either long to just accept the easiest/ best way deal with homework was to just get it done… learnt early it set their whole approach going forward with their education.

I would just leave it at 5, forcing her is more likely to make her think of reading negatively. Sometimes they find the school books boring. Let her choose something for you to read to her at bedtime, try and get her to read a bit of it but don’t push it too much.
My girls are 10 and 14 now and I really don’t think reading at 5 made much difference, we tried to do the reading school sent every week but didn’t always. We read books to them a lot.

We had this in reception. No matter how much we read to him he wasn’t interested in reading back. We compromised on every other day.

He also started school unable to hold a pen so doing spellings was a nightmare (he’s got a medical problem so was behind with fine motor skills)

We started to do spellings verbally in the car and would do phonics on the iPad so he was doing something which the teacher said would help when I raised concerns. He’s about to go into year 3 now and he’s now ahead in spellings, writing and reading. I found not pushing has meant as he gets older he wants to do it

I'd change it to an instant reward, she reads then she gets to do a fun activity/have a biscuit etc. The reward chart is great but I think the disconnect between the reading and eventually getting a reward a week or so later is probably not helping. As it's coming up to the school holidays I would consider putting this into practice now, she gets a mini treat each day and then also earns a sticker on her reward chart so that each fortnight she gets the bigger treat. Keep at it daily over the holidays, set a timer or a set amount of pages so it becomes a habit. 5 mins of reading a day so it's not a huge thing but will help build good reading habits, a written sentence every other day of a minimum of 6 words (more if she has a lot to say should definitely be encouraged!) Maths you can do without her realising, ask questions randomly throughout the day related to whatever activity you are doing and you can sneak that learning in without her realising and maybe do a "formal" 3 sums once or twice a week.
I appreciate the holidays are exactly that but with a reluctant learner keeping the homework going albeit very reduced is the best way to not set yourself up for drama at the start of each school year when she "has" to do it again.

You may be making it feel like a chore maybe?

Before bed, she reads to you, then you read to her. Four pages is fine — maybe use a timer and she reads for five minutes? It won't feel so long if there's a timer. Or make it two minutes to begin with. Reading four pages and then discussing what's happened or what was in the pictures that went with them at this age. Or you read and then discuss what you read about.

With English and Maths homework, pick a day when she is going to do her homework. As it goes through the years, it's likely to become online using programmes like MyMaths and SPAG. You might get spellings too. So just have a time either one day or three when HWK is done. Use command statements and a visual timetable so she understands expectations. It's what she will get at school.

If a 5yo is getting upset and not wanting to do HW then….don't do HW.

Research shows HW in primary is largely of no benefit anyway. And the quickest way to make a child hate HW is forcing them to do it aged 5.

My oldest boys are into secondary now. I always told them in primary HW was up to them - if they wanted to do it, great. If not then fine. But once they reached secondary it’s non-negotiable. That approach seems to have worked fine.

Personally I can’t imagine anything worse than forcing an unwilling 5 year old to do homework and I just don’t see the point.

And as for 10 mins a day over the summer oh my gosh your poor child. Pressure much?! Even the teacher has told you to leave it if she’s unwilling. I’d listen if i were you!