AIBU to wish primary schools would do away with homework

[Mondaymoanday]

When I was at primary, kids would be expected to learn some spellings, read, do times tables, maybe do a termly project at home. I hate how much family time is lost to busywork homework.

Lots of kids are tutored. I don’t know any that are tutored in busywork, model making or trekking round shops to look for whatever is needed to buy for that week’s homework.

@Mondaymoanday are your children at state or private school? I wouldn't expect them to do anything that they can't have a decent go at themselves

While I'm happy to in put on explaining an unknown word I would absolutely not be building a model of the pyramids. Work like that is often extra/optional at our school for a one off competition for example and only for children and their families that enjoy that kind of project and can fit it in to their plans

have you talked to the school?

My homework refusing one had to slum it in one of those areas that don't have grammar schools that you wrinkle your nose at.

I don't think I ever saw her do more than the absolute minimum required to avoid consequences (although my memories of deliberately not doing secondary homework on time because it got me into the nice, warm lunchtime detention room instead of shivering on the playground all winter may not have helped). The nearest thing she did resembling extra work was play the drums like a Terminator and not actually be a dick towards the DT teacher.

Doesn't seem to have hurt her PhD. Or her students' dissertations and funding/ethics applications.

I am in love with learning from a young age. Enjoyed it. But also life made me home educate - still love it

I'd rather read and do maths and all kids of learning alone or with my child rather than go to parties, social events etc

My daughter's school doesn't have a homework policy so they don't set it. They used to and it was always on a shit app that really wasn't fit for that purpose. People who were trying to keep their kids away from screens also didn't want homework to be app based. So now they just don't set it. I'm fine with that however I do see gaps where my daughter has forgot things and I do think homework to consolidate learning might be helpful. But I don't think it's necessary in primary.

My homework was always a maths worksheet, reading, or spelling and sentences. My niece has homework across multiple subjects and has to do some every single night and at the weekend. I don't really know what is for the best but I know that isn't.

Its also revision and consolidation!

I used to do some reading and spellings with mine when they were that age but nothing else even if it was sometimes set.

The world did not stop turning, nor did the sky fall in. Good degrees and jobs all around now that they are adults.

Oh god, the judgement from DD's primary school about homework. She struggled (eventually got an EHCP at secondary, primary just blamed her for not trying enough plus my 'bad parenting').

In the end I realised her mental health mattered more than pleasing the school. She had begun to.punch herself in the face for being 'stupid', plus everything i read said homework at primary has minimal long term impact.

I always read to her, and she enjoyed reading to me. She did Brownies, dance class, we played board games and went to museums and parks and the beach. When you looked at 'education' broadly she far more outside school than most of her classmates.

She is now a confident, hard working, intelligent young woman of 19 who has held a Saturday job since she was 15. Currently at College and the same system means she will be retaking - and failing - her GCSE maths endlessly as well. But at least now she has the maturity to shrug it off, instead of seeing herself as a failure and waste of space.

It’s good to practice the skills you’ve learnt away from the classroom, and good to get into the habit of doing homework for when they get to secondary. Some weekly spellings and a workshop, plus a little reading sounds reasonable.

I meant for some children e.g. those who already know how to read and have basic maths concepts, they spend the first couple of years at school just repeating it. Some people say it’s good to keep cementing that knowledge, which means a number of kids don’t learn anything new in all those lessons. My point was if it was truly the case that a child who meets/exceeds the curriculum threshold for x year should be going over and over basic phonics or maths in school and for homework, surely all children should be allowed that opportunity. Instead of just honestly saying, that’s the way it is, there is no real stretching in the classroom or with homework, some people pretend that going over the same building blocks for ages has huge value.

Some said homework is useful as an indicator as to what has been learned that week - I was saying it isn’t in our experience and used general arithmetic worksheets as an example. They do arithmetic everyday. They stopped children playing between drop off and registration to shoe in even more arithmetic worksheets. There are endless similar worksheets sent home.

Saying I find homework of little value isn’t the same as saying I find reading or learning (in school or out) of little value.

If they need it at secondary it can wait until secondary.

We don't start potty training new born babies on the grounds they'll need to use the toilet one day. We wait until they are ready developmentally.

My son is starting reception in September, we were told 0 homework for the whole of primary!
It's just going to be reading, not even phonics apparently.
They have some optional work available for parents who want to, that's it.

Another school we've seen said they had gotten rid of all the "parents' homework" a couple of years ago 😂that's all the creative/building projects. They only give things children can complete themselves.

Agree, this is what school time during the day should be for. At home let them relax, they will only be small once.

Let them enjoy their lives before growing up and having to work for 40 odd years. There’ll be plenty of time for homework in secondary school.

Homework for young kids should be abolished other than reading or timestable type practice.

@AreYouBrandNew state primary

A million times this.

We also don’t ask a child who is fully toilet trained to sit on a potty for fifteen minutes every evening and pretend it’s a benefit.

She sounds like a fabulous young woman. You must be very proud of her.

We had awful, upsetting battles over homework at primary too (although the teachers and Head really tried to help and basically let DD skip a lot of it mega tactfully - which considering it was a competitive prep school I thought reflected really well on them).

Could DD do a functional maths qualification instead?

If it helps we used to stick up the phonics on the wall beside where we ate dinner and we’d do 3 sounds or whatever ever day. A little bit every day actually worked in the end and when we started my dd was behind and struggling because we just didn’t do the practice

Well spellings, reading and time
tables is all my dc got all through primary nothing else. They are now in yr7 and 9, so current. Small village school.

As it should be Why are the kids being given stuff that the parents have to be involved in such as models? What does this teach them?

Me and my ex had this exact conversation on Monday night (he comes over on a Monday to sit and do homework with DD10). Our school has removed homework as being mandatory, but they ask if we have time to do it - I can't help but think though that when I was at primary school (I'm 43) I sat a desk from 9-3 and I learned the work that was put in front of me.....my 10 year old rarely sits at a desk, they do a lot of free learning, they have learning "stations" and can pick and choose so I think a lot of the homework is making up for the slack that they're not doing during school hours. I have the view that you get out what you put in, so we do extra learning at home on top of the worksheet that they send home.

Another point is that my DD is in her penultimate year of primary and still writes with a pencil - I am 100% sure that I had graduated to a pen by her age in preparation for high school, we've been writing homework in pen for practice.

I may be old fashioned, but I think there should be more sitting and doing real work..... (yes I know not all kids learn well that way, but sitting and working are actually key skills that most of us need to have for our working lives)

I think it's fine. Homework is a habit, as much as anything. Getting hit with homework in Y7 when they've not had to do it in primary would result in a lot thinking it's not necessary to do it.

My DC's work just gets marked with a well done stamp. Flick and stamp. 5 minute task for the teacher (TA) once a week. Setting it is more onerous of course.

It depends entirely how much they are asked to do. I volunteer to hear children read in primary - the children who are struggling and need extra help are largely those who nobody reads with them at home. There are just not enough staff to give each child 1-2-1 attention for reading, spellings, times tables as often as would be helpful. 10 mins reading every day in KS1, plus spellings and maths in KS2 is reasonable.
The ‘make a volcano out of paper mache’ type of thing? Not helpful!
My youngest is now in secondary and is in a routine of doing a bit of homework every day, it’s made the transition easier that she already had that expectation set.

It isn't the fault of teachers it is the fault of the system. Nobody is blaming teachers we know they do fantastic work and that the system is awful.

100% agree.