is homework at age 6 to blame for high levels of parental involvement in homework throughout school?

[thewomanwhothoughtshewasahat]

me and dh were just thinking - if you give a 6 year old homework it is not something they can be responsible for. Rather, it becomes something for which parents must take responsibility. When we were at school, we didn't get homework until we were 11. At that age we were expected to take full responsibility for it. Our parents never even knew what it was. Their involvement comprised no more than the occasional "have you done your homework?" This was the case throughout secondary school. Now that 6 year olds have homework, parental involvement becomes obligatory - children learn that homework is something they do with their parents, not something they do independently. Parents are left having to wean children off parental involvement or - as seems to be the case - letting it continue. And children simply don't get the opportunity to work in a truly independent way and truly take responsibility for their work. what do you think?

Is nobody else refusing to do homework ?
I decide what goes on in this house not the bloody school, my DD's go to fun activities after school, eat, bath and go to bed we have no time for homework and no intention of making time.

foxinsocks I would imagine your school would have a homework policy or at least they should have one.- as Bugsy said in your home school agreement.

I teach a very different subjeect than MB so I am delighted if parents of KS3 pupils do their homework with their children - not for but with. But that reflects the fact that I teach in a school where parents just show no interest -at our last full school meeting to deal with complaints from parents 2 parents turned up! ( we have about 600 kids)

AngelaChill where I teach almost everyone refuses to do homework but that is more of a discipline and motivation issue than a deeply thought out protest.

My son has just started yr4, and has to do 10 mins reading every night, and a 30 min piece of homework each week.
If he doesn't finish homework in time allocated, i just have to sign to say he's spent the time on it.
And spelling and times tables.

Also have daughter in yr1, who has to do 10 mins reading each night and 15 mins homework per week, and spelling and tables.

Teachers also ask for extra info to be found out during the week.

My children also do clubs, such as cubs, rainbows, ballet etc. Their choice.

And i have a 3 yr old who thinks she has to be involved in everything!!!!!!!

It is hard to fit it all in sometimes, but if we want our kids to succeed, then we have to do as much as we can to help them.

I have friends with 1 child, who say how hard it is to fit it all in and look after their child as well!!!!!!

I find it hard, but what about the parents who choose to have more kids, i admire anyone who gets it all done.

We got homework at 6 as children. Just depends on the school. It's good to get some parents involved who otherwise would never open a book with a child and think "leave it all to the school". Most children learn lots from their parents. Much better they happily sit learning a few spellings than wilt in front of the TV with no parental attention. Parenting involves effort.

I do think there needs to be a balance to this homework lark! Some people have it, some people don't. I end up feeling so regimented by school/society expectations. There is always something that slips. I just can't juggle it all.

If we are super conscientious with the reading one evening and follow it with specially nice home cooked meal, the chances are, my sons end up in bed later than they should and all housework gets forgotten. Day in, day out, all of us - dh, my sons, me - all get stressed and shouty in our own ways. There is simply too much we 'have' to do. It's not that I even work particularly long hours or have a big commute, so I can't blame that.

I know I sound like I am whinging. True, I chose a primary school with high expectations of its pupils and parents, and I continue to feel grateful my son is there and try and meet the targets it sets. But I sometimes think teachers forget that for most working parents and parents of several children, there are only 3 hours or so a night to fit in everything - homework, nutritious meal, 'quality' time, ferrying to and from clubs, reading, suitable bedtime etc etc

It seems to me that school and 'good parenting' expectations are more geared to small families where one parent is home at 3.30 pm. That's just not realistic.

Trust me, even when you ARE at home from 3.30pm it doesn't make it totally realistic either. I have a toddler who HAS to be doing what his older brother is doing which makes the simple act of taking his older brother to one side to do homework incredibly stressful.

"in front of the TV with no parental attention"

Now I don't see that as necessarily bad (shoot me now, as I'm obviously an inadequate parent). Ds1 at age 5 is usually SHATTERED by the time he comes home and often that's all he's capable of. I don't see that him vegging in front of the TV when he's tired while I get on with dinner is in any way a bad thing. After all, how do we as adults chill out when we've had a long hard day and don't want to engage brain? TV or computer mainly...

Now I'm fairly lucky in that our homework burden from school isn't too bad. One reading book a night (which we normally do last thing as our bedtime book - sadly meaning old favourites that he would normally enjoy get pushed to one side, but it's just the easiest way to get done), a discovery bag (weekly now he's in Y1, was every other in reception) which he generally wants to do, but can be a struggle to fit in. Gets done at the weekend mainly - some bags are gone into in more depth than others depending on family commitments. And the occasional worksheet - words to play matching games with, letter sheet from Jolly Phonics etc. The worksheets don't have to be returned to school so in that respect are "optional" but I do feel guilty if it takes us a while to get to them.

With that level we can just about keep an even keel and still get other stuff done in evenings (like swimming lessons, chill out time, proper meal, bath etc) but when ds1's homework increases in KS2 we'll also have ds2's homework to deal with and that's when I think we'll start to struggle.

Oh there's also the usual fundraising stuff where input from home is required on a fairly regular basis which can often be a tipping point: cake required for fete, costume for book day, collect small things for small pot (ds1 was enthusiastic for up to 10 items then got bored... we helped him a bit but basically left it as he was getting annoyed. "Winner" in the class found 100 items - how much parental help do you think THEY had?!).

At 5, DS is either tired or hyper when he gets home from school. Any sort of structured activity is likely to lead to more conflict than learning.

Thus he is given a wide selection of books, and stays in his bedroom reading them for 90 minutes.
He used to sleep during this period, but that's rare now.

We are fighting the easy option of TV straight after school, hoping that it won't become a habit.

Don't know if we'll win of course.
I hear very much the point about it being hard to teach one kid whilst the other one watches TV.

I have to take issue with the suggestion that teachers send hw home because we are expecting parents to do our jobs for us.

This is categorically not true.

You may be surprised to learn that most primary teachers, myself included don't like the idea of excessive homework any more than you do. By excessive I mean any (other than regular but not timetabled reading) at KS1 and more than the odd piece of investigative idependent task at KS2.

Homework is only of value if there is time to go through it with the children in class explaining concepts and clearing up misconceptions. In reality there is no time for this. Thereore the task is largely meaningless.

As I said earlier, teachers set hw because it is expected of them. I have been criticised by OFSTED for not setting enough hw as it was the main grumble from parents about me at the OFSTED parents meeting. This is despite the fact that each of my lessons were graded highly and that I got good end of year results. Sadly, not all parents feel the same way as the majority of posters on here.

My job is to teach your children various concepts. To teach them how to learn so they can become independent learners. Therefore, unless your child's teacher is asking you to do this rather than fill in dull worksheets then they are not asking you to do their job. They are just (reluctantly) doing what is expected of them.

homemama is right.

If my doctor tells me to get more exercise then he's not asking me to save him the trouble of fixing my heart.
I wonder if part of the underyling goal is to teach the parents, not the kids directly ?
Few parents have any training in educating kids, and can benefit from hints in technqiue and what can reasonably be expected for a child of that age.
Our school sent a two page note on "prep" (it's that sort of school), including the advice that that we weren't to do too much for fear of tiring the children, or blunting their motivation.

I'm also going to risk unpopularity by saying many parents need some sort of push from the school to make them tutor kids.

tigermoth, you are so right about the 3 hours!

One of the broad sheets is running a campaign to let children be children and i'm sorry but I do feel all this homework and stats nonsense is a huge problem in expecting too much too early from children. My cousin in law is a head teacher and she suggested we find out when DD's stats are next year and book the annual holiday for that week, i doubt we will be interesting thought.
Why isn't the NUS taking a stand against all this if they are so against it ?

Haven't read all this thread (dodgy internet connex) but I have always resented homework for small children. I don't have a problem with reading hw, it's easy to do that as a bit of cuddle-up time on the sofa but boring worksheets or never-ending sentences are plain discouraging. I think an imaginative project is also okay now and then but it's the mindless repetitiveness that is so awful.

10yo dd is currently at an international school where a lot of homework is set, at least 1hr a night and more at weekends. Half our Sundays were spent doing it, once taking a memorable six hours and many tears. And then the bl%dy stuff never got marked half the time! Her new teacher seems to be setting much more reasonable tasks thus far, thank goodness.

I am something of a lone voice, though, as most parents here like their childen to have plenty of homework as it keeps both children and their nannies occupied.

Suedonim, it sounds like parents at your dd's school treat homework as a sort of status symbol - I have a feeling some parents I know (not mumsnetters btw!) do this. They judge how good a primary school is by how much homework is given out. (And by implication means you are judged as a parent by how much homework you make your child do).

I agree with you that reading practice at home is useful and I suppose some spellings, too ( I say grudgingly). You're right, it's the worksheets that seem unnecessary.

It would be interesting to find out how much the other parents at my son's school do regarding homework sheets and reading records etc. The teachers must know the 'average' but don't share this knowledge with the parents. I am not at all sure if this is right.

our ds who is 4.5yrs got homework lastweek- it was his 2nd week in primary school

jambuttie. I agree with too many of these posts to mention everyone. The education system has worried me for some time now and all this talk of homework leads to a bigger debate as Smellens just said. I so agree that the way for children to gain a balanced and thorough education is to encourage a love of learning so they WANT to do it - i know from my own childhood that the teachers who ENJOYED their teaching and subjects were so much more exciting to listen to..this encouraged a love of learning in the children (Gosh - this is beginning to sound like a trailer for DEAD POETS SOCIETY!!)Setting homework that had meaning and could be related to progressing an enjoyment of the subject is valuable - homework that is set because OFSTED say it should be set is a complete waste of time

I think you're right, Tigermoth, about the status symbol thing. When we lived in Indonesia I mentioned to dd's teacher that we were struggling with the hw. She said not to bother with it if we had better things to do as she only gave hw to satisfy those parents who felt it was the be-all-and-end-all. The most extreme were the Korean parents who went all out for homework, they were quite scary in the demands they made of even their small children.

I have 4 children all at Primary School. I try really hard to keep on top of the homework during the week (DT's in Year 6 get 3 pieces of homework a week - science, maths, english and a project and spellings)

I find it very difficuly though to drag them in when they are outside playing with friends (play is sooo important IMO)

The problem is, that if we don't keep up with it during the week, its all to do over the weekend. I have lost count of the times we have had to cancel weekend plans to meet with family or g out for the day becausethe homework has mounted up. I do start to resent it.

I'll never forget 2 years ago, one of my daughters was sent hme for the christmas holidays with 250!!! mental arithmatic sums to do by her teacher because she felt she was behind with her numeracy. I was furious and told her that she didn't have to do it but she was so anxious about it that it worried her constantly. We sat there on christmas eve trying to get though them [cross]

I don't understand why you think parental involvement is a bad thing? My dd is 5 1/2 and in P1 and she gets about 10 minutes of homework to do 3 days a week - a total of about half an hour a week, so not a lot really. And yes, at this age, DH or I have to sit and do it with her (with her not for her). But personally I think that's a good thing. From our point of view it means we know how she's doing - what she's doing well in, what she's struggling with. From her point of view, she gets a bit of one-to-one time with us, some extra praise & encouragement. And hopefully, it means that even as she does get more independant she won't shut us out completely. Would you rather they came home from school every day and told you nothing?

I do enjy the time that we spend doing homework together, for one thing it means that the tv is switched off and peace decends on the house and even with my 10 year olds, I still like to sit with them and supervise.

Doesn't change the fact that with everything else going on, we really struggle to find the time to get it all done and spending half an hour per week with one child is a completly diffrent scenario to spending 3 - 4 hours per week or more, with 4 children.

At my DS school he has just started juniors he gets
spellings on a monday and a test on Friday this weeks were Egyptian,pyramid.tomb,ancient.papryus and pharaoh.
english on a monday handed back on Thursday
Science on a Tuesday handed back on Thursday
Maths on a Thursday handed back on Tuesday and reading for 20 mins every day .

It's the number of children which make it hard. When we had 3 at junior school age with 2 musical instruments each to practise too each day (that's 6 music practices) it was almost a full time job even with my ex husband and I both helping after a full day at work each and even if our then nanny helped a bit too. With the twins occasionally I put them in the after school club if no one is available to pick them up and there all the homework is done and you pick them up at 6 and everything is done. Much easier but tiring for them to do that every day. Depends on the child too. One of my twins paid his quicker brother yesterday to do his homework sheet before I realised what was going on. It was quite funny but not to be encouraged.

My dd is in primary 5 the Scottish equivalent of Year 4 in England.

I hate homework and I'm not afraid to admit it. I don't have time after being at work all day to come home and help with homework. I'm on my own with the girls in the evening as dh's works then so it's doubly stressful trying to do everything that needs done and fit in homework. Yes I want my dd to do well in school and yes I do find myself helping her almost every night because dd is a daydreamer. She's so slow when it comes to doing homework. She'll write out her words then will say I can't think of a sentence for this word etc. So most nights I find myself cooking dinner, trying to occupy a 2 year old who's desperate to help her big sister do her homework and think of sentences at the same time.

Maths HW is the worst, dd1 is not very mathematically minded which is fine as I'm sure it will come in time as I was exactly the same as a child. But the tears and tantrums we've had over the years when doing sums is unbelievable. Last night she had sums to do, but she's so tired at nights that she finds it hard to concentrate and ends up making silly mistakes which I then get her to change. The way they do maths now is different from when I was at school which doesn't help either.

One thing that I'll say though is that a lot of you have mentioned homework over the weekends or even during school holidays! We've never had homework over a weekend, it's only ever given during the week. and if my dd was ever given homework to do during school holidays there is no way she'd be doing it.