secondary school punishment...am livid

[Tortington]

my daughter partially completed her drama homework - as did most of her class as the teachers instructions were not clear. she has the chance to complete the homework and hand it in tomorrow - fair enough - she now has clear instructions! however if she fails to do this she has been given a slip of paper which says the following

"Five lines, to be done on your own paper, to be handed in tomorrow with the missing homework. Do three lines if you receive help with your english.

I am given homework, not for the benefit of my teacher, but purely for the imrovement of my own academic and analytical skills. to neglect to complete the aforementioned work is therefore not a logical course of action. It is a pity that the writing of tedious lines such as these becomes a necessity, when completing the weekly homework comsumes far less time; however, one must recognise that if one avoids one's responsabilities then there is a consequential outcome which must be faced. hopefully, in future, i will have completed my homework and will not have to repeat this experience"

now this might look like a small paragraph typed out but its practically a page to a kid, and after questioning my children the "five lines" bit at the beginning means to write the whole thing out 5 times - of this they are both certain ( twins in different classes in same year)

i remember having to deal with the drama teacher and asking for the homework policy for my eldest son- i got sent the drama homework policy - which wasn't what i had asked for but you just give up fighting after a while when real life issues tke over and you cant be arsed with petty mindedness such as this. i would much rather they learn something or use their time constructivly as a punishment ( which this time they have managed to avoid) i dont understand the benal insane stupidness of such as excersise - is there any recourse i can take - i know my children have avoided such a punishment this time - but what for those children that have not? i think this writing excersise come from the premis that all children are 'orrible little gits that dont do homework on purpose. i recognise there has to be a system of punishment - but i wonder where the limits are if punishments are set in class.

what to the great mumsnet population think?

no hard feelings Marina - I misinterpreted you. Good on you for sticking up for Drama, I get so bored by thickoes who assume it's just ' let's pretend' - tell that to Timberlake Wertenbaker!I do agree that incomprehensible lines for an 11 year old lines is a bit pointless, but then again I try to make certain punishments pointless from Year 10 upwards and it usually works - the fear of utter boredom seems a good incentive.Not going into details though as don't want to hijack the thread.So sucks to anyone who doesn't understand drama/theatre studies !

Glad we sorted it donnie

Hi Rowlers,

What I found amazing was the effort dd made trying to wriggle out of the lines. I never had sisters so teenage daughters are a new one on me!

I was the original target, being a big softee compared to my wife, but managed to fob dd off into talking to her mum. As I explained, my wife just packed her off upstairs with a wad of A4 paper.

The funniest thing was when dd tryed to get some sympathy from her godmother who then said that if she was a teacher she would have given her 500 lines! Her godmother couldn't stop smirking when dd recited the extremely long sentence she had to write.