Over the top silliness during homework

[Offyourrocker]

My DD 7 does really well in school, she's always being praised by her teacher for working hard and very rarely gets into trouble except for the occasional talking or giggling.

Anyway, for some reason when it comes to doing homework or reading at home, she goes really silly. Almost babyish and it's like she pretends she doesn't know the answers or words etc. Last Sunday I had a rare afternoon/evening out and my husband said she just got on with it with no help and I know she did fine as I've seen it marked!

I set her up on the kitchen table so she's got no distractions but tell her if she gets really stuck I'm here to help. This afternoon she ended up just sitting there for 15 mins not even starting so I sat with her and that's when the baby kind of talk began and she starts acting like she can't even add 6+3 (which she has done many many times)

I'm finding it really hard to keep my cool when she does it. I know she's more than capable of the work there's no doubts there. I just don't know how to cope with it and wondered if anyone else experiences the same thing?

If she's silly with you and fine with Dad then I'd suggest homework becomes a job for Daddy!

As to why she's doing it...she wants some attention and fun on a Sunday afternoon instead of having to do homework. Can you get it done in the week instead? Or first thing Saturday morning?

My DD does this also, she gets flustered when she has an “audience” and gets giggly and starts getting questions wrong which makes the silliness worse, now we set her up and leave her to it, if she needs help we quickly go over help her understand the question but and this is key- never ask her what the answer is just that she understands the question otherwise she feels that flustered pressure and leave her to it again xx

Homework is bloody boring, that’s why. It’s just her brain trying to cope with the monotony of the task. If she’s eventually getting it done, who cares if she talks in a baby voice? If she’s better with her dad, he does all homework.

You may also need to break it into tasks and find better times to do it. After school for example is really tricky for mine. But one of them copes much better doing it after dinner. The other one (my 7 year old) we climb into my bed at night and do it then just before he goes to sleep and he likes that.

You also don’t have to do everything just because the teachers set it. Mine youngest is strong in maths, less so in reading and spelling. We do the reading and spelling and not always the maths because I know it’s easy for him. I save it up and then we do it for fun one day when he’s really keen to do it because he likes maths. The stuff he actually needs to practice is all I make him do. That makes the time commitment more manageable. They’re 7 though. They don’t need to be doing loads of homework. Do what you can, when you can, and leave the rest.