Appropriateness of keeping kids in at lunchtime to finish homework

[matildarosepink]

Hello All, sorry if this has been dealt with somewhere else. If it has, couldn't find it.. Here's the thing: my DD is in Year 4 at a mainstream primary school. Her teacher has announced that the children who don't finish their homework at home will be kept in at lunchtime to finish it. I feel quite angry about this. The teacher has sent home quite a lot of work this week (some of it a waste of time e.g. 'copy out this story') and I think it will be too much for a week's homework. I'm fairly anti homework anyway (think it causes later disaffection. In countries where they don't give it to under 11s, bunking off is virtually unheard of). Is it legal for the teacher to be doing this? I'm going to check the school prospectus to see if it's a whole school policy. We do help DD learn spellings each week anyway, and she reads almost obsessively every night through choice, she loves it! Her maths is good, too, so it's not as if she needs to catch up with things. Am feeling frustrated and don't want to cause friction unnecessarily. Any advice on this? Is it legal? (Am ex-primary teacher BTW, so do have some informed idea that DD doesn't need this..)

Such a tricky one. I'm not a big fan of homework (primary school teacher) and certainly tried to keep mine to a minimum when I had class responsibilities, e.g. reading and maybe some spellings and a few maths problems.

I would reward those that completed their homework rather than punish those that didn't.

I'm about 'copy out this story' - what a pointless piece of work, either at home or in school!

Not sure about the legality but I might try and have a quiet word with the teacher and maybe other parents to see how they're feeling?

I do understand where you are coming from but i see it from a different angle really, i think that homework however relevent should be done, and if the child doesnt take responsibility to do it there are concequences ie doing it at lunchtime. My DD has just gone into secondary school and without having done homework in primary school it would of been a huge shock to her system now as she has at least an hour each night.

Maybe it's to give children who don't have support at home to do their homework somewhere in school to do it?

What does the home / school agreement say about home work (if you have one).

I think if you don't want homework, then you need to talk to the head and say it won't be done at all, or just support your dd to it at home. Maybe the copying a story was for handwriting practise for example.

By year 4 I just send my children to do their home work in their rooms, offer help if they ask, and make them redo it if I don't think they have put any effort in.

My dd went to a (very good) primary which had a policy of no homework.

She coped fine when she went to senior school and had to get used to homework - probably saw it as a novelty as she had not had to spend the previous 4 years or so completing pointless worksheets.

I think that homework in primary school is completely useless, however if you have chosen to send your child to a school which does issue homework, well I don't think you can undermine the school by refusing to do it, tbh.

"(think it causes later disaffection. In countries where they don't give it to under 11s, bunking off is virtually unheard of)."

Dunno about that one. In Sweden where there is very little homework in primary, bunking off is a major problem.

I think Yr 4 is a reasonable time to start learning about organising your homework: by Yr 7, they will have to organise projects that run over a couple of months and involve a fair bit of research.

I don't think it's essential: I am sure children can cope without having done primary school homework. But I really can't really see it as something worth making a fuss about. And for dd I think it did help her already being used to having to take some responsibility for unsupervised work.

I think it is easier on ds too to know that he gets detention if he doesn't do it, as that means I can leave him to be responsible for it and not keep nagging: if he doesn't do it, he takes the consequences, his choice. The school's attitude is: the work needs to be done, so you either do it at home or you do it at lunchtime. So he does it very quickly with a minimum of fuss- which is not what used to happen when we had to fall back on my nagging. Nagging was far worse.

Hmm.. there isn't a clear statement in the school prospectus about how much homework or what type is given. They do suggest that teachers 'may' keep children in at lunchtimes to complete it. I think their statements in the prospectus aren't clear (ie what the homework expectations are. I don't mind weekly spellings, we love reading in our house so it's hardly homework. Collectively, though, at least half an hour a day is already taken up with these.
We don't have a choice in choosing a school that does or doesn't give homework - we live in a rural area and we get what we get here! I don't think home schooling is a brilliant idea for us, in many other ways the school is just fine. As a family, we've given the school huge amounts of support in other ways, so I think they know we've got DD's interests at heart, rather than trying to undermine them. Jicky, I think you're right about talking to the head, although I'd prefer not to. I know most class teachers would rather the head isn't involved in things like this, and would rather sort it themselves.

Cory, your perspective is an interesting one, going to read up a bit more on this, as I clearly need to update my knowledge about the later effects of early intensive ed'n. I'm always interested in what happens in other countries. Did my teacher training in Aus, the country had its own challenges but bunking off in secondary wasn't common at all. Their primary teacher training is streets ahead of what happens here, and their approach to teaching generally is far more progressive and enlightened. And why didn't I stay there? Long story, and a bit off topic!

I wouldn't go to the head before speaking to the teacher first - that really would annoy me if I was the teacher and hadn't been given the chance to sort it out myself!

I'd have a little look at how your dd is actually affected. When you say it takes her an hour, do you mean there is so much work that it needs to take an hour? Or does she spend time faffing around? Is the work that gets sent home too difficult? If you find that she is actually struggling it might be worth having a word with the teacher. Could it be that she is in the wrong set? Or does she get very tired at the end of the day?

In my case, I would sometimes send a note in when dcs were little (Yrs 1` and 2) saying, they were too tired for homework. But by the time they got to Yr 4, I felt they could do with learning to organise their time efficiently (ds particularly, as he is quite lazy), so I paid less attention to their homework.

re the Swedish thing: I don't think their bunking off is anything to do with homework/no homework- simply that it is very easy to get out of a Swedish school; they are not at all security conscious

My son has just started year 4, as parents we all had to attend a meeting (we do every year) where they inform us where the children generally are in terms of writing, and comprehension and where they expect them to be by the end of year 4.

This also includes that if as a parent we don't help/make sure that their homework is done and SIGN their homework diary to show that we know what their homework is, they have to stay in at break time to finish it.

Homework consists of learning 14 spellings a week, reading almost every night (not necessarily out loud to us) and not an entire book as they read in school and write a short comment about the book and mark it out of ten. They get maths homework on a Friday to do over the weekend.

I think they would only keep them in at break if they were consistently not producing homework. Our school is very clear that they expect our help to nudge our children along.

Have no idea about the legality but have always thought that if a child is working through their lunch break for any reason then it will negatively affect their capacity for school work in the afternoon.

I would complain loud and long about this.

Utterly utterly counterproductive to do this.

I would tell the teacher child would not be doing homework and was not to be kept in at lunchtime. If necessary I would pick him up and take him out to the park for an hour.

(teachers hate me btw)

by that I mean excessive homework

reading and spelling lists are great but your list is ridiculous

she's doing something wrong if she needs to give that much homework

Why do teachers hate you Appletrees? If you speak to the teacher about your concerns appropriately there is no need for them to 'hate' you.

Wow, what a huge variance in what different schools set! I think lots of schools set homework a) because parents mistakenly think it will help their child 'get ahead' (!!??) or b) because they want to up their SATS results and they think it will help.

To be honest, I think home is for the social/informal/cultural ed that schools can't do and schools should content themselves with doing all they can between 9 and 3. Within all children is the capacity to cotton onto some things quickly without the need for consolidation, and other things take longer. 'Twas ever thus. I wish more parents let their kids be kids for a bit longer! If they think HW is good for personal organisation, there are plenty of domestic ways to teach it instead.

Getting back to what the school's doing in terms of taking away the child's break time to do what didn't get done at home, I think this is destructive. Schools can't control what happens in the home (and neither can the children at that age). Why should children get punished for something they can't control?

I'm still thinking through how to handle this with the class teacher. (We've already had a polite set-to because I signed the reading diary ahead of time. DD doesn't need her reading micro-managed.)

Maybe it was just one particular school. They weren't receptive to parents. Highly defensive and with good reason -- amzing democraphic, mediocre results.

Yes I agree one should always be appropriate and not "storm up the school". All storming should be safely got out of the way on mn before tiptoeing into the classroom with a slight cough and an inclined head no but I do agree with you Katie.

And cory, yes it really does take an hour or more. She does it under indirect supervision at the kitchen table while I'm sorting things in the kitchen. All the homework is photocopied from the A&C Black books or the internet. Not necessarily a bad thing, as long as the right kind of work has been chosen.

At the moment, I think I'll use the suggested amount of time for this age group and give DD the hour to get as much done as she can. She can then stop and I'll sign the book with a note to say she spent an appropriate amount of time and energy on it. If it's not finished, tough. I'm the guardian of her rights, and I say that's enough school at home.

Now I just have to find a tactful way of explaining this to the CT!!

I agree with you about the variation - but for every parent I had who complained we gave too much homework, I would have one who complained we didn't give enough!

You can't please all of the people all of the time . . .

Our school does this, or at least threatens it, and it works a treat where ds1 is concerned - he is hopeless at getting stuff done at home but can't bear the thought of missing football during lunchbreak. It's the ultimate threat.

Our school does not actually set much homework (too little, I think, for a child in Yr6 who is going to get the shock of his life with an hour's homework per day next year).

I can't decide whether primary school homework is a bad thing (let kids be kids etc) or a good thing (will his grades be affected in later years because he has not put in the hours now?).

Interesting how many parents think that hours and hours extra study will produce brighter children. I personally don't think so. Just because someone can do something at a younger age doesn't mean they're going to go further in life!! It's also been interesting to see how many parents (and even teachers) think an ability to memorise information indicates intelligence. Too much of the homework is very 'dead' activity and really quite uninteresting. If homework really 'must' happen, then why not make it open-ended, perhaps a problem-solving activity or a moral dilemma to consider? It could lead to some fun discussion in class then about the different experiences.. see, I should run the world

Knittingisbetterthantherapy, I do see that some parents want it, and some don't. If there were homework guidelines issued by schools rather than compulsory busywork, then parents would have the option to set it for their own children. You're never going to stop pushy parents pushing, but at least this way, individual decisions could be made.

And yet schools often set it because a few parents demand it. I'm a big fan of education, just not giving them something for the sake of it!

I just think it's a good discipline to get into at a reasonably young age - being able to carry out tasks to a deadline and sit down and concentrate for a time, however short. These are all useful life skills, for university and beyond, where you need to be able to self-start.

I do see how useful teaching life skills from early on is, I just don't see why giving schoolwork is the best route to doing it. I can also see lots of reasons not to use school-set maths and literacy to teach skills of personal organisation, concentrating on a task, seeing value in completion, etc. There are so many other ways to do it whilst allowing formal teaching and learning to stop at 3pm, as it should.

And if we are teaching about life skills and life lessons, preparing our children for the world of adulthood and work, then what jobs do you know that have you continually expected to work outside working hours? Punished or demoted if you don't? If I knew someone who had a job like that, I'd be telling them that they had little quality of life or work/life balance and that they should consider changing jobs, employers or their working hours. Do we really want our children to believe this is normal adult practice? And if we don't, why are we putting them through this? By all means, if they're eager to do it and enjoying it, great. But it can be optional, not compulsory. It achieves very little this way.

If you have strong views on this, you should be speaking to the head about the school's policy on homework. It sounds like the teacher is setting homework in line with the school policy and probably applying the sanctions accordingly. Personally i think quite a bit of homework is a waste of time, but as another poster has said for everyone who dislikes homework, there are five who go mad if there isn't enough!!