Please or to access all these features

Add post

Watch this thread

Save thread

Start a new thread

Flip thread

Hide thread

My feed

Active Unanswered threads

Getting started FAQ's

Unanswered threads Acronyms Talk guidelines

Hide shortcut buttons

Talk

Primary education

Join our Primary Education forum to discuss starting school and helping your child get the most out of it.

Flip

Original poster

Xmas homework

22 replies

Condemned · 05/01/2013 23:31

Is this too much for year 4:
22 questions on WW2
An Anne Frank style, detailed diary
On line mental maths
It seems a bit OTTO for me, how do we fit in Xmas??

OP posts:

Are your children’s vaccines up to date?

Set a reminder

CocktailQueen · 05/01/2013 23:43

How long do you have to do it? How long has it taken?

We had homework to do for end dec, not over Xmas hols. Thank god!

Picturesinthefirelight · 05/01/2013 23:56

Yes that's too much

We don't do homework over holidays - end of.

Startail · 06/01/2013 00:14

I think mutiny would have occurred here.

DD2 might have scribbled a bit
DD1 would have done the maths and I might have typed the diary.

In Y4 we were still trying to convince school DD1 was dyslexic written HW caused years and tantrums.

DeWe · 06/01/2013 00:16

None of mine have ever had holiday homework. My oldest is in year 7 now.

Original poster

Condemned · 06/01/2013 00:44

We had from start of hols (22nd Dec) until this coming Tue. It hasn't taken long as I have only just checked what is required. The annoying thing is that the last 3 weeks before Xmas weren't even marked. We will try and do a bit tomorrow but not going to spoil the end of the holidays. I do think that Xmas should be homework free!

OP posts:

bowerbird · 06/01/2013 16:41

I agree OP holidays should definitely be homework free! I hope you make your feelings known to the HT.

ilovepowerhoop · 06/01/2013 16:45

mine never had any homework over xmas thank goodness

LindyHemming · 06/01/2013 17:19

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

MilkRunningOutAgain · 06/01/2013 21:33

My yr 5 had none, which was great but my poor yr2 had spellings and reading scheme books to plough through, all of which she had already brought home before. Poor child has not been happy about it, but being diligent and wanting to please her teacher desperately, has read all the fading scheme books again, and yes we were both bored.

OldBeanbagz · 07/01/2013 10:22

My Y3 DS only had to do online maths this holiday, Y6 DD on the other hand had 1 maths & 2 english papers, science data collection plus seperate science project to be done on the computer.

Your Y4's homework sounds a bit too much for my liking.

Elibean · 07/01/2013 11:23

My Y4 dd has a teacher who believes in hard work during term, and no holiday homework (bar reading).

I luffs her (even though she's very strict)!

stupidgirlNo1 · 07/01/2013 13:41

My Y1 had homework during holidays.Story writing doing winter theme picture/model.drawing.He enjoyed it,as it kept him occupied.

DoItToJulia · 07/01/2013 13:49

We have had homework ( Y3). A new approach though...child can choose from a bronze, silver or gold level. It was quite interesting, gold was to create your own piece of Andy Goldsworthy art, silver to go out with a camera and take some wintry scene photos and bring one of them printed out, to school and bronze was something else (that i have forgotten an ds not interested in it).
Nice deviation form the weekly spellings, reading comprehension and numeracy.
Hard to fit in around Christmas mind!

littlemiss06 · 07/01/2013 13:52

It is a lot in the Christmas holidays, I think kids should have a free two weeks off with no homework, my two girls are in year 6. and 2, the year 6 had no homework, the year two had to write a poem but it was fun homework which she enjoyed.

scrummummy · 07/01/2013 14:04

Its horrible, I've just found a project deep in the school bag while getting ready for tomorrow. We ve done maths, spelling, reading and comprehension. Now found a snow project !!!! Oh and did is in yr2.

insanityscratching · 07/01/2013 16:29

No homework here for dd in year 5. They were expected to have read four books (of their choice) or more which isn't a trauma for dd who in fact read eight during the holiday.

ChippingInNeedsSleepAndCoffee · 07/01/2013 16:32

Other than a bit of reading (when small to keep it going) then Christmas Holiday homework shouldn't be given. The holiday is short, there are a lot of family committments & generally parents are off work Family Time. Children need a complete break too.

HappyNewBleurgh · 07/01/2013 16:34

Ours were just told to make sure they kept reading(YR6) and dd (yr9) didn't get any.

I so disagree with a load of h/w at this age. What is so awful about just enjoying a holiday? So yes I think that was far too much.

What misery would set all that over a holiday which is bound to be busy with so much else?

Elibean · 07/01/2013 17:17

Plus the fact that (if our school is anything to go by) the large majority of kids, and families, were ill over the Christmas break

pantaloons · 07/01/2013 17:27

My yr1, 3 and 4 dc's have had no homework. They've done all the lego, games and craft that we would normally do in a year in the 2 week holiday though so not sure we would fit it in!

TBH I'm not a huge homework fan and luckily neither are the dc's school. They normally do a page of a maths book a week, 10 spellings and reading scheme. I think it's more than enough.

picketywick · 08/01/2013 12:38

Homework at Christmas.. It is a liberty and vastly OTT. A lot of teachers go abroad at christmas

MrsMelons · 08/01/2013 14:21

That sounds like an awful lot.

DS1 age 6 (state school) had none (bit of a crisis at school last 2 weeks of term so they didn't have chance to sort it) but that was fine as he read whatever he fancied which I think is sufficient. He usually get one small piece a week, next year at Juniors its one small bit a night (really only a few mins).

DS2 age 4 (private school) had 4 pages of words to read (very early stages of blending) a maths booklet of about 15 pages plus writing practice. It sounds like loads but probably just a few minutes a day as they had 3 and a half weeks off.

I was ill over the hols so we left it till the last minute and he did most of it, it actually only took about an hour in total over a few days but I think for a 4 year old and the fact it was Christmas it is way too much but I don't want him penalised for me not helping him do it. I am still not 100% if they HAVE to do it or not yet so maybe they don't and its there just in case.

BUT I had to laugh this morning, taking DS2 in for his first day back and there was a dad taking the homework out of the childs book bag (rather than just leaving it to when the teacher empties it like every other day) and loudly told him that his DS has completed all his homework and that him and his wife made up an additional homework pack for him to do as well!

Flip