marking homework in Y1

[SarfEasticated]

My dd gets homework once every month or so, and it never seems to get marked. We have just been set some for the weekend and the homework book has come home, and it doesn't look like the last 3 pieces of work have been marked. We take a lot of time over it, and DD takes it very seriously, so it's quite demoralising for her never to get any feedback.
Should I say anything? Teacher is lovely and a NQT so don't want to be an arse about it. What do you think?

Ask the teacher how she marks homework, DS had a teacher in yr 2 who discussed the answers as a class rather than writing on the homework, then recorded the marks in a little chart. Or did the pieces before those 3 have written marks on?

The other pieces had been marked and had comments and a sticker. Nothing on the most recent pieces, a story, some sums and one other. The lack of feedback is what makes it disappointing I guess.

SarfEasticated:

Our school tended to not mark - except in the year OFSTED was visiting. It's not ideal - as it would be helpful to get a comment about the work and suggestions on what to work on next time.

My solution was to get a bit more involved in homework than I would like. DDs - now Y4 and Y6 - would do their work on their own (unless struggling) and then I'd look it over. If I found a miscalculation or if I couldn't read a word or thought there ought to be a full stop/ punctuation inserted - I'd say so.

Cummulatively working like this over several years - my DDs have picked up those skills necessary to do well.

I would have of course perferred it if the school were doing this - indeed DD2 has now started at a new primary (as we've moved) and her new school does give a few lines of feedback on each homework and in-class workbooks (often giving little tasks to go on and do - i.e. if DD2 gets multiplying 3 digits by 1 digit - the teacher will write well done on these problems. Now do you think you are ready to try something harder. Give 234 x 85 a try and let me know what you get?

I think it's a huge improvement - as a parent I get the sense that the teacher is actually looking over the work (wrong answers are marked wrong at this new school) and considering what to go on to do next. When DD2 doesn't get it - they give her a new way of thinking about how to do it - for example with 234 x 85 (she forgot 0 place holder) so reminding her that the 8 in 85 stands for 80 - and that putting the 0 place holder down is just making that task of multiplying 234 x 80 a bit quicker. He then showed her how to do the problem correctly and set another one.

I fear when that is absent at a school all a parent can do is step into the breach and provide that feedback. The difficulty is the sometimes children don't like your method/ you don't always understand how it was explained/ taught in class and sometimes children don't like working with Mum/ Dad. But persevere. It's worth that battle.

I am a bit loathe to do that pastsellbydate. DD's work still has a lot of errors in it, and the teacher knows what to mark up and what to let go. She usually writes really nice comments about characters in her stories. One of the excercises was a page of sums, which DD usually struggles with. We worked really hard on them so a acknowledgement of that from her teacher (who DD loves) would have really helped her confidence.