WIBU to tell the school I am no longer facilitating topic homework

[Paperweightmover]

subtitled, talk me down from a paper mache ceiling.

Once a term DD gets a topic homework, they have to do research and build something -out of Twiglets- The class has an open hour and any parents that can bunk off work early go and see the finished masterpieces, the children tell the adults what they have learnt.

I find it all very stressful even though children are supposed to do the work un-aided. DD in Y4 has very little idea of how to do research and I don't see how I can give no support. So I fond appropriate web-sites, we talk about why they may or may not be a good source of material. She then spends hours making stuff out of toilet rolls.

She learns very little from this work, apart from how to glue structures together. This may be useful for STEM subjects but tells her little about ROmans or whatever.

Today I went into class to see all the unfacilited homework to see once again lots of "stuff" that can only have been made by parents. So, not only is DD not learning anything , she also feels let down as she hasn't created a life size sarcophagus or a representation of the Great Wall of China from lentils.

Would I be unreasonable to say to the school I am not playing anymore. I will be ignoring any project type homework in future. I will quite happily spend the time reading with her or teachinhg her the times tables the school also seem to expect we teach her.

Of to do some paid work so I can afford the copydex, but will be checking back in when I have calmed down.

[glitterlips1]

Our school doesn't really give out this sort of homework anymore as so many parents starting complaining.

[berliozwooler]

DD2 had this sort of homework for their recent topic but there was a big choice of activities, from things which involved baking to making models to pieces of written work - they had to choose two. DD2 did a wordsearch and an acrostic poem - writing up the poem neatly with decorated initial letters. The only bit I helped her with was doing the grid for the wordsearch on the computer and I suggested maybe two words out of ten.

[cluelessnewmum]

Yanbu, I think the school is just passing the buck to parents stuff that kids should be doing at school. Perhaps the teacher doesn't have the time and resources to do this in class and they need it for ofsted but that doesn't make it right.

As pp have said, it is awfully divisive, it must be upsetting for those who don't get any support from parents.

It's not new though, I remember feeling embarrassed when I'd made a loom out of a cereal box for homework and other kids came in with really professional ones made of wood their parents had clearly made.

[HarveySchlumpfenburger]

If the learning objectives aren’t clear and parents might have a different view than the school, that would back up paperweightmover’s point wouldn’t it?

Since it will be the parent doing the teaching, it might be helpful if they had a clue what it was they were supposed to be focusing on. Otherwise it isn’t likely to be very effective.

[OlennasWimple]

We do whatever we were going to be doing anyway, but slightly tweaked to reflect the topic.

So "create something using 100 identical objects!", where some DC brought in the Taj Mahal in sugar cubes or or the Forth Bridge from drinking straws or homemade Roman style mosaics, DD brought in a batch of cookies that we had made that contained 100 mini M&Ms

[BubblesBuddy]

I think the comment you made, op, is that the projects don’t do what they are intended to do needs further clarification please.

Do you have learning objectives then? If you don’t, how do you know the homework doesn’t do what’s intended? Is it your view of what it should achieve? Or the schools view?

[paxillin]

Our termly projects stopped around year 3 when they could reasonably do it themselves . I "helped" make the fucking Tower of London (because 4 year olds can do this, right?), a 3D representation of a folk tale and a dodecahedron before they were 7.

I hated arts and crafts when I was little, neither my talent nor my enthusiasm for it have increased in the meantime.

[Paperweightmover]

I have to get the goat to budge over so the kids can see the wide screen TV. But then the satellite dish gets in the way-I can't win.

[MrsHathaway]

or you can just spend your weekends looking at your mobile phone while your child watches the tv!

Clearly those are the only two options.

This weekend we'll be juggling two football matches plus a session of additional training, and MIL's birthday, and the DC seeing their friends, and going to the forest for family bonding/exercise. That's not an unusually busy weekend. Finding half an hour for spellings needs military organisation!

We'd have far more time for this kind of project if we only had one child, admittedly. But it really isn't a case of sitting bug-eyed at a screen all weekend much as I'd like to.

[quizqueen]

Stop stressing out about school projects and just keep them simple and relative to the child's age and ability and enjoy spending the time with your children helping them learn about something new. You might learn something yourself too.
Stonehenge- just get your child to collect stones and stick them on a sandy board in a circular position- some standing/some lying down. Or go to the site itself, if you are close enough, and take photos and create a montage with them. Same with any castle project; first hand experience is always the most relevant.
Animals/plants etc. the child draws them or makes up a poem or story or just collect leaves, press wild flowers or do rubbings...all nice things to do as a family.
My grandchild's first project was autumn fruits and trees of the New Forest. I suggested she picked blackberries, a friend gave me apples from his tree and she helped her dad make a pie ( a lovely family activity) and took a slice into school with the recipe which she was capable of copying out by herself.
I did help her make a Tudor house as part of her Great Fire of London project ( they set fire to the ones they made in school) which was quite time consuming but looked lovely afterwards- we just painted a rectangular box white, lollipop sticks black and stuck them on in a pattern of her choice which was researched from library books and she drew the windows and doors herself.
It's not rocket science......or you can just spend your weekends looking at your mobile phone while your child watches the tv!

[walkingtheplank]

Interesting you mention cost OP. In year 1, the DS had to make a shoe box house, together with objects inside it. My son made his a wood cabin and did some wood rubbing and stuck that to the walls and then made some furniture with lolly sticks and clay. It looked like a 5 year old had made it.

Day of the exhibition arrives and his was the worst by a very very big margin. I don't think any other child had things inside that had been made. It was all objects that had been bought like Zelfs, Shopkins etc. These things had been stuck down and were therefore unusuable again and I think most must have spent over £20 with a fair few around £40-50. I was flabbergasted. A few people made disparaging comments about my DS's efforts too.

[walkingtheplank]

I made a complaint a few years back. One year, almost every homework that my DD had was something creative e.g. spend 2 hours making a poster illustrating 5 points that it took you 10 minutes to research. We also had the termly project which would theoretically be maths based but always seemed to involve making the Taj Mahal out of washing up sponges etc.

Having had to sign a parent-school contract, I pointed out that the homework did not meet any of the criteria listed in the Homework Policy and that in total, my DD had written a total of 5 lines in her homework book in the first term of Year 3 (as the rest was art).

I might have complained a few times and it so happens that the art projects have significantly decreased.

The school still have art competitions where the mums get to show off their skills. My children walk around the exhibition saying, "Look how clever Jonnie's mummy is" and have even been know to congratulate parents on their efforts. I have no idea where they get their passive aggressive behaviour from...

Last week an 8 year won a national competition with an essay that a graduate would have been happy with - it had footnotes and a bibliography. My children have never been taught to do this but this 8 year old had. The school was very proud of this, despite it being very clear to anyone that an adult had written it (or my children are being shortchanged in their English lessons)! I tell my children that it is better to do your own work with your own thought process and your own efforts because that is how you learn but too often the reality is that the praise and rewards go to those whose parents do the work.

[Paperweightmover]

That's great Brie well done her :) mmm I love beautiful cake

You,'ve got to admit the fact you aren't living in a hostel; have use of a kitchen; don't have the gas/electricity going off; have money to buy cake ingredients helped. Not taking anything from your daughter, save me a slice next time. Schools in areas with huge issues of social disparity should be aware of the difficulties though.

And a cake competition is lovely, I just wouldn't expect a child to learn about history from it.

[Paperweightmover]

at being coeliac so not being able to do homework. So much better than the dog ate it. Although if the coeliac dog ate my homework so much the better.

*coeliac disease runs in the family so I know it can be awful and limiting

[BrieAndChilli]

Saying that DD is very crafty and I’m sure people must think I do most of it for her (she won a cake competition last week and hand on heart I gave her a few tips but she did it all her self from measuring and mixing the ingredients to the decorating) but she just has my crafty creative gene.
So it’s hard for the teachers to know who has had help and who hasn’t as it wouldn’t be fair to DD to assume she didn’t do it when she did!

[Roomba]

YANBU OP. My friend went into school a couple of years ago and said look, I'm just not doing homework any more - I have four kids in this primary school and it's ridiculous. They don't learn anything. School were fine with this and her kids haven't suffered as a result. I'm a qualified teacher and agree 100% with you.

I thought it would improve in secondary school but it's not much better! DS's French homework this week was to make a papier mache alien! WTF does that have to do with learning French?

[Paperweightmover]

PARENT-MADE castle/sarcophagus/space rocket or whatever.

Good idea, and it should be added, Parent-designed too. There were lots of photos showing one child "making" a specific item". If that child designed it then she is a genius.

Thank you for letting me vent, that is really what I wanted to do, I wont make a big deal of it at the school. I have learnt to pick my battles wisely.

Thank you Rafa for your kind words. The school has upped it's game a bit in that department and cuts have meant that RR has less of an impact. Although I could cry when I see the children who were doing well in YR struggling in Y4 and the richer parents looking at specialist Dyslexia schools. The kids of the poorer parents, well we will see.


My problems with this type of homework are;

• it doesn't teach what it is supposed to teach.
  
• although new crafting skills may be learnt these aren't what the school is asking for.
  *art and craft are incredibly important and I dislike the way they are reduced to toilet rolls and paper mache.
  
• it increases the "matthew effect", to those that have are given...A child whose parents are architects will learn more from this than the child who must translate the homework for their parents. I don;t think any school should be increasing this disparity.
  *research skills are incredibly important and if the children learn that "just Google it" is the answer to everything we have a problem building up for the future
  *it makes me dislike the attitude of some of the parents at the school, sad I know but it does. It makes me uncomfortable and sad that some people just have to be best, that they chanel it through their children. It makes me see what the future will be for the children that don't have the social advantage.
  
  So the toilet roles and paper mache had a lot of meaning for me.

[MrsHathaway]

My DC recently won a bake off at school. They were heavily supervised obviously but designed and made the cake themselves (9&6) and it showed. Their hard work paid off and they won a rosette and a Nadiya book.

Thing is, there was a separate parents' competition and GOSH there were some talented entries there. Makes me think perhaps schools should cut the bullshit and announce a competition for the best PARENT-MADE castle/sarcophagus/space rocket or whatever.

[dairymilkmonster]

I am not keen on very time consuming parental craft projects 'done' by the kids. Or posters/powerpoints etc. Posters by reception/yr1 kids with lots of graphics from internet neatly cut out and stuck on beautifully with several paragraphs of perfectly spelt and formed prose seemed to feature heavily during show and tell at a school i visited related to work this week.

Thankfully our school hasn't been too bad on this front so far ...

[BubblesBuddy]

My children never made a single thing for topic homework and nor were they asked to. It is a bit lazy of schools to do this and I don’t think schools can necessarily teach research skills.

However they can point children in the right direction regarding how to find things out and even read a book about the topic! Now that would be a novelty! What better way to spend time with your child than looking at a book about the topic and writing down the most important things you find out together? Our school library service used to bring books into school that were relevant or deposit them in the local library. Finding out information is a brilliant skill for most children and certainly useful for adulthood. Rather than spending all the time on craft, spend it on reading and using web sites which should also be given by any half decent teacher.

Definitely yes to the questions to the school about the homework. Make them justify what they do. Artistic children may love it but give the others help to improve their skills in other ways and also, hopefully, an interest in the topic which should be related to the curriculum.

[LunasSpectreSpecs]

YADNBU. I hate this type of homework too. I finally threw in the towel when my middle child had a "make a Viking longhouse" task and one parent who is an architect made on with working electric fireplace and professionally thatched roof.

The children learn nothing. But school can take lots of lovely pictures to impress the Inspectors.

[lljkk]

pmsl @ the recycled projects.

That didn't work with DC... DD didn't get this type of h/w & she's the industrious kid. 2 DSs never did a project. Youngest is currently building a Greek temple out of Hama beads...

[Pigeonpost]

Topic homework (half termly here) is a pissing contest for parents. I don’t get involved, my kids do it if they want, I don’t!!