How much is too much Reception homework

[Notquitecrazyyet]

A bit of back ground. My 4 year old daughter Started a prep school in September. We hadn’t really ever considered private education before she started nursery there. (The only nursery with places when she was a baby) it was just a natural move with your friends transition and it worked out cheaper than paying for breakfast club/lunch, after school care and they Have swimming lessons, ballet, forest school, trips music inclusive.

However now I’m not sure I’ve made the right decision. She’s at school 8:30-5 (out of the house 7;45-6). Each night she is expected to read a reading book. (two/three sent home on the weekend). Learn spellings, tricky words, she has number and letter flash cards. Also lots of online things additional to this to “try”. I must also make clear I’m really happy with the school it’s just the homework.

So her life is school-tea-homework-shower-bed. She’s so tired all the time Which then makes her grumpy and emotional . I just feel that she spends enough time at school without extras. I also have a busy job, so when I walk in at 6 I have tea to do, children to tend, animals to feed, washing etc.

My 11 year old daughter went to our local primary and has just moved to the local high school and she has never had 1/4 the amount of homework.

So my questions are these:

How much homework do your reception children have?

Do you think that is too much or the right amount?

Any tips for finding time to do it?

What do you you think I should do?

Reception kids should be read to in the evening, unless they want to read themselves already.

In most of Europe kids don't start school till 6. In northern Europe mostly 7.
In the Uk it used to be 5. Now it's closer to 4.
No wonder teenage mental health problems are going through the roof.

My son is 5 and in Primary 1 so the 1st year of school. He gets one reading book a week which is very simple it has 2 words on each page ie a girl / a ball etc

Along with that he is given 3 words to practise learning and writing ie me / my / we

This is what he gets weekly

Sometimes he ok about doing it others not and I don't force the issue

In my eyes 5 is too young to even be at school , let alone forcing learning on them.

My son has only just started getting spellings in the second term of year 1. Before that is was reading books, a letter to practice writing in cursive and optional homework project that mostly aimed as a fun family cutting and sticking type project.
She is getting way to much. How can she do spellings if they haven’t laid the basic phonics foundations yet?

4 years old, poor little thing!

I wouldn't do it. I'd turn it in undone and spend time with my baby instead, read books, baking, playing board games, going for walks, drawing. Seriously, if she's going to get behind at 4 years old by not doing so much homework every night, then I'd be questioning what is going on in the classroom! 9-3 is already a long day for that age.

Reading book only (if not too tired). Any more is inappropriate, especially after such a long day.

To me it sounds like far too much for reception, but surely reason why many people send their children to prep is for a more rigorous academic experience than they would get in most state schools. That’s what your daughter is getting, I suspect most other parents of your DD’s class mates are happy with the amount of homework their children are getting.

We have a reading book which I don’t make her read every nights as some nights she is too tired . They have just started doing word ladders so she has to practice a sheet of about 8 words a week .

Reading at least 3 times a week. One diagraph/phonic to learn, sight words (6 a week). Apparently as they move up the school the only homework they get is reading and spellings and a little maths. This is an outstanding state schoola with above average leaving stats (English and maths are well above the national average for year 6 leavers)

If she is happy with it, fine, if not happy not fine.
My dd in year 9 doesn't do homework every day.

I'll just say the homework I have listed is what she is given, I wouldn't force it on her if she is tired but she 'wants' to do it so we do.

Reading every night is pretty standard - we get a couple of books a week from school which aren't enough so we supplement from the library - a book a night would be brilliant!

Other than that we have 5 tricky words a week (they focus on them that week at school so its more reinforcement than learning) and a really short piece of homework each weekend (draw and label a picture or write a sentence about something).

I do have issues with the amount of homework my older ones (still primary) get though, especially as there are elements I'd like to focus on, but by the time we've done the set homework, we can rarely face working on child-specific elements which is pretty annoying.

Reception child gets 1 book on a Friday to read over the weekend and 2 books on a Monday to read through the week. She occasionally gets a sheet of homework on a Friday, which will be something like talk about winter, an animal, a hobby etc and they discuss it in class on a Monday. She will also sometimes get basic numbers or match the sentence to the picture type stuff. Tbh the homework is so simple, I'd rather they actually made it a bit harder or just didn't bother as it isn't teaching her anything.

My reception-age DD just has to read a couple of pages every night. No other homework at all.

My DC are at a prep: in YR they had a reading book 3 times a week (and it was made clear they should be encouraged to read it but not forced if they're exhausted). No spellings until Y1. I think reading at home is important and well worth it but wouldn't want anything else in YR.

08.30 til 5pm seems a long school day for a 5 year old and on top of that you have a 45 -60min commute? DD1 goes to a prep school which is 8.30-3.45 which is long enough and then a 45 -60 min commute. Could you pick her up earlier? Maybe one of you drop her off and the other pick her up? Would this be possible to give her a shorter day? I'm assuming she's in childcare from 4 til 5pm. Some of our friends in London their children have long days in school and after school care e.g. 7.30 til 6pm but TBH I think this is too long for small children.
For the homework I would expect reading every night and the odd piece of additional homework but nothing more in reception. No spellings.

European nurseries do lots more than UK nurseries so it’s like comparing apples with oranges.

Reception at a prep, DD gets a reading book two days a week and one writing one maths (very basic!) homework a week. Nothing Fridays/weekend. No extra “try this at home” either.

That does sound a lot that your DD is getting. But also, it sounds like she is at school a lot. Is the after school club included in the cost? If you pay for it, perhaps you could use that money towards a childminder instead and the childminder could supervise homework?

we get a reading book and a list of words to sound out, but... there is no pressure to do it, esp if LO is tired, and even a page or two is fine - and the list of words to sound out is the same list for a week.

There is an activity at the weekend, and again we make a little attempt but last weekend i felt it was to tricky so left some of it, nothing was said - there is just no pressure to complete the homework at this age.

My older child was at the same school and i remember the reception teacher saying to me, its more important that they think of themselves as readers and being able to do it, so positive praise for even the littlest effort and if they are to tired then don't worry about it.

I think our school has a sensible approach.

I'd just do the reading (5-10 minutes) every night and leave the rest if she's so tired.

Used to get a reading book changed once in a blue moon with DD1's school (which was crap and we moved her).
DD2's school had a little wallet of letter cards and suggested phonics games which got changed once a week, books changed whenever they'd read them a couple of times (either themselves or shared with parents depending on where they were at with it) and fortnightly some form of learning task which half the parents never bothered with anyway (was always something practical).

Even now she's in year 2 it's fairly low-pressure - the school know that DD2 gets exhausted fairly easily as a result of her SN and I'll quite often get a post it stuck into the homework book saying "do however much she's up to on this" -especially if it's something involving physically writing which she finds very hard.

Definitely worth having a chat with teacher about what is actually expected - you may find there has been lots of pressure from parents to provide homework, and actually they couldn't care less and just want you to read. Our school has subscriptions to doodle maths, kodable etc which come with home access but definitely not expected at all. Homework very definitely optional (prep school).

Former reception teacher here (not private though). That sounds like far too much imo. Too much homework and too long a day. She's still little and I don't think private education places enough focus on play-based learning which is what it should really all be about.

The government guidelines (google it) say that for years 1 and 2, children should be doing a maximum of ONE hour homework per WEEK spread across several days. Obviously a reception child should be doing less than a child in year 1-2.

Some primary schools have a policy of giving zero homework - unusual, but worth being aware of. Those schools do not have worse results. Homework is largely given because anxious/competitive parents demand it.

In the Early Years, learning should be play based. Numerous studies have proved this over and over again. Free play also helps them work through their emotions and find balance, which it sounds like your daughter does not have much time to do.

When reflecting on your daughter’s schooling, it is worth also reflecting on the fact that British schools have much higher rates of child mental illness (and much lower childhood happiness) than other European counties.

We (yr 2) get given much less homework than your 4 yr old daughter. I ignore it. I will not ruin my child’s relationship with literature by forcing him to read aloud or ‘segment’ and I will not allow our free time together to be poisoned by the ill-informed demands of a broken school system. (Not yet anyway, I appreciate I won’t get away with ignoring homework at secondary school!) We do however do a lot of play based learning, and I read books to him most days. Ones that we choose, to suit his interests, not the boring stuff sent home by school.

He is near top of the class in everything so I’m confident our approach is working.

One reading book a week. That's it

Just do the reading and make everything optional for your daughter. Explain to the teacher that it's too much for her and you hope she understands.