Do schools not distinguish between children whose parents help with homework and those that don’t?

[NellyJames]

DS has been upset as they have a HW ladder where they sit on certain rungs depending upon how the do in their homework. He’s middling and hasn’t really been moving. This is fine by me as it reflects where he is/should be I guess. However, he’s getting upset as he keeps asking me to help (answers not explaining concept) and says everyone else’s mum helps. I’ve been telling him this isn’t true but talking to some other mums they’ve confirmed they always help otherwise their child would get 4/5/6 questions wrong each week. I often see DS getting the wrong answer but I never correct him. The most I’ll do is encourage him to check them. Anyway, DS tells me these friends are up in the ‘clouds’ which is apparently the top rungs of the ladder. Now I feel bad but I still don’t want to help as surely his teacher needs to see which ones he doesn’t understand so she can target those with him? I emailed to ask earlier this week and she’s just emailed back confirming the ladder is used as motivation. Today one of his friends got the gold award for consistently ‘excellent standard of homework!’ I don’t know if I’m being unreasonable.

Why would you not tell him if an answer is wrong? You don't need to tell him the correct answer, but telling him it's wrong to make sure he does it again is perfectly normal.

Poor child!

Oh, I thought this had failed to post!
@LemonBreeland, but surely it’s better for the teacher to know? I’ll ask him to check them over. What happens if I tell him it’s wrong but he still doesn’t know the answer?

So you don’t help him at all? You sit there knowing he has it wrong and say nothing?

If so that’s weird, of course parents help their children with homework, it’s not just the teachers job to teach, you can too!

The teacher will know how he is in a subject based on his classwork. They shouldn't need homework to inform them of the child's ability. I teach and I think of homework (certainly in primary school) as a way for the child's parents to be involved and help the learning.
The ladder and clouds however is an outdated and unfair reward system, as you can see from your son's experience, and I'd ask the school to get rid of it. You are engaging with your son's work and he feels hard done by. How about the kids that have no help or encouragement to do homework?

If he doesn’t know the answer you tell him it!!

What’s photosynthesis? I’m not going to tell you so you learn, I’m just going to give hints so you can guess 1000 times and still probably be wrong!

Of course they need to know the answers, that’s how they learn what the answers are!

@Autumnblooms, no, I don’t just sit there. I’ll tell him to check certain ones and occasionally I’ll tell him one is incorrect so he can look at it again. I do explain concepts to him regularly but I never ever lead him to the answer do he often goes into school with one or two wrong. I may have asked him to double check and sometimes explained the idea and he’s still confused do I always think it’s better his teacher knows this.

Well that technique is clearly not working but if you and your son are happy with it then that’s all that matters.

I’ve always helped my children in their homework. Not by doing it for them or just giving them the right answer, but by tutoring them fully. Explaining concepts and showing them how to do the work or research an answer. You should be helping your DS not just observing. The very minimum would be checking it and telling him which are wrong and which are right!

I don’t like the homework ladder idea though. It makes children publically compete against each other instead of their personal best. But schools do a lot of messed up things, award for attendance that discriminate against children with chronic health conditions and so on.

I check and ask my son to do the wrong ones again. But I leave the working on the wrong one so the teacher can see he didn't get it first time.

@Autumnblooms, but in class he can’t ask questions constantly. I’m fairly sure his teacher would just tell him to have a go rather than explain each and every question.
@RoaryMouth, thank you. I’m glad it’s not just me who thinks the ladder isn’t great. So, is your expectation that all kids have had lots of help with their homework? I have a Y11 daughter doing GCSEs. She is exceptionally able and motivated and I took the same approach with her. I just assumed it was what I should do.

Mine is 8. I'll help her if she asks for help but otherwise no, I don't check her work. Otherwise how does the teacher know what she's capable of doing on her own? I want the teacher to see where she's struggling.

Surely if you see your son has got something wrong, you sit with him and go through it so he understands what he got wrong and how to put it right? Letting him get things wrong isn't helping him. If he was consistently struggling with homework, you dropping a note to the teacher to say so, alongside supporting his learning at home, would be far more helpful to him. Its not an either or thing. You can help him earn how to get the answers right and make the teacher aware he found it difficult if you have concerns. But if you are helping him to learn qt home, hopefully he will do better overall and his confidence will improve too.

Its not about giving him the answers its about giving him the tools and techniques to find the answers.

Mine have now left school but I used to write on the homework if they had needed a bit of help with it so the teacher knew what they'd managed alone and what had needed help.

I do exactly the same, OP. Explain, tell them to re-check. But I don't just "give them the answer." The homework is to reinforce what they've done in class, and show the teacher what they understand. Neither of those goals are achieved if the parents just correct the mistakes.

If you have had to give a lot of help just add a post it note to say “Fred really struggled with this today. We talked it through but I think he will need more help”

By leaving him to struggle your much more likely to turn homework into a battleground

@NellyJames Some children will be motivated and put a good amount of effort into homework with little adult input. Some (like my son) will whinge for the whole time and would do a really half-hearted job without help. It's up to you how you approach it at home. You're not doing it wrong but neither are the others, unless your school has some stringent homework guidelines to go with their ladder! But I'd help your son now if he's asking (and it makes life a wee bit easier for you both). You can help with the wrong answers without just doing it for him.

And I agree with the others - a wee note tacked on if he's really struggled with something.

I do think there is an element of age to this as well - my dd is 7 and I do what others say they do (sit with her whilst she’s doing her homework, help her if she’s stuck, give her a nudge about how to do something if she’s not got the right answer), but ds is 10 and I wouldn’t expect to have the same procedure for him. For him I would probably check what he’s got to do first, make sure he understands what he’s doing and then let him get on with it.

I am surprised by some of the answers here.... she is not leaving him to struggle, she is checking and asking him to review the ones he got wrong. I sure if asked to explain a concept to him she would do so.
I see no point in completing their homework for them, it needs to be their own work.
I happily help if required, explain etc but like you I see a lot of parents doing it for them just so they get gold stars (or clouds, or ladder step etc) which completely misses the point in my opinion.

No- but then nor do they appear to mark the homework let alone use it as part of their assessment of how DC are doing/what they find difficult. I think they only set it because some parents want them to. So I would certainly feel free to help them with it if they wanted, make sure they understand and they correct errors, help them with ways of checking their own work etc. I never tell anyone answers, that doesn't help them learn.

They definitely shouldn't be having ladders based on how well children do at their work, in or out of school. For consistently doing it maybe. For making an effort. For how they score is going back to class ability rankings- that went out before I started primary school.

How old is your ds?

Some nice supportive and helpful posts here I see 🙄.

And I've reported your post @FlyingByTheSeatof

You sound nasty.

If you can't post anything helpful then don't bother,

OP it might be worth asking the teacher what she would like you to do.

I do see what your point is here....his teacher needs to see where he is struggling,

@FlyingByTheSeatof, you are very wide of the mark. This is not a troll post. How does this even come across as troll like? I’m there when he’s doing his hw. I look it over. If he doesn’t understand the concept, I’ll explain it. What I don’t do is give him the answer.
@Wisteria1979, thank you.
@Freakout11, he’s 7yrs.