inappropriate homework for a 9 yr old

[SugarSkyHigh]

My dd's homework this weekend is to read a poem and answer questions about it. All well and good - until you look at the poem and the questions. It's more suited to GCSE level. My dd doesn't have the vocabulary skills to understand the poem properly or the literary criticism skills to interpret to answer the questions properly. She is average intelligence, not a brainbox, but not behind in literacy either. Shall I complain to the school?

well, that is a poem set as comprehension in recent 11+ entrance exam for highly selective academic school round our way (n london). ds1 did it for practice when he was in year 5.... prob in summer term. obviously dont know if the ?'s are the same. imo poem is not "easy" but not ridiculously hard. recent exam ds1 did contained comprehension on a keat's poem

controlfreaky, my dd is a year away from 11+ entrance (if she were doing it)!

sorry - didn't read post properly.. he did it as a practice

OK, just shown it to DS1 (Yr5 as well) and he took one look at it said 'that's a bit scary' I've seen his homework and he's never had anything that complex (and his teacher is all for pushing the children just over their comfort level)

I wouldn't complain, I'd let him try it but write a note saying what problems he had. I'd also make it clear to DS that it was more advanced than normal so trying his best was what mattered rather than how much he could do (Ds1 is quite stoic with things like this though, he'd shrug it off)

Serenity, thanks for subjecting your ds to the horror of someone else's homwork

am going to tackle this homework with her properly tomorrow.......