How much 'homework' is necessary / helpful in Reception?

[Bramshott]

DD1 is in Reception this year - she was 5 in January, and is fairly bright and progressing well.

They have reading books home most days, and a writing worksheet to do over the weekend, which is fine, and I do these with her, trying to keep it fairly low key, and if she's too tired, we just don't bother, or I read her the reading book instead.

However, recently we have three lists of words that the school want them to learn to "read, write and spell correctly" with the injunction to "please do some words with your child each day".

Now maybe I'm just lazy , but DD is often tired when she comes in after school, and wants to watch a bit of telly, then play for a bit (dear God, she's only 5!). Anyway, I haven't been doing these words with her - I have stuck them on the fridge, and I did get her to go through the first set a couple of weekends ago, but she soon got bored and wanted to draw Letterland characters instead so I let her.

I know I should be thinking of creative ways to work on her words, and I'm sure there are other parents who are sitting their kids down for 'homework' after school every day, but to be honest, I worry that this is going to turn her off school, and turn it into a battle.

What do you think? Is she going to be permanently disadvantaged if I don't do this sort of thing with her seriously (rather than half-heartedly as I am doing now)? Am I just lazy? How much do you expect them to have to do at home in Reception?

in my dc's primary the only 'homework' they get in reception is one 'reading' book and one library book to share per week - we get a newsletter every Monday telling us that week's topics, letters, words, numbers but just so we know what's going on, there's no pressure to do anything at all other than hearing your child read when they want to and reading to your child

and frankly, that's just how it should be

at least half the children will be nowhere near being able to read/write/spell and that's perfectly normal - the effect of too much academic work before they're ready is to make them feel failures before the end of reception - hardly the best start and completely unneccessary

15 spellings a week?! DD doesn't get that many in Y1 and, as I said before, this is in a fairly academic school setting!

Surely spelling tests at 4 and 5 years old is just way too much!

I agree with most - spellings too much in reception. It's such a long day for them anyway. Just reading is best -- and even that can be too much sometimes.

..what, homework at five!
Hells Bells.

I suppose if you have to do it, do it as a game and "teach" the words to a class of dolls and stuffed toys.

Which is what I do if DD has to do something she does not like...we tell the toys how skanky it is, and she learns it by accident as it were.

But really, they should be outside playing!

None. Ridiculous.

none
even now in year 1 dd gets homework once every half term ( plus reading books every day)
no spellings

its a bit silly

I don't agree with homework at all before secondary school - apart from reading books or unless your child really needs special help with something that they can't get in school.

DS1 gets books home to read and we have a list of words to practice - so he recognises them straightaway, instead of working them out every single time. The whole class gets letters exhorting us to read to the children. But the poor lad is not 5 yet, not interested in rotten old reading, and after a couple of chats with his lovely teacher she is happy for us to carry on going slow and light on the reading "homework".

In terms of encouraging him, I iced words onto cup cakes and he had to tell me what they were before he or DS2 could eat them. That was popular! We also typed words together on the computer, changed the colour of the type, printed it out and cut them up. Then we were supposed to read them but he wasn't keen on that.

Anyone got any other suggestions I could try?

Spellings homework in Reception is just silly. I would not give spellings for homework before they were in Year 3 - and that was only because parents liked it.

We have a book to read on Tues and Thu, but if you don't read it you can keep it longer. We also get a Maths game every Weds, to be returned on the Monday. Then there's the rainbow words which are permanently in the book bag.

It was easier to do when she was part-time, as we could do them in the afternoon. But now she's full-time, I find it hard to find a good time to do the midweek reading.

The maths game gets played if we aren't busy, but they're pretty boring and I don't think there's anything in them that she doesn't learn from playing other games with her big sister.

I've been shocked too at how much there is. I can't remember EVER having homework at infant school or junior school.

DD1 gets 2 reading books and 6-7 words a week - changed on a Monday as that's her reading day.

I think that's plenty as it leaves her almost wanting more so when she's in the mood, we do informal reading, writing, numbers etc at home using everyday objects etc.

Vanilla - I'm useless at guessing people's ages, but he's certainly not particularly young - indeed 'tis a bloke - unusual for YR I know. Not sure how experienced in Foundation Stage teaching he is, though, although he's been doing it for least a couple of years.

I was just interested as the impression my Aunt gave me was that the more experienced teachers are more realistic about expectations but the ones more recently through training feel the pressure of the targets etc more and seem to pass that on. I want to do my teacher training and that does make me nervous in a way...
Spellings certainly seems very very OTT.

We have reading every night usually ten pages and since January six spellings per week. The spellings are tested every friday at school. We also have written homework every friday alternates between maths and english.

From the summer term, she will continue to have a daily reading book and weekly spellings. She will also get daily written homework. This is to prepare them for year 1.

I don't think they should get any at primary school at all.

MI

Agree with MI, certainly re. Infants. At 8+ I think a piece of maths and a piece of writing to do over the weekend is quite helpful in getting them used to making a bit of effort and working more independently outside the usual school environment.

A Y6 child who had never had homework at all would find Y7 a humumgous shock.

But homework in Reception? Pah.

We never had homework at primary and started doing it in yr 7, it wasn't an enormous shock, it was just one of the changes between primary and secondary school.

Our school doesn't do homework for infants and only minimal homework in yr 3 (I don't know about further up). it's liberating, you can instead encourage reading for fun or practising the recorder or whatever.

Sounds like too much to me. DS1 is in year 1 and last year the only homework was reading books and practising letter sounds, both of which were encouraged but not strictly compulsory.
I didn't do much with him at home because he was too tired after a full day at school (he was an August baby).

Rezmum - I truly think that is awful!