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Secondary education

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Y7 newbie DS: I think I may have over- reacted!

30 replies

ampere · 08/09/2010 20:47

Grin

DS1, day 2 today, seems to be fine at his new secondary. Oh, apart from the fact 3 lots of homework (2 days worth!) has taken the whole family 3 hours to complete! It was exercise book covering and I do feel that seeing as they have to look at these books every week for a year they want to do it properly and -ahem- nicely, hence MAKING him think about what he was doing.

Anyway, casually this afternoon he mentioned that another boy, ex of his primary whom he sort of knows (DS only did Y6 at said primary) asked DS if he could use DS's locker to store his PE kit. And I've gone off on one, a bit! Thing is, I know I'd've liked DS to ask why this other DS didn't have his own locker (lost key? (already??), forgotten key? Lack of foresight in ordering his own locker?); How long he proposed to leave his kit in there; I pointed out we pay £25 for this sodding locker; it isn't that big and is rapidly filling (with DS's PE kit as much as anything!) but by the end of my 'Why you should have said NO' rant I was citing fellow Y10s, when he's a Y10- hiding knives there etc!

I should point out that DS1 is small and not particularly 'street'.

I settled on an 'assertiveness versus aggression versus compliance' lecture. But I banged on for 20 minutes! No sound-bites here, I'm afraid!

... and breathe.

OP posts:
ampere · 10/09/2010 18:11

Tonight he has 4 lots of homework to be completed by Monday, Weds and Friday respectively... BUT he will get 2 MORE lots on Monday, 2 more lots on Tues etc!

One is a poster, the rest is Proper Work....

OP posts:
Adair · 10/09/2010 20:55

Poor kid. How ridiculous.

bigTillyMint · 10/09/2010 21:37

ampere, your DS is not the only Y7 with stacks of homework - my DD has had 15+ pieces this week. Sadly, only about half of the pieces are Proper Work.

It is ridiculous. Sad

Acanthus · 11/09/2010 10:46

No, I think it is a chat I need to have with DS2! Thank you.

ampere · 11/09/2010 16:27

bigTillyMint- whilst I appreciate it is important for the school to reinforce the change from primary to Big School, I am also not sure that immediately overwhelming them with homework is necessarily the way to go!

Also, I would have preferred if they'd've said, for example, 'OK, guys, you have homework in this, this and this. The first has to be in in 2 days, the second in 3 days, the third in 2 days. What I as your experienced teacher recommend is that you tackle one part of the first lot, the second part of the third lot tonight (as it has to be back in first!); then the first part of whatever plus the other thing tomorrow night' etc so the kids could SEE how they can consider breaking the work into doable chunks. As it is we are tackling everything as it comes in which might mean three bits on one night; all well and good but not with 2 hours of Scouts or a piano lesson thrown in!

I am going to post another Q asking how more experienced parents cope!

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