School-Aged Children
Littlejen22
member
Kindergarten and homework
Littlejen22
member
Did your Kindergartener have homework? If yes how often and when was it due?
Jen - Mom to two December 12 babies
Nathaniel 12/12/06 and Addison 12/12/08
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Re: Kindergarten and homework
His teacher does send home a monthly reading log and ask that we read with him 20 minutes a night. We always read at night anyway so that's not really homework for him.
K -- weekly homework packet. They had to read or be read to for 15 minutes every night M through Th. Each night had another hw activity. Mondays were always reading, Tuesdays math, Wednesdays writing, Thursdays were science or social studies. Most of the other activities involved discussing something with a family member. The exception was writing on Wednesdays. They had to answer a writing prompt on the back of the HW sheet and draw a picture to illustrate their writing.
1st - same as K except for 20 minutes of reading and the addition of a spelling list to study every other week.
2nd - 20 minutes reading each night. Written homework in a journal that is due at the end of the month. Study for a quiz on Friday each week. 1st and 3rd weeks of the month are spelling; 2nd and 4th are math facts.
FWIW, I have mixed feelings about this homework. On one hand, I feel like my kid could be doing more -- a LOT more. On the other hand, I don't think primary grade kids should be loaded down with homework. Mostly I use this homework as a chance to establish good study skills and work habits.
What types of questions, while I hate homework I am interested because I am trying to check DS' comprehension.
I totally agree, especially since I feel it is busy work. I actually do not mine the optional monthly homework sheet he gets with 15 items in it because they are more funish stuff that is not busy work repeating the work they did in class that my almost 3yo sits over DS' shoulder yelling out the answers to.
Oh, and weekly he gets a packet of 4 worksheets, mostly letters and sounds and usually one math plus 4 robust vocabulary words to be completed by the end of the week.
I think they are going a little overboard with it one week she had 9 different assignments. One of them was for music, it was ridiculous.
She also has to read 15 different books each month and answer questions on 5 of those books.
Dd gets a folder of worksheets on Monday that is due on Thursday. It's usually 2-4 worksheets that takes her between 3 and 10 minutes, depending on how much writing she has. It usually ltakes her less than 5 minutes.
Now the teacher has also sent home a book from reading group once a week that she needs to do a little writing for. Overall, it's not too much for her.
Last year for K it was "not more than 20 minutes per week" but I don't think it ever took him more than 10. It was usually a math worksheet like "draw 7 objects inside this giant number 7" or to read the little 5pg "See *** run" kind of books they brought home. It was more about learning to be responsible for work outside of school than it was about the actual work.
Now in 1st he's supposed to read 20 minutes per night and he gets a packet of 2-3 math sheets on Fridays that are due the following Thursday.
The only thing my DD has had this year is a reading assigment each weekend. They get a very small book (8 pages or so) with a short sentence that includes the sight words they are and have worked on up to that point. They need to read to 3 people over the weekend.
She brought the class bear home over the weekend this past weekend and we had to journal his stay - pictures with captions that DD had to write out. She loved it!
PreK- family art project monthly
KG- study sight words (10 per week) in the second semester.
1st- weekly spelling test studying, occasional reading of an AR book, occasional worksheet
2nd- homework "form" with the follow sections: reading, vocab, science/social studies, math and language arts. The reading section takes about 30 mins all others are 5-15. We have 8 days to complete it. Get it on Thrus, due the next Friday.
They go to the school library everyday and check out a book that we then read together at night. They also send one of those 10-page book for beginners that he has to read himself. We are also supposed to practice sight words but we dont get logs or worksheets.
When he was in pre-k, he had homework on Thursdays. He had a notebook for it. He had to write his name, the letter of the week many times, words starting with that letter , and glue pictures of things starting with that letter.
No required homework but he does bring home different readers - some he keeps and some have to be returned - so of course he's reading those.
They do public speaking for their winter and spring programs and we've worked together at home to help him memorize his parts.
Both my pre-schooler and my Kindergardener LOVE iXL.com and ask to do their "math" homework on the computer or the ipad so we are supplementing there.
The pre-schooler finished the pre-school curriculum in 2 months and is on to Kindy. The Kindergardener started out flying through it on his own but I'm now having to sit with him to work on the more challenging things like word problems.
I think it's a good habit so they usually sit at the table and "work" in one fashion or another (writing Christmas lists, drawing pictures, etc) while I'm getting dinner together.
Total score: 6 pregnancies, 5 losses, 2 amazing blessings that I'm thankful for every single day.
Now that he's in first he has homework every other day but we still make him read at least 20 minutes every day regardless of whether its a homework night.