Homework Hates Motherhood.

tsands · October 2010

Oh, please tell me I'm not the only one that dreads homework more than anything. Every night I contemplate bashing my head into a wall to get out of it. It's the most daunting task - and usually takes us HOURS.

neverblushed · October 2010

Ugh. I'm a teacher, so I hate it on both ends. I get home after a full day of teaching high school English, and then have to get right into helping my kids with their homework.

I have a 5th grader in a magnet program who usually has about 90 to 120 minutes of homework each night. Fortunately, she's a very good student, and once she's started, she can generally do her own thing. It's not like I'm sitting with her, coaxing her through every math problem on every night.

My kindergartner just started to have nightly homework. In a way it's nice that he has homework because it gives him something to do for at least part of the time while his sister is busy working. He can read, but he needs to read aloud to an adult for his 15 minutes, or he won't stay focused. So either my H or I have to sit with him and help him through his nightly work. I feel this is appropriate for a kid his age, but it's still a time suck right during the part of the evening when I need to be cooking!

So, yeah, I dread that time of night.

indigo91804 · October 2010

I make my DH do my oldest son's homework because I have very little patience for it. My little one I can handle. My oldest is in HiCap and it is a lot of work.

Sammysu · October 2010

I dread it. The older my DD#1 is, the harder it has become.

Surfinbride · October 2010

Homework is going to be the death of me. My daughter cannot do it without me sitting right next to her. She frequently has temper tantrums trying to avoid doing it. Once we sit down, she starts complaining about how the assignment is written. Daily, I hear things like, "It doesn't make sense"... "It isn't fair"... "That's cheating"...

I could bore you to tears with the stories that are our every day life. However I will cut it short and say, homework is much harder if your child is struggling. My daughter has learning disabilities. Because she is dyslexic, she'll often read the assignment wrong. For instance, she read the word "assignment" as arrangement... so, she wanted to arrange things. She will argue to make her point.

We had a word problem in math that said not to write any calculations. It was because the calculations were already done in the previous problem. The teacher was just asking that the students write a subtraction word problem based on the addition word problem that they had just completed. My daughter's response? "That's cheating!" She refused to do it. I tried to explain addition and subtraction using other equations on separate paper. I showed her working one way was addition and the other was subtraction. I explained that when I was a kid, our teacher called it checking our work. It just did not click in her brain. I had to write a note to the teacher.

... needless to say, our homework time is HOURS. We are trying to figure out what is reasonable. I don't want her to fall behind her classmates, so we plug away at it. However, we are devoting the majority of our after-school time to school work.

I keep hoping things will get better. It is exhausting.

samp42 · October 2010

I agree its so hard to make sure it gets done nightly and especially with projects involved as well. For instance, my son has to do an oral book report each month. So he will read a chapter book out loud to me each night as part of his reading, I do read to him one day a week instead of him reading to me. Then after we read a chapter I have him give me a summary of the chapter so when he is finished with the book it will be easier to complete his book report. But my son hates doing the summary and gives me so much grief over it. Its also really hard to get done with having to go to sports practice like soccer a few times a week and still make dinner.

blueshirt2003 · October 2010

The jump from K to 1st has been overwhelming for us. The amount of homework feels insane. About 2-3 weeks into the school year his teacher began sending homework home on Mondays for it to be due on Thursdays. So, it allows us to complete activities such as t-ball during the week without worrying that we'll have to do homework on those evenings.

I hope that you get into a routine and it doesn't feel as daunting as it does now.

mrsskiz · October 2010

You are so not alone. Most afternoons are a nightmare. My son is extremely intelligent, but also extremely lazy. He needs someone right next to him the entire time. So what we have started doing is working on homework while I am cooking dinner. So I am physically there with him but I am also busy so he has to be independent too. It works for him. He needs someone to be able to bounce his ideas or thoughts off. He has to read for 15 minutes as well so he will read then too. I make him read outloud to make sure he is really understanding and correctly reading the words. The laziness sets in and he skips chunks of paragraphs so its all outloud in our house.

CubbyMama · October 2010

I'd highly recommend Alfie Kohn's book, The Homework Myth. Buy a copy for each of your kids' teachers. It totally changed my view of homework as a teacher, and I read it just as my 4-year-old started preschool and started receiving weekly homework packets already! There is no evidence that homework has ANY benefit in elementary grades--it doesn't improve academic achievement, hasn't been shown to foster good study skills or responsibility, and largely has a negative impact on families. The first time I had to park my 4-year-old at the kitchen and help her do a bunch of busywork while keeping my 18-month-old from destroying the pages and/or the rest of the house in the meantime, I got a taste of what it's like for my own students' parents!

Definitely talk to your child's teacher about how long the homework is taking. No sane teacher wants his/her students chained to a desk for hours doing homework, and chances are, your district has a policy like "No more than 10 minutes per night per grade level" (so 10 minutes in 1st grade, 20 minutes in 2nd grade, etc.). If that's the case--or if your kids' teachers are reasonable--they should tell you that when that point is reached or your child is getting frustrated, stop and turn in what they've done. GL!

notkateanymore · October 2010

Oh how I hate it. My daughter is having trouble concentrating in class and had to bring some school work home this weekend and it's TAKING FOREVER. I swear she has been working on it forever.

Osgirl · October 2010

Wow. I can't believe the amount of homework and the amount of time some of you have to spend on homework! I am a first grade teacher, and I send home one math sheet about twice a week that takes the kids less than 10 minutes to complete. They give kids extra practice, and it's a way for parents to see what we are doing in school. I go over it with the kids before it goes home, and as long as they've listened to me and know the directions, they should be able to do it independently.

I could not imagine sending projects home and expecting kids and parents to sit and do homework for more than 10 minutes.

I will say that although I hardly send any homework home, I do expect my students to read for at least 10 minutes every night. This could be the child reading alone, with a parent, parent reading to child. Research has proven that kids who read more for leisure become better readers. I don't require the kids to read a specific book-they can read whatever they want. And I'm always open to sending home books with the child that would be on their reading level.

Homework should be something that takes very little time and is a quick review of what we did that day. If it's taking longer and you have to sit right there so your child understands it, I'd talk to the teacher. The teacher is the one that needs to change. Also a child who dreads doing homework, has to spend a lot of time doing it, will just grow to resent school.

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