from reading the other thread about homework, I'm wondering what are they doing at school all day if they are doing so much homework at home? my kids have never been in real school so clue me in here.
getting the children settle down to do work takes awhile and once you do that and go over the subject for the day not much time for anything else.
My son had a lot of homework at times in ps and part of it was that the other kids distracted him. He still gets distracted easily, but now he had more opportunities to work in a quiet environment and get things done. I think the other reason is that for some reason they think more work and pushing things faster will result in kids learning more and becoming more "successful" when I think it actually works against actual learning.
When I was a sub, we spent all day doing work. Then sent more work home to do all night. Often times the homework was meant to teach new concepts that were then gone over the next day. At which point more work was done on the topic.
I've also heard that.. and I don't pretend this is true.. parents push for more homework so the kids are occupied at home. Personally, I've never heard a parent say that, but I've read plenty of stuff online saying that is true (believe or not as you will ). And I think some homework is to encourage parental involvement. Why else send my 1st grader home with math games she has to play with someone else, or books she has to read to/with someone? :roll:
Another reason is that there is SO MUCH TESTING going on now that didn't happen when we were kids. Funding is based on the results of those tests, and teachers know full-well that many of their students aren't ready. They have to push kids to learn what they need to know for life and what they need to know for the test. There isn't time for both, so they spend every second they can teaching, and every second they can't ... sending work home!
It is sad to say, but when my son was younger and in ps (he went until 7th), I actually thought it was cool that he had homework. I thought, "this will help him in the future to be able to do this or that now and learn more now, etc." I know one teacher was going to have the kids memorize a lot of poetry and I even thought that would be a good discipline for him. That was in elementary I think. NOW, I am so different in my thinking. I haven't given my son any tests this year. Oh wait, I did have him do a vocab. test, but with the book. I feel that if I do give him any tests, it will only be to help him if he does go to college or anything where they require tests to show competency or retention. I also don't think it is essential to have all learning in paper format. I do digress that it will be helpful if I ever have to show what he is learning and we do do a lot on paper. I am willing to do less paperwork if we can have deep discussions about things we are studying. My son hardly ever has school work to do after what I would consider school hours.
In my kids' school they have two separate sets of work - classwork and homework. Homework is not unfinished classwork. The first day of kindergarten they get their first weekly homework packet to be returned by that Friday. Some first grade classes give weekly homework and some give daily homework. My son has daily homework - just a math worksheet, but still. They start doing word problems in first grade now too. Starting in second grade everybody gets daily homework. As to what they are doing all day, here's my daughter's third grade schedule: 8:25-10:00 - Language Arts 10-10:20 - Recess 10:20-11 - Spelling/Writing 11-12:10 - Math 12:10-12:50 - Lunch 12:50-1:20 - Silent Reading 1:20-2:30 Science/Social Studies Nancy
My neice also has homework in kindergarten. Her parents work, which means she's at the Early Morning program, and then in the After School program. They drop her off about 7:00, and pick her up around 6. Then she comes home, eats dinner, practices piano, does homework and then it's bedtime. Oh, and for some reason, my bil feels she needs a tutor twice a week. POOR BABY!!! When does she ever get to BE A KID? She's in KINDERGARTEN!!!
I just looked at my son's first grade math homework and thought I'd share it. Remember, this kid is 6. There are a couple of kids in his class who are still 5. 1) 6 birds are in the tree. 1 new bird flies to the tree. How many birds in all? 6+1 =___ 2) 3 frogs sit on a log. 2 more frogs sit. How many frogs in all? 3+2 = ___ 3) 7 rabbits are on the lawn. 2 rabbits are in the garden. How many rabbits in all? ___ + ___ = ___ 4) 8 nuts are in the bowl. Dad has 1 more. How many nuts are there? ____ + ___ = ___ 5) Ann had 4 stickers. Bob gave her 2 more. Then Ann's mom gave her 2 more. How many stickers does Ann have now? __________________ 6) Gina found 8 shells. Abby found 2 shells. Jen found the same number as Abby. How many total shells did the girls find? ______________ That was the first page. Here's page 2. 1) 9+2= ____ 8+1= ____ 6+1= ___ 2) 7+2= ___ 5+1= ___ 4+2= ____ 3) 7+1= ___ 5+2= ___ 6+2= ___ 4) 8+2= ___ 9+1= ___ 3+2= ___ 2+2= ___ 4+1= ___ 3+1= ___ 5) 9+3= ___ 3+6= ___ 3+7= ___ 4+3= ___ 3+3= ___ 8+3 = ___ 6) 3 children play. 2 more join them. How many children are playing now? _____________ 7) 5 dogs are in the park. 3 more dogs come. How many dogs are there now? ____________ ................ Fun, fun fun. And when he wants to write a book (he and his 8yo sister like to write and illustrate books) at 9:30 at night, I have to tell him to stop it and go to bed so he can be up at 7 to get ready for school. :roll: Nancy
My dgs is in ps K. He has homework every day, mostly sight words and letter sounds at this point, but also little "stories" to read. He just got his second report and they still marked that he can't write his first name, but we know he can because he could do that when he was 4!
I'm curious as to what constitutes Language ARts? I see that later in the day they have reading time and spelling/writing time. So they spend an hour and a half on grammar? and these poor kids only get twenty minutes a day to run around and play?
Language Arts con be made up of spelling, writing, reading, grammar, speech.... It's a kind of catch-phrase, much like Social Studies. Social Studies can include history, geography, government, anthropology, sociology, etc.
Social Studies includes a wide number of subjects. I'm trying to separate them. So, we don't call it SS, we have history, geography, etc... I'm not sure if government is an appropriate topic of discussion for a first grader. I don't think that my own son would understand it. Is anthropology part of SS not biology?
I think it can be listed as both biology and SS. No, you don't need "government" in first grade, no more than you need "sociology". But you might teach some government topics, such as the idea of voting, or even patriotic stuff can be government, or obeying laws. I'm one to not seperate out history and geography too much. We study a time frame, and do mapping, etc., as it connects to that.
My son trying to connect dinosaurs, Bible and map. May be it sounds funny, but some times it very hard to explain.
Yep. 20 minutes for recess. Lunch is half lunch and half recess, so they get a total of 40 minutes of running around time. I try to get them to school before it starts so they get time in the morning to run around, but I'm lucky most days if we get there 10 minutes early. But at least it's something. We also have my daughter in a optional ($$) after school program called homework club, which is exactly what it sounds like. They stay after school to get help with their homework. There are a couple of teachers in there to help the kids. My daughter really likes it. I think it's easier for her to get math help from a teacher who is teaching the exact same way as her classroom teacher, then to have mommy and daddy try to explain things our way. It probably gets confusing for her and takes longer in the long run. We're at the end of the first session of homework club at the end of this week. I've asked her if she wants to keep going. She says that she does and that she LOVES homework club. (Bless her heart..) They don't start until 20 minutes after school ends, so she gets another recess right before homework club starts. The problem is that it lasts until 3:45, which means we don't get home until 4:00. Then the girl needs some serious brain mush time. (Go watch cartoons child!) I can only give her a 30 minute break before she needs to start the rest of her homework. Even after six hours at school and 45 minutes of homework club, she usually has an hour or so of more homework. Sometimes more. Sometimes she finishes everything at homework club and can just come home and be a kid. I think this session I'm going to sign her up for a drop in pass rather than have her go every day (M-Th). I'm there picking her brother up anyway, so I can take a look at her homework and see if she's going to need the extra help. I'd rather her come home and do what she wants for an hour or so and THEN start homework instead of diving right in. We'll see how it goes. Nancy
I ran into two other moms in my daughter's third grade class after school today. They were wondering where my daughter was and I told them she was in homework club. One mom asked me if she was able to get all of her homework done there. I said, "Oh God no!" She said, "So our kids aren't the only ones who take HOURS to do their homework?!?!!" Oh that made me feel so much better. My daughter has some issues with learning. So sometimes I wonder if it's just me. I've always thought that it was just that they are pushing too much too soon on all the kids, but then sometimes I wonder... Then she told me that she had done her daughter's word search homework for her (it's supposed to be a game to help them with their spelling list but it's freaking HUGE) and it took her (an adult) 45 minutes to do. (!!!!) This is one of the moms that is involved in all of the school things, PTA, scrip sales, volunteering for anything and everything, etc. So for her to break down and do her daughter's homework (even though it was just a word search) and actually tell someone she barely knows about it, is a big deal. I told her and the other mom, "Well, at least we know we're not in the trenches alone anymore right?" It occurs to me that public school parents would benefit from having a "Public School Spot"-type forum to talk about homework. It would probably help a lot. Imagine a poorly-worded word problem. Even if one parent in your child's class has figured out what in the holy heck they're talking about.. Or someone has a different way of explaining something... That would be really great. :love: Nancy
The facinating thing is that it's still a school-by-school thing (or, perhaps, district-by-district). My neice and nephew attend a private Christian school. Some of the "more affluent" public schools also assign way too much homework. But in the schools my husband has taught in, it generally isn't done. Why? Two reasons. First, it will never get done. He teaches for half the period, then gives them an in-class assignment. So the next day he may not be lecturing, just letting them finish up the assignment and helping those that need it individually. The trouble comes when some kids get it done the first day, and he has to find something for them to do. The second reason is there's not enough books to go around. If his first-period class were to take them home, he wouldn't have any for second period. (BTW, I'm talking middle and high school level, where they need homework because they should be learning to work more independently.)
