When Gabriel first started school at age 3 he went to nursery for half a day, during that time they played a lot , mostly with educational toys but it was fun.
At age 4 he was in Reception full time, in this class he mostly played but there was also work done and the odd bits of homework were sent home .
He is now 5 and is in Year One His birthday is in July so he is one of the youngest in his class, some of his friends have already had their 6th birthdays.
During the week he gets a piece of homework which incorporates reading and spelling. Once the word has been learned he can colour it in. He also has reading books which are to be read for ten minutes every night. Once the book is finished I mark it in his reading folder and he is given a new one.
On Thursday nights he is given his ' homework folder' which is to be done over the weekend and this is where my problem starts. In the folder are 3 pieces of work . Two of them are literacy based where he has to read, write, and spell the words and then make up a sentence which incorporates that word and the other is for numeracy.
Personally I do think that this is perhaps just a little too much for a 5 year old but I can go with it. My main objection to this homework is the fact that they have said ' it is to be done over the weekend' !
Now most of the parents that I know work during the week and see the weekend as family time. The two days where you can actually see, spend time and have fun with your children. The time when memories can be made , to laugh, to run about and do all those things that can't be done during the week.
I have no objection to reading at the weekend but all this homework just takes the biscuit so I've decided to take a stand.I will do one thing when it is first brought home and the rest can be done during the week. On Monday I am going to send a letter into the teacher ( I tried to make an appointment to see her but that was a week ago and I'm still waiting for a response). In this letter I will explain what I have said here and see what she says .
It will probably end in me being summoned to the head teacher ho hum..
So do you think I'm right or am I wrong.... I'd love to know what you think?
I agree. it is too much. I bet the other parents hate it too.
ReplyDeleteI think you are completely right. My 2 are 5 & 7 and also very young for their year. We get reading every day, a half term topic homework, that you can opt in or out of (and is quite fun, to be fair, usually building a dinosaur mask etc, you get a list of about 6 and can choose any you fancy doing - for my oldest he has to do 2 from the list) then we get our weekly homework on fridays, to be handed in wednesday and timestables for oldest every week. I guess that's different, as we could do it monday or tuesday night, but the boys are so tired after school I try to get it done on sundays. I think the daily reading is important, but I hate weekend homework for younger kids, it's our only family time as well and the tantrums it can cause are very tiring. Hope you got a solution worked out - Kirsty Allsopp is with you! Bethx (thelinencat)
ReplyDeleteA (now 7 but it's been the same since she was 5) gets homework Mon, Tues, Wed, Thurs, so none at the weekend. I wouldn't like homework at the weekend, I'm sure it could all be done during the week. What she does get takes about 10-15 mins to do each evening which seems about right for now.
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