Your Child and Homework

[Merika]

This is a current event....but I'll put it under parenting due to content. It deals with the issue of Homework. Teachers are required to give X amount of homeword depending on the criteria of the schoolboard. In this article's case....I think it was warranted if the kid decided to take an honors class to begine with.

My kids were in gifted classes and got out of them due to the tremendous amount of homework. It was ridiculous. 4 hours a night didn't even allow for any kind of family life or personal play time for them. When they asked me to...I switched them to honors classes instead. It has helped quite a bit.

Does anyone else have an opinion on the amount of homework a child should have each night? Can you imagine coming home from work and being required to put in several more hours? I'm not sure that I even agree with the homework thing to begin with.

Anyway...here's the article:
Judge Tosses Homework Suit by Wis. Teen

Wed Mar 9, 9:16 PM ET

Add to My Yahoo! U.S. National - AP

MILWAUKEE - A judge threw out a high school student's lawsuit against mandatory summer homework, saying he and his father should have done a little more studying themselves before bringing the case.



Students in the Whitnall High School math course â€â€Â� honors pre-calculus â€â€Â� were supposed to do three assignments by certain dates over the summer. Peer Larson, 17, and his father, Bruce, had filed suit in Circuit Court, arguing that homework should not be required after the 180-day academic year is over.

The Larsons argued it was difficult for the boy to do the assignments because he had a summer job as a camp counselor. They also said students should be able to enjoy their summers free of homework.

But it's up to school boards to decide such things, Judge Richard J. Sankovitz ruled Tuesday.

Rest of Article/Link: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp...mework_lawsuit

[Star]

okay, homework during the summer months I totally disagree with. That's absurd!

I think kids do get way too much homework. Teachers have told me that they only assign 45 minutes of homework a day but that's a lie. Most of the time Kassandra has so much homework that she's doing it before, after supper and almost until bedtime (10:00 pm). That's rediculous! I'm thinking, what are they doing at school if they're bringing so much homework home?

Kids need their time to be kids. Kids need to play and do things they like to do to relax, not be stressed out over schoolwork 24/7. If Kassandra ever came home with homework to do on the summer months, I'd ditch it in the garbage. Kids need their summer to recouperate and re-energize, stress free for the next school year!

[Merika]

While my Mom was still teaching high school....they were supposed to give 30 mins per day homework for academic classes. Well...other than PE...that left 6 teachers feeling so inclined to give a kid 30 - totalling 3 hours a day....not to mention special projects, books to be read, etc.

I agree...I do think it's too much. Can you imagine having to store that much knowledge daily? What about the kids who work after school jobs? What about some free time? No wonder I goofed off, cheated when I could and basically didn't care.

To me, if they would focus the day on teaching academics instead of worrying what my child ate at home (yeah, the school sent out a survey :? ), teaching 'how to divorce your parents' and a lot of other nonsense...perhaps they could cover what they need to while my child is there 8 hours a day.

[Star]

I totally agree with you. There are way too many extra curricular activities in the shcools as well IMHO.

I never had nearly as much homework as kassandra brings home when i was in elemetary school. It is way too much for their little brains to absorb. Kids really do need to be kids! Maybe this has something to do with kids rebelling? They want to have some fun so they make sure they take the fun?

In high school, I didn't really have to study and I rarely brought homework home. I did all that at school before I went home. But it was easier back then. Kassandra's learning stuff I was learning in the 10th grade for crying out loud and she's only in the 7th grade! It's no wonder we have so many kids struggling in school now. they're trying to cram all this information into their little brains that aren't developped enough to absorb it all and comprehend it.

I really don't think there should be any homework sent home unless it is a project or an essay. everything else can and should be done in the classroom. JMHO.