Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy Homework... Dread, Stress...

ODS is 9. That means we have approximately 7-9 years of dealing with homework left to go, and that's just for him. YDS still likes it, but he's in K. So that's probably temporary.

I am so ready to scream over homework this year. ODS clearly needs practice on his math problems (gets concepts most of the time, gets frustrated by word problems, makes silly mistakes because his writing is so sloppy, etc.) but hates doing the extra practice problems he needs to do. This devolved into me saying some not very nice things yesterday after he sat there not really doing the work and making annoying sounds instead.

Literature/Language Arts, he missed one assignment, got zero credit and as a result, tanked his grade. He had a chance for extra credit but thought he had to format it a certain way, program wasn't cooperating (kept losing text box on the assignment he had to do first, melting down, etc.)... so he didn't finish the extra credit in time. I just wrote the teacher to find out if it really had to be done in that format and she said Word would be fine in the future... ARGH. This was not written down anywhere.

Am on the edge between "it's his responsibility" and "he's 9 and expected to do work for 11-12 year olds." Does scaffolding mean pulling out my own hair? With a possible move in our future, letting his accelerated class grades tank seems like a bad thing. The last thing we need is a PG kid with terrible grades when approaching a new school.

I may just be ranting... but I really don't know if we can take this... Googled tips on homework but none of them are anything different than what we've already tried.

I hate homework. There, I said it!

In our case, homework was not getting enough attention last year due to extra curricular activities which we prioritize because I thought that the homework was busywork, anyway. And DS was applying to a competitive school, which places a high value on grades. So, I sucked it up and "scaffolded" or "tomato staked" or whatever it is called - to make sure that what needed to be done was done. Eventually, the grades helped when it came time for admissions. A new school might assume that the PG child was unable to cope with accelerated material if the grades are not stellar (the ones that we applied to did). Or they might assume wrongly that there are learning issues that need remediation if a PG child does not have top grades.

It looks like you need to find a way to convince your ODS to do the extra work he needs to do in math - you could try reminding him of the upcoming move and the need for maintaining good grades.

ETA: I don't help with homework anymore after DS moved schools - these days, he finishes all his homework in study hall after school so that he can play his sports in the evenings.

Thanks! He does a pretty good job of managing most of the workload during breaks at school, but does need reminders. It's these extra or at home completion projects that are so stressful.

The move is just likely, not a solid thing yet, so I'm hesitant to say anything in those terms as it will just upset him to think of leaving this school. (He knows that at some point we will likely move again, but it's very vague.) That said, I have started talking in terms of being able to stay with these classes, etc. I fear exactly what you say as far as future administrators.

Glad to know your DS is handling it all in study hall. That's encouraging! Did you do anything in particular to survive the "tomato staking" days?

You might consider looking at the book "The Learning Habit." It has some good suggestions for managing homework struggles. Some of the book is a little silly, but the homework chapter is very good.

Homework has been a constant source of frustration for us as well. Both of our gifted kids struggle with it from time to time but for different reasons.

It is unreasonable for teachers to expect a 9yo (or even a 15yo) to have full executive functioning capabilities. Some people believe that gifted programs are for smart kids who are motivated and focused, but that's not what the law states. If your child has executive function problems, see if you can get a 504 or IEP. That has helped us force the teachers to be flexible in terms of homework deadlines and content.

The other major problem with homework is lack of clarity. So many assignments are not fully specified, or require that the students make logical inferences to understand what to do. If my wife and I can look at an assignment and come to two different but equally reasonable interpretations of what it is asking, how do they expect a child to figure it out?

Thank you! It gets very good reviews on Amazon and our library system has it, so I'm requesting it.

It helps to know that we are not alone. The weird thing is, he will do whatever homework he can get done at school (he came home last night having finished his math and literature work for the day, even turning in the latter ahead of time), it's anything he needs to do at home that's the issue.

Agreed that some of the worksheets are not set up well at all.

After reading your post, I did some searching on EF... you're right, schools don't seem to get that there's a wide variety in EF levels.

I learned to be calmer than I usually am, to take deep breaths and to keep our long term goal in perspective (i.e. moving to a better school). I also reviewed the weekly lesson plans, test schedules, book report requirements and systematically went through what was needed to be done each evening and asked DS to repeat verbally to me what he needed to do (spelling list first, math homework next, science worksheet after that etc.) and then begin working. For him, the main problem was that he did not know how to estimate the time and effort needed for homework - I guess that it is part of the EF development curve - the verbal reinforcement of the task list made him remember better, not loose focus, not be surprised that he had another thing to do when he thought that he had finished and to be on time. A big clock in his work area with reminders like "it is 5:45pm, we need to finish each item in 15 minutes, that means that we have around 45 minutes for 3 items which will bring us to 6:30 pm" helped a lot.