Come on – admit it, isn’t a small
part of you quite pleased that the children are going back to school next
week? There’s a little bit of me that is,
as I long for things to get “back to normal” and once again my day will be
moving along nicely to a pre-set routine involving the hurried brekkies,
misplaced packed lunches or dinner money and the school run. The school day book ended nicely between these
frenzied moments and my screaming to get changed out of uniforms and the
habitual cry of “have you done your homework!?”
Ah yes, the dreaded H word.
Is ‘homework’ a feared word in your house? To me the worst word I can hear at homework
time is “maths”! Not because I’m a
number thickie, I’m not - studying Maths and Economics at A level meant that
numbers didn’t scare me but “modern maths” does faze me and I cannot fathom
Tallest Daughter’s maths homework at all.
Plus ça change ………… Luckily, she
doesn’t need me to help her once she’s underway BUT she does need my regular
nagging to make her start it in the first place
And I’m not alone. Lots of parents secretly admit to having the
same feelings of dread and resistance towards their children’s homework as
their kids do. There are so many distractions – gaming, constant TV, social
media and mates to facetime…….in fact, ANYTHING other than homework, to be
honest. So what canny tactics can we
find to combat resistance – our own as well as our children’s?
Take the hard work out of homework
- Make
it clear that TV time is limited and homework still has to be done. A friend of mine put the TV on a timer
switch. After one hour it switches off – then it’s homework time. After initial groans, her brood soon
became used to this.
- Another
ploy which works well with younger children is to combine after school
snack time with homework to lure then to the table. Yes, it’s bribery but show me a parent
who hasn’t used a petit filous or a cereal bar with sneaky intentions and
I’ll show you a big fat fibber!
- Thinking
of younger children, let them have fun with homework as they are usually
only expected to go over work they have already done at school as a
refresher. Reading and spelling is
much more fun if you can use a silly voice and coloured pens make a page
come alive far more than pencil!
- For older children who have more
work, show them that you sympathise with their workload – make sure that
they aren’t worried about any chores they may have to do. Especially around exam time, you may
have to cut Junior some slack if his bedroom’s a tip.
- Establish a regular time in the
evening or weekend for homework and make sure the rest of the household
knows that this is quiet time as your older child get on with studies
- Finally, if things get really
desperate and the lure of Dick and Dom is too much for your younger ones or
Hollyoaks is too tempting for the teenagers – hide the remote and turn off
the set top box. They’ll soon get
the message. The same works for a
computer mouse or keyboard if it’s gaming on the PC that’s your youngster’s
downfall.
Like many of us, some kids will strive to do the bare minimum they can
get away with and others will stress and fret until they’ve finished, driving themselves
into a panic and possibly making themselves ill in the process. Know your child and help them find a balance.
Finally,
technology is there to help with homework too – have a look at www.homeworkelephant.co.uk There’s help for us all out there!
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