Helping with homework

I would make notes on his homework or E-mail his teacher let them know how long it took, how it went, did he understand it? Anything that you feel would help them to help your son. Maybe the information can be approached a different way.

My heart goes out to you, because I have been there. Make sure you talk to his teacher. E-mail works for me, because it’s not personal.

Good Luck.

Hi, Dover.

It is a tough balance. When faced with something like this I help my son but then e-mail the teacher with details of how it went—letting the teacher know if my son needed just a bit of help or if I basically did the work. I agree that getting a whole page wrong isn’t productive.

This link is to the nitty gritty suggestions a teacher had on how to help kids with homework. It’s pretty detailed and I found it very helpful. The teachers post is post #25 on this thread.

http://www.schwablearning.org/message_boards/view_messages.asp?r=281&m_id=24876&pg=5#R

I’m not very computer savvy so I hope this work!

After a few incidents of entire math worksheets done wrong, I decided we couldn’t afford the time or the tears to do them over again. (Our son had 2.5 - 3 hours of homework a night in 4th and 5th grade.) So we would do at least the first part of the math homework (if not all of it) together. That way he couldn’t possibly get through a whole page having done it all wrong.

Thanks, great link. Worth printing out for reference. I do try and approach things this way if I’m able to catch him before he decides to just do the work on his own. Yesterday we were both too tired, but this morning he asked me to help him correct it, so we worked on it then.

I felt a bit dishonest just sending it in as if he did the work independantly, though.

In the past I emailed the teacher, or sent a note, and it was consistently ignored, until I got discouraged and stopped even trying. Guess I shouldn’t paint this year’s teacher with last year’s brush.

[quote=”dover”]In the past I emailed the teacher, or sent a note, and it was consistently ignored, until I got discouraged and stopped even trying. Guess I shouldn’t paint this year’s teacher with last year’s brush.[/quote]

I guess I’m lucky. I didn’t get ignored until my son was in 6th grade! This year seems to be going better though. Hope yours does too.

I wouldn’t worry about feeling dishonest about helping your son. A lot of parents check their children’s work, even in sixth grade. I didn’t for my oldest and was surprised how many parents did, but am sure I will be doing it for my second, who is LD.

And too often, I have also retaught the material. This means going through each problem/question then until he gets it. I don’t feel like it is dishonest—my child is LD and doesn’t catch on as fast and no teacher has enough time to reexplain everything.

BTW, my kids go to my husband for science after my daughter got a C on her homework when I helped her!!!

Beth

With my LD son, we always looked at the homework initially together, and asked a few questions to assess whether he understood the concepts. If he did, I had him work on it independently. If he didn’t, we worked through the first 25% of the problems together. I would then look at the homework when he was done, and tell him was was wrong. It was then up to him whether he wanted to correct them.

My son is now a freshman in high school. For the first week of geometry, I went over his homework with him after he had tried it on his own. Since it now seems he’s understanding the concepts, I’m not going to go over the homework until he comes home with a bad test grade. For written work (he’s dyslexic and dysgraphic) he knows he needs help with editing. He always does the first draft on his own, then asks either me or his dad to help with the editing.

With my 4th grade daughter, I always check her homework. If it looks like there is a problem understanding, we redo it together.

If you’ve noted a problem where your child often does a whole worksheet incorrectly, it might be worth looking at the homework with him first, and getting him to explain it to you. If it’s clear he doesn’t get it, then you have your teaching moment. If he does get it, let him do the work on his own and give him the option of you checking it. If it takes just way too long for your child to do the homework, tell the teacher and work on getting homework modifications in his IEP. You can ask the teacher how long he/she expects the homework to take to do. If it’s taking 2 to 3 times as long as the teacher things, that’s too much, and your child needs modifications in place.

Good luck,
Kay

I always tell my 12 year old daughter that homework is a continuation of the school learning experience, not a test. We work together whenever she needs help. I demonstrate technique, make corrections—whatever is necessary—and I make sure that she understands and then can do it on her own. If she is able to master a concept or improve upon her work as a result of my help, I consider the homework a success. The point is, she has learned something, and I don’t give a rat’s patootie whether any teacher thinks my helping her is a good idea or not! I’m just glad I have enough education and time to be able to be my child’s “at-home” teacher.

Dover,

Here’s my two cents for whatever it is worth. I hope it makes the point I’m trying to make.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with helping your son with his homework. Homework is not a test it is a continuation of the learning experience. If you don’t help him learn who will? From what you said, its obvious he isn’t getting it at school. If he’s slow digesting the information like my son he’s only digesting half of the information so how can he be expected to do the homework if he doesn’t completely understand the concept? How can you find an address if you only have half of it?

I’m finding that math instruction varies wildly from teacher to teacher and from math book to math book. One thing that really bothers me is that many teachers only want to see the answers. They don’t want to see the “thought process” that went in to getting to the answer. Thought process is key to being successful at math!! If the child’s thought process is flawed they will never get the right answer.

Example: What if a child thinks he carries the number in the one’s place and not the tens. 28 + 37 = ?
5
28
+ 37
101

How would you know the child didn’t understand carrying unless they wrote the entire problem down?

The teacher’s might not like all the writing on the homework sheet. If that is the case, have him solve each and every problem completely on a separate piece of paper and then transfer the answers to the answer sheet. I might even go so far as to attach the working sheet to the homework paper.

Names and terms have changed since I was in school. For example, they call counting by 2’s, 5’s, 10’s, etc. skip counting instead of counting by…. They also have things called fact families. Easy once someone explains them to you but I didn’t have a clue as to what they were so I asked. It might be worth a visit if possible to ask about the concepts being taught. Explain that you’re curious so you can help your son gain a better understanding of the concept being taught. Make it your problem when asking for information. I’m always questioning how material is presented so I can understand what my son is learning in school and so I can present it in a different way if necessary.

I hope this helps.

We’ve all been there. I think it helps if the teacher (and you) are clear on expectations. Often the school has a handbook with policies setting out the purpose of homework and how much homework for a grade level. With those expectations in hand, I would review the situation. I diarize for a few days to really get a handle on how long for which subject or assignment. It really helps to have it written down when you go to discuss it.

I have asked teachers to prioritize assignments and to give time estimates. I realize my child will take more time than others -sometimes double but that’s as far as I am willing to go. 3-4 hours for grade 2 homework is not okay (yup, been there). We would begin at the most important and work down. At some point, I would write on the assignment book that we worked 30 minutes and moved to the rest of the homework.

This was a bigger problem in grades 2,3,4 but that directly relates to the quality of her teachers in those grades. In 7th grade, it is less of a problem. We have an established homework routine-she has a time, a place, adequate supplies and help if she needs it. I will type for her after she has completed a graphic organizer, or outline, or rough draft. We are at a point where her teachers know we support their efforts by checking that she knows what to do and helping her with organization but my daughter takes on the majority of it herself. My daughter knows how important it is to get the assignment recorded correctly and how much we value her being a self-starter. But it has taken lots of effort to get here.

It also depends on grade level and how grades are done and attitude to grades. I have seen schools where grades were the holy grail and kids came in with all their homework and projects done for them. I have also seen teachers who grade homework on done/not done basis. If the child erred on major portions, the student was retaught and asked to redo it for no loss of grade. Loss of grade occurred only if no attempt was made. Homework was gone over in class and students were required to correct their errors.

I’ve done my share of re-teaching, too. If you are doing too much reteaching you might as well be homeschooling. If things don’t get better and you have no alternative classroom placement, home schooling may well be teh best solution

Good lcuk

You’re asking very good questions and I’d certainly ask the teacher for her thoughts. I’d agree with you that allowing him to do the problems all wrong risks reinforcing an incorrect understanding of how to do the problems. I’d certainly try to teach him the correct way when you see he’s doing it all wrong but if he doesn’t ‘connect’, as you say then I’d guess I’d let him forge on with the homework, wrong though it may be.

Teachers can have very strong opinions and especially about homework so asking her/his thoughts on this are important. Some teachers in my school bristle at the idea of parents helping with homework and others like me welcome parent support with homework.

awww. …Dover…I just posted a huge speal about this under “inclusion, a good thing?”

Me???? I help my daughter„,but I WILL NOT spoonfeed answers to her!!!

If it was me, I would try to help but if he has not a clue of what he’s doing then there is clearly a problem that needs addressed. When you send in homework that “corrected” then they can say or think he has a firm grasp on this…hence later on when you feel your child may need more assistance they whip out the papers and comment on how well they are doing.
Now this is my experience.

Good luck Dover.
LAN