SES/ Occupation and Homework Opinions

[Anonymous]

HHI $150K. Engineer/journalist. MS/BA. We make our kids do their homework.

[Anonymous]

$500k
Ivy/Top Public
STEM/Consulting
Didn't grow up with homework in elementary school

Son is in 1st grade - we generally encourage him to finish assigned homework. Will not push him to finish overly long/busy work assignments. If it's a beautiful day we encourage him to go outside and play instead of homework.

But we leave it to him to explain to the teacher about what got done or not. Also, we don't generally correct his homework - we just have him review it himself.

I don't think there should be any required homework until much later.

[Anonymous]

Upper middle class, PhD and MA. One grew up with homework early and often and remembers freaking out about it until a parent said "Just do what you can in X amount of time." Other rarely had homework until 3rd grade.

We are generally rule-followers, but when some of our kids got teachers in grades earlier than 3rd who assigned way too much homework, we checked with the teachers about their expectations. We also told the kids (and told the teachers that we were telling the kids) that they need to do their reading and need to spend 10 minutes/grade on homework.

Homework is the child's responsibility, as is living with the grades the child gets as a result.

My oldest is in high school now. Straight As in all his classes, and he manages his life himself. He has friends whose parents are still riding herd them (and these are not kids with LDs, just parents who can't cut the cord). I hope they all enjoy college.

[Anonymous]

HHI 185K and I am a SAHM

I am not a fan of nightly HW before 5th grade but I think that weekly or monthly HW sheets starting in grade 1 are okay so long as they are basic for the kids to do. It has nothing to do with me not wanting to sit down and help them but more that they are young and need time to run, play, etc...

In middle school, I think each class should give no more than 20min of HW a night, and no HW the day before and night of test.

In High School, no more than 30min of HW a night per class and no HW 2 days before major test or night of test.

Nothing annoys me more when my high schooler studies hard for a major test and the teacher is giving HW unrelated to the test before and the night of the test. Give them a break sometimes.


That all said, my kids still follow the rules and respect the teacher's expectations.

[Anonymous]

HHI $1 million/ivy league educated/doctor/finance

Kids do homework everyday. Non-negotiable. We are Asian-American. I give extra assignments on weekends because school does not seem to give homework over the weekend.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:HHI 185K and I am a SAHM

I am not a fan of nightly HW before 5th grade but I think that weekly or monthly HW sheets starting in grade 1 are okay so long as they are basic for the kids to do. It has nothing to do with me not wanting to sit down and help them but more that they are young and need time to run, play, etc...

In middle school, I think each class should give no more than 20min of HW a night, and no HW the day before and night of test.

In High School, no more than 30min of HW a night per class and no HW 2 days before major test or night of test.

Nothing annoys me more when my high schooler studies hard for a major test and the teacher is giving HW unrelated to the test before and the night of the test. Give them a break sometimes.


That all said, my kids still follow the rules and respect the teacher's expectations.

Looks like you are raising overachievers.

[Anonymous]

HHI $400k
I'm currently a SAHM but I fool around in the stock market; DH is a systems engineer and we also own a side business. Our oldest child is in kindergarten (FCPS); younger two are in preschool. The kindergarten teacher sends home one reading book per week, a list of words he's supposed to learn to identify and be able to spell which changes each month, and a packet of math exercises he's supposed to do each week (one exercise per day, plus a bonus list). At the beginning of the year, it was suggested that all parents read to their kids 20 min each day. Honestly, I don't find this to be a big deal at all and have no problem with it; the whole homework packet takes maybe 30 minutes every week, including all the bonus math stuff. The math problems are things like, "Count how many pairs of shoes you have. Now, count how many pairs of shoes one of your parents has. Who has more?" He can do that while I'm getting dressed in the morning or folding laundry or whatever. Lately there have been exercises involving cards, which of course he likes. As for reading to the kids, we always read stories at night before bed, so that's not a problem. I think it's been an easy way to incorporate homework into a regular part of the school routine. I wouldn't want him to have hours of it per week, but he voluntarily goes and gets his homework packet and doesn't seem at all overwhelmed. He still has plenty of time to play and do all the other stuff he wants to do.

[Anonymous]

"Count how many pairs of shoes you have. Now, count how many pairs of shoes one of your parents has. Who has more?" He can do that while I'm getting dressed in the morning or folding laundry or whatever

Thank goodness my kids didn't have that assignment. They'd probably still be counting my shoes. Something of a hoarder.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:HHI 185K and I am a SAHM

I am not a fan of nightly HW before 5th grade but I think that weekly or monthly HW sheets starting in grade 1 are okay so long as they are basic for the kids to do. It has nothing to do with me not wanting to sit down and help them but more that they are young and need time to run, play, etc...

In middle school, I think each class should give no more than 20min of HW a night, and no HW the day before and night of test.

In High School, no more than 30min of HW a night per class and no HW 2 days before major test or night of test.

Nothing annoys me more when my high schooler studies hard for a major test and the teacher is giving HW unrelated to the test before and the night of the test. Give them a break sometimes.


That all said, my kids still follow the rules and respect the teacher's expectations.

Looks like you are raising overachievers.

Oh really? Care to explain.