Does it get better in fourth grade?

[Anonymous]

The centers do vary a lot. Our kids went to two different AAP centers, because we moved within county, and we always found that they had LESS homework in the centers than they had at base schools. Less need for worksheets to hammer home home basic concepts. And what homework and projects they had, they mostly did in class, to keep certain types of parents from doing their work for them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Intense? really?

My daughter is in AAP center. She spends 10 minutes a day on homework now in 4th grade. In 3rd it was probably closer to 15 (I don't include reading here as she reads all the time anyway)... There were 2 or 3 take home projects in 3rd grade, and zero so far in fourth. My daughter gets mostly 4s on her report card, a few 3s, so she is doing fine.

Yes, intense!! Daily math, vocab words. One or two quizzes a week. Four projects so far. A few cursive sheets every couple of weeks. One to two hours of homework, daily.

Which school is this?

[Anonymous]

My son is in a center. The third grade workload did not seem bad to me. However, he chose to complete a lot of his work in the classroom. He would be almost completely done with his homework before the end of the school day. Some of his friends left all of their work until they got home. The issue with third grade homework is time management. The students need to take advantage of the time given to them during the day. The workload (especially social studies and history) definitely has increased in 4th grade. But, it is still manageable. Fifth grade is supposed to be much harder.

Anonymous wrote:I keep on hearing that third grade is always a shock, but fourth grade will be much better...please share your experience!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My son is in a center. The third grade workload did not seem bad to me. However, he chose to complete a lot of his work in the classroom. He would be almost completely done with his homework before the end of the school day. Some of his friends left all of their work until they got home. The issue with third grade homework is time management. The students need to take advantage of the time given to them during the day. The workload (especially social studies and history) definitely has increased in 4th grade. But, it is still manageable. Fifth grade is supposed to be much harder.

Anonymous wrote:I keep on hearing that third grade is always a shock, but fourth grade will be much better...please share your experience!

It completely varies. When my first child was in third that teacher gave only a math sheet per night. VERY few tests and little other homework. My second child is also in AAP and has a different teacher and there are a ton of quizzes and tests now (math, vocabulary, science, social studies, etc.)

[Anonymous]

Our Center AAP school has almost zero homework. We did 2 projects on dreambox and few preparations for quizzes. We get once a week what they do in school (like sample sheets to practice if parents feel like they want to know what kids do and how they do). I kind of like it as we have other activities that require extensive homework, but somewhat unsuaul for us after we switched from regular ge school. 2nd grade had some homework (20-25 minutes a day). I do not count reading, we like to read

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The workload is intense. Too much homework, quizzes. Is all about the grades. I've heard this intensity decreases in fourth grade.

It isn't like this for my child at all. Talk to parents at your school, as this obviously varies from school to school. For us, the intensity really increases in fifth grade.

I agree. I have a third and fourth grader- but then again we go to a school that uses research based best practices and does not assign homework to elementary schoolers. Other than reading every night and the occasional project there is absolutely zero stress.