Typical nightly homework load at various Upper Schools?

[Anonymous]

Could people please list the school and typical hours of nightly homework? We've heard that one of the schools we're considering has a crushing workload for the Upper School, and we'd love to get an idea of what a typical US workload is like for top privates?

[Anonymous]

A half hour per academic course is suggested at some schools. In my experience, it depends a great deal upon your child's choice of courses. Is she in AP Chemistry, BC Calculus, AP English, and AP Econ all in the same year? That's a lot of work, several hours per night. Is he in Earth Science, Geometry, on-level English, and Spanish I? Not so much work. Choose the course load that will work best for your child, in other words: it is possible to choose a balance between honors/AP/IB and on-level courses. If the balance seems off, there is usually an add/drop period at the beginning of the year.

[Anonymous]

Op -- Good point. Our DC is a very strong student who most likely will be taking the hardest or close-to-hardest track possible. I don't know if that provides enough clarification.

[Anonymous]

DC is a Senior now, but they would typically be home and studying by 7:00 p.m. Freshmen year they worked until 10:30 p.m., Sophomore year it was more like 11:30 p.m., Junior year a 1:00 a.m. was not unusual, and Senior year (admitted early to college) we are back at about 11:00 p.m.

[Anonymous]

OP, this also depends upon your child's ECs, whether he/she will have/use study halls effectively, and his/her time management skills. Our two bright kids in the same school had different homework experiences because of different time commitments to ECs, different patterns socializing with friends, and different personalities re perfectionism.

[Anonymous]

OP --Maybe it might be easier if people could list which schools seem to have heavier than normal homework loads (although it seems that everybody's child is experiencing heavy workloads at least to some degree)!

[Anonymous]

DC is a 9th grader at GDS and the workload averages 2-3 hours/day. DC finds it very easily manageable. When DC does not have sports/extracurriculars, it is done before dinner. The major projects like the freshman research paper, lab reports, etc. can be hard for students who do not stay on top of the minor milestones and mini-deadlines.

Our understanding is that 10th grade work load is only a little more demanding. But, it really goes up for the top students in 11th grade. But, the school is really sensitive to the issue and does not allow students to take APs before 11th and sets a maximum of 4 AP classes.

[Anonymous]

DS graduated from Sidwell last year. He took the hardest classes available, and the workload was heavy but never crushing (typically 2 hours a night plus time spent on work during free periods). That said, DS is a fast, efficient worker with absolutely no perfectionistic traits, and was happy doing a "good enough" job on many assignments. DS2 takes much longer because he is a slower worker - more of a tortoise than a hare.

[Anonymous]

And I think 2 -3 hours of homework after a 7 hour school day is bullshit. What the hell are they being taught in class anyway if kids can't have a life outside the classroom. You' re not getting much value for money. Most of the crap being taught with exception of a few doesn't fit 21st century needs anyway and can learned online. I have my own curriculum for my kids, they go to school but I sweat the homework the way I used to.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:DC is a 9th grader at GDS and the workload averages 2-3 hours/day. DC finds it very easily manageable. When DC does not have sports/extracurriculars, it is done before dinner. The major projects like the freshman research paper, lab reports, etc. can be hard for students who do not stay on top of the minor milestones and mini-deadlines.

Our understanding is that 10th grade work load is only a little more demanding. But, it really goes up for the top students in 11th grade. But, the school is really sensitive to the issue and does not allow students to take APs before 11th and sets a maximum of 4 AP classes.

Agree about 9th grade being manageable and 11th grade being insane, depending on course selection. 10th grade varies and some kids do take AP courses that year at GDS. Now that math is being differentiated more in the MS, there will probably be more sophomores taking AP Calc in the future, for example.

[Anonymous]

DD at Holton in 9th. She does 1.5 to 2 hours of homework/studying a night and does another hour's worth at school during study hall or flex time. It's manageable, even during her sports seasons.

[Anonymous]

Anyone know about homework at STA for US? Our commute will be pretty long. With the sports requirement and any other ECs, it will be a long day before he even gets home.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:And I think 2 -3 hours of homework after a 7 hour school day is bullshit. What the hell are they being taught in class anyway if kids can't have a life outside the classroom. You' re not getting much value for money. Most of the crap being taught with exception of a few doesn't fit 21st century needs anyway and can learned online. I have my own curriculum for my kids, they go to school but I sweat the homework the way I used to.

1. They are not in class for seven hours. If they are using free periods the nightly homework load diminishes. Typical class time for Upper School would be 250 - 300 minutes of instruction a day (4 - 5 hours).
2. You can't have humanities classes -- papers, reading longer literary works -- without spending time at home. Theoretically it's possible for classes depending on problem solving to do more of that in the classroom.
3. In public schools no extra-curriculars are required; there are private schools with no sports requirement and a modest (say 2-3 hours per week) PE requirement; and even schools that require sports/PE generally have an option that is not time-intensive (for example, the PE option at Sidwell; Personal Fitness at NCS; intramurals at St. Albans). If your child is not doing a sport (your and their choice) they will have even more time for homework. And does your child do a club sport? Why is 4 hours a day of soccer (school plus club practice) more important than 2 hours of homework?
4. You can home school.

Bottom line, the American secondary school model includes homework. It hasn't really expanded over 25 years, either -- kids are taking longer to do it, by and large, because of interruptions (texting, YouTube, etc). There are some options if you don't like it, but you can't expect to apply to a prestigious school that has a significant amount of homework and then demand that they change their educational model.

[Anonymous]

Ok. I will answer. Public school kid had about 2 hours per night freshman year and three hours sophomore year. Average level of effeciency, not a perfectionist. Rigorous courseload. Played two sports and ec's were not super time intensive. Did not stay up until midnight until junior year. So i agree that junior year is variable. He seemed to get his act together junior year.

Child at big 3. Sports requirement was a total pain. Did not get home until 6 or 7 every night. Was a more of an arts person, singing and drama, and this was very time consuming. Arts kids at public do not have to do the sports component. Child two had more work, probably fifty percent more. More writing, more reading. But child two was extremely fast. Many stories of other kids staying up until 11 or 12 from freshman year.

I would hesitate to send a kid that was slow or less organized to one of the more intense school ie Sidwell, GDS, NCS/STA.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Anyone know about homework at STA for US? Our commute will be pretty long. With the sports requirement and any other ECs, it will be a long day before he even gets home.

Everything other posters said about variables (freshman year vs. junior year; working style -- e.g., fast/efficient vs. slower or procrastinator or perfectionist; and course selection -- e.g. most advanced vs. "regular" classes) comes into play.

With that said, I think it's fair to say that with the sports requirement and a long commute, even a relatively moderate homework load (which is what I see St. Albans as being, given that it's a very strong and academically oriented school) can seem very daunting for a tired kid after dinner. If your son can reliably get started on his work during the school day, it makes a huge difference, because there is a fair amount of time for that built into the schedule. Basically, St. Albans has a 7-day rotating block schedule. Most days a student taking 5 courses will have 4 classes a day, which meet for 65 minutes, and one free period. He will probably also have 1 out of 7 days with only three academic classes. (Classes meet 5 times in 7 days.) In addition to the student having a free period 5 out of 7 days, the schedule has built in time for the musical groups (the chorus and orchestra) -- something like 4 times in 7 days, for 50 minutes a day. So a student could have nearly two hours in a day in which he could get started on homework.

Of course, life isn't that simple. Kids want to socialize, and they're always hungry so they want to go get snacks. Juniors and seniors love to drive off campus to eat -- that burns that free period that could have provided 65 minutes on homwork. Not judging -- I remember being 17 too and I loved to socialize.

If you can really work with your son on being efficient -- ask him to commit to using most, if not all, free periods to work (and maybe send him off to school with some filling food for mid-morning snacks) -- it makes a big difference. The kids who work during the day are not up late.