We give 10-12 minutes of homework to our 1st grader - math worksheet, spelling worksheet, and two pages of reading — almost every day.

We do not flex just because of recalcitrance or whining, but we do skip on rare occasions if he is sick with fever or such like.

At first, there was a lot of resistance, and it sometimes took her 30 minutes to do 10 minutes of work. Now, there is not much resistance, because she knows we will not back down and also because now it feels “normal” to her. She is done in 10 minutes and gets more play time afterwards.

Anonymous wrote:He is not into structure or rules at 6 years old? Yikes, you have a long road ahead.

This.

My 6 year old hates it. He has to do it anyway. Sometimes it takes 45 minutes to do one 10 minute worksheet. When he's done we have cookies and hot cocoa and watch cartoons. My kids do not have tablets or any internet access.
My niece and nephew in Japan have way more homework at the same ages as my kids.
If you have the kind of kid who reads for pleasure and is self motivated to learn you can skip homework. I do not!

Anonymous wrote:Would you work after work hours? Because i certainly wouldn't, There is no legitimate reason for him to do school work after school hours.

+1 kids need to be kids. Start homework on HS if it's so important.

Would you work after work hours? Because i certainly wouldn't, There is no legitimate reason for him to do school work after school hours.

I don't think that homework is valuable for early elementary school students.

I also don't think that disobeying legitimate authority when the request isn't harmful is an acceptable habit to condone (ignoring relatively small amounts of work assigned by the teacher could easily escalate).

I especially don't think that consist disobedience to parents should be taken lightly.

In this case I would care more about the pattern of defiance than about him doing the assignments themselves. He would be required to sit at the kitchen table for 15 minutes with the homework and a timer. I would write the teacher a note saying we were doing this and that he would be turning in whatever he was able to do by the end of the time. Both DS and I would sign the note after I read it out loud to him, because I believe in kids taking ownership of their choices.

I wouldn’t force it per se, but he would be getting zero screen time. 5-10 min is reasonable and I do think it’s important to get on the habit of doing a small amount of work on something. If he wants to say no, then there is consequences- I would do no screens unless he does his work

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:He is not into structure or rules at 6 years old? Yikes, you have a long road ahead.

I agree. Some of the attitudes in this thread are concerning. My child is in G&T and finds school very easy, but she still has to do the light weekly homework, even though she could do it in her sleep. It's about teaching children how to cope with the minor inconvenience of temporary boredom. It also helps with her handwriting. I don't plan to raise a child who thinks she's too good for a worksheet. Geez it's not like they have to write a 10 page paper.

+1 OP is flagging a bigger issue - kid is refusing to do a mere 10 mins of something the teacher & parent have asked them to do. That needs to be addressed. If some other parent is just anti-HW, that's not really relevant here.

OP I empathize bc my bright same-age kid is the same way. And I would not care if instead of HW they were doing other academic things like writing their own stuff, doing math puzzles etc. I do think habits are important and an aversion to spending a few mins thinking about what they learned during the day is a good thing.

If you truly have an oppositional kid, you likely need to be talking to experts. You may end up with a diagnosis or you may just get parenting tips to help all of you.

That said, whether truly oppositional or not, homework at this young age isn’t the hill to die on. I would tell the teacher we aren’t doing it and move on.