Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not an expert here, but wondering how much time your son gets to run around and have unscheduled time alone. My kid can't focus as well if he hasn't had any break after school.

OP here-he attends SACC after school and they have some playground time and then homework time after. For a while, he was getting everything done during that period but there was a teacher there monitoring and assisting the older kids in another room so he was able to stay on task. That has stopped and now, he's in the gym with all the other kids and lots of distractions and all the things that are going on are a lot more interesting than the hundredth math or language worksheet he's trying to do.

The teacher responded to my DH's email basically saying that DS has enough time to do everything and that he requires redirection to stay on task. She had been using some strategies to help him with that but that seems to have waned. I am not sure how I am supposed to monitor that when I am not sitting in the classroom with him all day. He seems to find all these worksheets boring and would rather read or talk to his friends or stare out the window. It's a bit of a vicious cycle and I don't know how to help him. Of course, he has to learn to manage his work and his time but I don't really see the benefit of multiple worksheet packets and homework every single night for a 9 year old. Isn't running around and playing with after being in school all day important?

And no, I have no reason to think he has ADHD.

OP- I'm curious why you have no reason to think your DS has ADHD. My DS9 has ADHD and the overwhelming symptom at school is becoming distracted when he needs to be doing class work.

I'm not saying your son does have ADHD- I'm asking why you think he doesn't?

OP here- I guess because I am not that familiar with the symptoms and until reading about other posters experiences with their children, it had not occurred to me that he could have ADHD. I just thought he was a standard bored and distracted 9 y/o. Now I am reconsidering. While I am working on getting a formal evaluation, I purchased this book: http://www.amazon.com/Smart-but-Scattered-Revolutionary-Executive/dp/1593854455?ie=UTF8&psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00, which I'm already finding very helpful. We had a huge meltdown yesterday over catching up some writing assignments and just a little bit more insight into what may be going on was helpful in getting through that and getting the work done....eventually.

Driven to Distraction is another good book.

You can also watch some of Dr. Barkley's lectures and talks on youtube. One of his things is that ADHD is essentially misnamed -- it's an attention regulation disorder, not attention deficit. Hyperactivity is not a critical element of ADHD and, in fact, causes a lot of kids, especially girls, to be missed.

It's very hard for kids the majority of kids to focus and not get distracted doing homework at SACC.

It's a long day for a 9 yr old and he is probably pretty tired by the end of the day and his ability to concentrate on anything mildly challenging is likely gone.

At our house, I put a cap on homework at 30 minutes. If it doesn't get done, it doesn't get done. We usually have a little time in the morning as well and I have found that some worksheets, my child can zip through at 7:30am that she was slogging through at 7pm the night before.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I boycott homework but my kid is in K, so it's entirely possible I may change my mind later.

I think it's really inappropriate for schools to expect kids to get home at 6pm and start homework at what, 7 at night? I'm not sure that a kid is likely to learn anything from that.

Agree with PPs -- the school needs to coordinate so that there's appropriate coverage of homework in aftercare.

It is not the school's fault your kids gets home at 6. It is not like school ends at 5:30.
Ds is in 1st. The days that I pick him up on the later side I tell him he needs to do his homework in aftercare. He usually does it and when he does not he has to do it at home.
Those are rushed nights, but running around instead of doing homework at aftercare was his choice.

It seems like OP thinks the teacher should give less homework and SACC should make sure her son does his homework. I am not sure how OP is not understanding that as the parent she needs to make sure her son does school work during the day and his homework sometime between school end and bedtime.

If OP thinks DS might had issues she needs to get him evaluated. If not she needs to explain to him that he needs to buckle down in class and get his work done

It's not anyone's fault that kids get home at six ... what a weird way to think of it. But if teachers are assigning homework and expecting that kids are able to learn and reinforce classroom material at 7pm, they are kidding themselves. Young children are not going to be learning effectively under those circumstances. And if they are expecting that kids are doing this at 4pm, they need to better understand the contexts of the kids lives.

Does your aftercare provide homework support? A quiet place where kids can sit and concentrate? (And what is SACC??) Ours doesn't--not for young kids. In later elementary (4-5) they do, but those kids are also much more able to independently be organized and engaged in doing their homework independently.

School Age Child Care

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not an expert here, but wondering how much time your son gets to run around and have unscheduled time alone. My kid can't focus as well if he hasn't had any break after school.

OP here-he attends SACC after school and they have some playground time and then homework time after. For a while, he was getting everything done during that period but there was a teacher there monitoring and assisting the older kids in another room so he was able to stay on task. That has stopped and now, he's in the gym with all the other kids and lots of distractions and all the things that are going on are a lot more interesting than the hundredth math or language worksheet he's trying to do.

The teacher responded to my DH's email basically saying that DS has enough time to do everything and that he requires redirection to stay on task. She had been using some strategies to help him with that but that seems to have waned. I am not sure how I am supposed to monitor that when I am not sitting in the classroom with him all day. He seems to find all these worksheets boring and would rather read or talk to his friends or stare out the window. It's a bit of a vicious cycle and I don't know how to help him. Of course, he has to learn to manage his work and his time but I don't really see the benefit of multiple worksheet packets and homework every single night for a 9 year old. Isn't running around and playing with after being in school all day important?

And no, I have no reason to think he has ADHD.

OP- I'm curious why you have no reason to think your DS has ADHD. My DS9 has ADHD and the overwhelming symptom at school is becoming distracted when he needs to be doing class work.

I'm not saying your son does have ADHD- I'm asking why you think he doesn't?

OP here- I guess because I am not that familiar with the symptoms and until reading about other posters experiences with their children, it had not occurred to me that he could have ADHD. I just thought he was a standard bored and distracted 9 y/o. Now I am reconsidering. While I am working on getting a formal evaluation, I purchased this book: http://www.amazon.com/Smart-but-Scattered-Revolutionary-Executive/dp/1593854455?ie=UTF8&psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00, which I'm already finding very helpful. We had a huge meltdown yesterday over catching up some writing assignments and just a little bit more insight into what may be going on was helpful in getting through that and getting the work done....eventually.

Never in a million years would I have guessed a year ago that DD would be diagnosed with ADHD - but it turns out she does. ADHD inattentive. Homework issues and her inability to focus at school (while appearing to be participating, not hyper at all) were the key issues before we had her evaluated.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not an expert here, but wondering how much time your son gets to run around and have unscheduled time alone. My kid can't focus as well if he hasn't had any break after school.

OP here-he attends SACC after school and they have some playground time and then homework time after. For a while, he was getting everything done during that period but there was a teacher there monitoring and assisting the older kids in another room so he was able to stay on task. That has stopped and now, he's in the gym with all the other kids and lots of distractions and all the things that are going on are a lot more interesting than the hundredth math or language worksheet he's trying to do.

The teacher responded to my DH's email basically saying that DS has enough time to do everything and that he requires redirection to stay on task. She had been using some strategies to help him with that but that seems to have waned. I am not sure how I am supposed to monitor that when I am not sitting in the classroom with him all day. He seems to find all these worksheets boring and would rather read or talk to his friends or stare out the window. It's a bit of a vicious cycle and I don't know how to help him. Of course, he has to learn to manage his work and his time but I don't really see the benefit of multiple worksheet packets and homework every single night for a 9 year old. Isn't running around and playing with after being in school all day important?

And no, I have no reason to think he has ADHD.

OP- I'm curious why you have no reason to think your DS has ADHD. My DS9 has ADHD and the overwhelming symptom at school is becoming distracted when he needs to be doing class work.

I'm not saying your son does have ADHD- I'm asking why you think he doesn't?

Regarding evaluations and diagnoses .... we stared with a developmental pediatrician in K who diagnosed ADHD combined type after questionaires and a short evaluation. She was covered by insurance so only a copay out of pocket. We ended up getting a full evaluation at Mindwell in Chantilly a year or so later that identified DS's LD and gave us a full report we could use with the school. It was $2.5k out of pocket but well worth it.

New poster here.
While I think evaluation might be a good idea, I have a feeling that some kids are just not fit for public school with its traditional teaching methods. It may also be that they are late bloomers and would do so much better if they were held back a year.
My son is kind of like that, from what I see. He does pretty well when there is someone who can sit down with him and get things started- it seems like he can be overwhelmed by the mere grandiosity of the project. Then he pitches in, but he may need someone just to get the ball rolling. He has also developed resistance to things such as worksheets. He learns best if given new material casually, through play or discussion.
He is in K, however. It is near the end of the year that he started developing an interest in reading and spelling, while many of his peers are reading books like Diary of a Wimpy Kid.
We did have trouble with homework-not in school- on a rare occasion he hasn't finished stuff in class, he is pretty willing to finish it after bathtime to delay his bedtime - but in his second language classes. It has always been a struggle and I have taken him out of two classes because teachers were so keen on making him do homework. I am teaching him at home now and will enroll him in private lessons next year with a specific request of no homework.
I have a feeling that he is just a late bloomer. We shall see.