Tuesday, February 10, 2009

5 Tips for Homework

I have made no secret of my big, giant FAIL at homework time. These are the 5 things that help me to get through the afternoon. Well, when I remember to do them all!

  1. Have a talk with the kids-about their day, what is coming up that evening, what they had for lunch, anything! to reconnect.
  2. Remember to send them to the potty!
  3. Snacks. Headless Boy#1's second grade teacher had a session called "Chew and Do" and it helps for them to be able to munch while they get to work. I keep goldfish crackers around for this.
  4. Quiet voices. (Stop laughing!) If you know anything about me or my household IRL you're sure to find this one funny. I am loud. My kids can be pretty loud. I have found that if I keep my voice-volume and tone-lower than normal that they respond to me more calmly.
  5. Let them choose the order of the papers that they do. The boys bring home a weeks' worth of homework at a time. HB#1 has to turn things in on certain days: I let him choose if he wants to do worksheet A first or read. HB#2 turns in the whole packet at once so I tell him that he has to do 2 (or 3, or 4) pages per day but he can choose any of the worksheets in the packet. If he does all of the math on the first day, great, but he still has to do the rest of the work at some point.
And actually I have a bonus tip:

Don't forget to breathe!

Do you have any other tips? I'll gladly take suggestions!

Oh, and don't forget to go back to Shannon's place for more Works For Me Wednesday tips!

Headless Mom

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Homework time is something we need help with around here. Thanks for the tips!

kyooty said...

homework is hard work here for 1 but easy peasy if I can get #2 to focus as soon as he gets in the house. #1, I have to first unglue his eyeballs from the TV, or a book. If he reads first he can easily get sucked into the book for too long and everything else is forgotten.

Kaycee said...

My oldest has a spelling test every week and I have a hard time getting him to focus long enough to practice his spelling words. What works for me is making him practice in the car while he's strapped to his seat. I keep the list with me in the front seat and call the words out to him.

We do this every morning on the way to school and his test scores have sky rocketed.

Anonymous said...

Uuugggghhhhh! I fail at homework time on a consistent basis too. Just the other day I was scrambling to correct homework that I had completely forgotten to follow up on....two minutes before we were supposed to be leaving for school!

Good tips! And... way to go to realize the whole vocal influence thing! Me? I have the girls sit in front of me while I cook dinner....I flip between 6th grade geometry and 2nd grade spelling while I stir the spaghetti sauce....It's a wonder it ever tastes halfway decent! :)

Anonymous said...

Yeah I got in! (took 6 tries but got your post to show)

Anyways.
This is what I have to add...
ROUTINE.

Homework is done at exactly the same time every single day.
Home 2:30
Snack/TV. relax
3:00 sharp is homework at kitchen table with snacks...
no breaks...until it is all done. All of it. I don't accept the- "I will do that after dinner" thing. Nope we do it till it is done. Ours only takes AT MOST an hour.

Kids don't fight me on this. Because they think this is the ONLY way. Like any good mother...I have brainwashed them in thinking this is THE LAW. And I may or may not have threatend to call the police once. Maybe.Once.