Hellobee

I couldn’t agree more! I taught lower elementary in a Montessori setting for awhile and in the beginning I struggled to find meaningful work to assign my students for homework and fell into the trap of mindless things like handwriting and math facts. After the first semester I finally found my groove and sent home a packet weekly with ideas for them to choose from and asked that they choose 3. It was a mix of things they could do with or without help and not everything had a written component (it was also tailored for different levels). I also let parents know that the homework was meant for enrichment, learning time management and study skills so while it would supplement their education it wasn’t the end of the world if they had a rough week and couldn’t get it done.

My work as a nanny highlights for me that homework can get out of hand. One teacher had the rule that if it didn’t get finished in school it was added to your homework but if you finished early you could work on your homework. I was working with a set of twins at the time and one would wind up with 25 minutes worth of work twice a week and the other would spend hours almost daily. At the age of 8 that is way too much time spent sitting still! For a child who works more slowly piling on the work it just detracts from their education- they become less engaged and more frustrated. And the flip side is that the other child worked so quickly because the job was to finish that the information didn’t usually “stick.”

I dig your posts, Mrs Cowgirl!

Re homework in Kindergarten: I agree. We are not there yet, but I do not think formal homework such as worksheets is necessary or desirable at that age. Five and six year-olds need some unstructured time (that isn’t in front of a screen)!

Have you read “The Homework Myth” by Alfie Kohn? It’s an excellent book for both parents and educators, as it questions many of the long-held beliefs that society seems to have regarding the value of homework.

I currently teach third grade but have taught Kindergarten. I couldn’t agree with your post more! Very well said!

That is great! I really hope we can find a great kindergarten teacher like this especially because my August baby will be the youngest in the class.

Just curious, what kind of information and reports do you send home? I know one thing love but want more of at our daycare is the little sheets that describe the topic they are studying and what they did that day. For example, theme is dinosaurs and they made “fossils”. I more want to know so that I can have follow up discussions at home with my daughter about this! I think the best “homework” is stuff that encourages thought and discussion!

@Cole: I agree, I hate when teachers just send unfinished work home. I have seen with my nephew how this has caused him to have a mentality to just race through the work to get it done but he doesn’t learn/understand it and it is messy and filled with errors.

Thanks for this! I have a 5 year old in Kindergarten and his teacher, thankfully, doesn’t assign homework to his class. This is good for him, cause he already gets pretty bored in school, and having him bored at home would just be sad.

Instead, he uses his after school time to exploit his creativity. Yesterday he came home and made a puppet show theater out of a carseat box. He often tells me he needs certain supplies for a craft project he comes up with in his head.

Letting him figure this stuff out is WAY nicer than making him sit and write words over and over again. And, sometimes he chooses to write a book or something, but it’s stuff he’s interested in for the moment, so I indulge him. :)

You know, I struggle enough with the thought that I won’t be there to pick up our daughter from the bus stop because I’ll be at work. I can’t imagine asking my 5 year old to come home at 6pm and do homework. It’s too much to handle. I don’t know what our school system does but if this is part of it, ill probably revolt.

I love your post and your teaching philosophy for young children. DD has 4 more years until Kindergarten but I hope her teacher will have your similar mindset. Young children thrive best when they are engaged and using their own imagination!

Somehow I missed your Kindergarten series and I just went back to read it – this is great and just gave me more ideas on things to do with DD. Thanks!

It’s not just kindergarten! I think it’s fair to say that we’re dealing with some of the same homework issues at the junior high level. In many instances, students have just stopped doing homework (too many extracurriculars? not enough time in the day? apathy? lack of parental support?). In a typical class, it’s not unusual for half the students to show up without their homework done. So, outside of math, many teachers have stopped assigning nightly homework. Advanced placement courses still get nightly homework, but otherwise homework is becoming the exception rather than the rule.

As always, great post! I was reading some information the other day about the benefits of extended play in Kindergartners and first graders, and I love that you encourage that kind of development. :) it’s incredible just how important play is to young kids, and worksheets just can’t produce the same results!

home with a sick kiddo today so i can reply to comments in the morning! ;)

@Cole: exactly! and after being at school all day, the last thing kiddos want to do is sit still at home so i can’t imagine homework was met with any kind of enthusiasm!

@Mary B — i have not read that book, but i love his stuff, so i will check it out! thanks for the recommendation!

@Thehistoryofus: i send home a weekly newsletter. it includes a review of what we focused on the previous week; what’s coming up for the next week; a website to extend or enrich learning or just for fun; and some questions to ask your kiddo about the things they’ve learned. it’s pretty basic, but a good way to send out info to families since so many kids won’t share much! :)

@Mrs. Tricycle: that’s so awesome that homework is recognized that way in junior high! sometimes i feel teachers send home homework just because we think that’s what we’re supposed to do and that’s what kids are supposed to do, so it’s great when age-old routines are revisited when they don’t seem to be working.

I think I favorite every blog post you write! :-)

Could you be my LO’s teacher when we move to NoVA? :)

@Mrs. Cowgirl: Just curious, do you have any suggestions or tips for how to encourage kids at the Elementary level (obviously probably later than kindergarten) but before they really understand why good grades are important? I know my nephews have really struggled with why it is important to get good grades, take your time on homework, etc.

Totally agree with this!! I hope LO’s future teachers feel as you do :)

I love that you do activity sheets (away from a screen) for parents. However, I think of the struggling learners..the ones that are behind and need the extra practice. Also there are the parents who are at a loss of ideas for interacting with their kids’ education. They can benefit by providing additional structure of homework. As an upper grade teacher, my daughter came home with ‘homework’ from preschool and I was thrilled! I couldn’t wait to do it together. Even my husband had fun making a book with her. For working parents who can prioritize evening time, Mon-Thurs for homework, it can open up dialogue/discussion etc for enhancing the school experience and reinforcing work habits. At our school we do 10 min HW for first grade in addition to reading…20 for 2nd…30 for 3rd and so on. So I’m pro-homework but with limits.

I completely agree.

@808love: I am totally one of those parents who is at a loss for what to do with my child, although blogs like HB and friends who are educators have helped. A worksheet is something tangible. But @Mrs. Cowgirl: I am one of those parents who have seen how much kindergarteners are getting for homework and it’s appalling. I agree with your approach and thanks for the link to the other post about activities to do with our kids!

this is great!! I love it – so wise and so fun.

LOVE THIS and couldn’t agree more! I hope N’s future kindergarten teacher is as wise and insightful as you. :)

The first year I taught kindergarten, their only “homework” was to get their agenda (a notebook with newsletters & daily info/notes) signed by their parents and returned. The focus was purely on learning to be responsible for “schoolwork” while at home.
The next year I taught a K/1 multiage. The firsties needed more tangible homework and parents were requesting it within the first week of school (I wait 2-3 weeks before starting homework)! So I made notebooks with a numbered list of activities to help practice skills (sort the silverware at the dinner table, look for sight words on the drive home, etc). They were easy to differentiate for kids at different levels, quick, fun, and seemed to help parents interact with their kids. There was a calendar in the front where I assigned different numbers each night. Gosh, I LOVED those notebooks.

My school now not only mandates homework (I’m teaching second), but the TYPE I must send. They must read & respond to a book each night, do a math worksheet from our curriculum, and practice their spelling words. I can’t say how much I hate this policy. It’s not productive for 75% of families, it’s a ton of paperwork for me to keep track of, and it’s a headache to have to “discipline” kids who don’t do it. Blerg, man.

@Thehistoryofus: unfortunately, there is no easy answer! it definitely depends on the kiddo…but to start i would find something to “hook” him in. for example, if he loves basketball, perhaps his parents could find him a book about basketball that is slightly above where he is reading and he could see the value of working on becoming a stronger reader. same with math — perhaps having him compare prices of a toy he is interested in and calculating the best deal, etc. i find that when children are given a real-life situations to see the importance of what they are learning, they are more interested in and understanding of what they are learning. i hope that helps!

@Weagle: aww, thanks :) are you seriously moving to my ‘hood? shoot me an email at cowgirl[at]hellobee[dot]com if you want to chat! :)

@808love: i’m pro-homework with limits for older children, too, but i don’t think homework is appropriate for kindergartners — at least not the traditional pencil-paper-turn-it-in-tomorrow-to-get-it-graded kind of homework.
i think it’s awesome that you and your husband set aside time to work with your daughter, and that’s where a list of activities or open-ended projects would probably be helpful. and it seems like that might be what you are already working on…i definitely encourage ideas and activities like that, but i don’t believe in sending home work that is “busy work” (for example, spelling worksheets in Kindergarten) or work that is so far above a child’s head that he needs lots of help completing every part of it.

and with regards to helping struggling students, i do send home activities that are review or reinforcement (an alphabet matching or memory game, for example). however, i firmly believe that the best thing for young struggling learners is a “double dose” with a highly trained teacher. in our school, we have built in lots of early intervention for kindergarten-second grade so that any student who is struggling can receive extra support at school. while i fully support and encourage a strong home-school connection and parent partnership (and certainly do not mean to offend), i think what struggling students need most is a second helping of what is already being done in the classroom (an extra guided reading lesson, for example) and i believe that can best be given by another trained teacher, especially when students are just learning developing a foundation for reading, writing, math, etc. i hope that makes sense!

Unfortunately, this doesn’t get better. I teach 2-year college level. I am trying to flip my classroom this semester. So they are responsible for reading the chapter and doing an interactive lecture. How many of them did it this week? 5 of 25. Yes 1/5 of my college students are even willing to prepare for the week. The idea is then they can do the “homework” in class where they can get support from other students and myself. We also do activities in class to reinforce the ideas. But if they don’t understand the ideas they cannot participate.

Why would I expect a 5 year old to do this. Reading and comprehension should be homework even in 5th or 6th grade. If they prepare for the next day then the class can be more productive. I also thing sending stuff that couldn’t be finished is appropriate for higher grades.

I do like the idea of things to do with the kids. I remember when my brother was in Kindergarten, he got a calendar with an activity for each day (like setting the table, etc). Those were awesome and give the parents a jumping spot. It also gets the kids ready for syllabi at older levels.

@mewtill: blergh, indeed!!! i haaaaaate reading responses. they are just so inauthentic…as adults, when we pleasure read, we don’t have to respond in writing — we chat with a friend about it to help us process and share our thoughts…isn’t that what we should encourage in our students if we want to them to love reading, too?

those notebooks *do* sound awesome! i will send home a similar calendar of sorts when asked, but i LOVE the idea of keeping it all in one notebook! so easy to manage, too!

hang in there and keep doing what you’re doing…you sound like an awesome teacher! p.s. i creepily just checked your profile to see where you were from. (haha!) and i know it’s huge state, but debbie miller is one of my favorites…;)

I love your philosophy! I think it makes more sense for young kids to engage in the world around them to learn during free time, rather than have mom/dad guide them through homework they can’t do on their own. So many years of homework will follow; why not start off light? :)

@Mrs. Cowgirl: Yes, I agree not giving a grade for HW and I’m all for the ‘double dose’ teaching too!

Our preschool has reading HW every night–they supply books and we record it and return. Then we get one homework assignment for the whole week. They keep it and are compiling it in a book so we can have a nice keepsake.

we’re not anywhere near being ready for school and homework, but i have heard other friends talk about how homework has changed over the years. i don’t ever remember homework in kindergarten or the younger years of school. i totally love your philosophy and hope when our girl gets into kindergarten she has a teacher like you!

@Mrs. Cowgirl: Not yet. Right now we live on the MD side, but we’re pretty sure we’ll end up in NoVA. Maybe Fairfax or as far out as Sterling. It’s a few years away though :)

I just wanted to tell you I love this post. You know my opinions on the subject… and I think you did a great job making your case here! I wish all teachers saw both sides of the argument!