Homework is Where the Heart Is

I'm fairly certain that I went to school everyday when I was in the second grade, it's just that I have no idea what I did when I was there. I remember some addition and subtraction; I remember that the class was divided into high, middle, and low reading groups; and I remember feeling bad that my best friend was in the low group. Our big math project was counting the seeds in a cherry tomato (tomatoes still make me a little nauseous thirty years later) and I wrote a report on my favorite dinosaur (triceratops) off the top of my head. Homework? Never.

Things have changed.

Alison's in the second grade, Henry's in kindergarten, and both of them have a significant amount of homework every night. Alison usually spends about sixty to ninety minutes, and Henry clocks in at about an hour. (I don't think I was doing that much until at least the fifth or sixth grade.)

Homework usually starts after dinner and bath time, somewhere around seven o'clock, which is probably our first mistake. The thing you have to realize, though, is that Hurricane Kate is swirling in the late afternoon, making conditions less than ideal for concentrating on math facts and identifying patterns. And so we wait.

Once Baby Kate is put to bed and homework gets started, the division of labor is clear. Alison and Henry attend a Spanish language dual immersion school, which is amazing. The problem, though, is that Alison's second grade Spanish has already outdistanced my high school Spanish. Since Leslie is fluent, she's in charge of Alison while I take care of Henry.

Henry's kindergarten homework is really just about learning how to learn, but the secret bonus is that it's also helped us learn how to learn together. Like most five-year-old boys, Henry can be frustrating sometimes. If he's not in the right mood he might scribble all over his paper and start to cry or roll around on the floor and dissolve into laughter, making me sure in either case that he'll one day make an excellent President of the United States.

Recently, though, things have been different. We both still get frustrated, and there are still evenings when the session ends in tears, but those aren't the norm. I'd love to take credit for the transformation, but the truth is that Henry has taught me more than I've taught him.

1. There will always be more homework
If he has trouble repeating a pattern of shapes on Monday night, I can be fairly sure that he'll do fine on Tuesday.
2. Tomorrow is another day
If we get a late start and it just make sense to spend another thirty minutes cutting out capital letters from the newspaper, we can always put it off until the next day. The world won't come to an end.
3. Stay within the lines
Okay, maybe he didn't teach me this one. Everyone knows that even if you're thinking outside the box, you still need to color within the lines. What he has taught me, though, is that there's a reason why kindergarten teachers ask for everything to be colored. Little boys have trouble with small activities like this, and Henry's no exception. Coloring is good practice.
4. Be patient
There's no need to worry if he can't recite the letters of his name in Spanish. He'll do it when he can do it. (And by the way, he can do it!)

The biggest thing that all this homework has done is given me an hour of uninterrupted time with my son every night, no small feat in a family of five. So whether we're deciding if an airplane should be colored purple or red, sorting words by their opening syllables, or discussing the trials and tribulations of Curious George, we're doing it together. I wouldn't have it any other way.

Comments

[J Simpson]

Hello,

I really enjoy your blog.

I was wondering if you had heard of www.dadlabs.com.

It's a really fun and informative video podcast dealing with all sorts of parenting issues.

You should check it out if you get a chance.

We need all the help we can get right?

Keep up the great work!

J

[Jeff]

As a new dad, I've gotten a lot of great parenting tips from http://www.dadlabs.com/ . It's a fantastic resource, I highly recommend it.

Jeff