Yeahhhh, so the homework thing…
September 23, 2008 at 12:45 am 3 comments
One of my concerns about my son entering a CPS Gifted Program was the homework. Edison and Bell are known to give copious amounts. The principal at our new school assured us that the CPS guideline is 15 minutes a night and she supported that. Well, that sounds like just a blip of time every evening.
So now, in fact, he does have homework virtually every night. Mercifully, it is given out in a weekly packet so parents can decide if they want to start good nightly habits or raise yet another generation of procrastinators who are trying to crank through the whole packet on Sunday nights.
Each assignment includes a few cute and appealing little worksheets that look as though they would take minutes to fill in. The challenge, of course, is keeping a Kindergartener focused enough to complete it. The challenge, of course, that makes me wonder how a teacher ever gets 27 5-year-olds to sit and do anything for more than 3 minutes. Clearly magic or witchcraft is involved.
Much of the homework involves writing, and perhaps the girls are more efficient, but getting a 5yo boy to write a whole page of letters is just slightly easier than convincing my dog to bring me breakfast in bed. The pauses, the wrong letters that spontaneously pop out of his pencil, the random drawing of a butt that needs to be made (“would my teacher think I was a jerk if I left that there?”) BTW, the universal butt symbol is a circle with a line going vertically down the center. It can easily be turned into an apple to disguise it. The gist is that these 2-4 little pages can end up taking freakin’ FOREVER to complete what with the goading, coercing, cajoling, slow writing, refocusing, doodling, etc.
Due to this, I actually had a homework nightmare this past week. I suspect it will replace the long-standing college stress dreams that I’ve had for 20 years. In the dream I had to turn in a kiddie homework assignment (yes, me) but somehow I couldn’t figure out the directions or what the teacher wanted. If this is starting in week 3 of Kindergarten, I’m looking at a lot of restless nights ahead.
Entry filed under: Homework, Regional Gifted Program. Tags: CPS Chicago Public School Kindergarten homework.
1. Janet | September 24, 2008 at 5:42 pm
You win the prize!!
I’m not sure what the contest was or what the prize is but you win! I love your blog and all the sarcasm within.
Now that I have buttered you up … I’d love it if you would take charge of something at your new school. Let me know when you’re ready to chat.
Signed,
Janet
aka ‘That PTO Mom that you should run away from’
2. Ryan | October 2, 2008 at 10:57 am
Love it! My son, Liam, is in Quinn’s class and it is so nice to hear about the homework. He is my first, so this is all new to me and I was wondering if anyone else had a hard time getting their child to focus long enough to do the homework. Thanks for doing this, really enjoying it:)
3. Peggy | December 25, 2008 at 7:50 pm
Is it Edison and Bell sending home handwriting worksheets? My kids’ preschool does this and it drives me insane….it is pretty much totally unacceptable education practice to still be sending home “packets” in this day and age. Specifically worksheets. And gifted kids? This kind of stuff kills the joy of learning in all kids, especially gifted kids! I wonder if this changes part way into the year? Do they assign more creative things now?
It was so dissapointing to read that even the “good” schools are using such antiquated practices!