Healthy Homework Happiness Part 1
If you’re having problems getting your kids to do their homework, or worse, getting stressed with it yourself, then this is for you. We are going to discuss several issues that come up with regards to homework, and some possible solutions to them. To the average Naples family, education is the most important aspect of their children’s lives. Doing your bit to help in the most productive way is the best thing you can do to aid development.
One of the most common beliefs is that you as a parent have to help them with the homework because your child doesn’t understand it. While this might be true sometimes, homework is generally set after the child has learned something, not before. The whole premise of homework is to give the child work to reinforce what they have learned during that day or week. To spend more time on the subject than they have time for in school.
It isn’t beyond a child to pretend they don’t understand so you will do the work for them. Careful balance is needed here, between helping your child genuinely understand the work, and relieving them of the burden of it completely.
Help with it by all means, but never do it for them, and never worry about sending them to school with it uncompleted. One of the best lessons a child needs to learn from education is consequence. If the homework doesn’t get done out of laziness, inattention in class or because they lied about having any, then consequence is something they will have to contend with. It’s an important lesson every parent needs their child to learn for them to lead a happy and healthy life.
On the positive side, sometimes a child does genuinely need your help with their work. This is a good bonding exercise for you and should be a time for mutual understanding a respect. Helping, but not doing the work is the best way to help your child develop in the way they need to. It might seem a little unfair at the time, but struggle, failure, and seemingly insurmountable problems are all part of life, and a child will need to learn to cope with them. Doing so in a relatively low risk situation like homework is a great way of gaining that experience.
If you have a problem at work and can’t complete a task, you would ask your immediate superior for help, but only so far as to learn the task, not to get them to do it for you. The same principle applies in education. Help by all means, give the child the tools to solve the problem themselves and they will grow. Do it for them and chances are they will become weak and lazy.
There’s no hard a fast rule here. If your child regularly needs help with homework there might be more to it, and a chat with the teacher is in order. If the child needs only occasional help, then by all means lend them a hand. Like most aspects of parenting it’s a judgment call.
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