Q. My child is in fourth grade and his teacher had parents sign a contract that we would enroll our child in two days of art (like drawing, painting, piano, guitar, theater, etc.) and two days of fitness (like swimming, dance, basketball, tennis).
In exchange for this, the teacher sends no written homework – only studying for tests. If you choose not to do the contract, you get written homework every day. What do you think about this for a fourth-grade child?
As a parent, it has been a wonderful year, very relaxing, but I worry that the work ethic fell quite a bit. My child no longer “feels” that thing where you feel like you have to do homework when you get home. He relaxes, eats a snack, goes to practice, and his grades are strong with B’s more than A’s, but he has always been like that.It’s the teacher’s first year doing it.
A. I am just guessing here, but I bet many parents are reading this thinking they wish their children had your teacher. As a parent and a teacher, I admire this teacher’s experiment. You said it was her first year trying this, and I would imagine she will be studying the impact of the contract and the homework, or lack thereof.
My fear as a teacher would be those parents that sign the contract and do not take the children to the extracurricular activities, but enjoy the reduced workload. I have never tried something like this, but I would love to hear from your teacher to learn the results she is finding in the classroom.
Homework really should be independent practice of concepts learned in school. I like kids to go home to practice math and writing particularly. When they are alone, they should try to practice what we learned and turn to parents for help when they cannot quite do it alone. Fourth grade is the year kids become upper elementary students who are more proficient. The work is more difficult in math; having the kids step back through their lessons on their own is valuable as you work toward tests.
Children should also read for at least half hour a day, aside from homework, so I hope your teacher mentioned this.
Parents often step in quite a bit doing written homework for the kids anyway, so stopping homework for a year isn’t likely to hurt most kids, but it will work against others – those who do not get concepts quickly and need a lot of practice.
I think all kids should try different extracurricular activities at this age, and a balance between art and fitness is perfect. I am not sure if you need four days a week, but because of how this teacher set up the contract, it does sound like the right amount. Many of us often have kids in sports with practices this often anyway. Students who participate in the arts often have higher grades and open more academic doors.
Kids with homework and activities often do not have time for TV or video games during the week, but that is not a negative thing in my estimation. Kids do need unstructured time to be silly and sit with their thoughts to get ideas and find independent interests, so this experiment might be worthy of consideration for the rest of us.
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goasktheteacher@yahoo.com.
