The importance of homework must be considered. Homework is a critical element in a child’s learning and development journey. Children spend more time at home than in school. The limited time and exposure in school require reinforcement in learning in the form of homework.
Homework Serves the Following Critical Purposes
- It extends classroom learning to homes and helps reinforce classroom learning.
- Homework allows children to practice certain activities to gain mastery.
- It helps develop independence as children are expected to work independently, ideally without much supervision or help.
- It helps in developing good time management skills.
- Creates a sense of responsibility in children
- Completing homework can develop a sense of pride, accomplishment, and achievement among children.
- Working diligently to complete the homework helps create a work ethic amongst children from a young age.
Let’s Look at the Top 10 Homework Tips for Parents to Help their Children with Homework
These tips broadly cover the setting in which homework is being done and parents’ role in children’s reading. Parents will find these homework tips extremely useful in their daily lives.
1. Appropriate Setting
The child’s environment while working on their homework must be conducive, enabling, and supportive of the task. Parents must take care of the following tips about providing a conducive workspace:
- Ensure the area is well-lit so that it doesn’t strain the eyes of the child, which might lead to early fatigue and lethargy in the short term and damage to the eyes in a long time. There should be comfortable seating, and the ambient temperature should be as comfortable as possible. It is essential to strike the right balance when it comes to comfort. Extreme comfort could be sleep-inducing.
- The setting must be quiet and devoid of distractions such as televisions, noise, games, smartphones, and other family members. Sometimes even a bed or a couch could distract the child into slumber. Suppose the homework involves the usage of smartphones or computers. In that case, parents must employ necessary precautions such as parental control and proxies or firewalls to block access to inappropriate or unwanted content. Required supplies, such as pens, paper, pencils, erasers, calculators, geometry boxes, etc., are available within easy reach of the child. Frequent fetching of various items can lead to unnecessary wastage of time and energy and might also lend them to environmental distractions.
2. Guidance and Support
While homework is meant for the student, parents have a significant role to play actively and passively to achieve the desired objectives. Parents can use the following homework tips regarding their function and involvement in the homework activity.
3. Create a Homework Routine
Include homework as an essential daily task in your child’s daily routine and stick to it without fail. Time slots can be created based on the child’s preference, availability, productivity patterns, environmental conduciveness, and availability of the parents. Parents must lead by example to stick to the homework rigor and routine. Deviation from practice must not be encouraged unless in emergency and unavoidable circumstances.
4. Understand Your Role
Homework can be of different types and degrees of complexity and difficulty. Depending on the subject matter and the child’s age, various homework tasks require different levels of parental involvement. Parents need to ascertain their role in the homework process. Keeping in touch with the teachers can be helpful in this regard.
5. Keep in Touch with the Teachers
Parents must routinely interact with teachers to understand their role in the development of their children. Interaction with teachers can also help parents understand the performance of their children. Through these interactions, parents and teachers can work cohesively and in sync to achieve the overall development goals of the child and help the child understand the importance of homework. Read more about the tips for parents from preschool teachers.
6. Be Available
Your child might get stuck and look for help. Make sure you are around, available, and approachable for any quick help, guidance, or troubleshooting. A proper balance is required here. A slight bit of “keeping a watch” might keep the child focused on the task and away from distractions. However, excessive micromanagement of assigned readings can also defeat the purpose and importance of homework in the child’s mind. It is essential to set the right expectation with the child. Parents must come across as approachable but not excessively intrusive.
7. Encourage Self-Reliance
Allow your child to take ownership over their homework process and make mistakes – this gives them the confidence to tackle complex challenges independently and learn from experience. Parents must sense the objectives of the assignment and calibrate their involvement in helping the child appropriately. Slight nudges in the right direction might be helpful. However, excessive hand-holding might prove to be counterproductive.
8. Instil Positive Work Ethics
Homework can be a good opportunity for parents to instill planning and organizing skills among children. Managing the timely completion of homework across multiple subjects daily could be a powerful learning ground for children to develop skills such as time management, planning, and execution. Discourage multi-tasking.
9. Keep Track
Keeping track of performance on routine homework is an excellent opportunity for parents to keep regular track of their children’s academic performance. Parents should look for any patterns that indicate areas for improvement and work with teachers to take appropriate countermeasures. These tracking routines can also unearth specific hidden talents or strengths in the child, which, if acted upon early, can lead to a fruitful future and career.
10. Look for Teachable Moments
Parents must look for “teachable moments” while helping their children with homework. A teachable moment is “an event or an experience which presents a good opportunity for learning something about a particular aspect of life.” Parents can use such opportunities to instill specific values related to the real world they are preparing to face. Such moments can help children understand how their learning will help them navigate real life and succeed.
These homework tips for parents can help them achieve holistic developmental growth for their children. Homework time is a vital bonding time between parents and children. Effective use of these homework tips can ensure this time between parents and children is spent well. Read more about the best positive parenting tips every parent should know.
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