(GLO — Feb/10 — From a year ago… more musing on homework dynamics…)
A friend recently shared the contents of a message home from school, where his child’s teacher was appealing for help at home reminding students where homework assignments can be found online and reminding them to get that work done in a timely fashion.
Innocent enough.
But the reaction at home was… unwelcome.
Home is already a very busy place.
Parents already have a lot to “nag” their children about.
Homework is where the rubber meets the road in the home/school “partnership”, and where everyday the home is reminded what a one-sided relationship that actually is. And “you do this instead of me”-type delegation can get old fast when the parent as co-educator is given no resources, no warning, no scheduling coordination and no training or understanding in what the value of that “do-ing” holds.
The reality is that in the increasingly demanding and competitive world of schooling that represents only 15% of a child’s time before adulthood, work at home and in the world during the other 85% is both unavoidable and necessary for success. but when 99.99% of the resources are hoarded by schools, and barely 0.01% are shared meaningfully with their “co-educator partners” at home… it’s hard for those parent co-educators to “get it”.
And really hard for them to care.
And really hard for them to keep plodding along for 13 years from K-12.
Sure, in theory, it’s all about the kids.
But when the money goes 99.99% to the school, and time and reality go 85% to the home, it’s hard to remember who it’s all really for.
GLO
gordotto@parentsnschools.com
P.S. I occasionally refer to schools as “government learning facilities”. But they could also be characterized as “government teaching facilities”. Because while the learning is oft times hit and miss, what is assured is the teaching… the employment, the benefits, the pensions, the management, the scheduling and the structure. Government schooling is in many respects about delivery of teaching. If it were entirely about delivery of learning, a great deal else would enter into its operations… including resources for the home and that “other 85%” of children’s life and learning.
Homework is where that uncomfortable reality rubs and chafes.