Helping kids with assignments
-
@paekakboyz said in Helping kids with assignments:
@rancid-schnitzel was he in on the re-write? Like did you take him through it or debrief him on what and why? Like all skills practice is impt, and that's true for writing.
Other bit is will the teacher spot the difference and spot the parental 'polish š¤£Thatās the problem isnāt it? Luckily my son loves words and often selects the most ridiculous solutions. But eyebrows may have been raised. I went through it with him but will he then just dump the next assignment on me because he knows Iāll fix it or will he take it all on board?
Teenage boy: easy option vs hard option. Iād say 95% will take the easy route.
-
@rancid-schnitzel said in Helping kids with assignments:
Some of the Ferners who have had/currently have kids in high school may have some thoughts regarding this. My son had a humanities assignment which was a bit of a dogās breakfast. I went through it and ended up almost rewriting the entire thing. He hands it in and gets an A. Did I do the right thing or should I not intervene? To be fair there are subjects like maths and science that heās really good at (much better than me) but it still troubles me a bit. I reckon most kids get assistance, but how much?
Just on that, a good Mate of mine at high school was not the brightest spark (was a prop of course š) and his dad started doing his assignments to get him through. His dad was pissed off that he was only getting Cs š¤£. Mate remains a loveable deadshit so nothing was really gained there.
Personally speaking as someone who is in the industry, I guess I would ask whether your help is going to help him do the next assignment, or whether your help is making you feel better about how he will look when he hands in his assignment to his teacher?
If it has 'teach him how to fish' aspects, then I think your involvement (even if it goes too far sometimes) is a good thing, but if it is not about him developing academic or critical thinking skills, then you're better off letting him struggle.
I would add that the fact you are asking yourself this question probably means that your son is already in a good percentile for being parented.
-
@rancid-schnitzel well you could hassle him to produce a workable draft earlier, go through it with him, then he makes the changes. It can appear magical when you actually push to get a draft, leave it a bit, then review. Often lots of easy wins to tidy stuff up.
As long as you are still making sure it's his responsibility that is awesome parenting imo - like @gt12 said the fact you are checking around this means you're doing well bro.Is it the ideas bit or the more technical parts of writing that needs work?
-
@rancid-schnitzel the best investment you can make in your child for essays is helping them develop a process to create their ideas, and then structure how they express them.
I work with some folks with decades of experience who blast ideas onto the page like a shotgun. It is crazy.
And, as others said, if you are self aware enough to ask the question, you're probably doing a great job. Keep it up. Circlejerks are real
-
@paekakboyz said in Helping kids with assignments:
@rancid-schnitzel well you could hassle him to produce a workable draft earlier, go through it with him, then he makes the changes. It can appear magical when you actually push to get a draft, leave it a bit, then review. Often lots of easy wins to tidy stuff up.
As long as you are still making sure it's his responsibility that is awesome parenting imo - like @gt12 said the fact you are checking around this means you're doing well bro.Is it the ideas bit or the more technical parts of writing that needs work?
Technical parts and structure.He writes some really good stuff but canāt be arsed checking it properly. For instance this latest assignment had no introduction or conclusion. Itās him in a nutshell really - a million different thoughts racing through his head and unable to focus on the task at hand. Heās a brilliant artist so maybe thatās an artist thing?
-
@rancid-schnitzel said in Helping kids with assignments:
@paekakboyz said in Helping kids with assignments:
@rancid-schnitzel well you could hassle him to produce a workable draft earlier, go through it with him, then he makes the changes. It can appear magical when you actually push to get a draft, leave it a bit, then review. Often lots of easy wins to tidy stuff up.
As long as you are still making sure it's his responsibility that is awesome parenting imo - like @gt12 said the fact you are checking around this means you're doing well bro.Is it the ideas bit or the more technical parts of writing that needs work?
Technical parts and structure.He writes some really good stuff but canāt be arsed checking it properly. For instance this latest assignment had no introduction or conclusion. Itās him in a nutshell really - a million different thoughts racing through his head and unable to focus on the task at hand. Heās a brilliant artist so maybe thatās an artist thing?
[Without know anything about your boy]
It's often a tendency for young writers to think of an academic piece of work as an answer to a question rather than as a task which requires them to develop a full piece of work that should introduce the question, discuss the arguments, then summarize them.
It's the second skill that teachers want to see, but it's sometimes not clearly explained to students why that is important (e.g., why being able to work from the topic to a question to a thesis is a good way of setting up problems for solutions with people who don't know the background of the issue).
-
my eldest who is in his first year of high school is pretty literal. He's really good at math, because it has a correct answer. And a process.
He's battling a little with English because he tends to recite facts rather than delve any deeper and find meaning
He had a assessment due this week that helped him a bit on. And that's where it becomes tough. Remembering he is 12, so his level of insight should be reflective of that, not mine. I try and ask questions more than anything, so make him think for himself to get there. But then also sometimes i'll suggest wording to prod him along. I am trying to help him see what is required more than anything
but it's really fucking tough to not pile in there and "over help". The boy needs to succeed and fail on his own terms. Someone who always wins doesn't learn much.
-
TR Jnr struggles to put it all on paper (or tap the keyboard as it is now)
We helped him with a Geo assignment, where he would sit there dumbfounded at the questions being asked, claiming he has zero idea about it. Then Mrs and I start discussing the points of the questions tocome up with the answers, and he chimes in with all the relevant points.
-
is there an opportunity for those of you with kids to do each others home work...then you can honestly say you didn't do your kids homework
(sorry for the lighthearted derailment)
-
I'll try to stop commenting too much, but one question I think is useful is: What have you been practicing lately in class?
Most teachers will be looking for students to show the skills they have been practicing with the extension of the student needing to go through most of the process by themselves, but in many situations kids don't really understand that the task is to do that (i.e., show that you've mastered shit you've been doing in class with lots of help) and think that the assignment is something that requires them to show new skills that they haven't any idea about.
A second thing I would always suggest is to ask your kid for the grading rubric - this should be given to students when they get the assignment (usually at least) and I think there is value in asking them to discuss what they think is required to get a certain grade, then aiming for that grade. So, for example to get an A grade, one part of it it may say 'draw on a range of legitimate sources' and you can hopefully get from your kid that they shouldn't use Wikipedia etc but should find higher quality sources. If kids can start doing that process with assignments that can start developing the regulatory skills that transfer across to real life - OK, I've got this task, I've got this much time, I can do this much with my existing skills, what is required for me to keep my job and not cause enough shit to get my boss in trouble (C grade), be unmemorable in a good way (B grade), get a good on you from the boss (A grade) or show that I'm trying to develop my skills to put myself in line for a promotion (A+) .
-
Very relevant now. Just found out that he has an exam next week in which he has to write an essay. English not Humanities, but still need to have correct structure, intro, 3 points, conclusion etc. Obviously it would take James Bond levels of villainry to be able to do it for him this time. I guess the moral of the story is that they will be caught out in the end. This will be a test to see if heās actually learnt anything. I really hope so but goddam itās frustrating.
-
@rancid-schnitzel
Do kids these days still have to hand in essay plans prior to the actual assignment? Apologies if already mentioned, you know, reading š...
At A level stage (16-18) we would basically have to map out the essay in bullet point style, in order,no more than one side of A4 and then hand that in first. The teach' would then mark it and make suggestions to the order of points or any gaping holes etc. Kids who didnt get the plans done were always the ones who got lower marks, it just prepared you better.Maybe you help him at this stage? Just an idea.
I carried on doing this throughout Uni as it was pretty standard practice then, always left you with a handy revision sheet!
Re: helping kids with homework, I may or may not be a dab hand with a crayon... š Can't help but speed up the colouring when she's on a go slow.
-
My advice as a secondary school humanities teacher with 20+ years experience is to leave them to it. It is their work. In the long-term it will be their love of learning, their curiosity and their willingness to work independently which will drive their success more than anything else.
What you can do that will really help:
-
Talk to your kids about their work and what they are studying at the moment.
-
Make sure there are high-quality reading materials about the house. Buy books for your kids by their favourite writers or order them through your local library. Think about getting your kids a subscription to a couple of weekly/monthly journals that contain great writing about something they are interested in.
-
Watch some high-quality documentaries or listen to some podcasts together. Talk about them afterwards.
-
Encourage them to take risks with their writing and to enjoy it. Don't write the same piece twice. If their writing contains fluency, energy and wit, that's half the battle.
-
Encourage your kid to have a mature attitude to feedback. Don't worry too much about marks outside national exams. Failure is a great teacher. Very few people are natural writers. For most writers, it is a skill learnt over many years. The more constructive but critical feedback you can get about your writing the better.
-
-
@sparky said in Helping kids with assignments:
My advice as a secondary school humanities teacher with 20+ years experience is to leave them to it. It is their work. In the long-term it will be their love of learning, their curiosity and their willingness to work independently which will drive their success more than anything else.
What you can do that will really help:
-
Talk to your kids about their work and what they are studying at the moment.
-
Make sure there are high-quality reading materials about the house. Buy books for your kids by their favourite writers or order them through your local library. Think about getting your kids a subscription to a couple of weekly/monthly journals that contain great writing about something they are interested in.
-
Watch some high-quality documentaries or listen to some podcasts together. Talk about them afterwards.
-
Encourage them to take risks with their writing and to enjoy it. Don't write the same piece twice. If their writing contains fluency, energy and wit, that's half the battle.
-
Encourage your kid to have a mature attitude to feedback. Don't worry too much about marks outside national exams. Failure is a great teacher. Very few people are natural writers. For most writers, it is a skill learnt over many years. The more constructive but critical feedback you can get about your writing the better.
That is all good advice. Unfortunately itās not what they get judged on.
You are pretty much describing my son. Had the effort and attitude but the system told him that he wasnāt that good. Luckily he hung on to the attributes and they serve him well in running his own business.
Could have easily taken the āscoringā feedback to heart and undersold himself. -
-
As another person working in the "industry" I really don't think it's a good idea although I can understand why a parent wants to help out their kids.
But, there's lots of opportunities for tertiary students to cheat these days (including contract cheating - which is essentially what was done in this example) so you really do not want to normalise it in any way.
-
Nah chuck em to the sharks. Little bastards learn quicker that way
Look, I recently taught my daughter some methods on how to algebra properly, and she's finally getting it despite "hating" maths.
I think taking them through what you've done is important the first couple of times, then walk back the help as fast as they can take it.
My wife recently rewrote significant portions of my daughter's creative piece, and unsurprisingly it was even wordier than the word limit she'd already breached
Top marks aren't the end of the world.
-
Cheers for the feedback. Much appreciated.
Ultimately you want them to achieve their potential. My youngest is on an academic scholarship and should really be a straight A student. He learnt the Cyrillic alphabet for fun! He doesnāt even need to put in that much effort. But he has to be switched on and by God that is a daily struggle. Hope he grows out of it. Itās one of the reasons I donāt want him playing rugby. You have to be focussed and switched on when on the field. If not you can get badly hurt. Heās likely to be thinking about the symmetry of the ball or something.
