My Son Doesn’t Want to Do His Homework

Sit with him and make him do it. My daughter is 6 too. She gets no Tv or playtime until homework is done.

I agree with Kellhy at this young age, you or dad need to sit with him until his work if finished. In time he will develope good study habits and work on his own. What you do now will set the pace.

Blessings....

He is 6!! He is not a teenager.
Sure the homework isn't difficult, but he sees it as punishment. You've relegated him to his desk in his room. There are also thousands of distractions in there...
Have him sit at the dining room or kitchen table.
Have him do his homework the minute he walks in the door. Make sure he has a small snack and a drink when he arrives home. Put it on the table so it's there where he is going to work.
You stay in the kitchen/dining room with him. Read the notices that were sent home, fill out the forms, do bills or whatever. In essence you do your homework while he does his.

Your job is to support him. By not being there with him, he feels totally lost, I'm sure, and unsupported. I used to check the kids' homework when they were done. If I could see it from my chair, I'd check it as they went. If they made a mistake, I'd say something like, "You might want to check number 5. or Is that what you meant to put for number 4?"

My children used to come home from school, have a quick snack, and do their homework. Now that they are teens, they come home from school, and just do their homework. They usually skip the snack because it is almost time for dinner -- they stay after school for activities and such now.

You need to instill the routine now, so that later it's not a fight.
LBC

no teacher is ever going to just hand a kid a bunch of work, and walk away. at this age he needs guidance and help. it's a good time to get into good homework habits - he needs you to sit down and give him some structure. have you ever had a job that seems so huge, you don't even know where to start? i bet you anything that's what he's feeling.

No kid WANTS to do homework - ever. Most adults are not much better. A lot of the time you have to sit down with him and keep him focused on getting it done. Up through 3rd or 4th grade many kids just can't sit on their own and go through it. You need keep him organized and talk him through it. Don't give answers but act like the teacher. In my son's school through 3rd grade they had parents sign every piece of paper, so it was as necessary for me to go through his homework very thoroughly every night. Make sure there's no distractions (tv, games, toys, etc), and let them know the fastest way to fun is to get the work done. If you start with that early on and establish good habits, you have fewer problems when the homework load is heavier in upper grades.

My oldest son, though quite smart, was the same. Your son sounds like mine was. I ended up with huge long homework battles every day.

To keep a long story short, my son is now grown, but I learned a few things.

This homework wasn't worth sacrificing our family harmony.
I don't think kids in elementary school should have too much homework -- Education should be the lighting of a fire, not the filling of a bucket.
Leave homework between the student and his teacher.
Praise EFFORT, not intelligence.
Try a reward system, if you must get involved.

I'm assuming that you know that your son is fully capable of doing this homework. If he doesn't understand it, that is another issue.

Long story short -- don't make your time with your son miserable by battling over homework. Find positive ways to deal with this. My oldest son was the least scholastic of my three kids, but he still graduated high school with a low B average, which is acceptable, and I guarantee you all the early years of fighting about homework only affected his schooling negatively, if at all.

Some kids you just can't change.

Hi at 6 kids need the interaction of the adult. Accept thatyou will need to sit with him. go question by question tap the book when he wanders. Don't yell or get upset even though you are crazy frustrated. I've been there lol. After a week or so of doing this try getting up and doing something else in he same room and when he wanders remind him again. Also my household is very strict in that no playing or watching tv until homework is done.

Try and make it "fun" by making some sort of game out of it maybe? Set a timer and see if he can beat the clock to get his math done. Maybe give him a time limit like 30 mins and tell him if he gets it all done before the big hand is on the 6, he can have a little treat. See who can do something faster...him doing his homework or you making dinner, loser has to take out the trash or something silly. You lose of course and it's funny to him to beat mom AND the homework is done.
Make a reward chart. If he does his homework without any issues, he gets a sticker. Fill up a full week and he gets to pick something out....even if it's a movie at the rental place, the resturant you eat at on Saturday night or some junk at the dollar store.

I know it sounds like I love to bribe kids (ha! ha! ha!), but sometimes it's all a mind game with them. Any spin to make it fun or where he can "get something out of it" MAY help with the nightly struggle!

I have twin girls and we go through this from time to time. They would rather be doing ANYTHING else other than homework. The thing is the teacher doesn't usually give them much work to do. One day last week one of my daughters was really particularly whiny about doing the work and I was also trying to go over a worksheet she got graded on and made a 65 on. I was trying to explain to her what she did wrong because she obviously didn't understand how to recognize a plural from singulair. Anyways because of the massive fit combined with her not wanting to listen to me I sat the notebook down and said "You know what-if you don't care then I don't care either. I have already done this....I have already been through school and did my turn-this is for you to learn and if you don't care then that is fine. Sit there and make bad grades because if you do then guess what will happen? You won't pass the second grade and they will hold you back and you will have to repeat it over and over again until you do care to "get this". I walked away and she came running up to me in tears saying okay mommy I will listen. I will do my work. I was finally able to sit down with her at this point and explain to her until I knew she "got" it. Consistency is the key I think and if they get used to having to sit down and do it from an early age then its not as much of a hassle later on-however I'm not there yet so we shall see-I am going on hopeful wishing here but regardless-it is THEIR grade and its THEIR responsability to ensure they are doing the work and understanding it. I tell both of my daughters all the time. Don't get lost in the field -if you aren't getting something then you need to stop your teacher and let her know at some point. They have complained that the teacher is too busy and tells them not right now or whatever and I tell them that is fine but at some point during the day they need to let the teacher know they don't understand the lesson or whatever. If the teacher still wont help them well then I told them they need to let me know and I will go to the teacher myself and let her know my child is struggling with this and I can't help her either because I myself don't understand it. It amazes me how these teachers send the homework home without an example done....I have been out of school for quite sometime and the way they teach the kids these days are much different. It irritates me when they come home with a worksheet and I myself don't really understand the directions because its been too long or I just don't understand it for whatever reasons....but if they did an "example" on the stupid sheet I could probably figure it out.
Routine is also everything as well....some kids to better coming straight home and doing the work. Whereas others actually do better to get a "break" from it all and then eventually there is a set time to sit down to do it. I get my girls to come home and have a snack then as they are munching ont heir snack they are also sitting down to do homework. If they come home first to play it is more of a fight.

You have some good suggestions already - especially in how to sit with your son. He may be old enough to have homework, but he's still very young.

I never wanted to do homework either. I was great at "forgetting" to do it. Sometimes I wanted to do other things instead. Sometimes I didn't know what to do and didn't want to say I didn't know. Sometimes it was both. Sometimes it was something else.

Is it one particular sort of homework (one subject, such as spelling), or homework in general?

As if you needed something else to do, you probably need to say, in a friendly way, "OK, you may not want to do it, but it's one of those things you have to do anyhow. So I'm going to sit down with you and we'll work through this together." Don't make a big deal out of it. Just put on your Sherlock Holmes hat quietly.

Then keep your eyes and ears open and pay attention! You may discover a lot. I can imagine him, once you're sitting beside him, speeding through it just to get it done. I can imagine him saying, "I can't," and expecting you to do it for him. I can imagine him even not knowing where to start. Be curious (not angry) about any behavior your boy displays; treat it as clues to a mystery - which it is. You can't find out much when you're angry (or lecturing, although you're right about the importance of doing homework); you CAN find out a whole lot when you're curious.

Then take the clues to his teacher. She (or he) deals with lots of homework-avoiding students, and may be able to help you in solving this mystery. It might possibly be just a need for you to be there. It might be a need for an extra kick in the pants (only so to speak!), followed by definite praise when the job is done. Nearly every child needs that from time to time. But it might be a need to learn some special organizational skills (as an adult, my mind is definitely more creative when my house is in good order! It took me years to discover that connection). It might be a need to get your son's eyes checked. It might be any number of things! Go to it, Sherlock! :^)

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Yes, you need to sit with him. Don't hover and monitor every single line of work, but start out going over the instructions for that particular sheet or page, maybe have him repeat them back to you in his own words so you know he understands what to do. Then stay in the room, possibly quietly reading while he does the work, and then check it over with him at the end. The point of homework -- and tell him this -- is not to have every answer perfect every time but to learn from what you're doing. Be positive. A sticker chart, as some suggested, could work if he's the kind of kid who responds well to that, but I'd ensure it has rewards that he gets fairly quickly (he's too young for you to say "you'll get the reward after two weeks of homework being completed by X time" -- that makes him wait longer than he really can at this age).

Some folks say have him do it the instant he comes in from school. That may work or may backfire -- only you know his personality and his needs to have, for instance, a snack or a BRIEF break. I would not let him get involved in playing, toys or TV before homework, but if he is the kind who needs a few minutes off before starting, you could let him have a timed 15-minute snack break, at the dining table, maybe while he reads a book for pleasure (even if it's leafing through his favorite cartoon book). But nothing like TV or play that would be hard for him to break away from. My daughter likes homework but does still need a snack to get her energy back up after school (there is no afternoon snack at her school), plus if she goes instantly to homework she complains she feels she hasn't even left school.

Make sure he has a distraction-free environment; if his room is full of toys and fun stuff, find another location but make it a clean and consistent place. If he has any sisters or brothers, they need to be quietly occupied while he's doing homework and where he can't see or hear them. The right light and all the pencils, extra paper etc. all ready to go, would help too -- if everything's there and ready, he can't say "I need this, I need that," which lets him procrastinate and delay things. Oh yeah, and a bathroom break could mark the start of each homework time, so you can truly say, sorry, yoiu went to the bathroom at the start of homework time, so you can't go right now!

Get him folders for each subject, even if it's just to put blank papers in for now, and maybe get him book covers if the school allows that. Let him pick them out at the store. Make him feel that organizing papers and books and his work space is fun and emphasize how grown-up that makes him.

Now is the tiime for buiilding good study habits but you'll have to help with the right setting, timing, and your presence each day for a while to come -- possibly all this first grade year and next year too.

It sounds to me like the water and bathroom and mess cause you to fuss with him quite a bit, which at any rate is attention. Kids don't understand the difference between good attention and bad attention, but they definitely like the attention. I'm not saying you don't spend enough time with your child. Trust me. I spend oodles of time with my child and he still acts starved for attention. But one thing my son does like is homework and that is because I sit with him each night and help him with it. Sometimes we play "smart" games in addition to the homework which he really enjoys. Our school district had a "parent academy" and they taught us some games to play with our kids to help with math and vocabulary, etc. If you want to know more about these games, let me know!

You probably have to get him started on it and sit with him. He might not know where to begin or feel overwhelmed.

I found (when my daughter was in first grade) that she felt cheated that she had to sit and do homework while I was cleaning or fussing around the house. So I started doing my "homework" when she did hers. This meant I paid the bills, caught up on paperwork, etc. right there at the kitchen table with her. It was great for me, it forced me to handle MY work! And my daughter felt "grown up" to be sitting at the table doing her work while I did mine. I was also right there, ready to answer a question if she had one, but I wasn't hovering over her shoulder.

If I was done with my paperwork, I'd just sit and read a book or do sudoku.

Children love to mimic adults, so this is a wonderful way to set the example and also bond with your child. Once I started doing that, my daughter rarely complained about homework, in fact, if she didn't have any she still wanted homework time! She'd color in her coloring book :)

At 6yrs old, I was still needing in the room with them while they did their homework (at the kitchen table, so I could be preparing dinner, etc). If they strayed, I would remind them to stay on task. If they had a question, I was right there to help. At 7yrs old, they did homework both in the kitchen and in their rooms depending on how much help they needed that night. Now, my son (13) still does homework in the kitchen (he has autism and school is very hard for him so he still needs my help sometimes). My 10yr old goes straight to her room and gets it done right away with minimal prodding or help from me. My 8yr old sometimes sits at her desk, sometimes at the kitchen table, whatever she's comfortable with at that time. As long as the work is done in a timely manner with best effort, I don't care WHERE they work. But at 6yrs old, I still had to pretty much be right by them until homework was completed. I think kids need to "learn" how to do homework just as much as learning *what* the homework is teaching them. Telling a 6yr old to "go do your homework" is like telling my husband to "go bake a souffle" - ain't gonna happen without much help and hand-holding. Teach your son HOW: 1)what do you have for HW tonight? 2) sit here and make sure you have plenty of space to spread out. 3) is your pencil sharpened? 4) What's your first question? Can you read it out loud and tell me what it's asking? Do you understand what you need to do to get the answer? Kids really need to be talked through it for the first couple of years. By 3rd grade, he'll be doing it on his own (and checking for his own sharpened pencils) because you'll have taught him *how* to do homework. Once he has THAT mastered, you'll need to teach him *how* to study for a test (THAT'S also LOTS of fun!!) (^_^)

I think it really helps to have an expectation that they do homework before their favorite "free time" activities such TV, playing video games, or playing with friends. My kids have an after school snack immediately when they get home. They are allowed to play with the dog in the back yard a little. Fresh air and exercise are highly encouraged! But they must complete their homework before turning on the TV, Wii, or calling over the neighbor friends. My youngest daughter is a bit of a dawdler, but she gets that the more time she wastes, the less time she has for her "free time" activities before dinner. I think if his desk area is a mess, that is a big distraction. Think about it. Do you like to do work in a messy space? That would drive me nuts. Have him sit at the kitchen or dining room table with ONLY his homework in front of him. I would not sit down at the table with him, but be right nearby to answer questions and to check it when he is done. Accept some stalling without making it a big deal. Eventually, he will realize he isn't getting out of it by wasting time.