Do Our Children Get Too Much Homework?

Any parent who has watched their child stay up way past their bedtime toiling over their books or wasting a weekend working on projects and assignments knows how tough it can be. Teenagers are especially burdened with work that leaves them tired, stressed and with no time for social engagements, sport or family events.

Overloaded children suffer from anxiety and fatigue that many think is counterproductive and bad for their health and well being. Unfortunately, an increasingly competitive academic culture and jobs market mean children have to push themselves further to succeed.

Guidelines for Homework

The National PTA and the National Education Association have set guidelines for homework which should increase by 10 minutes for each grade. That means that in the first grade your child will be doing 10 minutes of homework a day, 20 minutes in the second grade and so on. What this means is that by the 12^th grade, they will be doing two hours of homework a day. Some experts say two hours a day is way too much and doesn’t leave enough time for the sleep, rest, social time and the exercise healthy teens need.

More Homework doesn’t Mean Brighter Stars

Studies show that students who did more than two hours of homework did not fare any better than those who did two or less. While this is counter-intuitive, it seems like assigning less homework that is focused on areas the student needs to improve on is far more effective. Unfortunately, most teachers have no time to give students individual homework that help them work through the issues they have.

Here one-on-one tutors provide the most effective solution as tutors are able to help students to get through their homework and cover areas that they are having problems with.

While studies show that a reasonable amount of homework did improve test scores for students in high school, it seemed to make little difference to those in elementary school.

Better Learning, Better Life

The trick seems to be a finding a balance. Parents often don’t complain to teachers when their children have too much homework but if you see a negative impact on the performance or happiness of your child or if your child is experiencing anxiety, you need to work with teachers to find an amicable solution.

If homework is a daily struggle, speak with teachers and tutors on how you can motivate your child. Some children have real issues with executive skills like task initiation, time management, organization or staying focused. This can mean that your child actually has a reasonable amount of homework, but they take forever to do it.

If this is the case, find an in-home tutor who teaches executive skills so that your child learns to organize their time, prioritize tasks and stay organized. Being able to focus for long periods of time to finish tasks is a great life skill to learn, so persevere and you will soon have an independent learner and no homework hassles!

Best Apps for Game-based Learning

 Lucélia Ribeiro

What’s the best way to get your kids excited about learning? Turn it into a game. With more and more technology available, you can download apps that will have your kids learning without even realizing it. Over the summer holidays, kids can lose up to 30% of the academic gains they made in the previous year. Put an end to the summer slide by encouraging learning through play with these incredible apps.

Gen i Revolution: Teach personal finance to middle and high school students with this fun app. The players will be faced with sixteen missions to help people in financial trouble. With Gen i Revolution, earning is learning as they select their operatives, earn points as they gather information and complete tasks which teach them about general finance, financial concepts and terminology.

SpellingCity.com: We all know just how difficult spelling can be, but a spelling mistake on a CV or job application letter or on a college entrance exam could mean a missed opportunity for your child. Not only will this be a great life skill to learn, but being able to effectively communicate ideas and concepts with a healthy vocabulary will help your child to excel on exams and tests. With over 50,000 words and 60,000 sentences, SpellCity.com offers K-12 students a fun way to learn to spell while improving their vocabulary.

Duolingo: Learning a foreign language? Duolingo was voted best Apple app in 2013 and will help your child to memorize words in a foreign language. You can also lean on other language apps to help your child master a second language. Some of the better ones include MindSnacks, Babbel and Cat Academy for all those LOL cat fans out there.

Galxyz: This great app helps kids to master basic scientific concepts and scientific reasoning. This app follows school curriculums to augment what students learn in class in a fun and engaging way. On a quest to save the natural curiosity of children from the evil King Dullard, students are taken through the Next Generation Scientific Standard in the proper sequence as outlined by the US government.

Cosmic Reactor Arithmetic: A fun game for both parents and kids who want to hone their math skills. With seven different games and variable difficulty, you can set the parameters to fit your child’s abilities and grade. Best for students aged 5-12. You can also turn to Math Ninja or Mathemagics to practice your math skills while learning basic principles.

Tutor Doctor also works to prevent the summer slide and keep young minds active over the summer with the Academic Game Plan. Here students can take just a couple of hours a week to catch up and forge ahead while having fun. Contact your local tutor Doctor office for a free consultation.

This summer, you can use screen time constructively to keep your kids learning and growing while they are having fun. Remember to limit screen time and set a timer with a shut-off so you don’t always have to be the bad guy.

Are Private Schools Better than Public Schools?

The pervasive consensus is that a private school education is better for our children than one provided by a public school. But is this really true? Private school do a much better job of marketing themselves because their success relies on them filling their classrooms.

Better Academic Outcomes

Private schools do tend to produce higher scoring students. For example, in Canada, about a third of the top ranking schools are private. The rankings are based on the student’s performance on standardized tests.

One important consideration is that private school children tend to come from families that occupy a higher socio-economic bracket. This means that they are more likely to have parents who are at home and are more likely to be university-educated, they have access to better materials and resources and they have access to better food and medical care.

In 2014, a study by two researchers from the University of Illinois found that, when you control for these socio-economic advantages, private school education performs on par or worse than public schools. There was little evidence to support the notion that these private school with better resources and better teachers, had a positive influence on the academic standards of the students.

A recent study followed 7,142 Grade 10 students from both public and private schools. While they found that the private school students excelled at academics (about 9% better than their public school counterparts) and went on to enjoy more success after graduation, they could not attribute this success to the school itself. From the report: "Two factors consistently account for these differences; students who attended private high schools were more likely to have socio-economic characteristics positively associated with academic success and to have school peers with university-educated parents."

Another study by the Center on Education Policy challenges traditional perceptions about private schools. President of the Center Jack Jennings sums it up: "Contrary to popular belief, we can find no evidence that private schools actually increase student performance, instead, it appears that private schools simply have higher percentages of students who would perform well in any environment based on their previous performance and background."

Some advantages

The study found that private school students were positively influenced by the academic caliber of their classmates. Private schools often have stringent entry requirements and being surrounded by successful academics is certainly a positive influence on students.

The study also showed that the students went on to enjoy greater success in the labor market in part because of the associations and connections that they had established with other families who were well situated on the social-economic level.

Level Playing Field

Contrary to popular belief, the study found that private schools in general didn’t differ that much in terms of the resources and quality of teachers and were only slightly better than private schools. As funding for schools gets cut (especially in the US) this gap may grow.

So if a private school is only slightly better than a public school at educating your child, where would you get the most for your educational buck? “I would get a private tutor,” says Jon-Anthony Lui from Tutor Doctor. “With a one-on-one tutor, your child gets the individual attention they need and the tutor can not only find the missing building blocks in their knowledge, they can also teach them the executive skills they need to be successful in academics and in life. You’ll spend less on a tutor and you’ll see the results instantly.”