Homework Fiasco

For some reason, the kindergarten my 6 year old daughter E goes to assigns quite a bit of homework. There is reading to do, some sight words to learn, and even a show and tell activity where they need to write out three clues and present them to their class weekly. I thinks that’s more than I did in first grade back in the day!

E has been usually very motivated to do her sight words since she gets little prizes when she finishes a set of sight words. She has done quite a bit of sets and displays her prizes in her school cubby until someone took a few of them, so now she sets them up at home. It’s just little cute erasers that are shaped like different things and they are very effective at motivating E.

Recently, the sight words are getting very difficult. They are learning how to read words like “direction” and to me, it’s still insane that a kindergartener is learning that. E hasn’t been as motivated because she knows it is challenging. When my wife tries to get her to start, E sometimes messes around and doesn’t pay attention to the words. She wants Mommy to sound them out for her. Then she will memorize.

This definitely struck a chord with my wife and she talked to E for an extended period of time about learning the words on her own (or at least trying to learn and figure them out by herself). There were tears and E wasn’t too happy, but eventually, a chart was made for homework and we offered to help anytime E wanted to do her homework. She needs to me internally motivated to do her homework and learn, so setting up this chart will hopefully help out. If there is an external motivation (like a cute eraser), that helps also, but cannot be the only motivator for her. She needs to want to improve her knowledge and skills and this is the start of trying to nudge her in the right direction.