NATIONAL
ASSOCIATION
OF
SCHOOL
PSYCHOLOGISTS
Homework Survival Guide
A Parent Handout
by Peg Dawson, Ed.D., NCSP
Center for Learning and Attention Disorders, Portsmouth, NH
A Place to Work
1. Find the right place.
In some families, having a central location where all children in the family do their homework
works best. This may be the dining room or kitchen table. In other families, each child has her
own study place, usually at a desk in the bedroom. What works for you depends on your
children. Some kids do best under the watchful eye of a parent in which case the dining room or
kitchen may work best. Others need the quiet of their bedrooms to avoid distractions. Some kids
like to work with the radio on (and this helps them focus), while other do worse with this kind of
background noise. Think about possible distractions that will need to be avoided (a nearby
television, the telephone, etc.) when planning your child's workspace.
You may want to conduct "experiments" with your child to determine what setting works best
under what circumstances. Try several options for a week to see how your child does (rate the
quality of the homework completed, the time it took to finish, and the child's subjective reaction).
2. Gather necessary materials.
Youngsters can waste a lot of time tracking down things like pencils, paper, rulers, etc. when
beginning their homework. To avoid this, stock your child's study area with these materials and
any other he is likely to need, such as a dictionary, highlighters, pens, scissors, glue, tape,
colored pencils, stapler and staples, etc.
It may also be helpful to set up file folders for each subject your child is taking in school to
keep track of necessary papers, such as long-term assignment directions, tests and homework
that have been passed back (to help in studying for the next test), etc. These folders should not
be used for storing homework, since your child is likely to leave it at home and forget to take it to
school. Completed homework should be placed in the child's backpack, trapper keeper, or
notebook as soon as it is finished to ensure it gets to school.
A plastic bin may be an ideal place to store study materials; if you have more than one child,
you may want to have one bin for each child. The advantage to this is that these are
portable--just in case you have a child whose preferred study style is to work in a different place
each night!
You may also want to have a second container (such as a dishpan) which your child can
"dump" their school things in as soon as they get home from school. This will help avoid last
minute frantic searches for permission slips, library books, messages from the principal, notices
of meetings, etc.
Organizing Homework/Setting Priorities
A homework session should begin by reviewing what the day's assignments are. It is
probably a good idea to draw up a list of assignments on a separate sheet of paper, so that you
can then help your child prioritize and break down longer tasks into shorter ones. The steps to
follow might be:
1. List out assignments.
2. Make sure the child brought home the necessary books, worksheets, etc.
3. Break tasks into subtasks.
4. Check to see what other tasks the child has to do which should be included on the list--including long-term assignments, and tests later in the week for which the child should begin studying. Add these to the homework list.
5. Have the child decide what order she will complete the work. A good rule of thumb is to have the child begin and end with assignments she considers "easy,~ sandwiching more difficult assignments in between.6. Estimate how much time it will take to complete the work.
7. Make sure you have allowed enough time for the child to complete all his homework, allowing
for break time as necessary.
Sometimes it is difficult for kids to complete homework because of other obligations they
may have --sports events, doctors' appointments, scout meetings, chores, family events, etc.
You may find it helpful to put together a weekly calendar to keep track of these activities. A
sample of such a weekly calendar is contained in Appendix A. Once a week (Sunday sounds
good), sit down with your child and fill out the weekly calendar together. Then, as you plan your
homework time each day, you can reference this calendar to allow time for the other activities
your child is involved with.
Getting Started
As mentioned above, it is usually best to have children begin with a task that they consider
"easy." Some children may want to start with the hardest task first to get it over with, and this is
acceptable unless the child has a very difficult time getting started and will dawdle or avoid the
difficult assignment even though it was his/her choice to start with it.
For many youngsters, just getting started on homework seems like an insurmountable
obstacle. We have several suggestions for handling this problem:
1. Have the child specify exactly when she will begin her homework and then reward her for getting to work within five minutes of the time she has specified (see the section on Incentive Systems for more information about this).
2. Sit with your child for the first five minutes to make sure he gets off to a good start.
3. Talk with your child about her assignments before beginning. This is particularly important for
written language assignments or more open-ended tasks. Children often need to be "primed" or
activated for the best efforts to come out. This is particularly true for youngsters who may have
difficulties with verbal fluency or word retrieval.
4. Orient your child to his assignment; walk him through the first one or two problems or items to
make sure he understands what he is supposed to do.
5. Build in a short break relatively quickly, if getting started is a problem.
Getting Through It
Make sure adequate breaks are built in. Many children have a great deal of difficulty working
for long stretches of time on homework without a break. Better to plan for a two-hour homework
session with frequent breaks built in than to try to cram homework into a one-hour, non-stop
session. You can use a kitchen timer to keep breaks to a reasonable length (e.g., 5-10
minutes). Breaks might be used to get a snack, play a few minutes of a Nintendo game, or to
shoot baskets or do some other form of exercise. Breaks should be scheduled when tasks get
accomplished rather than after a set period of time, otherwise your child can daydream the time
away and still get a break.
One child we know arranges homework sessions between TV shows he likes to watch.
Thus, his schedule on any given day might look like this:
4:30 Math
5:00 TV show
5:30 English
6:00 Dinner
6:30 Social studies
7:00 TV show
8:00 Science
8:30 TV show
If he hasn't finished whatever task he was working on when his television program comes on,
he either misses the program or tapes it to watch at a later time.
Other suggestions for getting through homework:
1. Make a game out of work completion: have the child estimate how long it will take to complete an assignment, have her "place bets," set a kitchen timer where the child can't see how much time it was set for and challenge her to "beat the clock" or use a stopwatch to see how quickly she can do an assignment, one math problem, etc.
2. If a task takes longer than your child can sustain (even if it's broken down into smaller steps), or if he "gets stuck," have him switch to another assignment rather than stop working altogether.
3. Use a "beep tape" to help him stay focused. This is an audio tape which sounds an electronic
tone at random intervals. When the child hears the tone, she is to ask herself, "Was I paying
attention?" She can be given a form to fill out to accompany the tape. This has been quite effec-
tive with children who daydream or who get pulled off task easily, often without even realizing it.
The tone brings them back to task. Alternatively, some parents make "nag tapes" where they
tape messages at random intervals, again to prompt the child back to task.
Long Term Assignments
These are often the hardest homework assignments for youngsters to keep track of and to
complete.
1. Know what assignments are due when.
In addition to having a weekly assignment book where daily homework is recorded, it is also
advisable to have a monthly calendar on which long-term assignments can be written as soon
as they are assigned. With younger or more disorganized students, parents may want to
periodically send in this calendar and ask the classroom teacher to verify that it is up-to-date.
Older students should be able to keep these themselves, transferring items as necessary from
their weekly assignment book.
2. Break long-term assignments into subtasks.
Sit down with your child and read over directions or discuss the nature of the long-term
assignment. Make out a list of the steps necessary to complete the assignment. If desired, this
can be a fairly lengthy outline with notes attached providing more guidance about what is to be
included for each step. For written reports, for instance, the steps might include taking notes,
generating an outline, writing the introduction, the sections of the report and the summary,
preparing a bibliography, drawing any necessary maps and charts, proofreading, preparing the
final draft, and making a cover.
3. Draw lip a timeline.
Once the outline is developed, each subtask should then have a due date attached to it and
should be written on the monthly calendar. An example of this is included in Appendix A.
Care should be taken to ensure adequate time is available for each step. A long report will
require that more time be devoted to each step, particularly preparing the final draft and
proofreading. If the longterm assignment requires that your child use the library, visit a museum,
or gather information from outside sources, include these trips in the timeline, with dates
attached. If materials need to be purchased, the time when this will happen should also be
identified.
In the beginning, your child will probably need extensive help breaking down his
assignments and developing a realistic timeline. As time goes on, he can assume increasing
amounts of responsibility for these. Time management is a skill of life-long importance.
Developing increasing independence in planning for and executing long-tem assignments is an
early opportunity for a child to acquire this valuable skill.
Incentive Systems
For many youngsters, homework is an exceedingly difficult task representing an ordeal they
perceive at times to be insurmountable. For these children, all the organization and planning in
the world may not be enough to get them through the daily grind of homework. In this case, an
incentive system may need to be put in place to make homework completion a more attractive
task for them.
If this is the right approach for your child, we recommend a system whereby your child can
earn points for completing for demonstrating other appropriate behaviors required for successful
homework completion. The points can then be traded-in for daily, weekly, or long-term
reinforcers. Steps involved in setting up a point system include:
1. With your child, draw up a list of privileges or rewards your child would like to earn. Daily
rewards might include an extra half hour of television, a special snack, the chance to stay up
an extra half hour before bed. Weekly rewards might include a trip to the mall or McDonald's,
or the chance to go to a video arcade or rent a video. Longer term rewards might be going to
a movie with a friend, inviting a friend over for the night, or the chance to buy a small toy.
2. Now, again with your child, draw up a list of "jobs" for which your child can earn points.
Related to homework, such jobs might include:
Writing down homework assignments.
Bringing home necessary homework materials.
Getting homework started on time.
Completing work within the specified homework time.
Finishing homework without reminders (nags) from parents.
Finishing homework without constant parental supervision or assistance.
Completing work with an acceptable standard of accuracy.
Proofreading written work/checking math problems.
Handing in homework completed and on time.
Successfully solving homework problems (e.g., calling friends or teacher when an assignment
is not understood, knowing what to do when books or other necessary papers were left at
school, discussing homework problems with the teacher or going to the teacher for extra help).
3. Decide how many points each of the homework "jobs" can earn and how much each of the
privileges or rewards will cost. To determine how much the rewards should cost, add up the
number of points you feel your child will earn each day. Be sure that your child has about one
third of her points free to save up for special privileges.
4. Get a notebook, and set it up with five columns, one each for the date, the item, deposits,
withdrawals, and the running balance. (* See Point Tracking Sheet.)
5. Once a month or so, review the list of jobs and privileges and revise as necessary.
Described above is a fairly elaborate system that may be necessary with those children who
are highly resistant to doing homework. Samples of two homework reward systems are included
in Appendix B. When the problem is not considered to be so extreme, a more informal system
(such as the opportunity to earn a small reward after all the homework is done each day) may
be all that is necessary. Children can also be taught to reward themselves as they complete
tasks, both major and minor ones. they can also adjust the reward depending on the size or
difficulty of the task: half an hour of reading is worth a 10-minute break to shoot baskets;
completing a term paper is worth a bike ride to the store to buy a favorite snack.
With some children, the use of natural or logical consequences alone may be sufficient. Not
being able to watch a favorite TV program because the homework wasn't done in time is a
logical consequence that arises from dawdling over assignments. For some children, a failing
grade is a natural consequence for failure to complete homework, and this alone will be
sufficient to induce them to work. However, it has been our experience that parents should not
assume that fear of a failing grade alone will be sufficient to induce their child to do his
homework.
Parents should resist the temptation simply to punish children for their failure to do
homework. While it may make sense to cut down on the number of outside activities or the
amount of time their child is allowed to play with friends after school in order to allow for
sufficient time to do homework, a system in which incentives are built in for homework
completion will likely be more effective than a system of negative consequences alone. Most
children who have problems doing homework are not happy about their situation or the fights they draw their parents into. Rather, it seems to take these children
considerably more effort to get down to work and to sustain attention to homework than it does
the average child. For this reason, it makes sense to reward them for the extra effort it takes.
Parent Role: Help or Supervise?
Many parents, particularly those of children who may be struggling in school, wrestle with the
question of how much help they should give their children on homework. The following
suggestions are offered:
1. It is a good idea for parents to discuss with their children the nature of the assignment, to
make sure they understand what they are supposed to do, and to guide them as they do the
first one or two items of an assignment. Parents should not have to remain by their children's
side throughout the entire session. If your child seems to require this, then you should
probably build in an incentive for working independency to wean your child of reliance on you
for support or assistance. Setting the kitchen timer and telling your child to wait until it rings to
show you her work or to ask questions is one way to gradually increase independence.
2. Parents may want to review homework assignments to check for either neatness or
accuracy. If the handwriting is illegible (and your child is capable of writing more neatly
without an inordinate amount of effort), it is acceptable to ask him to rewrite the assignment.
If your child is ready to learn to proofread or to check for mistakes himself, you may want to
hand back a paper back with a comment such as, "l found three mistakes on your math
page," or "PIease look for spelling errors." If he's not ready for this, point to the specific
mistakes and ask him to correct them (without giving him the correct answer).
3. Parents should keep in mind the overall purpose of homework: to give children independent
practice with a skill Hey have already been taught. Parents should not have to teach she
skills necessary for their children to complete their homework successfully. A good rule of
thumb is that children should be able to get at lest 70 percent of a homework assignment
correct working on their own for it to be within an appropriate instructional range. If your child
cannot achieve that level of success without a great deal of support from you, then the
homework she is being assigned is probably inappropriate. Make an appointment with your
child's teacher to ask for assignments that will better give her the practice she needs.
4. You may also want to talk to the teacher if your child appears to be spending an inordinate
amount of time on homework even though he is successful at it. Ask the teacher how much
time a child should be spending on homework, and K you child is working much more than
that, ask for an adjustment in workload, such as reduced assignments.
References
Chesworth, M., (1991). Putting on the brakes: Young people's guide to understanding Attention
Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). New York: Magination Press.
Frey, R. (1991). How to study. Hawthorne, NJ: The Career Press.
Frey, R. (1991). Manage your time. Hawthorne, NJ: The Career Press.
Levine, M. (1990). Keeping a head in school. Cambridge, MA: Education Publishing Service,
Inc.
Schofield, D. (1984). Confessions of a happily organized family. Cincinnati, OH: Writer's Digest
Books.
Wirths, C.G., & Bowman-Kruhm, M. (1989). Where's my other sock? How to get organized and
drive your parents and teachers crazy. New York: Thomas Y. Crowel.
1998 National Association of School Psychologists, 4340 East West Highway, Suite 402, Bethesda MD 20814--301~657~0270.
. . _
Helping Children at Home and School: Handouts from Your School
Psychologist
69
Appendix B: Homework Contracts
Sample Homework Contract I
Terms of Contract:
1. John will write down all assignments in assignment book.
2. The daily TV schedule will be:
a. John can watch Batman at 5 o'clock.
b. In order to watch any evening TV shows, homework will be completed.
c. If homework isn't done, we will tape shows for later viewing.
3. John will not be allowed to play video games during the week unless all his homework is done. He can
play no more than one hour per day at any time (including weekends).
4. On Fridays, John will have teachers sign a sheet indicating he has fumed in all homework
assignments for the week.
Points can be earned for: ( Point Value)
1. Handing in all homework assignments for all classes each week ( 5)
2. Grade of B or better on quizzes or tests ( 3)
3. Grade of B or better on a report or project ( 5)
4. Grade of B or better on report card (academic subjects) (5)
Points can be traded for:
1. A contribution to the Super Nintendo fund--$30 ( 120)
Sample Homework Contract 11
Daily Homework Tasks Points
All assignments written down ( 1)
All materials brought home (1)
Finish homework by 9 PM ( 1)
Privileges Cost
DAILY
Extra half hour TV show ( 3)
Extra snack (3)
Practice soccer with dad (3)
15 minutes video game time (3)
WEEKLY
Rent a video game (12)
Rent a movie (12)
Have a friend sleep over (12)
Go to Friendly's for ice cream (15)
LONG TERM
Eat at a Chinese restaurant (75)
Take a friend to a movie (75)
Go bowling (75)
Earn a new cassette tape (75)
