I hate homework!

[JKF]

easy child/difficult child has had four nights to do a paper for English class. It's due tomorrow and needs to be 4 paragraphs so basically one per night. He has trouble organizing his thoughts so I helped him on Monday do a basic outline and he needed to just fill it in with details for each paragraph. We've done this before and it works well if he actually puts the effort into it. Tonight he wanted to play with Legos and was obviously rushing. The last paragraph is supposed to explain why they like the book they had to read. His whole paragraph - "I like the book because it has a lot of words". O-M-G! Shoot me now please!

 

[InsaneCdn]

You got THAT much out of him? That's more than I got out of mine at that age.
By the time they get home from school, there isn't much brainpower left...

 

[KTMom91]

I stopped helping with homework when Miss KT was in fourth grade. All I got was rudeness and attitude, so I let her teacher hand out the consequences for not getting it done. She didn't catch on till high school, unfortunately, when she failed a class and had to make it up.

 

[DammitJanet]

Do you think he has trouble getting his ideas from his brain through his fingers? If so, have you considered Dragon Naturally Speaking? Sometimes people and kids in particular, do better if they can just talk and write their papers as they speak. It saves the step of typing it or writing it. I wish they had this program when my son was younger because he had dysgraphia. He could have told us everything but getting it on paper was torture. This program is much less expensive now than it used to be. My cell phone actually uses a form of it and I love it.

 

[LittleDudesMom]

I agree with Janet. My difficult child has dysgraphia (which can actually improve with hard work). Graphic organizers, at 17, are still a much easier way for him to organize before putting it to paper. We have also found that using a keyboard is much easier than using a writing implement (he started typing his work in 6th grade), and using a pencil is easier than a pen (the slight "drag" of the lead on the paper).

Side note to Janet - I love the Siri on my new phone - don't have to use my big ole fingers on the keyboard anymore, I can just talk my texts!

Sharon

 

[InsaneCdn]

Dragon is a HUGE effort to learn - and only partially effective. We tried it.
Typing... helps.
Scribes for exams is an essential accommodation.
And... getting the teachers to turn some of the written work into oral presentations (by making that an option for ALL the class, it doesn't single out the kids with dysgraphia) - for example, the kids have a choice on a research project between doing a written report, or an in-class presentation. Usually, most of the kids would rather write a report - but the ones that do present, add to the overall learning of the class, so everyone wins.

 

[TerryJ2]

OMG, lots of words isn't going to cut it!

Could he play Legos and talk about the book while he's playing? Or is that too much of a distraction?