Kids Homework?

[fxm88]

I had the impression that while most Thai schools focused on rote memorization, at least the kids got away without having to do too much homework. I guess I was wrong. How much homework is the norm in Thailand? How much time do your kids spend doing homework?

From "The Myth About Homework", Time/CNN:

Teachers in many of the nations that outperform the U.S. on student achievement tests--such as Japan, Denmark and the Czech Republic--tend to assign less homework than American teachers, but instructors in low-scoring countries like Greece,

Thailand

and Iran tend to

pile it on

.

Edited September 6, 2006 by fxm88

[barryofthailand]

Our son goes to a private bilingual school in Pattaya. He gets English homework, and Thai homework every day.

With 33 children in his class the teachers do not have the time they need to spend individgually with each student.

What we do is go over what he did in school today, have him correct what he didn't understand. For instance he was having a problem with math. After I showed him how to figure out the problems he said it was easy. Then I have him do his homework. My wife does the same for Thai.

Barry

[berries]

My Webpage

Take some responsibility.

[Siwanan]

My children are 5 and 6, so they go to kindergarten (Varee Chiang Mai school). When we first moved to Thailand we lived in Pattaya and they went to Bi-lingual school there too.

Homeworks for children of this age (kindergarten) was all new thing to us! In Skandinavia, children in kindergarten don't get homework and kindergarten is not school, like here in Thailand! My children were quite exhausted in the beginning because they were used to play all day in kindergarten, not work.

In Pattaya they had extra classes for homework after school, it was good because it would have been impossible for us to help them with Thai homework. Here in Chiang Mai they don't have those extra classes, but we are already able to help them.

After more than one year kids seems to be happy with school and they are ok with homework too.

It is also nice to notice how fast they learn in their age, my older son who is a special need-child and was told that he would propably have learning difficulties, is now speaking three languages and would like to start studying Chinese too!

Usually they get about two pages Thai homework every day; writing or maths, and English homework about two times a week one or two pages.

[soap]

my seven year old son leaves the house at 6-30am for the 40 k taxi ride to school,he returns home about 5-30 pm,a couple of times a week he brings homework,thai, english,maths,

last night he had maths,decimals and fractions i could not help him with because i dont think i learned them at school or if i did i have forgot them after 45 years.he had about 4 or 5 multiplication sums,

example 87x96 57x82 etc plus some division sums etc

ok i agree with sitting down with him and helping him has much has i can but i do say to myself whats the point of giving homework like this when its to difficult for him.

if he his the worst in the class,so be it but i cant believe that all the other seven year old kids find it all to easy doing the same homework.

the way i learnt my times table years ago was by sitting in the class and reciting over and over again my times table so even now if i want to know whats 8x7 it comes automatic to me without the use of a caculator.

i agree with getting children to use their brains but i dont think they should be thrown in at the deep end from the word go because i am sure the will only turn to the calculator one day.

[Siwanan]

I agree..math is too difficult for young children.

[whosyourdaddy]

I agree..math is too difficult for young children.

Languages, I include math in this category, are learnt actively. The more homework the better, the more exposer . The problem with Thai schools is not the amount of homework per class, but the amount of classes. Being in school from 8-4 and then commute and possibly extra tuition does not leave much time for anything else but homework. Plus compared to my country where a student would take 4 courses per semester, The thai curriculum has so much more with about 8 core courses plus elective. Too much. Too stressful