Homework 2: Check it or correct it?

Hmmm... I usually correct it, and then test it. Which I guess is somewhere in between?

For example, spelling tests. We go over them the day before the test. I read 'em out, she writes them. If she's wrong, I don't just leave it, I say "you got that last one wrong." Either she corrects it on her own (usually) or if she's just stuck, I show her the list with the correct spelling.

Then she figures out a way to memorize that (usually some sort of pronunciation thing).

Then a bit later, I test her again. She almost always has it at that point.

Spelling tests are a bit unique because it's hard to test yourself -- if you look at the list, you see the correct spelling. If you don't look at the list, you don't know what words you're supposed to be practicing.

I think there would be some homework situations where I wouldn't want to correct things though.

I do the same with spellings list. I guess I've never considered them homework even though we review daily.

I do the latter. I go over it and why the mistake was made and have my daughters fix it.

I think this depends too much of the child's age and personality for other people to be able to help you with this. Just because something may work for most children, it doesnt means it would work for yours. Off course, teachers cant "specialize" since they have to teach in a way that works decently for all children, but parents can.

That said, it would help if you said his age, at least =)

Albeit it seens this thread is aimed at people who already know your situation.

Also - sometimes depending on the homework, I'll simply circle the question that is wrong and have them go back and fix it. This I use more often with math problems.

Hi manored.

Most of us have talked together for so many years that we forget that new people come in who might have no idea of what's going on. Sorry.

My son is 9 and he has a mild learning disability.

But really the question is more general than that. I was wondering how people typically handle homework mistakes.

My friend said that she thinks teachers expect parents to help their kids get the answers correct. I argued that teachers have no way of knowing if the kids are understanding the lessons when the parent helps correct the work. Since some kid's parents don't bother to check the homework, much less to correct the homework, that the teacher's perception of what the kids are learning can be skewed since it's possible that many other children did not know how to complete the work until the parent helped them.

I think your method is OK, if you're sure his teacher has the time to go over it with him. Otherwise, i'd go with Soz' method--check, correct it and make sure he understands where he went wrong.

I don't think she is going over it with him. She sends the corrected sheets home and I go over it with him. He's much more likely to listen to my explainations after having had the teacher correct it.

We recently made some modifications to his homework assignments. I received an email from his teacher the other day asking how things were going under the new plan. She noted that he had made a few mistakes on it.

I explained my position -- that I thought she should know what parts of the assignments he was unable to do. That I helped him with the work but that I wasn't going to do it for him, so, if he made a mistake I left it.

Then I was talking to my friend and she explained how she does it the same way soz and linkat do.

I'm with Soz and Link.

I was under the impression that the teacher expected the child to do the homework and then have the parent review it. For the younger kids, it is also expected that the parent sign the child's planner (2nd/3rd/4th grade) - when they older, the child does not need to have the parent's signiture. My older daughter, I don't check all her written homework, but will go over with her, test questions, and projects.

It is almost like getting them ready to be completely on their own for learning. A little step at a time.

What is your child's teacher's expectation?

She hasn't said what her expectations are and I haven't asked.

But I don't know how that could be a public school teacher's expectations. There are kids in school who are homeless, who are in foster care, whose parents don't read english, whose parents don't know how to read at all... the list is endless.

I think that as long as you have an open line of communication with the teacher, you can just focus on supplementing Mo's learning. Helping him get it before he turns it in rather than after.

Then you can directly relay to the teacher what he's having problems with.

In less concrete situations (i.e., with spelling it's right or it's wrong), I tend to not "correct" so much as help her find the solution herself. Ask leading questions. Give parallel examples. Etc.

The point is that at the end of it she's come up with the correct answer herself, and understands the process and why that is the correct answer. Rather than me just supplying the correct answer.

Edit: I guess I do that with spelling too when I can. Not all spelling words lend themselves to that kind of figuring-out though. English is such a weird language.

I don't make corrections. I learned early that it frustrates my kids when I do that. Seems like they only want me to be impressed with how well they do, and when I make corrections it makes them feel like they've failed. Of course, that could just be my kids. Maybe if I homeschooled it would be different but I leave the correcting to the teacher unless I'm asked for help. I only verify that they've completed the assignment.

I never thought about the fact that it also provides feedback to the teacher -- that's a good point. It also makes the kids responsible for their own work early on.

Yeah, it sucks that not all kids have the same support.

With teacher hat on, it's pretty easy to know where students are academically from the work they do in class. While it sounds like Mo's class has a lot of homework, I'm sure it's still a fraction of the total school work they're doing. So it's pretty easy to suss out disconnects (homework is always perfect but classroom work has consistent errors) and whether some kids need more help than others.

Whether those kids that need more help get it is another question, of course.

Yeah, spelling words are somewhat different to me too. I guess it depends on the point of the assignment. Spelling words are supposed to be studied and correcting mistakes there is part of the studying. Worksheets, book reports, math problems, etc... I let them do it how they think they should. Many times they have a better understanding of what is expected since they are the ones who are in class when the teacher gives instructions.

Yeah, I agree with that part.

To go back to the Homework 1 thread, sozlet has hardly any homework, so I don't do a lot of the worksheet type stuff with her. On a weekly basis, it's really just spelling tests and math games (nothing recorded, just stuff we're supposed to do at home). Occasionally she'll have something for her logic class and will do say 8 out of 10 and then ask me about two, where I'll do the leading question/ parallel thing.

For reports, I don't do much at all, just let her write it.

But isn't it easier for her to see what he missed on her own than for her to have to read an email from me everyday telling her what he got wrong? She has to go through the papers anyway.

I do sit down with him and go over it with him once she returns it.

Yay! It's always nice to see that I'm not alone.

Interesting that we approached it from different angles but arrived at the same conclusion. Now I can add your arguements to mine should the discussion ever come up again.