Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

My Daughter’s Homework Is Killing Me

theatlantic.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

201–210 of 347 posts

Re: My Daughter’s Homework Is Killing Me

#201

Post by throwaway1979 »

GotAnyMegadeth wrote: post #120

The Author and his daughter haven't learnt the tricks of the trade. I was set 3+hrs of HW a day, but I certainly didn't do that much. First, they need to assess which teachers "Don't mind" if you don't do the homework. This could mean they stand you up in front of the whole class and shout at you, but if they don't give you an after school detention, don't do it. Getting in the teachers good books previously helps wi…

I know what A levels are. What does AAAB mean? Does this mean you gave four subjects and scored 3 A's and 1 B? If that is correct, I'm curious what subjects you gave?

Re: My Daughter’s Homework Is Killing Me

#202

Post by dthunt »

mistercow wrote: post #107
nja wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Per class?

Surely it can't be per class. Depending on the class schedule of the school, that would be suggesting that 8 hours of homework for a high school student was "within acceptable parameters".

I think the better lesson is not, 'how many hours of homework is fair' but, 'teachers, please assign the minimum effective dose of homework'. This is one of the reasons I think labs are effective in high school science classes, provided they don't spell everything out for you and require you to understand what is going on, why you are doing it, and what's the important points are of what is going on. Applying knowledge is far more effective at making knowledge stick than balancing chemical equations.

Re: My Daughter’s Homework Is Killing Me

#203

Post by foobarbazqux »

patio11 wrote: post #163
tptacek wrote: post #130

Some quick thoughts, as the parent of a high school freshman: * If you anticipate your child being assigned 3 hours of homework in a typical evening, it is negligent to allow them to start that work at 8:00PM. Instead of allowing his daughter to watch episodes of Portlandia on her computer all afternoon, he could consider a rule suggesting homework gets completed before electronic entertainment; that's our rule this…

Japanese students probably do not work less hard than US students, or to greater effect. Wait wait, people really think American students do more work than Japanese kids? HAH. HAH. HAH. HAH. That's a good one. Seriously: Japanese schools don't assign 3 hours of homework because that would conflict with the 3 hours of "not required but it will ruin your life if you don't do it and then fail your next admissions exam"…

A misunderstanding.

>> Japanese students probably do not work less hard than US students

  !(work (J)  work (J) >= work (U) 
  --> work (U)
> American students do more work than Japanese kids

  work (U) > work (J)

Re: My Daughter’s Homework Is Killing Me

#204

Post by yardie »

vacri wrote: post #24

There are some concepts at odds here. "The measurements included numbers like 78 13/64, and all this multiplying and dividing was to be done without a calculator." is not 'rote learning'/'memorisation without rationalisation'. It's directly exercising an ability. I've had a university-level experience reach for her calculator to multiply 0.2 by 3, and when I forbade her from using it, she just stared dumbly at me. Th…

When I got to university the calculus instructor told us "we could use calculators, but they're going to be worthless" sure enough we only had symbols with a few numbers used as filler, but nothing you couldn't work out in your head. ie. (5x+2)^-3n

Re: My Daughter’s Homework Is Killing Me

#205

Post by aestra »

yardie wrote: post #195
GotAnyMegadeth wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You had to recite a pledge of allegiance? Wow. Sounds like North Korea.

I found this to be really regional. I did when I was a kid, then I questioned our teacher why she did not after the first week or so. She felt the whole standing, gazing and hand over the heart was a bit too military for an elementary school. I've had a few "super patriotic" teachers threaten me with detention for not towing the line. But these tended to be in urban and ex-urban, lower socioeconomic schools. The type…

Where I grew up the Pledge was absolutely a mandatory part of every school day, and was said before morning announcements through the loudspeaker. Every room had a flag in it, so students in that room could Pledge to it. I grew up in an urban area, so my experiences are skewed urban. I couldn't imagine an individual teacher having a choice in the matter.

Of course, as I posted in the parent, the Supreme Court allows for individual students to stay seated and not salute the flag if they choose.

Re: My Daughter’s Homework Is Killing Me

#206

Post by adestefan »

dsego wrote: post #126
neltnerb wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think a good part of the problem is that we learn to multiply and divide backwards. The standard US algorithm involves starting at the least significant digit and working your way up. It is much easier to do in your head if you do it from the most significant digit down. Or learn to convert hard multiplications into easy ones, for instance: 9x27 = 10x27-27 = 243 The other way to do this would be to multiply 9x7 to…

Why isn't this type of mental calculation actually taught at schools? Not every kid thinks of these "tricks". Instead, they do how the teacher showed them and do it on paper the long way. Seems like we are crippling our kids.

That's how I was taught in the mid-80s at a Catholic elementary school in Pennsylvania.

I believe I heard, probably on NPR, that the new Common Core standard also recommends teaching in this manner.

Re: My Daughter’s Homework Is Killing Me

#207

Post by adestefan »

dsego wrote: post #151
Tichy wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel a bit bad for not memorizing it, to be honest. Not sure if there is any other way for learning to multiply? How do you "understand" that 6x 8 = 48? With bigger numbers, then you can apply a system. And as I mentioned I also "cheated" a bit with the basic table. For example I would have remembered that 5 x 8 = 40 and then calculated 6 x 8 = 5 x 8 + 6 in my head, because the multiplications for 5 are easy (half…

You can learn to better comprehend a quantity or amount. So you understand that 6 * 8 is larger than 2 * 8, and then understand that it is actually 3 times that. Another approach would be to always think of multiplication as condensed summation, so 6 * 8 = 8 + 8 + 8 + 8 + 8 + 8 = (8+8) + (8+8) + (8+8) = 32 + 16 = 48. I would let my kid write out the summation and apply an analytical approach rather than memorising it…

Then they can also get out the popsicle sticks to add up all those groups of eight.

At some point you just need to memorize things.

Re: My Daughter’s Homework Is Killing Me

#208

Post by ctdonath »

The Montessori method: take each child at his own pace thru sensory-grounded material, giving enough familiarity with material until it is internalized and the child abstracts it himself - THEN move on to the next step, at individual pace. Therein lies understanding. Not doing this leads to contempt for the material and rote memorization (which the article starts out noting is the plain conclusion) devoid of understanding.

Re: My Daughter’s Homework Is Killing Me

#209

Post by 6d0debc071 »

lgieron wrote: post #159
rorrr2 wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never understood how the knowledge of the capitals of states or countries is useful in any way. It's meaningless. It can be easily looked up, if you need that information. I can't even imagine a practical scenario when one would need to know it.

It's hard to function in the world without some rudimentary knowledge of it. As for practical scenario, imagine your boss wants to send you to a conference in Paris, and you answer back with "Where?".

Smarter questions would be about accommodation or travel - reveals the rough distance without pointing out you don't know where it is.

Re: My Daughter’s Homework Is Killing Me

#210

Post by mkr-hn »

TuringTest wrote: post #194
alextingle wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Surely it would be better to learn history, economics, sociology and to read the international section of a newspaper than to memorise cities? Knowledge of capitals and so forth is incidentally acquired by doing those other things.

Why does it have to be either/or? A systematic approach guarantees that you have seen each capital city at least once.

Why are the capitals so important? Maybe I want to travel to Kyoto or Makati instead of Tokyo or Manila. I can see the value in knowing the countries and a little about them, but capitals aren't the entirety of a country, and knowing about them won't tell you much about the country as a whole.

I can learn about the capitals if I ever plan to go there.

Post reply on HN