Name: Homework.
Age: Here today, due tomorrow.
Appearance: Like schoolwork, but on the kitchen table.
What does it consist of? Three A4 sides of problems, one of French adjectives, pages 23-26 of the workbook and 500 words on the Corn Laws.
Oh yeah, I remember that. My dog ate it. You let a dog eat all that paper?
No, not really. I just didn’t understand any of it. Perhaps you should have got some help from a parent.
I am a parent. In that case, you may be interested in a new study by an educational charity.
You’re not going to make me read it, are you? I’ll summarise: the Varkey Foundation found that 66% of British parents believe they spend either enough or too much time helping their children with homework.
You can count me in there. In the UK, parents spend an average of 3.6 hours a week helping their children.
That’s loads! It’s also less than almost any other country surveyed. In the US, it’s 6.2 hours. In Russia, it’s 7.5, and in India, it’s 12. The global average is 6.7.
If I knew anything about statistics, I’m pretty sure I would find that depressing. On a more positive note, the UK ranked among the top countries when it came to parental confidence in the quality of education their children were receiving – well above Japan, Canada and Singapore.
Well, that’s something, isn’t it? Sadly, there is little or no correlation between this confidence and education attainment, where the UK ranks well behind those three nations.
There must be some European slackers out there who give even less help than we do. Yes. Finnish parents spend just 3.1 hours a week.
Stupid Finns. But Finnish children have less homework generally, spend fewer days at school than British children and still manage to get much better results.
Can we just skip to the crumb of comfort traditionally offered at the end of one of these? I’m sorry, we’re fresh out today.
Do say: “Bring it on, kid. I love the smell of calculus in the evening.”
Don’t say: “Well done, darling. Let’s put the French adjectives to one side for the moment, while I move on to the French white.”
