Grading Papers & Doing the Math
I am tired of 4th grade. I am sick of grading piles of papers. Why do I feel the need to keep grades for everything they do? When they're working diligently, cranking out assignment after assignment, the pile of papers and workbooks is overwhelming.
My friend has a son who is one year younger than T, attends public school, and only brings home about 6 completed worksheets per week. When she called me concerned that her son wasn't getting much of an education and mentioned the piddling amount of work brought home each week I thought "Goodness, K & T can do that much in an hour!" The conversation had me wondering if I might be overloading the kids with schoolwork. I know homeschoolers don't have to spend half their school time waiting on 20 - 30 children to get down to business; but, six worksheets for an entire week's worth of classwork is about one per day! That's not much by any standard. Apparently, she isn't the only parent of a child in that class who is worried about the lack of schoolwork. She asked around and learned that the teacher has a reputation for being lazy. What's sad is that it isn't just that teacher who assigns so little. My own children brought home roughly the same quantities when they were in public school. K's second grade teacher was the exception.
I did the math & was shocked at the result. If the above mentioned teacher had 25 students (actually it's more like 18) and assigned 6 worksheets per week to each of those students she would be grading 150 papers per week. If my kids do 12 pages (usually more) per day per child the result is 120 pages per week. Now, if one were to consider that I spend just as much time on lessons in front of the white board as one would assume that teacher does (the rumor is she stays behind her desk much of the day) one could easily reach the conclusion that I am doing the same amount of work as a school teacher. It's pretty amazing to think about it. What is even more incredible is the realization that my children are doing the equivalent of 20 of that teacher's public school students! Remember, that teacher actually has 18 students in her class. It would be accurate to say my children do more schoolwork each week than her entire class.
That little piece of information got me to wondering if I was overwhelming the kids. They don't seem overwhelmed, bored perhaps, but not overwhelmed. They still have time to play, go to karate, do their chores, and veg out. No, the kids aren't overwhelmed. I'm the one who's overwhelmed, buried under piles of not yet graded papers. Yeah, I definitely need to give up on the notion of grading every single one.
My friend has a son who is one year younger than T, attends public school, and only brings home about 6 completed worksheets per week. When she called me concerned that her son wasn't getting much of an education and mentioned the piddling amount of work brought home each week I thought "Goodness, K & T can do that much in an hour!" The conversation had me wondering if I might be overloading the kids with schoolwork. I know homeschoolers don't have to spend half their school time waiting on 20 - 30 children to get down to business; but, six worksheets for an entire week's worth of classwork is about one per day! That's not much by any standard. Apparently, she isn't the only parent of a child in that class who is worried about the lack of schoolwork. She asked around and learned that the teacher has a reputation for being lazy. What's sad is that it isn't just that teacher who assigns so little. My own children brought home roughly the same quantities when they were in public school. K's second grade teacher was the exception.
I did the math & was shocked at the result. If the above mentioned teacher had 25 students (actually it's more like 18) and assigned 6 worksheets per week to each of those students she would be grading 150 papers per week. If my kids do 12 pages (usually more) per day per child the result is 120 pages per week. Now, if one were to consider that I spend just as much time on lessons in front of the white board as one would assume that teacher does (the rumor is she stays behind her desk much of the day) one could easily reach the conclusion that I am doing the same amount of work as a school teacher. It's pretty amazing to think about it. What is even more incredible is the realization that my children are doing the equivalent of 20 of that teacher's public school students! Remember, that teacher actually has 18 students in her class. It would be accurate to say my children do more schoolwork each week than her entire class.
That little piece of information got me to wondering if I was overwhelming the kids. They don't seem overwhelmed, bored perhaps, but not overwhelmed. They still have time to play, go to karate, do their chores, and veg out. No, the kids aren't overwhelmed. I'm the one who's overwhelmed, buried under piles of not yet graded papers. Yeah, I definitely need to give up on the notion of grading every single one.
Labels: homeschooling
posted by Cindy at 6:16 PM
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