Help Your Child Finish Holiday Homework

Making your child do homework on regular schooldays is a problem. But making him/her do homework during vacation is a huge problem, is it not?

Before the holidays begin most parents plan out the vacation if they are travelling. It is time saving as well boredom saving, if you have planned the vacation.

Make a few plans and set the ball rolling. You never know which plan would work!

Help Your Child Do Holiday Homework

1. Wait for the holidays to begin. A fair warning here- this would work out for primary and middle school children. Teens would have their own agenda
2. Create interesting and colourful posters using ‘used’ charts or calendar paper. Create them together. The posters will have a routine put up- a routine from dawn to dusk
3. Do give concessions on waking up an hour late or sitting up an hour late after dinner. From 10.00 am to 1.00 pm there can be slots for homework. Some children would prefer doing homework in the evenings. See what suits their mood and go accordingly
4. The treat would be that if they complete homework in the morning they could have a day off
5. Set up a chart with columns for incentives. Award a star or a glitter sticker when they complete. When they get five stars reward them with extra hour of play or entertainment. Try not to set any negative punishment
6. Keep aside not more than 1.5 hours or 2 for doing homework
7. Keep the first week of vacation free to their liking. From the second week to the middle of May you could slot their homework. Math would be one subject they would need about 30 minutes every day
8. Deck up their room and study table with holiday theme. Keep their room and table cheery so that they see it and feel their mood lightening up
9. Keep some surprise treats to cheer them up too
10. Parents, largely the mothers will have to spend time and effort to be near their little ones when they do their homework
11. Parents ought to just guide them on how to do. Please do not do their work for them. Remain cheerful and make it like a game to be completed
12. Appreciate and applaud their effort
13. It is essential you supervise the Internet if children have to use for their homework
14. There would be some amount of complaining. Ignore the melodrama
15. Avoid the television when the children are doing their homework. It would not be fair otherwise
16. If you set any consequence then please follow them through
17. Organise ‘homework get together’ weekends or weekdays. Invite the classmates over to your home. Create a theme. One day you could have a Math scheme, another day a history theme based on their work.

    Allow them to work on their homework and then play. Maybe you could even organise an outing or a science experiment to be done. You could think of a ‘cooking without fire’ contest to get them interested. As a treat have a video game evening in between their homework sessions.

18. Have an outdoor homework day. Take your kids or kids and their friends along with few other parents to a park/museum/resort/beach/any open space where they can complete their work and then enjoy the rest of the day. Since it is going to be hot through May, it would be good to go outdoors in the evenings
19. If you are in an apartment complex, organise a homework week and get the children to complete their work under your supervision. Treat them to their favourite food/snacks. Rope in their mothers to help you out
20. Create a ‘homework monster’ evening during the last week of their vacation. Make it like a Halloween party where they dress up as monsters/ vampires and label their most tough or difficult subject. Collect the labels and allow them to tear up the labels and use as confetti

Happy holidays!

Did you like the tips? Do you have any others to share with fellow parents? Do write to us in the comments section below; we'd love to hear from you.