Ah, homework. Homework, homework, homework. Long time readers know my great (evidenced-based) antipathy to homework. But, I chose to send my daughter to a school that I knew would require homework, so I need to get over my cognitive dissonance and suck it up. Easier said than done.

Even if I were totally gung ho about homework the transition from elementary school where she had about twenty minutes a week to middle school where she has at least 40 minutes a day is huge. Rose was used to reading about 6 hours a day. I'm not making that up: two hours before school, an hour at school, an hour before dinner, and two after dinner. And pedagogically (cognitive dissonance check in) I know reading is better for her than any homework. So, we all have to mourn the loss of reading time.

The good news: we seem to have a rhythm going. Rose comes home from school, tells me all about her day, goes to the bathroom, gets a snack, and then practices her cello for thirty minutes while I go pick up David. She saves her ten minutes of math problems to do in John's presence, though at curriculum night the principal made very clear that if the parents help too much at home the teachers won't know what they aren't teaching well in class. So, John tries to be a reassuring presence, not a tutor.

Orchestra and math seem to be the baseline homework. Every other week we have a large Language Arts/World Cultures assignment that involves home research, prewriting, revising, and gluing on posterboard. The first one was a poem and a map which we spent a lot of time on but had a really good time doing so. I liked how the teacher designed the assignment. I loved the actual creation of the poem, watching Rose make her poster though stressed me out. We'll see how the next project goes.

It's not a ton of time, yet. We have mostly got it organized and don't have those crying fits at 9:30 about homework she has forgotten, so far. And I have agreed to support her.