There are no grades for homework? Why would you ever do schoolwork for no grades in elementary school? Because it's so clear to you when you're 10 that it's important to learn the material? If the only consequences of not doing homework was the use of a not-painful stick, even I, the ultimate nerd child, might have thought about skipping it. I think the trolls are winning.

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so I just got her as an example via my mother's "Why aren't you more like your sister?" Which included "Why are you such a nerd? Why don't you have boyfriends and go to parties?"

Ah. Most of my Mom and sisters' fights were about clothes to wear out on dates and at parties, and the timing and extent of the dates themselves. I think Mom found my nerd-dom rather restful.

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There are no grades for homework?

My best guess is that some Boca Raton parents group sued the school board when little Johnny didn't get an A.

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My kids are graded for homework. I can't understand it not counting toward some (even a small) percentage of their overall grade.

It is a generalization, Cindy, but I think it's a generally good one. I know my sister could deal with her son better than with her daughter, and her husband could deal with the daughter better. There's variance within the genders, too, though - like Calli, my sister and I had completely different reactions to our mother (except I was the one with the screaming fights).

Yeah, there's variance even in my household, which was the model for my gross generalization. Ben and I are powerfully alike--IN SOME WAYS. Where those ways are concerned, Scott actually does better with Ben, probably because he (Scott) understands me so well. But when it's a power struggle sort of issue, Scott generally gets through to Julia better, and I generally get through to Ben, better. Another variance is that I generally understand Chris better. Chris is powerfully like Scott IN SOME WAYS, and powerfully like (parts of me, some of which Ben doesn't seem to share) IN SOME WAYS.

Basically, parenting is a tremendous crap shoot.

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Second best guess is that stopping grading homework raises the school's overall scores and makes the schools (and Jeb) look good. Shortsighted R Us.

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I made it through both of my classes, got lunch and am now at work with a BIG task. Hopefully I can focus enough to get it done.

edit: UGH. I have no idea what I'm doing. What have I gotten myself into?

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I'm not pleased with the destruction part, but he will have to fix or replace what broke. I don't really think that I can tame 13 yo hormones instantly to prevent screaming and tossing chairs, but I hope that he will learn quickly that for his actions there are consequences.

can't stop them mid-rage that's for sure.

So if dentention - which from what I remember as a kid was boreing - sitting in a room either writting lines, doing homework or stareing at a wall - is the stick, where is the carrot? While I can't pretend to understand that homework doesn't count- I wonder if teachers could count it as extra points to add to a grade...doing 100% of you homework will add x to your test score ,90% x-1 , and 80% x-2.

that might have motived me, an a/b/c student - even more than homework counting as a general % of a grade.

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I'm sure individual teachers have incentives, as do parents. It does count at the middle school level. When I have had conferences on the subject in the past it boils down to the teachers telling me I have to make the kid do his work. Not real helpful.

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When I have had conferences on the subject in the past it boils down to the teachers telling me I have to make the kid do his work. Not real helpful.

I am Laura.

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I've been fortunate so far that Emmett is fairly diligent and conscientious about doing his homework. I think this is mostly due to two things which have nothing to do with me: (1) his school emphasized homework from grade one, though for the first two years it was really just to inculcate the habit of doing the homework; (2) his current aftercare sits all the kids down at 4pm and they spent 45 minutes doing homework, no exceptions. (The advantage of the aftercare being in University Village where UC houses all it's grad student families.)

His only real problem (which is a work problem for me as well) is that he zips through his work like a speed trial without enough attention to detail. It's something to get over, rather than do properly in many instances.

As for father/son dynamics, I know that Emmett's angry responses trigger similarly angry/aggressive responses in me that I have to sidestep. Not that often though - he's most likely to get upset when he's frustrated and that's easier to sympathize with.

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