homework strategies

[Lindsnh]

Can anyone give me some homework strategies for 2nd grade ELA and Math? I have a concerned parent and being a 1st year teacher I need help with strategies I can give this parent.thanks in advance

[mercygate]

Can anyone give me some homework strategies for 2nd grade ELA and Math? I have a concerned parent and being a 1st year teacher I need help with strategies I can give this parent.thanks in advance
Is your parent concerned because her child does not do his homework? Because the homework is too hard? Either way, the best "strategy" I know is to break it all down into manageable parts.

Do you know anything about "FlyLady (http://www.flylady.net)"?

Her system for getting control of your house and your life involves using a timer and setting it for 15 minutes as you tackle big jobs in baby steps. She gives a recipe for building a "control journal" that helps us keep track of what we are doing. On her web site, she has a "Student Control Journal" that would work for a second grader.

If the kid is all over the place and disorganized, FlyLady's "House Fairy" is wonderful for kids this age.

[Dhe Poet]

Only when it comes to math and vocablary. For math I think all children should get their composition books and count by ones twos threes excetera. My son is ten now and still has not memorized the multiplication facts! I just implemented this as parents homework and expect it to work for 7x5 is 35 (42)49) 7x7 is 49.At least he's not counting by ones using his fingers and still getting it wrong. His 6 yr. old sister will know how to multiply probably by next week,LOl Vocaabulary I say, read the dictionary. Words derive from other words, and one better than that I guess is the thesaurus.

[Brit]

what exactly is the parent's concern? not getting homework done? not enough homework (believe it or not, I have a lot of parents who want me to send MORE)? too much? the student doesn't know what to do?

if it's simply not willing to get it done, then I like the timer idea -- breaking the task down into little bits. I actually did this for my parents a little bit -- grammar is to be the first night, reading and reading response the second, and writing the third (I teach no math). I give them five nights, so they can choose which nights to do the work on, but I lay out a specific order and amount of work...or that's theoretically how it's planned. Whether or not that was clearly communicated to parents, I don't know. I never know how much actually gets through to parents.

[kingrichie]

Read 20 min.
1 page of math
1 page of language
1 page science or social studies