How you can help your child with their homework

Helping children with their homework is a part of every parent’s weekly schedule. Some love the challenge, whereas others dread it. Keeping a child focused or wanting to complete their homework can be an uphill struggle, especially if there are other more fun activities going on around them.

Every child is different. There are some that focus much better straight after school, so for these children, this is the best time to set them down quietly to do their homework. Others need time to run off some built-up energy, talk to others about their day or just generally have some space before the work starts again – so for these children, a later homework time would be best, as long as it is not just before bedtime which should always be seen as a relaxing wind-down time of day to calm the mind and get it ready for sleep.

Give them space

It is important to be able to offer your child space when they are carrying out their homework, and this is especially so if they have younger siblings. Having a quiet area where the mind is at ease and therefore finds it easy to soak up information is highly beneficial to get the optimum amount of knowledge, and therefore get the most out of homework or home study time.

Although it is always a good idea to be on hand should your child require support within any given subject. It is also a good idea to let them decide as and when they would like to have this input rather than be constantly offering to help or, worse, do their homework for them.

If there are younger siblings, you may find it easier to have a time schedule for when homework gets done and while the older children have their schoolwork, set other tasks for the younger children to do at the same time so that they feel a part of the process and do not feel left out or get bored and irritate those trying to concentrate. 

A helping hand

Being able to help your child while they are doing their homework does not just fall into helping them with their subjects or, for that matter, keeping their younger siblings busy and entertained. There other things that you can do in order to make their home study time flow and be as enjoyable as possible.

There are websites such as Studentreasures Publishing that offer downloadable and printable worksheets which you can use to help your child develop their creativity in writing and can be used as a resource for parents and teachers alike.

You can also take your child with others to different locations or museums connected to their classroom subjects to help them get a deeper understanding and other connections within their memory so that it enhances their learning experience.

Let confidence flow

When helping your child with their homework, it is important to encourage their thought processes and aid them in making the right connections rather than just jumping in with the answer. Helping your child understand how to get to the right answer by explaining processes to understand and progress through their learning to the ultimate result is a far better way than just reeling off what you feel they should know automatically.

By showing and guiding your child through the subjects that they struggle to understand, you will be enticing their confidence to grow and flourish. The more confident a child gets within their understanding, the more willing they will be to learn more and more.

Final thoughts

In order for your child to get the best out of their schoolwork and their home study times, it is a good idea to keep them in a calm and quiet location so they can concentrate. If there are siblings, it is good to have some sort of quiet time while the homework is carried out so that there is no feeling of missing out for either child. 

For younger siblings, setting the time by for drawing or coloring may be a good start so that when they are of an age to start bringing home schoolwork, they are already in the routine for it to be carried out within the scheduled time. If you are printing off sheets for your school-aged child to help with their homework, maybe finding some coloring pictures to print off for your younger child, too, could be a way forward.