Back to school means it's time to stress out over homework

In my little corner of the world, school starts next week. And all around me I hear the moms talking about various after school programs and which ones they are avoiding because they don't encourage children to complete their homework first.

And I can hear that they are already stressed out over their child's homework: How much their child can expect this year, when it will get completed and what type of math they will have to relearn to help their children.

I am listening to their tips and concerns, especially after reading a study published in the American Journal of Family Therapy which found elementary students have three times the recommended amount of homework.

The experts cited in the study were recommending 10 minutes per grade level per day. So a first grader gets 10 minutes and a second grader gets 20 minutes and so on. Yet the research showed that even Kindergarten students had an average of 25 minutes of homework per night.

Granted there were differences in the amount of time spent for children who spoke another language at home or for children whose families didn't value education, but a half-hour block becomes a fairly large chunk of time if it isn't completed right after school.

By the time my husband is able to get our son and bring him home, they may have as much as 10 minutes together before I get home to cook dinner. After dinner is family time (if we are lucky), bath, stories and bed.

Experts (as in: other Moms) say they are beefing up their children's time management skills or offering rewards to their children who complete their homework during after school programs instead of right before dinner.

As for me, I'll be interested to see how much homework my son gets hit with in the new year.

What are your tips for helping your child with the amount of homework they have? Share them in the comments.