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Sunday, 30 November 2014

Homework for Bear

Bear's homework this week is to research on the internet about the continents, their climates, currencies and population.  Normally they expect about half a page and bear is nearly eight.  While I am normally supportive of the school, I have a few reservations.

There is the generic one, what if we didn't have the internet.  This is a bit of a straw argument as practically everyone has internet these days, but if you are on a PAYG dongle or restricted and limited access it can be a bit of a bother.  Bear is fine.  We have internet, we have a generous package, it isn't a problem.

There is the lack of precision.  I am unimpressed by the scope of the question.  Bear has managed an extremely badly written paragraph about North America - his handwriting is appalling - but it looks like this is going to be impressively long for an exhausted, stressed and obsessively meticulous little boy.  He will want to get everything right.  Besides, what do you put about currencies in Asia?  How about Africa?  I can see me spending most of this week navigating through this one.  However part of being a student is learning how to make a question ask what you have revised so we can lay the foundations of that.

The biggest reservation I have is 'internet research'.  I am actually very careful about this with bear.  I have talked about it with him and in front of him with DH about the hazards of the internet, about things not being what they seem, about clicking on to iffy links and that it isn't always safe.  I know when I search for innocuous things I don't always get family friendly results.  While I am an adult, I don't always know the 'code words' for naughty things so I could accidentally put it all sorts.  There are some strange people out there.   Yes, of course we are watching him while he is on there, that's my version of parental control, and we have programmes on the computer that block access to odd places but really, it is a minefield.

This is going to be a looong piece of homework and I shall be glad to see the back of it.

1 comment:

  1. That does sound very open-ended for a 7 or 8 year old child to sort out. Hope they have all got such supportive parents xx

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