Listen to Your Child’s Homework Excuses and Complaints

Understanding why children avoid homework is a topic of concern among parents as a new school year begins.

Listen, pay attention, gather clues, and if it helps, record your child’s exact words relating to homework. A pattern of complaints can help you and your child to identify problems. Recognizing reasons children avoid homework can lead to successful strategies and solutions.

“I left my books at school.”

Organization
Some children leave a trail of things behind them at school, at home, and wherever they go. They might leave a well-done finished assignment at home or forget to take it out of their backpack and turn it in the next morning. These same children may or may not find it challenging to organize their thinking and written work.

”I don’t know how to begin.”

Study Skills
Getting started might be the biggest challenge for some children. Others need help with planning and carrying out their work from beginning to end.

“I’m finished, can I go out to play?”
“It takes me too long to do my homework.”

Time Management
Some children work faster and/or slower than others. If homework is consistently taking too much time, it is a good idea to seek to understand the reason(s). Some children tend to work too quickly and fail to complete quality work. Making good use of work time is a skill that children can learn.

“Homework is boring.”
“I know all the answers, what’s the point?”
Motivation
Many children use the word “boring” when they don’t want to do a task because they would rather do something else. Others use this excuse because the work is too hard. Homework that is consistently too easy and/or tedious can be a problem for children who want/need to be challenged.

“I can’t think.”
“It’s too noisy.”

Distractions
For some children, any noise is distracting. Movement, smells, bright lights, air temperature, interesting objects nearby and/or a hungry stomach can also affect a child’s ability to concentrate. Anything in the child’s environment can be a potential distraction.

“I don’t understand the directions.”
“What?”

Processing Weakness
Some children, due to a weakness in language and/or auditory processing, may not understand directions. Some children choose to not do homework rather than let others know that they did not understand the directions and/or concepts.

Remind yourself to listen to your child as s/he talks about homework. Is it possible that a child avoids homework because of more than one reason? Yes. Is it possible that a child might use a general complaint that is difficult to interpret? Sure. How about this one?

“My dog ate my homework assignment.”