To find this really depressing?

I don't think there is areal problem with children learning the correct names for things, the problem is that things must be taught, regardless of the level the child has actually achieved, when the curriculum says they must. So there are children being taught main and subordinate clauses when they can barely read.
Casawan we finished at 4pm as well, but our lunch time was 12-1.30pm. and we had an afternoon playtime. Lunch is now usually 12-1pm and there is no playtime so not so very different.

DS brought his 2 children over for the weekend, he is divorced and their mum refuses to spend any time on homework with them, so they always do it with him. I went through the youngest's (4) reading book with her and found this comment in her record from school "R... successfully identified the R grapheme, and recognised it as being part of her name". Don't they talk about lettrs any more?

So glad you said that I was a TA for 30 years and that's just how it was, so sad to see how education is going. My grandaughter is so unhappy at her secondary school and I feel so sorry for her. It is her last year as she is doing her GCSEs does not want to stay and we are looking at 6th form colleges. Just wish political parties would leave education.

Obviously it is essential for somebody to sit with children to do their reading and their written work when they are small, otherwise it either won't happen or will be scribbled off with letters formed the wrong way round. I had four children who enjoyed reading, but I found much of the other homework to be an exhausting battle, especially at secondary school.

As others have said I'm sure that there isn't time for this in every household, especially in large families or where both parents work very long hours. There are also families where nobody can be bothered to help. I can't help but think that this is why there are still children leaving primary school illiterate and innumerate.

It is such a shame that with all the extra teaching assistants in schools there cannot be more teaching going on, with less of the meaningless satisfying of criteria, assessments and measurements of work. As Casawan suggests it might be possible to extend school hours? Personally I would prefer that "homework" (other than necessary reading) was actually done in study periods at school, perhaps with teaching assistants sitting in with the classes to help with difficulties.

When SAT's were started the idea was to test whether the school was up to scratch, not whether each individual child was doing at least as well as his/her specified learning age. The "Added Value" concept is difficult - suburban schools in middle class areas with readily available nursery schools have a very different intake to schools on estates with more limited opportunities and more children for whom English is a second language. The suburban schools, often classified as excellent or outstanding, have a head start with their well prepared pupils and might have no problem with subordinate clauses or the vagaries of English grammar. But for the average child in the average school this seems largely surplus to requirements. Being able to read and write well, to calculate properly and speak intelligibly should be within the capabilities of a normal school.

Not you're not being unreasonable to find this depressing. I watched Michael Moore's latest film where he went to different countries to steal ideas to take back to America. He went to Denmark (I think) for their education - they have NO HOMEWORK and their education is considered the best. He spoke to a Head who said she wanted to see them learning through play and socialising.

I have worked in schools since 1991 and have only just fully retired. For the last few years I have worked with Children in Y2 and Y6, helping them to prepare for SATS. Obviously as a teacher you want the kids to do really well in their tests, yet at the same time we are being forced to teach ridiculous grammar rules - when what we need as a nation are articulate people who love and appreciate their own language. Children in the Infants do not need to know what nouns, verbs, adjectives are, what the difference is between a statement, an interjection and a question. It is a nonsense! Write to your MP's, to the Education Sec. and COMPLAIN!
Incidentally my GD had homework from her Nursery recently - she is 18 months old!!

agree 100% its SO depressing

When I was in primary school we learnt poems off by heart for english homework

My DDs learn complex linguistic terms (it's not just basic grammar) which are beyond what you need to read and write competently, and by god it sucks the joy out of the subject.

My friend's son was 4 in May and started school in September. Unsurprisingly, He can't read or write. After a week he had learned to recognise about 6 different letters but was struggling to recognise several others. However, after 5 days at school he had been told about using a question mark when a sentence was a "mystery". Why does a 4 year old who cannot read or write need to worry about question marks? Michael Gove (Previous Education Secretary) and his department have a LOT to answer for. I cannot believe that this generation is going to be book lovers!
As a reception teacher in the 70s I am shocked how much education has changed, and not for the better!

One of the problems seems to be the idea that formal = better. This is a delusion which has shaped the education policies of both the Tory and Labour governments. Hence the insistence on correct grammatical terms (even for the very young), the emphasis on testing, and the adoption of school uniform for all ages. Did you wear uniform at primary school? I didn't - in fact, I remember it being introduced when my eldest daughter was about 6, and it was an informal and voluntary colour scheme. Now, at the same school, it is a strict uniform which has to be worn by all, even the 4 year olds. Is it necessary?

Our 4 and 6 year DGDs are now being home educated, mainly by their mum and myself, and we're trying to use quite a bit of the Montessori method. (They may attend a new Montessori group 2 days per week, if it gets going.) It's a good way of imparting abstract information in a visual and tactile form, which is a problem, I think, for the way that state education is going at the moment. The only problem is that it requires a lot of equipment, which is either very expensive to buy or time-consuming to make. It's a pretty good method, though. Shame that our schools are unlikely to adopt it.

Has anyone ever found it useful to be able to recognise a subordinate clause? Apart from, of course, to teach it to children who will never need to know apart from to recognise it in an exam.

DGS now in Primary school in Beijing does not get homework but is expected to review the days lessons. As it is all in Chinese DD has employed a Chinese tutor for 30 mins a night to go over his work with him and that is all he is expected to do. School starts at 8am and finishes at 3.45pm - a much longer day than in the UK.
How sad that I am not surprised that Morgana's GD has been set homework at 18mths old. Just when will the powers that be realise that children have more in their lives than school work. I find it all absolutely depressing and I was a teacher who fought (often unsuccessfully) against giving homework for the sake of it.

I find it a vital component of my everyday life djen!

Although I am sure I did learn in primary rather than secondary school
But that is all so long ago.......

We used 'First Aid in English' at primary school

It didn't dampen my enthusiasm for reading.
However, we didn't have any homework at primary school so there was plenty of time for reading at home as well as playing.
However, we did have regular tests (but no-one following us around with a clipboard -weirdly worrying).

Morgana! What was the homework? 'Can you identify a potty, describe its use and how it could be beneficial to you and mummy in 500 words'?!!

Yes, we wore uniform from junior school onwards Bluecat; DGD (4) loves her new uniform.

The only school my DC attended which was anti-uniform was a chaotic open-plan 'progressive' primary school from which I removed them because they were learning so little.

Spent 30 + years teaching. Latterly spent all my time 'assessing' rather than teaching, so frustrating and unfulfilling. Reminded me of a story, a man constantly weighed a pig, which left no time for feeding it, and then he wondered why it was loosing weight! Go figure educational specialists!

Meant ' losing', can spell, just fingers a bit stiff and fiddly today !

Reading all this is just so depressing. I am so glad my daughter took her children out of school to educate them herself. The lady from the DoE who visited last week to assess how they are progressing was very impressed with her teaching, and how the children are learning.

8am and finishes at 3.45pm is not much of a longer day than here, it's only 45 mins longer than many academy primaries in the UK

They never give the kids breathing space to feel confident in the basics.
For example: the week DDs class did telling the time, she came home on day 1 of it all keen to read every clock in the house… however on day 3 of telling the time she was expected to do it in Roman numerals.. and although she managed that homework she lost her brief enthusiasm for time telling because it must always be hopping on to the next more complex concept..

One of our local comprehensive schools starts at 8.30 but they are out by 2.50 pm

hildajenni I am impressed by how my DGD is learning at her primary school, the enthusiasm of all the teachers and the generally happy and encouraging atmosphere (apart, of course, from the homework with which I disagree, but it seems to be a part of primary education these days).

Perhaps a slightly more rigorous approach to teaching grammar in primary schools may not be a bad thing. There was a time when spellings, grammar etc were not taught or corrected because it 'daunted the child's imagination' and resulted in cringeworthy statements such as the review I have just seen on another website :
a gentle touch approach to hoasting that leave's you well cared for but not overly fussed over. There rooms are clean, warm and we'll furnished. We had an early start to the day and was still offered the full breakfast menu

Its the same all over the world, the other day here in Sweden, there was a debate about teenagers not being prepared for their further education at sixteen, because they havent had the correct education from when they start at seven, lots of parents dont know how to help their children with homework, what a state this Country is in,poor kids/youngsters.

I taught for 50 years, so sad to see what we have now come to in many UK schools.
Reading is about acquiring information and the enjoyment of the written word. Writing is about communicating and expressing oneself.
Soon we shall be swamped with young people with MH issues. There is far too much stress in education lately. Schools should be places of learning through curiosity and cooperation, not of rigidity and force feeding with facts.

Homework hmm. We took the DGC bowling on Saturday. Taking four year old DGD as an example she learned new vocabulary eg Strike, Spare, bumpers (yes I needed them too!) She recognised her name on the screen, could count how many pins she knocked down and how many more were left and even had a strike! Excellent hand eye co-ordination and muscle strength (those balls were heavy even for me!) She socialised with her siblings and cousins and was able to take turns and cheer when others achieved strikes too.

Afterwards she selected her own meal at Pizza Hut(with a little help reading the menu). She enjoyed colouring in a BFG booklet, beautifully within the lines I might add. She also found her way through mazes, played noughts and crosses, with some help completed a word search and drew a picture of her dream. Her dad has previously read the BFG book to her at bedtimes and she has seen both films.

When she got home she drew and coloured a picture of what she had done in her 'Magic Moments' Books sent home from school as homework. She dictated what she had done for her dad to write down but insisted on writing her own name.

This was a 'special treat' outing but her learning takes place in every activity we do at home whether it be baking, playing in the park, going for walks, collecting stones, shells, flowers, conkers etc etc. We talk. In her speech she uses main clauses, subordinate clauses, adjectives, adverbs, relative clauses and conditional clauses and many more grammatical structures, though we have never told her that. She has fun and learns. No clipboards or tick boxes - amazing isn't it!!!

Jalima, they're not teaching the basics, they're rushing past the basics to learn linguistic theory which is completely unnecessary.

They have to cover stuff in primary which wasn't even needed for English A-level in the past.