Home Work

A few weeks ago I was listening to a radio interview where parents were moaning about the hellacious amount of homework kids are required to complete nowadays. As I was folding the towels I listened to the broadcast with only half an ear. Since my boys are only four and three years old I knew I was years away from having to think about kids’ homework. Boy, was I wrong.
My sons are in nursery school, and this fall my oldest son Quincy started pre-kindergarten. While there has always been an educational component to the boys’ nursery school schedule, most of the boys’ time was spent on the real work of childhood: play. But I found out this year that pre-kindergarten is a whole new ballgame. The kids in the pre-k class are being prepared to step into school. The pre-k teachers have established a thorough curriculum. The kids are introduced to using computers and each one gets his own notebook. And horror of horrors, the kids also given simple assignments to complete at home. Simple assignments + Completed at home = homework.
It took me a while to get up to speed with this pre-k homework concept. I am taking classes at a local community college myself and I have been struggling to juggle household chores, work assignments, and my own homework. One morning my youngest James asked to wear his favorite shirt and I explained to him that his shirt was in the hamper.
“When can I wear my shirt?” James pleaded.
I looked at the towering mountain of laundry piled precariously on top of the hamper and honestly replied, “I have no idea, sweetie.”
While struggling with studying for my own classes and trying to complete my homework assignments, helping Quincy with his pre-k homework was a low priority for me. Quincy’s first project focused on something to do with family stories. Dimly, I remember glancing at the homework directions printed on his classroom door. Apparently I was supposed to leave some family pictures or something in Quincy’s cubby. I completely forgot about it. The next morning Quincy’s new teacher reminded about the homework assignment. The teacher handed me a specially decorated bag for the family photos. Luckily for me, Quincy’s teachers had found an old photo of Quincy as a baby with my husband Kevin and me hanging in Quincy’s old classroom from a previous art project. They used this old picture for the first few days of school.
Embarrassed by forgetting the first assignment of the year I promised Quincy’s teacher that I would do better. The next morning I remembered the photo just as I was running with the kids out of the house to school. I grabbed a photo of me with the kids dressed in Halloween costumes from the fridge door and tossed the picture into Quincy’s decorated bag.
That afternoon I picked the boys up from school. This time the homework complaint came from Quincy. “Why did you only put one picture in my bag?” Quincy asked in a huff. It turns out all the other children had have four photos in their bags. I hated disappointing my kids. Deciding that overkill was the best solution, the next morning I put a whole photo album in Quincy’s cubby.
The photo album was returned that afternoon with the homework assignment and decorated bag rubber-banded to it. Once again, Quincy was displeased.
“No one else had a book!”
Aaarrrgghh! I can’t believe I am flunking out of pre-kindergarten. Determined to not screw up again, I carefully read the homework assignment. Quincy and I were supposed to select four family photos together. We were supposed to discuss who was in the family photos and what the occasion was in the photos so that Quincy could talk about his family for class.
I finally got it. Quincy’s homework was not just one more thing on my to do list that needed to be checked off. My little boy was growing up and I needed to get him ready for school. Together, Quincy and I looked through a stack of our photo albums together and we picked out a handful of family favorite photos. The boys and I discussed the photos and I prepared Quincy to speak in his class.
Finally after a week of Mommy missteps Quincy’s show and tell was a success. There have been more decorated bags with homework assignments in the cubbyhole since then. Recently Quincy’s class has been working on their reading skills. In honor of the letter A I cut out pictures of apples, acorns, arbors, and aprons for one homework assignment. Quincy decided on the apples and acorns for his assignment and carried them happily to school.
I am still overly busy but I am making a greater effort to be more organized. In the past I have jumped into new organizational plans like they were boot camp. I would buy the latest organizing tome, a brand new calendar, and an over-priced organizer or PDA. Typically I would stay on track for a few weeks. Then I would slack off. And after a few months I would be back to my messy, cluttered, disorganized self.
At this time in my life, I have started the organization process more gently. So far, I have just started with jotting a brief to do list each morning, writing in my journal, and getting a good night’s sleep. For my writing career, I have set up my reference materials and office supplies neatly on the desk in the living room. And for my schoolwork, I have massed my ever-growing cache of art supplies on one side of our sun porch near the sunny table where I create my projects.
For Quincy’s assignments I now take great pains to carefully read all of the directions my son’s teachers send home with him. I have learned from writing and drawing that creativity is a muscle that has to be trained. With time, ideas flow more freely and craftsmanship improves. I realize now that Quincy’s homework is training me to help Quincy be a good student and support his educational future.
A few days ago while I was buckling James into his car seat he asked me, “Can I go to kindergarten?”
I reassured James, that he too would go to kindergarten.
“Can I go to kindergarten now?” James suddenly asked as I was buckling in Quincy. I bumped my head on the car door in surprise.
“Not now.” James became his predictable wail. I cut the high-pitched whining short with a gentle answer. “Not now, but soon.” I got into the car and began to drive the boys to nursery school before I headed off to my own classes. My boys began to chatter about going to kindergarten and driving busses and taking train trips and all of the other silly things they usually talk about. Suddenly I realized that my little boys were not quite so little anymore.