When the TPC become a nightmare vacation time – publico

                 

                         
                     

                         

                 

 
 

Whoops, reprimands, tiredness. These are some of the effects in the “family dynamics” of so-called homework (TPC) reported by several mothers. PUBLIC launched this challenge to readers: if you have children in the 1st cycle of schooling (between six and 10 years), tell us how homework will have to do on vacation Páscoa.Também asked whether often help children in this task and think that TPC help to have better results. They arrived about 50 responses, of which only four submitted by parents (men).

Only five say the children came to vacation without homework. Already 20 realize that their children have five or more chips to do and there are even those who, at age six, already has nearly two dozen sheets of chips to dispatch this school break, only two weeks.

Teresa Melo has two daughters, one to seven, with another 18 months. It is separated and the home workday starts from 18 hours, when the oldest daughter ends its activities. Consider the following: “The daily scene here at home is this: from 18 hours I’m in anxiety trying to help my older daughter to work while trying to take baby bill, which of course at this time calls my attention and destabilized completely the oldest. Often the thing degenerate into shouting. “

By way of experience with the eldest son, Filipa Azevedo, who has three children between four and 10 years, who is now on the side of consider that TPC “are counterproductive to the family dynamics.” “In my particular case, have led to tremendous discussions, shouts and reprimands that could well be avoided if they had not been passed so many TPC” he said.

It also says that the situation only improved when, recently, to have displaced to devote exclusively to children, since she is pregnant with a fourth child and his salary was “too small to pay for Free Time Activities and the necessary explanations”. But it is to highlight the following with regard to this experience: “Extraordinary that, these days, it was necessary I become a housewife to be able to save the marriage and keep the family on the way”

Pedro Rosario, Professor of School of Psychology, University of Minho, is more notable for the fact that the debate on the TPC to be very influenced “by the impact they have on families and not so much for its educational purposes.” But this teaching, which has focused part of their research on this subject, stresses also the educational objectives of TPC are put at risk when they are in excess. “All the research shows that homework should have an adequate charge to ages. In the case of the 1st cycle if they are thought to last more than 30 minutes a day, and this already in the case of the 4th grade, become unbearable, “he said.

to say so, for example, the case of Rita Pereira? He has a six year old daughter who is in 1st grade. Brought to rent 16 sheets of Portuguese chips, Meio and Mathematics Study. The mother of unemployed kindergarten teacher, says that the work has been completed, but sighs: “The TPC are in excess. I can not forget the children how many chips also do not know yet complete and it is intended that the parents do with them in the middle of the week. “

The daughter of Maria João Calvary is seven years old, is in 2nd grade and came home to “28 sheets of chips to make. At Christmas were 20 “. The Ana Oliveira is six years old, is in the 1st grade and came to vacation with “13 A4 pages of homework.” “The TPC can help children keep the memory of what was being taught before the holidays, but frankly it takes a lot more sense in the amount of work that is required in such small children,” protests. The daughter of Isabel Santos is nine years old and is in the 3rd grade: “On vacation has to make six Portuguese chips, eight mathematics and 15 years in the book.” “It is absurd,” he says.

This is also the term used by Pedro Rosario and the president of the Mathematics Teachers Association (APM), Lourdes Figueiral when faced with these situations. “It’s more than proven that it is not more of the same repeat that children learn. This only makes them come to hate school, discipline and study, “explains Lourdes Figueiral. This teacher believes that, as a rule, students should not take jobs for the holidays because there are other activities that “promote the development of their capabilities” and that are different from performing in schools, which is, stresses a point their favor.

vacation there?

“we lost two hours of our holiday to do the work instead of being to enjoy quality time together, “laments Monica Diniz, who has a daughter in the 2nd year, who will have to make five chips and composition during this school break.

Marta Guerreiro, who has a child of six years 1st grade, regrets that the “drama” that has lived in the Christmas holidays happen again now at Easter. “There are three forms of Portuguese and three mathematics. In theory it is not so in practice is immense. It is that the holidays of the children do not join the parents’ vacation, which means that it continues to stay in school “attending the activities that are oferecias during school breaks. “We continue to get home at 19 pm and the routine of homework, baths, dinner and preparation for the next day is repeated with children and parents exhausted. In practice are not holidays, “says

Maria José Araújo, the Centre for Research and Educational Intervention of the Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences of the University of Porto, is peremptory:.” The holidays are to rest “. “If for adults working vacation is not working because it would be different for children?” Asks this researcher, remembering that the holidays are a “right” necessary to any human being.

“Adults can not affect this right to rest or be committing an illegality, “he maintains, referring to the Convention on the rights of the Child, adopted in 1989 by the United Nations, which stipulates that they have” the right to rest, leisure and to engage in play and recreational her age activities and participate freely in cultural life and the arts “.

” they are completely inadequate loads, “says Peter also Rosario, warning that this indicates that” there is a gap of teacher training that is worrying. ” Also because everything has been studied on the TPC, he adds, it shows that they are only effective in terms of improving learning, while at the same time have “a load and a suitable purpose, which must be explicit and should be communicated to students. ” “If the student realize that the work is useful for you, is more available to accomplish,” specify.

daily work

The TPC are from long a source of controversy. Some argue the fiercely, some the contest and there are even schools that already decreed his death, as is the case of Carcavelos Group of Schools in the municipality of Cascais.

In a recent report on the load work home, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) stated that just the word TPC to “cause epidermal reaction in the majority of students.” Of all the organization’s countries, the Portuguese 15 year olds were aware that, on average, spend the TPC about four hours a week, thus Portugal being the 10 countries in which students at that age, they spend less time with the tasks they are passed by teachers to perform at home.

But at earlier ages, such as those that were the subject of our inquiry, the situation is reversed and is even leagues away from everyday life in France, Spain and Finland, where the TPC have been officially abolished, though the first two countries there are schools that continue to insist on this practice, which led to a strike by parents.

Overall, readers who responded to pUBLIC challenge to agree on the existence of homework, provided that “with account, weight and measure” and does not represent a daily requirement. Also among the readers there who does not deny the existence of the TPC, but the kind of exercises that are passed by teachers for students to take home because, as stated Ana Carvalhal, who has a child in 2nd grade are “a mere continuation of what already spend hours doing in school.” And almost all, more or less actively help children make the TPC.

Sofia Coutinho, who has two children of seven and three years, assumes that what has been learned from that was born older, which entered this year in the 1st cycle, the leads to be on the side of “not rotund to homework.” “So, here at home, the scheme is simple: if the realization of homework colliding with the family routine (which includes the banter between the two brothers who spend the whole day without seeing each other), the oldest does not make them TPC and take a message for the teacher in this direction, “he says, adding that he still had teaching of complaints.

To Maria José Araújo, the existence of daily TPC in the 1st cycle “makes no sense”. “After school children should play. Playing is learning to know each other and the world. It is a way to study, “he argues, noting that while not realize this” walk all and all to do a disservice to children. “

Since Pedro Rosario argues that TPC” should be frequent but not long. ” The work to come home “a thermometer of the autonomy of the students and also their skills,” he says, noting that when a student is not able to make such must be “a warning to himself, for teachers and families about the skills who are missing. ” “The problem is that is killing the TPC because of its poor quality and an excessive load is disruptive and does not facilitate the motivation and involvement in the tasks,” warns.

It depends on a lot of teachers leaving the raffle children, says Tania Sardinha, mother of two daughters who are in 1st and 2nd grade and who is also a teacher of 3 cycle and secondary. He says that the daughters will have to make “only one plug in each of the areas [Portuguese, Mathematics and Study of Middle].” “They are lucky with the teachers that caught because neither exaggerates the amount of TPC,” he says.

It adds that, as a teacher, “as a rule, does not send work home.” “It shocks me the existence of TPC, but not shocked me the lack thereof, because I think that children / young people are long in school and that it should have a space and time for all tasks stay done,” argues . Because? “Children need to play, to sleep and have time to spend with their parents. Teenagers need time to socialize with their peers, and be alone together with their families, “says.