Advice for parents
Building a homework routine that doesn’t end in a fight
Why homework time falls apart, how to separate your role as a parent from the role of corrector, and a seven-step routine to test for two weeks.
The starting point
Why homework so often ends in a fight
The same scene plays out in a lot of homes. It’s 6 p.m., the backpack is still zipped shut, and the question “Do you have homework?” is enough to raise everyone’s voice. It isn’t a lack of goodwill. It’s a question of timing, of fatigue, and of role.
Your child has just spent six hours concentrating at the pace of a whole group. Their attention is running low, and diving straight back into the same subject is like asking for a sprint at the end of a long race.
Then there is the feeling of not being good enough. When a student doesn’t understand, they avoid. The refusal doesn’t say “I don’t want to work.” It says “I don’t want to feel stupid in front of you.” The blurrier the task, the more visible the avoidance: dragging their feet, hunting for an eraser, going to the bathroom three times.
Finally, there is the role. At the kitchen table you are both the parent and the person marking the work. For a child, the two collide: whoever is supposed to reassure them is also the one pointing out their mistakes. The argument isn’t really about the worksheet. It’s about that confusion.
Refusing to do homework is an avoidance strategy, not defiance.
The principle
Separate the parent from the corrector
The single change that makes the biggest difference is also the simplest: decide that you are not your child’s corrector. Marking belongs to the teacher. Your job at the homework table is a different one, and it is the one only you can do.
In practice, you set the frame — the time, the place, the quiet — and you let the work leave the house with its mistakes still in it. An imperfect assignment tells the teacher what hasn’t landed yet. An assignment redone by a parent tells no one anything, and the gap comes back the week of the exam.
It also means being willing to say “I don’t know.” Secondary 3 math isn’t taught the way it was twenty years ago, and laying your method beside the one used in class doubles the confusion. “Show me how your teacher explained it” is a better sentence than “Never mind, let me show you.”
Three demanding roles are left to you: keeper of the frame, encouraging witness, and the person who notices when something has been stuck for too long. Nobody else can hold those in your place.
In practice
A homework routine in seven steps
A homework routine doesn’t have to be long. It has to be predictable. Try this one for two weeks before you judge it.
A real break before starting
Thirty to sixty minutes between school and the first exercise: a snack, fresh air, movement. A screen doesn’t restore attention; it only moves it somewhere else.
The same time every day
The brain saves energy when it no longer has to negotiate the moment. An imperfect but stable time beats an ideal time that keeps moving.
One spot, cleared and well lit
A clear table, the phone in another room, siblings busy elsewhere. The same corner every evening becomes a signal: this is where we work.
Two minutes to read the agenda together
Your child says out loud what has to be done, then chooses the order: the easiest task to get moving, or the heaviest one to get it out of the way.
Short blocks, with a visible timer
Ten to fifteen minutes in elementary school, twenty to twenty-five in secondary, then a break. The timer makes time concrete and replaces your reminders.
Stay within earshot, not over the shoulder
Sit nearby with a task of your own. Your presence reassures; watching over their shoulder raises the pressure.
A clear ending, announced in advance
The session stops at the agreed time, finished or not. Packing up together and naming one thing that went well beats stretching it out until there are tears.
If the routine falls apart, keep only the fixed time and the fixed place: those two steps carry the other five.
The hard moment
What to do when your child gets stuck
Getting stuck happens to everyone. What matters is not letting it last twenty silent minutes: after that, there is no energy left to understand anything.
Start by naming the obstacle, without judgment: “Are you stuck on the calculation, on a word, or on what the question is asking?” Very often the difficulty isn’t the subject; it’s the instructions. Have your child read them out loud, then ask them to say the question again in their own words. Next, look for the worked example in the previous pages or in their class notes: finding an example is a skill that pays off on exam day.
If nothing moves after ten minutes, stop that exercise. Put a question mark in the margin, or a note to the teacher: “I got stuck here.” That is useful information, not an admission of failure. Move on to the next assignment so the evening doesn’t end against a wall.
One word about tone: when voices rise on both sides, the session is over. Saying “we’re stopping, we’ll pick it up tomorrow” protects the relationship and the willingness to try again.
What to avoid
Six common mistakes, and what to do instead
Every one of them starts with a good intention. That is exactly what makes them hard to spot.
Doing the work for them
Finishing the exercise erases the information the teacher needs. Hand in the incomplete work instead, with an honest note.
Correcting every mistake on the spot
Jumping on each error as it appears breaks concentration. Let your child finish, then pick one single thing to go over.
Renegotiating the time every night
Debating the moment every day turns the routine into a negotiation. Set the time once, as a family, and post it on the fridge.
Stretching it out until it’s perfect
A session that keeps growing mostly produces fatigue. Stop at the planned time and write down what is left.
Turning the report card into an argument
Bringing up marks during homework ties studying to fear. Talk about the report card at another moment, calmly.
Comparing with siblings or classmates
Comparison motivates no one; it just breeds shame. Compare your child to the same child last week.
Knowing when to hand off
Signs that outside help would change things
Asking for help is not a parenting failure. It is often the shortest route to calm evenings. A few signals come up again and again: homework regularly takes more than double the time the school plans for; your child cries or puts themselves down more than once a week; the same concept has been stuck for a month with no progress; you can no longer explain without losing patience; homework has become the main thing you argue about at home.
An individualized education plan, an ADHD diagnosis or a learning disability changes the picture: the homework routine has to build on the measures already in place at school rather than work against them. Talk to your child’s teacher, then to the resource teacher — the orthopédagogue — if your child works with one.
An outside tutor solves part of the problem by position alone: they are not the parent. They correct without emotional history, go back over a concept without the record of past arguments, and hand you back your role. In Montreal, in Laval and on the South Shore, our sessions are held online, and we plan them around one precise difficulty rather than “homework” in general — that is what a session can actually change.
Need a hand with homework at home?
Tell us the subject, the level and what is getting in the way. We look for a tutor who matches your child’s need and personality.
The form takes a few minutes and commits you to nothing.