<p>We actually have the same 10 pm rule, as well. My son just needs that much sleep. He comes home, naps for an hour and gets started. Takes a break for dinner and shower from 6:30 to 7:30 then 7:30 to 8:30 for music practice and 8:30 to ten for snack and finishing homework.</p>
<p>Yes, music practice was 15-20 min. but every day. We would take the music notes on our vacations to Mexico, and D. would practice…in the air for the lack of instrument. I have mentioned 20 min. to her private teacher many times. She said, if it works, then it is fine. Well, no proffessional musician here, but graduated with Music Minor from college.</p>
<p>Mine plays an hour before school with various ensembles, takes an hour lesson every week, plays in an ensemble one afternoon a week and practices at least an hour six days a week. At least an hour, sometimes much more than that. We spend that hour together in the living room just me and my boy. He practices using the Benny Goodman method and then he plays for me. It is the greatest joy of my life to hear him play, and he is always working on a piece just for me and while he is fiddling with the mouthpiece or changing his music we have the best talks and it is where I learn about him. My husband doesn’t enjoy listening to the clarinet and wonders why he never knows what is going on with the boy. His loss.</p>
<p>I’m glad for some, the 10 pm rule works. For my driven, all AP kid in a national level sport which mandates daily, multi hour workouts to maintain fitness level, who also happend to play an instrument in various ensembles, the 10 pm rule was not doable. She had the best time mgmt skills of any of my kds, and still was up til crazy hours doing HW. And yes, she did HW in all the expected places…on the bus to competitions, during lunch, and sadly even in classes she knew she could afford to multi task in. I’ve learned that there is no “one size fits all” in education. I only wish my youngest could figure out how to manage as well as his sister did.</p>
<p>My daughters didn’t need the rule, they were fine managing their time. This guy, though, isn’t mature enough yet. He just isn’t. Maybe someday, but not now.</p>
<p>My D would have laughed if I had dared to impose a bedtime when she had Calc HW. She never needed my help past 1st grade 
My youngest will need me forever, I think. Not really…but there are days when I have to bite my tongue and remember that HE has to learn how to juggle and time manage without my continuous hand holding. Or he will be living in my basement when he’s 40, asking if I’ve done his laundry or found him a job. Hard to believe I gave birth to two such different kids. But despite his challenges with time mgmt, I gotta say I do enjoy his sweet demeanor and easy going nature.</p>
<p>I really, really question the purpose and validity of so much homework. My daughter was in a very prestigious private school with classes 6 days a week and hours of homework. The school was great but they admitted that not everyone can handle the workload. She transferred to a smaller, more holistic school for sophomore year and is so happy.</p>
<p>She has about one-quarter of the homework at this school. The biggest difference to me is that she has blossomed. She loves learning, she comes home and bubbles over with what she is studying and synthesizes material from different classes and how it relates to her lessons.</p>
<p>She is learning how to learn and learning to love learning. WHile she could recite the periodic table and all the dates of ancient Greek history events, she never had a chance to put it all in perspective. And she never got enough sleep nor down time.</p>
<p>I am so grateful her school sees value in leaving its students enough time to pursue other things and get enough sleep. She has math problems to do, and reading, papers etc. But the quantity is so much less than most schools.</p>
<p>And guess what? The graduates go on to go to all sorts of colleges and universities, from Ivy on down. </p>
<p>I really wonder what we are teaching our kids, that they have to be busy and working from sun up to midnight. It just isn’t healthy IMHO.</p>
<p>Sports around here begin immediately after school, so homework is never started until after dinner. My S2 would not go to school the next day with his homework incomplete. I don’t think that’s the answer or the right message anyway. I’d rather he learns to work more efficiently with better focus - in the long run, this will serve him better. His older brother learned how to “hyper focus” at a point in HS and it allowed him to take a dozen APs, college classes, sports, etc. and still be in bed by ten every night. I’m hoping S2 can learn some of the same skills - S1 is home for the weekend, so maybe he’ll give him a few pointers. Thanks for the words of encouragement, zoosermom. I already saw a little improvement towards the end of the week, and today S2 could sleep in on a Saturday morning for this first time in weeks.</p>
<p>Gourmetdad and I are focused on helping S2 deal with this, but many kids don’t have the resources or the support from parents. S2 says that a good number of the kids in his classes do come in with homework not finished. From what I can tell, most of his classes consist of 1/2 time reviewing homework, 1/4 new material, 1/4 misc. nonsense. He attends a top private school in our area.</p>
<p>When D was in public school there was WAY to much “pretty project” type work.
S went to private (after D’s experience)–the teachers would synchronize the work load so it never got out of hand.</p>
<p>I will say this…the horrific workload (and self imposed crazy EC load) did prepare D very well for the demands of being a student athlete doing a STEM major. Not enough hours in the day, ever, but youth is an amazing thing. These kids seem to make it work. I know I could never have done it, but it works for my D. I do think I had the more pleasant childhood though, with no HW on weekends, no AP summer HW, and no pressure to be a 4.0 ( don’t think they even weighted classes in the early 80s at my HS…and very few had a 4.0 even though it was a very good school). Then again, my dad said the same thing about HIS childhood being better, in the freedoms he enjoyed, than mine.</p>
<p>At our high school you will not find the best students able to be in bed by 10 and it says nothing about their time management skills. Whenever my son was up late, I would start getting concerned he had been procrastinating or there was some comprehension problem, etc. but then he’d show me via IM that ALL the top kids in his class, eg. the future val and sal, were up late right along with him. And my son played sports and the others didn’t and said they could never do what he did. Same with my D. When she attended our state governor’s school, there were top students from all different high schools in the state. One day they talked about having to stay up late all the time, and some kids said they were never in bed before 2 AM. So they were all bad time managers I suppose? When my kids got to college it felt easy, and one worked part time while at an Ivy, and the other is a 3 sport athlete at Stanford.</p>
<p>^^^^yes, S1 says the same thing about the workload at Harvard.</p>
<p>My son really needs 8 hours of sleep to be functional. That may change as he gets older, but getting up at six means that, for him, he needs to start shutting down at ten. Which is no reflection on his study skills. Which are abysmal. People keep promising me that maturity will eventually descend upon my house. I will welcome her with refreshments!</p>
<p>Zoosermon, when she gets there, send her to our house when she’s done pleaseeeee!</p>
<p>Ok I promise! And if she comes to your house first, please let me know so I can come with a net and capture her.</p>
<p>I should clarify that the content at college is not easier, and the workload is not easier in itself, but as others have pointed out there is less busy work and fewer stupid group projects, and more importantly the student has far greater control over his time management because has the course syllabus in advance and can decide what he actually needs to do to learn the material and by when he needs to learn it. There won’t be homework checks to snare him if he has to put off the reading for day, or little 5 point picky quizzes that ruin your grade if you don’t study for them when you really need to be writing that paper instead, etc.</p>
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<p>It certainly isn’t my experience that there are fewer group projects. Though maybe the emphasis was on the word “stupid.”</p>
<p>Deal, Zoosermom!!</p>