I Let My Kids Skip Homework for a Week (Here's What Happened)

By Tiger Ma 虎媽手記 · 13 October 2025 · 4 min read

Let me tell you what happened last Monday. I was standing at the kitchen table at 9:17pm, voice raised, pointing at a maths worksheet while my P4 son stared at the wall and my P2 daughter was under the table — literally under the table — refusing to come out until I "stopped being angry about numbers." My husband walked in, looked at the scene, and said: "We need to stop."

So we stopped.

For one whole week, I did not mention homework. Not once. I didn't ask if they had any. I didn't open their school bags. I didn't stand over them with a red pen. I sat on my hands, metaphorically speaking, and I let the chips fall.

Here's what nobody tells you about what happens when you stop.

Day 1-2: Absolute Chaos

My son did zero homework on Monday. He played Minecraft for 90 minutes, ate three bowls of cereal, and went to bed looking vaguely confused, like a dog whose owner just left the front door open. My daughter drew pictures of cats until 8pm and then asked me to read her a story, which we haven't done in months because homework always ate that time.

I was physically anxious. My hands were itching to check the school app. I texted my friend Grace (two kids at the same school) and she replied with seven question marks and a "are you okay????" I was not okay. But I held the line.

Day 3: The Teacher WhatsApp

The class WhatsApp group pinged at 7am. Miss Leung posted: "Several students did not submit homework yesterday. Please ensure all work is completed at home." I could feel the message was aimed at me. My stomach dropped. I considered caving.

I didn't cave. But I did something I'd never done — I messaged the teacher privately and said: "We're trying something at home this week. The children will catch up. Thank you for your patience." She sent a thumbs up. That's it. The sky did not fall.

Day 4-5: Something Unexpected

Wednesday evening, my son sat down at the table unprompted and opened his maths book. I said nothing. He did four questions, got bored, and stopped. Thursday, he did six. He was choosing to do it. Not all of it — maybe a third of what was assigned. But the tears were gone. The negotiating was gone. The forty-five-minute battle was gone.

My daughter, meanwhile, started "playing school." She set up her teddies and gave them worksheets and marked their answers with a crayon. She was practising the motions of homework without the pressure of it being real. I nearly cried watching her.

What the Data Says

Here's the thing — I'm not making a philosophical argument. A 2015 study by the OECD across 38 countries found that beyond 60 minutes of homework per night, academic returns drop to near zero for primary-aged children. Hong Kong primary students average 80-100 minutes. We are well past the point of diminishing returns.

Stanford researcher Denise Pope found that excessive homework is associated with greater stress, physical health problems, and less time for other developmental activities — and crucially, not with higher achievement at the primary level.

I'm not saying homework is pointless. I'm saying the way we do it — the standing over them, the crying, the nightly war — isn't producing what we think it's producing.

Day 6-7: The Hard-Won Insight

By Saturday, here's what I'd learnt: my children are not allergic to homework. They are allergic to the performance of homework — me watching, correcting in real time, expressing frustration, turning a worksheet into a referendum on their intelligence and my parenting.

When I stepped back, my son self-selected the problems he found interesting and skipped the repetitive ones. My daughter returned to homework as play. Neither of them completed everything. Their grades did not visibly suffer in that one week.

What did change: we had dinner conversations again. My daughter asked me to read to her every night that week. My son told me about a game he'd invented at recess. I hadn't heard a recess story in months.

Would I Do It Again?

I went back to homework enforcement the following Monday. I'm a Hong Kong parent — I'm not a revolutionary. But I changed how I enforce it. Now I set a 25-minute timer. When it rings, we stop. Whatever's done is done. I don't check it myself anymore — I snap a photo, Tutor Wong handles the grading, and I use those reclaimed minutes to actually talk to my kids.

Is it perfect? No. Miss Leung sent another WhatsApp last week. But my evenings don't end in tears anymore, and I think — I hope — my children are starting to believe that they are more than their homework scores.

The Permission

If you're reading this and your nightly homework routine looks like mine used to look — the shouting, the tears, the guilt afterwards — I want you to know: you're not a bad parent. You're a good parent trapped in a bad system. And it's okay to bend the rules a little to protect your family.