Doing homework in the car

Do your kids get homework? When do they do it? There is of course the whole sticky situation of whether or not homework is a good thing (more about that here). Personally I'm all for it. Our girls get a variety of homework -and have to learn to find time for it amongst their busy schedules of school, sports, music practice, reading, playing etc. 

Both our girls this year have been receiving a homework 'grid' which has tasks on to be completed over the space of 2 weeks.  Some of this is recorded reading, some is worksheets, and then there are tasks like telling their parents about things they have learned in class,  discussing news items with their parents, or verbally practising times tables, or maths exercises like doubling or practising 'rainbow facts' (numbers that add up to 10). These latter verbal tasks are ones that we do in the car on our way to and from school.

For a while now we've done times tables practice in the car journey to school. This has become a challenge for the girls who now get started with it as soon as we get into the car and have often both finished before we've even left our street!

Now we add in whatever homework tasks they have too. We live close to the school and our journey is only 5 or 10 minutes, but it's enough to do a little maths practice or discussion. 

My favourite parts of the homework are when the task is for the kids to tell their parents about things they are doing in school. When this is a 'homework' task, the happily chat away telling me all about their day. Whereas if you just ask, "So what did you do at school today?" all to often the response is , "Nothing."!

Do you ever do 'homework' in the car with your kids? Do you think it's a good idea?