Sir, – Your article on levels of unhappiness among girls in Ireland mentions 70 minutes of recommended exercise per day (“Less than a third of girls aged 10-17 report feeling very happy with their lives, study says”, News, May 2nd).
My 14-year-old daughter is either commuting or at school from 7.30am to 4.45pm. She gets around two hours of homework per night. She also has to eat, rest and sleep, and ideally spend some time with her family every day. Schools need to look at how they can justify monopolising children’s precious time with homework. As a salaried worker, I would lose my mind if I had to do another two hours of work at home after my usual work day. Surely 10 minutes at the end of each lesson to answer some questions demonstrating an understanding of what’s been covered would suffice. Can advisers and policymakers please take a long hard look at this fraught issue? As it stands, children don’t have a hope of getting their 70 minutes of daily exercise, which would do them so much more good than however long they spend sitting at their homework each day. If schools could encourage this exercise instead of endless homework, we might all be happier. – Yours, etc,
SINÉAD KELLY,
Donard,
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Co Wicklow.
