Ask ten parents how long a child should study after school and you will hear everything from "one hour minimum" to "until the homework is done". But when it comes to practice — actually solving questions, not reading or copying — the honest answer is smaller than most families expect: about 30 focused minutes a day.

Here is why short daily practice wins. Memory research calls it spaced repetition: the brain stores a method permanently when it is retrieved again and again across many days, not when it is repeated fifty times in one sitting. A child who solves 8 fraction questions daily for two weeks will outperform a child who solved 100 in one Sunday marathon — with far fewer tears.

Attention is the second reason. A 9-year-old can hold genuine focus for roughly 20–40 minutes. Everything after that is pencil-holding, not learning. Long sessions teach children to look busy; short sessions teach them to think.

What should the 30 minutes contain? Mostly questions the child answers themselves, at the right difficulty — hard enough to require thought, easy enough that they get most of them right. Getting roughly 7 out of 10 correct is the sweet spot where confidence and skill grow together.

The habit matters more than the minutes. A fixed time (right after a snack, before play) and a fixed place turn practice from a daily negotiation into something automatic, like brushing teeth. Most families see the resistance fade within two to three weeks.

This is exactly the idea Practice30 is built around: 30 minutes a day, with an AI picking the right questions for your child based on what they have already mastered and what they are finding tricky. An exercise is complete at 30 correct answers, and a wrong answer never punishes — the question simply returns later until the child owns it.

If your child currently studies zero minutes some days and three hours on others, do not try to jump to a perfect routine. Start with 15 minutes daily for one week. Consistency first, duration later.