When your fourth-grader complains about homework, it's not just empty whining. Homework for fourth-graders is more difficult.

And there may be more of it.

Welcome to higher education, kid.

From preschool through third grade, the idea is to teach a student to read, "to learn how to translate those squigglies on the paper into words and ascribe meaning to those words and then read sentences, mostly in the context of reading stories," says Darion Griffin, the senior associate director in the educational issues department of the American Federation of Teachers.

The questions at that stage of development often are very literal: What color was the dog's fur? Who were the characters? Summarize in your own words what happened in the story.

"That's like a baseline level of questioning to measure whether the students could do two things: read what was on the page and then understand enough about it to literally tell you the story back," Griffin says. "That's the foundation to more difficult tasks."

According to education -portal.com, a Web site for students and teachers that offers information on career paths, degree programs and schools, fourth-grade teachers are expected to help students improve their reading levels, instruct them in applying math to everyday life and teach science, social studies and the arts. Fourth grade is where the simpler lessons of earlier grades — and homework — get ratcheted up.

Older students are less likely to be assigned simple stories; they will instead have to read informational texts, such as biographies or lessons about dinosaurs or the solar system, Griffin says.

"And that text, starting around fourth grade, is very, very dense," she says. "It is full of new concepts, new vocabulary that students have to master. But also the tasks, then, that students have are not just to retell what they've read, but to apply what they've read to real life or a situation that has been set up by the teacher, or to analyze what they've read."

Not only is the work more difficult, there may be more of it, she adds. That's a result of the addition of more subjects: science, social studies, music and art, as opposed to earlier grades where reading and math were about it.

"So the number of topics that are covered beginning in fourth grade in depth, and the density of that reading material, combine to probably result in more time for homework," Griffin says.

THINK LIKE A KID

Here are questions, culled from education experts, that might be posed to fourth-graders. Unlike the basic questions — and answers — of earlier grades, these require complex thinking as well as applications to real-life situations.

1. You are becoming part of your local government. Read the paragraph below. As a group, get into the character of the branch that is assigned to you (legislative, executive or judicial).

There is a group of children that needs to get across a busy street to get to school. This has become very dangerous over the past couple of years because of the traffic on the street. There is no light to let pedestrians (walkers) cross the street safely, or a crossing guard. Students cannot get a ride on a bus to school because they live too close, and their parents leave for work before the school is open. Parents are very concerned for their children's safety.

How can this problem be solved to make it safer for these children? Remember to think as your branch of the government would.

2. Design models of two simple weather instruments you could make. Explain how they work.

3. Annie Aardvark's dinner was all ants. One half of the ants she ate were black, one quarter were red, and six were brown. How many ants did Annie eat? Draw a picture to find your answer. (We can offer an answer for this one: 24.)

4. Palm trees are usually found in warm climates. Scientists have found fossils of palm trees in Wyoming. What can scientists infer from this fossil record?

5. Why do geographers divide areas into regions, and what are some of these regions?