Parents feel increasingly unable to help their children with homework because they find it too difficult to understand. A study by the General Teaching Council for England has found that parents 'across the social spectrum' are calling on teachers to run sessions that will help them to understand the curriculum and modern teaching methods. They also want schools to provide them with 'homework accompanied by worked examples' so that they can better support their children.

The research highlighted mathematics and science as particularly difficult for parents because the way in which they are taught has changed so dramatically from when today's adults were children. Many also feel teachers are increasingly remote figures with less and less time for parents, especially in secondary schools.

The report looked at how parents were coping with the growing expectation for them to engage in their children's learning. It found that the tradition of sitting at the kitchen table with a child and their homework is almost impossible for parents who work. For those who try to find time after they come home from work, there can be rows, as tired parents and equally tired children fight over the task. This is despite the fact that the government is recommending that schools set homework that children cannot manage alone, as a way of involving parents.

The Department for Children, Schools and Families website states: 'Homework is a fantastic way for you to get more involved in your children's education and find out what they're doing all day.' But with a recent survey by the Office of National Statistics finding that a typical working parent was spending a total of just 35 minutes a day 'looking after' children, getting more involved can be a daunting prospect.

Lorraine Thomas, who runs the Parent Coaching Academy, said the amount of homework had caused a big rise in parents' anxieties. 'Homework has become much more of an issue in the last 18 months, and with younger and younger children,' she said. 'Working mums especially are feeling the stress that they can't help. Frayed patience and tempers at the end of the day doesn't help anyone, and this is becoming a real sign of the times. I call it the arsenic hour when parents get home thinking there's going to be an idyllic evening when everyone discusses their day and bonds like a perfect family. But of course there is no such thing when everyone is tired.'

'Getting homework [handed in] from pupils is a huge struggle,' said Hayley Bennett, a secondary school teacher in Torquay, Devon. 'I find it very difficult on a daily basis to get homework from every pupil. If parents have genuine anxieties over helping and understanding homework, then they need to remember that we are specialists. No one would expect an art teacher to understand someone's physics project, so it's about supporting and encouraging their children.'

Anna Barnes, a teacher at Brill Primary School in Buckinghamshire, said: 'If time is really tight, then parents can be imaginative, five minutes reciting their tables in the car or in the bath, spelling words at the breakfast table.'

Keith Bartley, chief executive of the general teaching council, said parents should not panic. 'We understand the challenges for parents feeling the pressure of having to sit down and help with homework. It's an ingrained expectation, but it is unrealistic in many cases.' He said it was clear teachers and parents were feeling there was decreasing time for engagement.

Parents in the study all commented on how it was 'increasingly difficult to talk to their child's teachers - both primary and secondary, and particularly so for secondary schools with administrators acting as gatekeepers. Primary school teachers were increasingly only available at the end of the day, which is not convenient for parents with young children.' Many described secondary teachers as 'unapproachable'.

'We commissioned this research because teachers had told us they welcomed parents' engagement and we wanted to understand the challenges for parents. And it is clear schools do need to foster more open-door policies; teachers are busy people, but there needs to be scope for the quick conversation,' said Bartley. 'Teaching has been revolutionised since most of today's parents were at school, so its not surprising they feel left behind by it.'