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 I Hate Homework!!

10/12/2012

7 Comments

 
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Don’t be confused, this is not a quote from one of your children. This is a quote from you and me and every other parent who has had to hover over their daughter or son sitting motionlessly at a recently cleared kitchen or dining room table with pencil poised over a blank page.

For most of us, who endured years of our own homework purgatory, there is a cruel irony about listening to our parents’ voices come out of our own “enlightened” mouths as we encourage, cajole and threaten the next generation about the consequences of unrequited homework expectations.
One of the issues that haunts children who struggle with a learning difference is the volume and frequency of homework. It has come to be conventional wisdom that the watershed of learning is a child's ability to complete any and all assigned tasks sent home by their school. Parents will often wade into the process; researching, scribing, editing, even completing their child's homework rather than have them face the imagined wrath of their teacher if they arrive at school in the morning with a blank or half-completed page. There are even educators and schools that claim to have "high standards" based upon the height of the mountain of homework that they pile on each evening. The successful completion of this work, relevant or not, is seen as a clear indicator of future academic success!

Having said all of that, the traditional approach to homework is not the sacrosanct institution that we sometimes believe. There is considerable research evidence to indicate that years of school-assigned homework may not have had the impact on the teaching and learning process that we once thought.

For example, a recent study  in the United States found the following discouraging statistics:  65% of homework assigned is unnecessary and marginal (at best) to student learning; 45% of all homework is never referred to again in class; 75% of overnight work is not marked, shared or evaluated in any way to ensure accurate completion or to address concerns; 80% of “taken up” overnight homework is peer reviewed to ensure completion or accuracy but there is not meaningful analysis to aid in student understanding; 35% of all submitted homework is never marked or returned; and, 67% of of what is returned is not done so in a timely fashion.

Are you depressed yet?

Given these stark statistics, should homework simply be scrapped? The answer, obviously, is “no”, but what is clearly necessary is a rethinking of how we use homework to enhance learning, the extent to which the homework that is assigned reflects the academic priorities and philosophy of the school, and, the establishment of a truly collaborative approach to the assigning and completion of homework that involves on-going discussions both among educators, and between home and school.

According to the research, homework definitely has a role in a number of specific instances: when reinforcement of a newly  learned concept is clearly necessary; when time (as in “there isn’t enough in the school day!”) is a factor; and, when you want to actively engage parents in the learning process.  So, what can schools do to ensure that students and their parents appreciate the value of doing work beyond the end of the school day? To begin with schools have to ask themselves so hard questions: Is what we are assigning essential? Is it better done at home than at school? Is it effectively integrated into our programme plan for the next day? Clearly, some things simply must be done at home in the evening or on the weekends: completing work not finished in school; review and revision of written work; test preparation; assigned reading; project work; research that is beyond the resources of the school; in short, almost anything that can’t be accomplished within the constraints of a regular school day. At Kenneth Gordon, we try to minimize the amount of homework and keep it only to essentials. Our students work hard enough during the day without piling in on in the evening as well.  Our goals are: to monitor the type of tasks that we assign for students to do; to prune the unessential, prioritize the rest; and, to maintain collaborative discussions among staff to guard against inconsistencies and overloading.

What are we asking of you in our drive for more effective homework?  Be involved. Sit at the same table as your child and do some of your own "homework". Read with them and take the time to ask them about what they are doing and why they are doing it. Please try to remember to monitor your children’s assigned work and look to see not just “how much” but also “how valuable”; and, let us know if you think that it is out of whack. And finally, if it becomes too angst-ridden a process, tell them to put it away and let it go.

One request from every educator and every school is to try not to negotiate away your child’s responsibilities for homework with a late night email to the teacher. We are a flexible  bunch, but let your child take ownership of the situation. We will work it out with them.

In the final analysis, we are all working in concert to manage the learning process at school and at home in a way that is meaningful and respectful to the needs of each and every child. Homework should always be a bridge between home and school and never a battleground!


7 Comments
Brenda
10/22/2012 01:49:34 pm

I shared your blog on another blog that was asking parents if they planned to discuss the subject with their kid"s schools in light of recent studies. I am so pleased to be part of a school willing to discuss topics in a collaborative way.

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Mark Brown link
10/23/2012 08:58:50 pm

Good morning Jim,

Count me as one of your blog fans, but, as I know you enjoy a good 'chew', I take issue with part of this post on homework.

After recounting dreary homework statistics, you write: "Given these stark statistics, should homework simply be scrapped? The answer, obviously, is 'no',". I thought for sure the answer would be a resounding YES!

Rarely in my career, except in my darkest days (you know about these) have I ever assigned 'homework'. With that said, my visits to grocery stores, the local 'city', and other social events wherein I mix with my students' parents would suggest to me that the topics from my classroom are very much discussed and debated at home.

The key difference between 'homework', and 'work done at home', is that one is assigned practice and another comes through inspiration to learn. Inspiration and relevance are the keys.

I don't know the students at Kenneth Gordon Maplewood but my suggestion would be, as per my suggestion for every student, to say an unequivocal 'NO' to homework, a 'YES' to engaging in the world, a 'YES' to producing in addition to merely consuming knowledge, and finally a 'YES' to enthusiastic kitchen table discussions about what is happening inside and outside the classroom.

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Jim Christopher link
10/24/2012 01:30:17 am

Hi Mark,

While I usually defer to your judgment on this sort of thing, and know that your research has been pretty devastating about the value of homework, I am still convinced that there are some tasks which simply cannot be shoehorned into the school day.
Unless we want to revert to the classic comic book version of literature for example, some outside reading will always be required - plus, and I know this reflects your thinking, the best learning often takes place outside of school and it is healthy for kids and their friends and parents to do some of this real world exploration on their own.
Maybe homework should be assigned to parents, not kids!

Thanks for your comment.

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Brenda
10/24/2012 12:14:52 pm

Maybe. Or maybe it's called parenting and schools have no place in requiring either the student or parent to do the 'work'. The argument thy there is work for which there is not enough time at school is troublesome to me. To me it means that the school day was not used effectively or too much work is expected. You know the hours you have so plan accordingly. After school time does not belong to the school.
As a parent I am supportive at homework time. My heart is not in it. I am resentful of this time being taken from us. I am conflicted. Reading practice is important. Keyboarding practice seems pointless at school and not a great use of resources - namely teachers time. Still thee must be another way.

Brenda
10/24/2012 12:15:19 pm

Maybe. Or maybe it's called parenting and schools have no place in requiring either the student or parent to do the 'work'. The argument thy there is work for which there is not enough time at school is troublesome to me. To me it means that the school day was not used effectively or too much work is expected. You know the hours you have so plan accordingly. After school time does not belong to the school.
As a parent I am supportive at homework time. My heart is not in it. I am resentful of this time being taken from us. I am conflicted. Reading practice is important. Keyboarding practice seems pointless at school and not a great use of resources - namely teachers time. Still there must be another way.

Jim Christopher
10/25/2012 05:50:45 am

Good observations Brenda! I do think that schools squander some of the time at their disposal for direct instruction or individualized support. All too often students are given time fillers - like rote keyboarding practice, or watching a video, or extended periods of silent reading that could be just as effectively done at home with a minimum of stress. My preference is for school "work" to be something that is built into the day and does not become the evening and weekend responsibility for parents.
Years ago I had a parent challenge one of my Grade 6 teachers claiming that she did not send home enough work. Her child in another school was getting 20-25 Math problems a night whereas my teacher was only sending home 3 or 4. The parent saw this as a lack of rigour on the school's part.
My teacher responded quite beautifully. She said that if she was expected to teach a concept, and did it well, then a child should need only a few sample problems for reinforcement. On the other hand, if a teacher did not teach it well, then she could demand that the parents do her job by agonizing over a large number of problems in the evening. She finished by saying, if your daughter is bringing home that much work, then there is not much teaching or learning going on at school!

For me, it is my hope that parents will try to enrich their children's learning through visits to museums, or galleries, or hiking in the woods, or just talking at dinner about issues of the day - that is the extension to learning that is sometimes beyond the reach of the school but is so critically important for our kids.

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Rob Young
11/17/2012 10:11:59 pm

Hello. I am the single father that was mentioned in the Globe and Mail's Nov.1st, 2012 article, that you replied to. As metioned in your forums, I sent an email to the Superindentant detailing a teacher using the last 45 minutes of school time to appoint individual reading, all the while she sat at her desk and texted on her phone, and then with 5 minutes to go, she assigned 3 pages of math homework. Before I declared my home a "No Homework Home" I sent many emails regarding the amounts of homework that was given with absolutly no school time to work on it. I also suggested that the French teacher could think of a better way to teach her lesson than to invade our homes on the weekend, forcing parents to buy the ingrediants to make a homemade pizza, oversee the project, take pictures and develope them at our own expense, and buy the cardboard to present it to the class, all to teach a few french words???? And the Medival Times Project. Couldn't they think of a way to teach this subject without castle building in our homes on our weekens and evenings? And lets not forget about the amounts of movie watching, fieldtrips, and assembies that take away from the learning day. When I sent my email to the Principal and my children's teachers, I invited them to sit down with me to come up with our "No Homework Agreement", similarly to Tom and Shelli Miley of Calgary, however they just chose to ignore my emails. I have read an article somewhere where Shelli Miley tried to go the route of homework policy change with her school, but in the end found that it was not achievable, and as a result we have our case law, with regards to this issue.

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    Dr. Jim Christopher is recently retired Head of Kenneth Gordon Maplewood School and Maplewood Alternative High School in North Vancouver. A parent, author and long-time teacher, and educational administrator across Canada, he has been actively involved in the drive to differentiate learning experiences to meet the needs of all learners.

    View my profile on LinkedIn

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