As I sit and plan the upcoming school weeks, I am stopped by the feeling of doom that homework brings to students, parents, and yes, even me, the teacher. What is appropriate, meaningful, and not just busy work? I found some interesting articles and would love parent and student input.
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1376208,00.html
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/09/11/AR2006091100908.html
http://library.adoption.com/articles/homework-.html
http://www.thecaseagainsthomework.com/
This is what made me ponder what homework really should be:
In an interview with Kenneth Whyte of MacLeans magazine, Alfie Kohn author of “The Homework Myth” challenges our assumptions about the value of homework. Kohn tell us that research suggests:
First, (homework) chosen by the students so that kids have some role in a democratic classroom community of deciding what is so vital that it ought to spill over into the after school hours. Second, it might simply involve free-choice reading rather than writing those gawd awful book reports that could destroy anyone’s love of books. Third, it might take the form of activities that logically ought to be done at home, like replicating a science experiment in one’s own kitchen, or interviewing one’s parents about family history, rather than the kind of stuff that could be and should be done at school. I guess my overall point is not, let’s get rid of homework altogether, but that we should change the default state. Right now, the default is to make kids do school work at home almost every day, regardless of whether it’s necessary. If the burden of proof, so to speak, was on educators to say that a given assignment is so useful that we’re going to presume to interrupt family time to ask you to do it, that’s a very different situation.
This paper takes a deeper look into the issue. (20 pages long but well worth the read)
http://www.temple.edu/tempress/chapters_1400/1712_ch1.pdf
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1376208,00.html
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/09/11/AR2006091100908.html
http://library.adoption.com/articles/homework-.html
http://www.thecaseagainsthomework.com/
This is what made me ponder what homework really should be:
In an interview with Kenneth Whyte of MacLeans magazine, Alfie Kohn author of “The Homework Myth” challenges our assumptions about the value of homework. Kohn tell us that research suggests:
- Doing homework does not make kids smarter..
- Doing homework does not improve their marks.
- Doing homework does not teach good study skills.
- Doing homework does not lead to parent and children spending quality time together.
- Doing homework does not prepare students for the competitive world.
- Doing homework does not improve standardized test scores.
First, (homework) chosen by the students so that kids have some role in a democratic classroom community of deciding what is so vital that it ought to spill over into the after school hours. Second, it might simply involve free-choice reading rather than writing those gawd awful book reports that could destroy anyone’s love of books. Third, it might take the form of activities that logically ought to be done at home, like replicating a science experiment in one’s own kitchen, or interviewing one’s parents about family history, rather than the kind of stuff that could be and should be done at school. I guess my overall point is not, let’s get rid of homework altogether, but that we should change the default state. Right now, the default is to make kids do school work at home almost every day, regardless of whether it’s necessary. If the burden of proof, so to speak, was on educators to say that a given assignment is so useful that we’re going to presume to interrupt family time to ask you to do it, that’s a very different situation.
This paper takes a deeper look into the issue. (20 pages long but well worth the read)
http://www.temple.edu/tempress/chapters_1400/1712_ch1.pdf
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