Teachers decide whether homework helps them learn the material or steals childhood, and schoolchildren hate homework, regardless of the conclusions of adults. Here is an American teacher Brandy Young and decided to cancel the homework for her class.
In the USA, obligatory meetings with teachers are held: parents come to school, get to know the teachers, see what and how. At one of these meetings, Brandy, who teaches with second graders, handed out notes to parents with killer information: there will be no homework until the end of the year. At home, you only need to finish what the student did not have time to finish in class. The teacher suggested that parents use the free time to good use: have family dinners, read books with the whole family, walk more on the street and go to bed earlier.
The mother of one of the students took a picture of the note.
Many liked the idea, judging by the huge number of likes and shares.
Indeed, homework is not needed. That's why.
1. Homework is harmful to health
All parents are talking about this: the constantly growing academic load and stress testing are hitting the health of children.
Due to the high workload, children sleep less. They sit up late over their textbooks and worry about grades, and as a result, they have problems with sleep. The relation among sleep duration, homework burden, and sleep hygiene in chinese school-aged children ..
We have almost no healthy schoolchildren. Nearsightedness, gastritis, chronic fatigue, posture disorders - the child probably has some of this.
So maybe spit on that homework and grades and do something more rewarding?
2. Homework takes time away
Today, kids are as busy as ever, says Peter Gray, a professor at Boston College. They spend too much time at school, then they run to the tutors, on the way back they turn into the section. The schedule is strictly regulated, every hour is taken into account.
Psychologist Harris Cooper in this paper has conducted studies that have shown that homework is not very effective: too much information a child will not learn. Kids need no more than 20 minutes of extra classes, older ones need an hour and a half of Homework in Elementary School ..
For comparison: according to our sanitary rules, an hour and a half is the volume for the second class. Graduates can spend three and a half hours on lessons. Almost half a day after school. And when to live?
3. Homework does not affect academic performance
Alfie Cohn, one of the top education critics, wrote Homework Myths in 2006. In it, he said that for younger students there is no connection between the amount of homework and academic achievement. In high school, the connection is so weak that it almost disappears if you apply more accurate measurement methods in research.
Not everyone agrees with this. Tom Sherrington, a teacher and advocate of homework practice, has come to the conclusion that in elementary school there is really little use for homework, but when students are over 11 years old, lessons help them achieve brilliant results Homework Matters ..
The long-term benefits of canceling homework are not really measurable. The TMISS Research Center found out how much time schoolchildren spend on homework in different countries. So, in the fourth grade, only 7% of students do not do their homework. How Much of Their Out-of-School Time Do Students Spend on Homework During the School Week .. A small figure for analysis.
4. Homework teaches nothing
School education is absolutely divorced from life. After many years of studying English, graduates cannot connect two words, they have no idea in which hemisphere they are resting, they firmly believe in the power of homeopathy. Homework continues the trend: they boggle their heads with facts that kids can't apply.
Think back to how you studied and compare the process to lessons in a Swiss school. If homework helped close the gap between class and life, it would be a good thing. But this is not the case.
5. Homework kills the desire to learn
“Doing homework” still means either solving school examples or reading a few paragraphs. In fact, teachers shove into the house what they did not have time to tell from call to call. It's so dreary that homework becomes a chore.
Worse than this boredom is only "creative" assignments, which boil down to drawings and PowerPoint presentations.
6. Homework spoils relationships with parents
Many parents do homework with and for children. It turns out so-so.
The school curriculum has changed, the knowledge of the parents is outdated.
Many parents themselves do not remember simple examples from the school curriculum and try to complete tasks from the point of view of an adult. Children can't do that.
Parents are not educators. They did not learn to explain the material, to present it correctly and to check it. Often such training is worse than none.
Homework is a constant conflict. Children do not want to do it, parents do not know how to motivate, joint activities lead to a dead-end, and all this results in quarrels.
What's good about homework
The problem is not homework or quantity. And the fact that in finished form, as it is now, it is absolutely useless, only destroys time and health. You can get results from homework if you rethink your approach to it.
Homework is done in a comfortable environment, so at home, you can find the answer to a difficult question and understand the material. If, of course, you have the time and energy for this.
If you develop an individual homework assignment for each student, then the student will be able to bring up topics that are not given to him and develop his strengths. Homework as an important component of lifelong education.
