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Homework And Tears Last edited September, 2006, Last reviewed September 2007 The beginning of the school year is often a rude awakening for parents and students alike, who have their expectations about homework confounded by heavy workloads. Often children in one classroom are assigned minimal homework while children of the same grade in another classroom spend long, tearful hours at the kitchen table each night. Just what is appropriate for each grade, and just what is the purpose and benefit of homework? Homework is another example of cyclical educational policies that have long existed in American education. Yet, the subject has not had much in the way of rigorous scientific study. Very early on, when education was centered on rote memorization, homework drills were a means to help students recall facts and dates. In time, though, a reaction against this strategy called into question the benefits of homework. In the era of World War II and just beyond, the notion of developing problem-solving ability in children became more prominent over rote memorization, and homework declined. It was also thought during this period that homework interfered with home life. After Sputnik was launched and America felt a need to compete with Soviet “progress", homework again came back in fashion as a way to quicken the pace of development in students. By the late sixties and early seventies, however, there was a reverse of the trend as professionals wondered about the effects on students of too much pressure and lack of family time. In the 1980’s, especially after the landmark (or landmine) report A Nation At Risk, the pendulum swung back in favor of homework as a means to correct a supposedly failing educational system and to help meet new state standards. Today, the cycle continues. A September 12, 2006 article in the Washington Post, As Homework Grows, So Do Arguments Against It noted: “…teachers say they work hard to conform to school board policies and parent demands that do not always match what they think is the best thing for children…some educators and authors are making new cases for the elimination of homework entirely.” Still, homework is pervasive in all grade levels today, and it isn’t difficult to find first grade students with homework on the first day of school. The modern reasons for promoting homework are frequently not purely academic. Some believe that homework encourages students to “buckle down”, to learn organizational skills and to handle the pressure that will inevitably come in the higher grades and in life. Indeed, this line of thinking is part of the reason agenda books are handed out to some students at the start of the year, complete with a place for parents to “sign off” on nightly homework completion. There has been only one large scale examination of homework, and that research study was really an analysis of other, smaller studies. In 1989 professor and author Harris Cooper published his work and then published an update in the Review of Educational Research this year. In studying the supposed pros and cons of homework given by proponents and opponents, he finds these sorts of effects: Supposed Positive Effects
Supposed Negative Effects
So, which effects predominate in reality? In broad terms, Cooper finds less positive effects and more negative effects with each lower grade level. A high school student can glean far more positive effect from homework than can an elementary student. In fact, Cooper and other researchers found no evidence whatsoever that students in lower elementary grades (grades 1-3) gain any benefit at all from homework. There is some correlation between homework and achievement in middle school grades and more in high school. In his updated review in 2006, Cooper could only find slight evidence that short assignments given on basic skills relating directly to a unit test could have any positive effect on that test in grades 2-5. What about length of time? Do long nights spent at the kitchen table at least offer a payoff in higher achievement for students? A number of educational organizations recommend a rule of thumb for fixing the amount of time spent on homework in each grade level, which tends to vary between ten and twenty minutes per grade per night. A fourth grader, then, would be expected to have 40 to 80 minutes of homework based on these rules. Yet, again, rigorous research by Cooper and others suggest a more nuanced interpretation. In elementary grades there is no evidence that more time equals greater achievement, period. In the middle school grades there is evidence that homework longer than 90 minutes produces negative effects, and in high school the same thing applies for homework longer than two hours each night. Homework in higher grades can be correlated with achievement, but it isn’t clear if this correlation is due to the homework, or due to more advanced students doing more homework, or due to teachers assigning more homework to more advanced students. Anecdotal evidence is certainly available against the idea of long homework assignments. In her recent book The Overachievers: The Secret Lives of Driven Kids, author Alexandra Robbins follows a group of high achieving high school students in a wealthy district. These students frequently spend “all-nighters” on homework, after participating in sports and other activities. The hours spent each night on assignments do not seem to produce a strong work ethic or improved attitude, however. To the contrary, these straight “A” students are soon cheating on homework, making up written assignments out of thin air, and even sharing or stealing each other’s projects for re-use by another student. A September 11, 2006 Newsweek article, The New First Grade: Too Much Too Soon? tells of a young student putting down her head on the dining room table and sobbing over a homework assignment. This sort of behavior is well known to parents of young elementary grade students who are pushed past their physical limits by the school day, by long bus rides, and by after-school activities. They are then expected to sit down at night for an hour or two of homework. Many proponents of homework in earlier grades argue that the point is not so much the academic results, but the good work habits and organizational skills needed for later in life. Better that these children learn early what will be required of them as they grow older and figure out how to handle that pressure, it is said. In their book The End of Homework by Etta Kralovec and John Buell, the authors wonder: “…do we really believe that learning how to handle work pressure is an appropriate goal for a fourth grader, or indeed for a child of any age? The implicit assumption here is that we learn best how to handle pressure by having to handle it at an early age…Since the nineteenth century, developmental psychology has been moving away from the notion that children are nothing more or less than miniature adults.” Others echo that sentiment. Author Alfie Kohn, who wrote The Myth of Homework, was recently quoted in the Washington Post: “It is striking that we have no evidence that there is any academic benefit in elementary school homework. Then people fall back on the self-discipline argument and how it helps students learn study skills. But that is an urban myth, except that people apply it in the suburbs too.” Aside from the amount of time spent on homework, the quality of the homework has much do with the attitude of students in completing it. Students asked to complete worksheets and dittos from shrink-wrap math and literacy programs are really doing no more than the students of the nineteenth century who were asked to memorize rows of numbers or dates. Students of all ages quickly understand the concept of busy work and typically react with understandable indifference. Harris Cooper in his 1989 study said: “…only one outcome appears to have withstood empirical testing: Well-designed homework is more likely to be completed than homework that is not well-designed.” For example, students who are assigned a project to which they can personally relate or to which they can apply their own unique experience are likely to be more enthusiastic about doing it. In all grade levels, but especially in the younger grade levels, homework that is tailored to individual children or specific lessons and homework that is brief and achievable is more likely to be completed earnestly and to provide a real benefit to the child. The ultimate illustration of poorly designed homework is the well-meaning but counter-productive act of adults who offer rewards—bribes—to students for completing homework. Teachers may offer candy or prizes, parents may offer a trip to the ice cream store or a new electronic gizmo, or principals may offer to perform an embarrassing stunt to convince students to complete assignments. These token economies simply reinforce to students that the work they are being asked to do is not worthy of doing in and of itself, or else why would these bribes be offered at all? Punishing students through the use of “homework rooms” or make-up assignments or detention is no better—again, if there is no inherent incentive to do the homework, how is the stick any better than the carrot? Teachers, for their part, do sometimes grasp the importance of limiting homework to manageable and well designed assignments. Some teachers practice a “25 minute” rule. Once a student spends that amount of time on an assignment and cannot easily get further, the student should write “25 minute rule” on the paper and move on with life. These teacher reason that the student needs help from the school if the assignment takes any longer and that there is no sense in banging heads over the problem. Yet, other teachers feel pressure to pile on the homework each night from teammates, from the administration, or from their own fear of failure. Often a lack of communication between teachers results in multiple assignments for a student on one long night which add up to tears and frustration. Another problem is that there may be no clear district-wide policy on homework, so students who have different teachers will also have vastly different homework experiences. So, what are parents to do? The general conclusions of experts who have taken the time to scientifically study the issue is that homework is less useful or even counter-productive for young elementary aged students. In later elementary grades and high school, homework is useful to a point, but then becomes a negative influence when too much time is spent on it. The quality of assignments is crucial for a correlation with higher achievement. Parents, then, should be wary of long assignments in lower grades and of assignments which appear to be busy-work rather than authentic learning. There is no rigorous study showing a positive influence of homework on work habits or organizational skills. In fact, many experts contend that those skills could be better learned by participating in family chores and activities outside of the classroom rather than at a kitchen table arguing about homework. If you notice your child struggling with long assignments or in misery over tedious worksheets and other busy work, it is best to speak sooner rather than later with the child’s teachers. Explaining the child’s state of mind and the child’s fatigue or distress with homework can help bring about a better understanding. The teachers may simply not understand the effect of their assignments because they are not there at home with the child. Over the long term, leaving this problem unaddressed can cause the student to tune out of assignments, to lose the will to participate in learning, or even to carry out more disturbing behaviors such as cheating. It can cause a cognitive dissonance in a student who is disenchanted with learning and it can drive a wedge between parent and child. As Authors Etta Kralovec and John Buell point out: “When homework is examined in the context in which it actually occurs, it begins to take on a very different look. Much of the mindless work of homework is simply not useful. More complex homework, in contrast, often demands supervision by trained educators—not by parents, who may be limited in their ability to help children complete the assignments.” Parents need to concentrate on the job which is solely theirs. Namely: encouraging the growth of the whole child, not just his or her academic skills. Putting away the books in favor of a conversation, a night of baking, or a trip to the ball field can be more effective at teaching the whole child than a ditto of repetitive math problems. That balance must be reached in full cooperation with teachers and the school district. *** Copyright 2006 rationalamerican.com *** To cite this article: Painter, John. Homework And Tears. (September 2006). Retrieved month x, 2xxx, from <http://rationalamerican.com/education> |
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