The heavily discussed topic of
homework has been an issue for quite some time now. However, as of recently, a
new question has rose to the surface. A lot of people are wondering “is
homework really beneficial?” The answer to that question is yes, to some
extent, and here is why. If students were not given homework to reinforce their
knowledge that they spent six hours at school learning about, the standard of
education across the United States would very likely plummet. Sure, six hours
of school is enough to retain an education. When it really comes down to it,
though, the six hours really is not enough to grasp a full understanding of new
concepts.
On
the other hand, many teachers take far too much advantage of a student’s free
time outside of school. Homework should take an about an hour to complete at
most. When a homework assignment becomes too tedious, students very easily lose
focus. In the long run, the more extensive a homework assignment is, the less
beneficial it is to the student. I know from personal experience in high school
that trying to balance school, work, sports, and homework was a major struggle.
I have always felt strongly about the importance of school, but motivation to
complete hours of homework assignments was a significant issue for me. I very
firmly believe that if less homework was given to me that my grades would have
actually been better than they were. When I stayed up all hours of the night
trying to study and get homework done I compromised sleep, which in turn
greatly reduced my focus when I was actually in the classroom learning. In the
future, I definitely do not want to see the idea of homework be completed
abolished, but rather see it reduced to a very minimal amount.
I am surprised that you are assuming that all homework is created equally. My experience from supervising my children's homework is that the vast majority of it was busy work, and not conducive to their grasping the material. Rather, it was work that was easy for the teacher to grade, and reinforced rote memorization of material that would regurgitated during the MCAS tests.
ReplyDeleteThe other problem is that, unlike when I was in high school, getting a passing grade on the homework is required in order to pass the class. It was not possible for my children to do the same thing I did -- refuse to do the homework, get straight As on the tests, quizzes and papers, and get a "B" grade for the class.