This. Imo it's necessary to start early because most of your tertiary (and even secondary) education will be independent work "at home".
School homework should be abolished
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This. Imo it's necessary to start early because most of your tertiary (and even secondary) education will be independent work "at home".
My nephew was extremely stressed about some homework he had recently to the point of becoming upset about it. At that point you're not going to retain any learning, you just want it done so you don't need to worry anymore.
Part of the school experience is eventually figuring out how to get away with doing fuck all of your homework anyway, unless it's a piece of coursework that's going to affect an actual grade then fuck homework.
Part of the school experience is eventually figuring out how to get away with doing fuck all of your homework anyway, unless it's a piece of coursework that's going to affect an actual grade then fuck homework.
No one said that parents should be "off the hook when it comes to education." You stated that the buck stops with the parents regarding education and my stance is that the educational system and the entities involved at all levels within bear the lionshare of the the responsibility. Because parents are legally required to have their children in a school of some type and the non-public options aren't financially viable for most people. To say, "Your kids have to be in school or else you got to jail/lose custody of them but we're not going to provide adequate resources to educate them, so you still have to do that too" is ridiculous. Parents have a responsibility towards their kids education but that lies in preparation and support. Not teaching kids themselves because the school can't do it. If the school can't educate the kids, then don't legally mandate the kids be there and instead let Parents educate the way they best can.
The point of my anecdote wasn't about homework but addressing your putting the blame on parents regardless of the context of a parents responsibilities in supporting their family's survival.
I'm British, Additionally you're mindset comes across as Work hard now to work hard later earn money and Die and I reject that concept because it's shitty and people all over can lead amazing and enriched lives without having high paying jobs.
Nothing about homework is NEEDED that notion is ridiculous. Are you telling me your children wouldn't develop minds and be prepared for the real world if they didn't have homework?
The concept of "living your job" that seems ingrained in the American mindset is so toxic. Got to do your home work kids so that when your boss needs you to work outside of your hours you're prepared.
You know it's possible to have a life that isn't Eat Sleep Work Repeat Die right?
Also the parent can teach the child is so many ways that doesn't boil down to sit down do this learn this shit information till you can't forget it because it's "essential".
I feel like certain kinds of homework.... like reading or studying are just fine.
If you ban ALL homework, that just means that schools will no longer be able to assign books because they are a time sink.
If you ban ALL homework, that just means that schools will no longer be able to assign books because they are a time sink.
The alternative you suggest is literally the same situation except now the parents need to pay for daycare for 6+hrs of the day. I understood what you were trying to do with your anecdote, but chose to point out that even in your example, removing homework would do nothing.
This is a pretty funny (and gross) point to make when your post is supporting hypercapitalist "work till you drop" bullshit that is one of the actual reasons America is falling apart.
It's not the same situation because as it is right now the educational system is in charge of education. What I suggested is the only way that one can reasonably say that "the buck stops with the parents" where education is concerned.
Removing homework actually does do something. It prevents a struggling student from going home and becoming even more frustrated with their trouble understanding. In the classroom they can ask the teacher for help and have at least a shot at getting it from the source that's ultimately grading them. A child at home whose parents are working doesn't have that.
Ok, you still didn't answer my question. What then, can parents be liable for? Where are you drawing this arbitrary line for parental responsibility? Because as I've said, just because education is mandatory does not mean the government magically owns all of the responsibility. The time spent on mandatory education would be spent doing... what in the context of a poor household? Will the tax savings for said household fund a private tutor? Absolutely not. I don't see the point in arguing such a point.
I did mention the gains of mental health. You're producing a false premise here in that you're portraying a much better school environment than the one you're criticizing. I've already agreed with you that if children were given all the tools to succeed in school as is, then homework may be superfluous. You can't both tell me the system is broken and also argue that homework is unnecessary because the child has all the resources they need at school. We're talking about here and now, pragmatic solutions to the current situation. Because I'd agree with you in the pie in the sky scenario.
I stated in the post previous to the latest that you responded to that a parents responsibility towards education in the current system is in preparation and support. And yes, the school system and all of it's agents do bear the brunt of the responsibility. The entire purpose of the school system is to educate children. If they are failing to do that, then it's their responsibility. This isn't a difficult concept to grasp.
You haven't actually mentioned mental health at all in response to any of my statements. I'm also not producing a false premise. In any school as it exists today, there is a teacher in the class and any student can raise a question or a series of questions in an attempt to understand the topic of discussion. No additional tools needed for the premise to be 100% accurate. And no, the discussion isn't about pragmatic solutions to the current situation. It's about whether or not homework as it currently exists is a boon or a hiderance.
So if the teacher fails to touch on a subject adequately, you'd rather say, "not my job!" than just fill in the holes for your kids. And you find this morally correct to do so. That's what difficult to grasp. That you're willing to abdicate teaching (not prep and support, because parents draw lines as to what they do for their kids) you kids because that's someone else's job, regardless of the realities of how good of a job they're doing.
You're suggesting that homework is unnecessary because any student can raise a question and be helped at any point in time? Ok. I don't see the point of continuing this. Agreeing to disagree and moving on.
Holy leaps of logic and putting words in my mouth. First of all, we're talking in general, so trying to turn this conversation personal while also attempting to impune my character through taking the absolute worst case scenario assumptions is such bad form for discussion in addition to being a bad faith debate tactic. You're entire statement here is disingenuous and a pretty thinly veiled attack.
What I actually said was that the school system is responsible for a child's education. It's the literal purpose for a school system to exist. You keep trying to twist this into a personal blame game. It's not about "who do we blame for this?" but about "What would be best for these students overall?" There are a myriad of complex factors in the success or failure of a child's learning experience so looking to place the blame squarely in one place or one area is a ridiculous thing to do. What isn't ridiculous is expecting an organization that exists to do a job, to do it's best to... you know... actually DO that job.
No, what I said in that statement was just to point out that my premise was accurate and your claim that it wasn't was plainly wrong.
Overall, it IS better for a struggling student to seek help from the teacher who is actually teaching the subject rather than trying to figure it out themselves get frustrated, lowering their desire to even try to learn or practicing how to do the assignment incorrectly, thus reinforcing bad habits/structure/procedure through rote that the teacher then has to try to correct. The latter, by the way, was explained by one of my sons teachers to all of the parents at the beginning of the year as her reasoning for keeping homework lighter this year than she has previous years. It's something she's literally seen happen with her students through her experience teaching.
My foster daughter's 2nd grade teacher isn't doing homework this year. We still read with her every night and she had been progressing much faster than last year in this setup.
I agree because the time we spent in class was usually bullshiting, and then the homework was all the work we coulda done in class
No homework = more time for extracurricular activity. I think they should get rid of homework and make clubs, volunteer service and sports a requirement.
This. Personally I think elementary homework should be reduced or eliminated but outside of that homework is necessary, even it takes quite a bit of time. Otherwise, you will either lose the information that comes from class more easily or begin to not care/pay attention to the class itself. I'm currently experiencing this with a college course and I feel I'll probably end the class with a mediocre grade because of the lack of homework and overall engagement.
At least in primary school a good happy medium is to assign x minutes of reading at home, but no worksheets
That way some people can't use the excuse of 'this is hard' etc to not do it.
That way some people can't use the excuse of 'this is hard' etc to not do it.
In all seriousness, fuck homework. I grew up in a household where I had no help with homework or learning outside of school. As a teenager, I was pretty depressed to the point where I could barely do anything in school - let alone even think about doing homework. Fell behind big time because of both factors.
Schools get what 7-8 hours / day? That's more than enough time to fit in all the learning.
Come to Ontario, where they get homework AND mandatory volunteer service. As a teenager, I used to rant that the mandatory volunteer service was a way for the province to have to spend less on services because they had a giant pool of unpaid labour that was required to take part. As an adult, I'm not so sure I was wrong.
I'm a teacher and I can tell you that for many parents, it's the only connection they have to the school.
It's impossible to reach every child every day but with homework, what you send home is your way to make that connection.
I teach 8 year olds and I can promise you that at my school, what they're doing besides homework is not productive or healthy.
It's impossible to reach every child every day but with homework, what you send home is your way to make that connection.
I teach 8 year olds and I can promise you that at my school, what they're doing besides homework is not productive or healthy.
It's about providing the skills needed to give them educated options down the road no matter what path they choose to take. You put in the work early and whatever career they embark on isn't a choir as it is for the majority of the population. It's with your mindset that puts your kids in a situation that will have them left behind and working until they die. It's where you apply your hard work that hones the skills your child needs to develop and succeed. Home work has it's purpose and you are failing to see it's intended purpose. Help your kids earn a job that pays well, is stress free and something they love.
That isn't what it's supporting but if you want to take it that way go ahead. Your generalizations are amusing...
When leisure time is running around your apartment complex and getting into fights or cussing, yes.
I would rather they were doing homework.
Plus, there is a recommended amount of homework. I give one page of reading, one page of grammar, and one page of math every night.
It can be done in 20-30 minutes if the student is focused.
*gasp* cussing? *faints from the vapours*
I'll take your word on it, but I don't really see how 20-30 minutes of nightly homework is enough to combat the kinds of things you're describing.
The kinds of things I'm describing are all surrounding the #1 thing that hurts students which a lack of parent involvement.
Parents knowing I send homework every night, their kids asking about it, and both working on it together is the absolute start of student success.
Nothing I can do in the classroom compares to that.
I agree. If the teachers can't successfully educate children while they are in the class room than they have failed, and no amount of homework is ever going to be a supplement for poor education.
Most jobs don't have you working after hours, why should we have children do the same? It's just odd and honestly abusive.
Also, as an aside; FUCK the American education system.
Most jobs don't have you working after hours, why should we have children do the same? It's just odd and honestly abusive.
Also, as an aside; FUCK the American education system.
Maybe I missed it, but I see a lot of people saying "I didn't do well at school and having homework just added to the burden." I don't see people saying "I learned all I needed to during school and homework was a burden."
The other thing is, maybe it was just my school but don't schools have study hall periods where your'e supposed to be studying?
The other thing is, maybe it was just my school but don't schools have study hall periods where your'e supposed to be studying?
The big difference between having homework in college and high school and earlier is that in college I spent far far less time in an actual classroom. I think the time I spent studying/going to class in college was less than the time I was forced to spend sitting in high school, doing extracurriculars, and homework
There's plenty of people posting about their own children who do well at school and are burdened with homework that takes an excessive amount of time to do. Also, not every school has study hall periods. I've never met anyone who had a study hall period unless it was a private school.
Maybe I'm thinking after school programs. Since my wife and I work "standard" hours my kids go to after school care and they usually finish their homework (if they have any) before they get picked up.
I graduated high school with a 4.8 GPA, and the vast majority of the time homework was a complete burden because I already knew the material. In most cases all it did was waste my day and add intense amounts of stress to my life, because let me tell you, I was assigned multiple hours of homework per night.
The only time it was useful at all was to test myself to make sure that I had taught material to myself correctly when my teacher didn't have time to teach it in class, ie, when the lesson itself was designed around learning it at home.
Bingo. I teach an AP course, the idea that homework should be abolished is laughable.
Crazy, not all students come to the classroom with the same abilities. Some need to work on those abilities in either tutorials or via additional practice i.e. homework. Its odd, I know.
"Most jobs don't have you working after hours." Making that statement in a thread about the education system is probably one of the most hilarious things I have read today, thanks.
I think more and more jobs are actually requiring you to work 'off' the clock than ever before. Even before I was teaching AP I would traditionally spend 1-2 hours per night and roughly 3-4 hours per weekend working off the clock. Lesson planning, grading student work, and emailing parents.
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That's interesting, so you were good enough at school that for the most part, homework was all review, but it was still so time consuming that it made you stressed out? Was this a private school? Because that does seem excessive, I can't imagine what students who weren't doing as well handled that. That still doesn't mean all homework should be abolished, though. And if a teacher is giving out excessive homework, the parents should absolutely complain or at least hear the teacher's reasoning for it.
The reason I brought it up initially is because if you absolutely hated school (or felt a lot of pressure even without homework) it's natural that you would hate homework and not want to bring school back home with you.
This was public school, a bunch of GATE, AP and honors classes. Mainly we're talking piles of worksheets re-doing the work we did in class. So like we are taught a concept in calculus for example, and go over some problems in class, everyone gets it. But we have to go home and literally do pages of problems that night. AP Biology, we go over how the eye works or whatever in class, take notes, everyone gets it. We then have to go home and answer pages of questions in basically short essay format on how the eye works. Repeat like this across language, literature, history, etc.
This was 20 years ago so I assume things have changed one way or the other, but that's the basics of it. The homework wasn't anything new, it was a repeat of what we already learned that took a massive amount of time even if you knew it all by heart. And like I said, sometimes we'd just straight up be assigned to teach a chapter of material to ourselves overnight.
And honestly not many of us struggled with the material itself because a lot of kids were weeded out of these classes at the time. Nobody left standing was goofing off or not paying attention in class. You're right, there would have been no way to keep up if you struggled.
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It is highly unlikely that the average student could learn a subject like software development, differential equations or statistics without doing some homework; it reinforces in a practical setting whatever theory was learned in class. What about readings for humanities classes? Should you be exempt from reading books and papers at home? It sounds more like the objection is to bad homework than the concept of homework itself.
These are people who actually GET IT....
As a high school teacher, I try not to give homework. Generally, students only have homework from me if they didn't finish the work in class. Instead, I encourage them to read. It's not perfect of course but I would rather be there to help them out if they need.
Maybe it should tell you something if people keep telling you that. But have fun being a shitty teacher anyway.
Yah, just gonna report and move on, its obvious you aren't looking to formulate an actual response. Take care.
As a HS teacher (NYC), I disagree. We only get 45 minutes with students each period. The educational process needs students to refresh themselves at home or even do readings at home so we can discuss in class.
Also it's not only about content but teaching people to be responsible adults where you have deadlines. Funny you say this doesn't change homework in college. So do you want students to just adjust to having homework in college without the gradual buildup to setting time aside from their daily lives to do tasks. There's a huge reason why some schools see a large college dropout rate, among many reasons is the difference in workload and independent time management. It's about self-efficacy and being able to say in society to your friends that maybe I can't go hang out I have some things to get done for school. Priorities and time management are key.
Education is about gradual release but if you hold their hand the whole time people won't learn on their own and be independent.
Also it's not only about content but teaching people to be responsible adults where you have deadlines. Funny you say this doesn't change homework in college. So do you want students to just adjust to having homework in college without the gradual buildup to setting time aside from their daily lives to do tasks. There's a huge reason why some schools see a large college dropout rate, among many reasons is the difference in workload and independent time management. It's about self-efficacy and being able to say in society to your friends that maybe I can't go hang out I have some things to get done for school. Priorities and time management are key.
Education is about gradual release but if you hold their hand the whole time people won't learn on their own and be independent.