Hey, let's go out to eat after school, and you can come over after.--No, sorry, too much homework tonight. We're all going to the game Friday, you should come!--Sorry, wish I could. Honestly, I do, but I'm swamped with homework tonight. Can you come to the gym with me later? Haven't hung out with in a while.--I don't think so I have a lot of--Homework. I know, alright well I'll see you tomorrow I guess.-- Homework, a subject near and dear to my heart.....A word I know oh so well, a word I know a little too well, a word that is constantly taking control over my life; homework. The word brings tears to children's eyes, sends chills down their spines, and puts their stomachs in knots. Whoever invented homework successfully found a way to make sure that students do not break free of the shackles of education, even when they have escaped from the prison some call school, and have returned to the safety of the impenetrable fortress they; "home". Homework; I loathe the word. I understand the importance of homework in some instances, sometimes I learn more from homework than I do in school, but after hours and hours of incessant "at home" assignments, I can't help but ask myself, "What is the point? Do teachers feel obligated to give homework, and therefore just pile on hours and hours of needless busy work? Is their a method to this madness? Are they doing this simply to take up my time, making sure I never have the time to enjoy my ephemeral youth? Is this homework helping me at all?" My life is completely dictated by homework; no doubt about it. My social life at the moment is nonexistent. The only men in my life are Hammurabi, Pythagoras, Isaac Newton, and a Mr. Henry David Thoreau. My day pretty much consists of coming home, doing homework, going to gymnastics, doing more homework, and hitting the sack by 12:00.....Yeah, go ahead and say it, that's a lot of homework. All of this homework is hurting me rather than helping. Not only is it tedious and stressful, but I feel like it only teaches me things I already know, while taking the fun and interest away from learning. That being said, I do think homework can be helpful (hard to believe with all my ranting, but hey, I'm a kid. It's what I do). I feel like homework should compliment what I learn in the classroom, not repeat it. After reading Keith O'brian's article "Why have homework?" I agreed with his main thesis; teachers should reduce the amount of homework they give their students. Shorter, better targeted, higher quality assignments will do more for students, even though they are spending less time on the subject. So teachers, give us kids a break, school is important, but not as important as actually living our lives.
O'brian made it clear that homework is not all bad, but it has to be the RIGHT kind of homework."Teachers should not be assigning homework simply to occupy kids’ time, sending them home with untargeted, poorly planned busywork. And it’s worthwhile for teachers to think critically about the work they are assigning to make sure that it’s actually teaching kids something." Homework, when given correctly is extremely beneficial, but when given in unneeded excess, it does more harm than good. O'brian uses study results to prove his point, "According to the National Center for Education Statistics, fourth-graders who received 15 minutes of math homework per night in 2009 scored on average higher on achievement tests than fourth-graders who received no math homework per night. But studying for 30 minutes, 45 minutes, one hour, or more per night, according to the data for fourth-graders, is associated with lower test scores, not higher ones, a curve that generally holds true across different age groups and subject areas." O'brian brings up many pro-homework and anti-homework arguments, but he is undeniably in support of homework. That being said, he doesn't believe in piling it on with no purpose, and that blindly throwing homework at us is NOT the answer. I have nothing against teachers and I have nothing against school (the only reason I even get up in the morning is to go to 3rd period and see Mrs. Fay's smiling face), but I have everything against being given homework with no substance behind it. Hey, Teachers! Leave us kids alone!
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Why Have Homework?
"I feel like homework should compliment what I learn in the classroom, not repeat it." Thank you! Especially for people with high learning curves, not everybody should be forced into slaving over a concept they fully understand! Last year was took the cake for the most abundant amount of busy work, and this year is already shaping up to beat the record. We could learn so much more; we are so much more capable of getting through material than our teachers think. Last year in honors chem, we didn't finish learning how to name compounds until Christmas. It was torture for those of us who actually understood it. For everyone else, get out of honors. I'm pretty sure that was covered in the AP summer work.
ReplyDeleteRead The Homework Myth by Alfie Kohn. It's tough to assign homework after reading that book. Reading, however, is an exception -- there is value there, not in busywork.
ReplyDeleteI love this and I lovvvve the last line:) Jim, our Chem class was a mess last year, I agree with that completely. She really didn't have time to properly teach because a certain person or two would say something rather stupid and set everyone else off. I think that's why it was really slow torture.
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