Stop Homework

Today’s guest blogger, Diane Hewlett-Lowrie is the mother of a six-year-old son. Diane works in education and interpretation with the New Jersey Division of Parks and Forestry. She grew up in Scotland and believes in nurturing the development of the whole child. Her experience with homework to date has been that it is pointless, has no real merit and takes time away from much more valuable activities at home.

The Experts Tell Us
by Diane Hewlett-Lowrie

Eat healthy food.
Play a ball game with your family and friends.
Cook your own meals from scratch using fresh organic produce.
Don’t eat take-out food regularly; the trans-fats/sugar/carbohydrates, etc. will kill you.
Have sit-down family dinners at least four times a week; it helps communication and keeps your kids off drugs.
Allow your kids an hour every day for unstructured play and interaction with the natural world.
If you’re in first grade, get at least 11 hours of sleep so you can concentrate in school.
Cherish the time with your children while they are young. They grow up so fast.
Reduce stress in your family - enjoy some down time and relax together.
Get at least 20 minutes of aerobic exercise every day.
Read to your child for 30 minutes every night.
Get a good night’s sleep.

I’m sorry; we don’t have time to do that, WE’VE GOT HOMEWORK!”

Today’s post is an op-ed published in the Contra Costa Times on November 15. It’s written by Kerry Dickinson, who was Monday’s’s guest blogger.

Homework is Culprit
by Kerry Dickinson

I was both thrilled and perplexed with the front page article “Healthy development tied to nature” on Nov. 8. I’m thrilled because our family loves being outdoors and we know that nature is good for the mind, body and soul. I’m delighted that this article promotes riding one’s bike or walking to local schools and stores. That’s great for the environment as well as for one’s own health.

I am perplexed, however, that the writer mentioned video games as one of the main reasons kids stay indoors. It’s true that after school activities such as video games, sports, or music lessons do take up a considerable amount of time, time that could be spent playing outdoors. But let’s not ignore the fact that children are spending one to three hours on homework after school each night and sometimes more on the weekends. Add homework to after school activities and it’s easy to see why children spend so little time outdoors.

As parents we have a choice about our children’s extracurricular activities. But we DON’T have a choice about the homework they are given. I would much rather send my boys outside to play after school than nag them about doing their homework.

Imagine a time when you came home from school and the first question out of your mother’s mouth was “Who are you going to play with today?” instead of, “How much homework do you have today?” Chances are, that time was 30 years ago when you were a kid.

Today’s guest blogger is Kerry Dickinson, the mother of two middle school age boys, a former middle and high school teacher, a current part-time substitute teacher, and a stay at home mother. She, and Julie Kurtz, the mother of two teens, a Mental Health Director, and a licensed marriage and family therapist in the San Francisco East Bay as well as teacher at a local Junior College, are actively working to change homework policy in their community.

How We’re Organizing in Danville, California
by Kerry Dickinson

Julie, and I have been spear-heading a movement to get our district (San Ramon Valley Unified District - SRVUSD) to re-evaluate its outdated homework policy, written in 1995.

We’ve started an email distribution list (currently at about 80 people) and have sent out a general survey about homework to collect initial data to present to the district. We ended up with about 60 completed surveys which I put into an Excel file.

Julie and I met with the Director of Instruction, Student Services, at our district on November 27. He seemed genuinely concerned with our issue. We gave him the results of our survey and he agreed to study it and get back to us.

A week later, he called Julie and told her that he met with the Educational Services Cabinet in the SRVUSD and they discussed homework. He indicated the group shares our concern about homework and the outdated policy we have. He stated after the winter break that a task force group would be developed to address the homework issue in our community as well as the homework policy. This task force would be comprised of a wide variety of stakeholders who can fairly represent the opinions that vary throughout the San Ramon Valley, including parents. They did not know who would be on it or how it would be developed or even how large or small it would be. This is yet to be decided.

So, at this point, we are cautiously optimistic about meeting with the district after the break to begin to form a task force and move forward with rewriting the outdated homework policy.

In the meantime, we continue to write editorials to the local paper and keep communicating with parents on our homework email list about any relevant issues that pertain to this homework issue.

In my previous blog entry, I wrote about Tracy Mason, of San Marino, California, who is organizing parents to challenge homework policies in her District. Here’s her follow-up email to parents who have expressed interest, urging them to come to the meeting, sign an online petition, and vote in the School Board election. (In The Case Against Homework you can find other samples of follow-up emails.)

SMUSD HOMEWORK REFORM NEWS
from Tracy Mason

I continued to be excited about the overwhelming response to my efforts toward homework reform. I shouldn’t be surprised, however, because intuitively I knew that many parents in San Marino shared my concerns. While I recognize that we have various personal opinions and experiences related to the “homework experience”, I think we can all agree that we believe it’s time for SMUSD to evaluate the current homework policy and practices. We parents have been loyal partners with the district in the effort to provide our children with a quality education, and SMUSD owes us the respect of addressing our concerns.

The online petition is ready to sign!

Don’t forget about the meeting:

It’s very important that you make a statement by attending this meeting! My email distribution list continues to grow daily, but your presence at the meeting will really help make our point. We may have coverage by both the San Marino Tribune and the Pasadena Star News, so this is your chance to be heard! I do not anticipate meeting on a regular basis, but instead using technology to form an online advocacy group which will share information and work together toward common educational goals.

VOTE VOTE VOTE! Don’t forget, today is an important school board election. The current board members have been very receptive to listening to my concerns, and I hope that we can continue this dialog.

LINKS:

“In The News” – Have you seen this article “Schools Turn Down the Heat on Homework?” Originally published Jan. 19th, 2007 in The Wall Street Journal, Author Nancy Keates discusses homework policy changes that some elite schools in affluent areas are making. It’s A must read!

What the Research Says:
For a very simple but thorough discussion of current research findings related to the value of homework

What can parents do? To find out what other parents are doing to ease the homework burden: stophomework.com

Okay, more to come! Don’t forget to forward this email to other parents who may be interested!

Less than a month ago, I heard from Tracy Mason, a mother of 3 from San Marino, California, who had

experienced (one of many) long afternoons helping my 11 year old daughter battle the mound of homework she had been assigned. After “we” were finished, I decided to go online to see what I could learn about the educational value of homework. I just didn’t “get it” and was sure that I must be missing something. What an eye-opening evening that turned out to be!

Tracy told me that she was reading everything she could about homework and then was going to start discussions with her local school district.

Tracy works fast. Over the past few weeks, she’s called all of the members of her School Board (and heard back from many of them) and organized a meeting for this coming week. Her local newspaper ran a front-page article on the meeting she’s organizing.

In the next months, this dynamic stay-at-home mom (and former certified public accountant) will keep us informed of her progress.

What follows is the email Tracy sent to parents, friends, and colleagues announcing her meeting. (In The Case Against Homework you can find a sample of a much shorter organizing email and tips for how to run a meeting like the one Tracy is planning.)

Dear Friends,

I am sending this email out to all San Marino parents that I know, with the hope that I may find some of you share a concern that I have that affects the well being of our children and families. The issue is:

HOMEWORK

I know that many of you can identify with the “negatives” of homework:

Read the rest of this entry »

A few weeks ago, I had a great conversation with Christopher Garlington of the Dave & Chris show out of Chicago. Check out his very funny blog, deathbykids, about his life as a mostly stay-at-home dad. Here’s what he posted about homework before I went on his radio show.

Down with Homework
by Christopher “G” Garlington

So it’s 10:30 at night and I’m driving to Kinkos to print out my daughter’s social studies paper because our printer is, mysteriously, out of ink again. Like it’s got a leak. I get to Kinkos and they’re closed. So I have to call and find the 24 hour Kinkos where all the employees are failed dot com millionaires and screenwriters and perform their duties with the grim disaffection and terminal hatred you’d expect from vassal slaves and I’m thinking–this isn’t life: it’s survival.

When the hell is my daughter going to lie on her bed and daydream? When’s she going to read something that’s not assigned to her? When’s she going to hang out on the stoop with her friends and shoot the $%!^? When am I?

Anyone with a new teen knows that this is the point in a child’s development psychologists call the FU phase
Read the rest of this entry »

Today’s guest blogger is Vera Goodman, author of Simply Too Much Homework; What Can We Do, which came out in early September. Her book is concise, straightforward, and short (88 pages), and I highly recommend it. Vera a long-time educator, teaches parents of struggling readers how to “conduct reading practice with material that is interesting for both parent and student and that models for the student how to read fluently and with comprehension.”

It’s Hard to Read When You’re Tired
by Vera Goodman

Reading well is the most important outcome of schooling. We learn to read most effectively by doing guided practice with someone who can read.

But the parents I teach often complain that excessive homework makes reading together almost impossible most nights. An example is Zack who is eight years old and is struggling with reading. He works hard to keep up all day despite his handicap. When he gets home he is often so fatigued that he puts his head in his arms and cries. However, he still faces an evening of homework, which is especially draining on him because he doesn’t read well. Zack is an incredibly gifted inventor and would just like to spend his personal time working on his latest invention. But instead, homework fills his time. When it is done, he is exhausted and reading together is out of the question. His mother, Joy, says, “Sometimes I wish I could home school Zack because at least I could practice with him when he is fresh in the morning.”

My question is,”How can an 8 year old who has failed to learn to read be expected to do homework that inevitably requires the ability to read?” As a teacher I know how easy it is to assign the same work to everyone and fail to realize that for some it is the straw that can break the camel’s back.

We learn to read well by reading. Time for reading is compromised for all students by excessive homework.

You might have noticed that I am featuring more guest writers than I did last year. So whether you’re a student, teacher, mental health professional, or parent, please send me your thoughts. Because I think it’s important to see students’ work in its original form, I don’t edit it or correct grammar and spelling errors. I don’t think teachers see enough of students’ original work. (Too much of it has been gone over by parents, peers, or tutors before students pass their work in.)

Today’s guest blogger is Jordan Swogger, a junior at Calvary Christian Academy in Cresaptown, Maryland. Jordan wrote and presented this speech for his Speech/Writing class. Needless to say, his classmates loved it.

by Jordan Swogger, 11th grader

Did you know that in 1948, a national survey of high school students showed that the average amount of time spent on homework was three to four hours per week? In 1957, the American government became concerned that U.S. students were not keeping up with their fellow Russian students, and so made a movement to increase homework and studies in order to catch up with the Russians, who had launched the first artificially made satellite, Sputnik, into space. After the end of the communist crisis in the 1990’s, the U.S. was still a strong advocate for keeping up the large amounts of homework, and so continued to give students much more homework. In my opinion, the level of homework given today is far more than is necessary, and is bordering on the unhealthy.

My problem with homework is not in the idea of homework itself, but in the amount of it, and what we are required to do. Also, homework takes up time. Think about it for a second. We get up in the morning. On average, we spend seven hours in school, not counting extra-curricular activities and events, or after-school Read the rest of this entry »