Stop Homework

Here’s an email I received from John Painter, the editor of readingtonparents.blogspot.com. You can read John’s earlier guest blog entry here.

The Trouble with Internet Based Homework
by John Painter

My latest entry on readingtonparents.blogspot.com is about internet based homework, and I thought you might find it a worthy read. My kids, now in 6th and 8th grade, have been just inundated this year with homework requiring internet connectivity and other computer resources. I was recently forced to upgrade my infrastructure at home once again, and that led to a related article on readingtonparents.org about creating a safer Linux-based student PC at home. This is a fight I’ll be pushing hard in my district this school year. Even though I have gained the attention of three district administrators who are sympathetic to the idea that internet and computer based homework needs to be better delineated and understood by educators, I’m realizing now that they simply don’t have the expertise in the district to fix the problem. The push from the top of the district food chain to include technology at every turn (sometimes called techno-lust) has already created problems, including some young elementary students inadvertently viewing some delightful websites about the unique sexual habits of human beings. Yet, there is no leadership on how to properly harness the power of the net for young students within the district, and parents are left to scramble on their own.

Here’s a letter Caroline Moellering of Chicago, Illinois sent to her first-grade son’s co-teachers at his private Catholic school when she learned that the teachers would be assigning weekend homework. When her older daughter was in the same school, there was no weekend homework.

Please Don’t Assign Weekend Homework to First Graders
by Caroline Moellering

Dear first grade co-teachers in a downtown Chicago Catholic school,

Thanks for your quick response to my email. I feel compelled to further question the decision to mandate weekend homework so please bear with me.

My concern is that you indicated in your announcement that there would be homework “most Fridays”. The qualifier ‘most’ to me indicates a pretty great percentage of the time, ~90% in my view. I am hoping you will consider reversing this new mandate to ‘rarely, if ever’ or ‘never’. Currently there is much discussion by educators about the value of homework for children, particularly in the younger grades. There is also concern that children are suffering because one of the most valuable conponents of early childhood development, play, is not occuring as children’s time is being eaten up by the over-prescription of homework. Also sacrificed are opportunities to spend quality time with parents and siblings in activities the family unit finds engaging. This could be travel or outings but can also be as simple as cooking a meal together or going for a walk. Finally, children are increasingly suffering from stress and stress-related issues as educators expect more and more of children at younger ages.

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I just watched the DVD of the Fall, 2008, Stressed Out Students conference, with keynote speeches by David Elkind, author of The Hurried Child and The Power of Play, Dr. Ken Ginsburg, author of A Parent’s Guide to Building Resilience in Children and Teens, Dr. Madeline Levine, author of The Price of Privilege, and Denise Clark Pope, author of Doing School. There are also 3 student speakers–2 highschoolers, and one college sophomore.

A parent from Calgary, Canada, recently told me that she was able to persuade the committee studying homework at her school to listen to the podcast interviews of Harris Cooper, Alfie Kohn, John Buell, and me at Senior Dad, before the committee begins to rewrite policy–a brilliant tactic, in my opinion.

For the same purpose, I would suggest getting copies of the DVD of the Stressed Out Students conference. Or, you could host a get-together in your community, watch it, and figure out a strategy for reducing school stress. (For ideas, read The Case Against Homework.) The DVD is under 2 hours, costs $4, and is very compelling. You can order a copy of the DVD here.

Dear Sara,

I am 14 and homework burdens me ridiculously.

Below is a timeline of how overburdened today’s high school students are. Showing this to people (you have permission to alter or use it) may show them how packed everything is. Some details may differ from student to student but it is still reasonably accurate:

7:00–get up
7:30–leave for bus
Approx 8:15–arrive at school
3:00–leave school
3:30–get home; start homework
6:00–finish homework; eat dinner
6:30–finish dinner and go to sport/other activity
8:00–arrive home and do chores
8:15–finish chores and have “family time” ):
Relax or leisure until bed

As you can see, it’s pretty packed. You may not notice, but I haven’t even included a possible part-time job, social activities OR anything else.

The problem is that we just can’t fit anything more into everyday

I also believe part of the problem is that we get all the assignments at the same time

I don’t know how it is for you Americans but in Australia year 7 is HELL. We have primary and high school (Primary k-6), students are pounded and I have been pushed to breaking point.

Please keep up your efforts.

I was recently interviewed by Rat Race Rebellion. You can read it here

Readers of this blog are, at this point, pretty familiar with the work of Kerry Dickinson, a mother from Danville, California, who, last year, got her school district to reevaluate its homework policy and institute a new one. You can read Kerry’s earlier guest blog entries here and here and here.

This year, Kerry, concerned about a new school program which would have made students finish uncompleted homework during lunchtime, wrote a letter to her school at the beginning of the year. The upshot: the program was immediately turned into a voluntary, as opposed to mandatory, program.

The program was called Zeros Aren’t Permitted (ZAP), and was explained to the parents: “When a student arrives at school without their homework done they will be ZAPPED or assigned to get the assignment finished during lunchtime by their classroom teachers. Like it or not, in real life we are not able to just chose not to complete assignments or fulfill our responsibilities. Our goal is to not allow students to fall behind by not completing crucial assignments which may lead to failure.”

Here’s Kerry’s response.

Lunchtime Should be Lunchtime
by Kerry Dickinson

After having served on the SRVUSD homework task force last year I am concerned that Charlotte Wood is beginning a program this school year called “ZAP” that will ask children to complete unfinished homework assignments during lunchtime. The “Zeros Aren’t Permitted” or “ZAP” program implies that students will learn responsibility by giving up their lunchtime to complete homework because “like it or not, in real life we are not able to just choose not to complete assignments or fulfill our responsibilities.”

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Nick Caumanns, an independent running for the Surrey School Board near Vancouver, Canada, is running on a platform that excessive homework is detrimental. According to News1130.com, Caumanns, who has seen his own three children struggle with too much homework, argues that too much homework can have negative effects on student health, family life and fitness. “It’s an extension of the school day and particularly when the homework is graded it sort of moves the classroom into your home and they don’t get a break from what they do all day. If we sent our kids to hockey school and for five or six hours they did pushups and skated, when they came home we wouldn’t send them out to the driveway to take shots or go for a run.”

I wish Caumanns a lot of luck, I hope he wins, and I hope he inspires other parents to run for their School Boards.

Today’s guest blogger, “FedUpMom,” had been advocating for homework reform in her daughter’s public school in suburban Philadelphia. This school year, she decided to try private school for her fifth-grade daughter; she is having more success in getting the school to respond to her concerns. This is FedUpMom’s fourth post; you can read her other entries here, here and here.

A Private School Listens
by FedUp Mom

We fled the public schools last year and enrolled our kids in a private Quaker school with a reputation for being nurturing and child-centered. When my daughter visited the school last year, the teachers were concerned that she seemed withdrawn and depressed. I was hopeful that they understood the issues in her case.

Everything got off to a good start until the beginning of the second full week of school. When I picked my daughter up, she told me that she had been held out of recess because she forgot to do part of her homework! I was furious.

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