Let My Children Work

I just finished reading Let My Children Work, by John Blessington, who I was lucky enough to have lunch with several weeks ago. Blessington, the one-time head of the Whitby School in Greenwich, Connecticut–a school that revived the Montessori method in the United States–wrote Let My Children Work in 1974. (It was re-issued in 1999.) His book provides a wonderful critique of education and homework that still feels fresh today. Here’s how one of the chapters begins:

Let’s make a real distinction between the teaching functions of home and school. Homework is a farce. It is ill assigned, poorly designed, thoughtlessly and subjectively corrected or discarded; it wastes class or teacher-child relationship time; it causes cheating at home and in school; and the lies about it abound.

Advice Columnist Suggests Parents Define What They Want for Their Children’s Education

In an advice column in The Jackson Hole Star Tribune, Dr. Yvonne Fournier responds to a parent who is concerned about the homework overload her child gets at a “good” school. Dr. Fournier notes,

In many cases, the “good” schools have given students and their families a one-size-fits-all definition that makes “good education” synonymous with “more education.” Consequently, students at the “good” schools are given more homework, more tests and, often, more stress.

She goes on to suggest:

As you define “good education,” make two lists: one of everything a school should be and one of everything a school should not be. Consider what values you want for your child and what impression of learning you would like to instill. Here is a sample list:

I want a school that:

Teaches my child to love learning and teaches what he is ready to learn.

Offers structure with flexibility.

Praises my child for his work and effort.

Believes my child needs time with his family each evening.

Helps my child find his own special strengths.

I do not want a school that:

Treats my child as an adult.

Expects me to be my child’s math and spelling teacher.

Uses an accelerated curriculum to raise scores on standardized tests.

Next, you will need a list of questions to ask as you search for your own “good” school. For each point on your lists, you can create questions to determine if a school meets your criteria.

Finding a “good” school is like baking a cake. Decide which ingredients will make the very best cake, and then combine the right ingredients in the proper amounts. Do not fall for schools that offer the frosting and forget the cake.

Needham, Massachusetts, Principal Tries to Ease Burden for High School Students

When I started this blog last summer, one of my first entries was about schools that had cut back on summer homework. There, I wrote about the principal of Needham High, Paul Richards (whom I had interviewed for The Case Against Homework), an educator who’s concerned about the amount of stress today’s students face.

Paul Richards was in the news again recently because he put an end to the tradition of publishing the honor roll in the local newspaper, a move which subjected him to ridicule on national TV. But, according to Richards, high schools stress contributes to increased incidents of suicide, eating disorders, drug abuse, and other self-destructive behaviors.

According to the Boston Globe, Richards recently outlined several new initiatves to combat stress among students, including surveying students about their anxieties; consulting the Benson-Henry Institute for Mind Body Medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital; and forming a stress-reduction committee of students, parents, and teachers. He also said he’d ask teachers to be more flexible in their assignment deadlines, noting that college professors often hand out a syllabus at the start of a semester that list windows of time to turn in projects and reports. And he plans to ask teachers to make sure they clearly state the objective of assignments, so that students are not left feeling they’re doing busywork.

Read the entire article here.

Alfie Kohn Distilled

I always wished Alfie Kohn’s book, The Homework Myth, had been written before The Case Against Homework, because his is a terrific resource, especially if you’re interested in how homework research has been conducted and what it actually says. I’ve read plenty of interviews with him over the last several months, all of which I’ve liked. Here’s a recent one from Education World.

Podcaster Interviews Denise Clark Pope, founder of Stressed Out Students

You can listen to Denise Clark Pope, the founder of Stressed Out Students at Stanford University and the author of Doing School: How We Are Creating a Generation of Stressed-Out, Materialistic, and Miseducated Students, on the podcast of Stan Goldberg at srdad.com. Part 2 of the podcast will be next week so be sure to check back to hear the second half of the interview.

In addition to reading Doing School, I spent several hours on the phone with Denise when I was doing research for The Case Against Homework and it was really great to hear her interview with Stan. Denise is very articulate about what’s the matter with schools these days and I always wish that more parents would familiarize themselves with her work and her ideas. I think she could single-handedly quell much of the competition that exists among parents and schools, if only everyone knew about her and her program.

First Monday

This coming Monday is the first Monday in February. As suggested in The Case Against Homework, and in this blog every month, I recommend that every parent send a note to her/his children’s teachers, administrators, or School Board members on the first Monday of every month.

Many of the emails I’ve received from parents recently have talked about the sheer volume of work their children bring home every night. Why not make this Monday the time to discuss overload? If you’re not sure what to say, take a look at the conversation on pages 209-210 of The Case Against Homework. To get the conversation going, you could just write a short note to the teacher or administrator requesting a meeting. Here’s an example from page 208 of The Case Against Homework:

DEAR TEACHER/ADMINISTRATOR: [After writing some kind of pleasantry]: We’d like to come in and talk to you as soon as possible. Just to give you a heads-up, homework is cauing a lot of stress in our home and we’d like to sit down with you and figure out a way that we can alleviate it. We look forward to having an open discussion with you.

And, don’t forget to email me or write a post in the forums and explain what you did and the results.

From the Mouth of a High-Schooler

This opinion piece was written by a high-schooler in Lexington, North Carolina, and published in the Dispatch Online.

There’s Just Too Much Homework and Not Enough Time
Faithe Owens

Everyone spends time in school at some point in life. Some students seem to breeze through without having to study or work too hard to pass their classes. Others aren’t that lucky.

A student’s workload is born in elementary school when you have a couple of spelling words and maybe a book to read for homework. But then as you grow older and go through middle school and high school, the life of a student gets harder.

You are eventually pounded with homework, and it only gets worse as you grow closer and closer to graduation. It’s understood that the higher your grade, your classes are supposed to become more challenging. But we spend enough time at school each day. We don’t need hours and hours of homework each night on top of it.

Many of my fellow high school students who usually do very well in school are starting to struggle because there is so much homework. The workload these days is ridiculous. Students who actually do their homework spend at least two hours or more on homework each night.

Some students don’t even have time to finish all the homework assigned, which puts more pressure on students to cheat.

Students need some free time to relax and live their lives. Every day should not be strictly focused on school work.

It’s difficult to finish the tremendous amount of homework given when you participate in clubs or afterschool extracurricular activities. As an athlete, I have been up late numerous school nights trying to complete all the homework I have been assigned. Sometimes, I’m just not able to finish it all before having to get a few hours of sleep and head back to school.

There is just too much homework assigned. Educators should try to do something to better their students and give them a break. Students are in school to learn and grow educationally. Applying stress and pressure isn’t going to do anything but make students dislike school.

Schools need to loosen up and try to help their students – not hurt them.

From the Mouth of A Seventh-Grader

This opinion piece appeared in New York Newsday.

Give Us A Weekend Homework Break
By Maggie Rouder

I sit in school all day watching the clock, hoping for it to be 2:40. But why?

Once the bell rings and school is out, I have to go home and do my homework. Rewriting pages from a workbook or doing math examples on a topic we haven’t even learned yet frustrates me to no end.

After sitting for more than 6 1/2 hours listening to the drone of my teachers’ voices, why am I now expected to do even more work? And then there are the teachers who assign so much work that they don’t get a chance to go over it. They simply rush to the next lesson.

When is there time for us to just be kids? These days we are living a very structured life. From orthodontist appointments, tennis lessons, religion, team sports and other school activities, there is never any time for us just to curl up in front of the television and relax. Studies tell our parents that too much television and computer time is not good for us, but I can tell you that stress and an overloaded schedule are just as harmful for our mental and physical health.

Each day I feel as though I am in a race, hurrying to finish my homework, rushing to appointments and sitting down with my family for dinner. I end up going to sleep late and having a hard time waking up in the morning when I am expected to start the same routine all over again. That is why kids cherish the weekend so much. No worrying about getting up early, studying for tests and other school projects. Teachers and schoolwork should not intrude on our weekend. Students who are conscientious about their schoolwork and grades should be entitled to a little break over the weekend.

Some Highly Competitive Schools are Reducing Homework Loads

According to an article by a Wall Street Journal reporter, some of the most elite elementary and high schools across the country are changing their homework policies, limiting the amount of work assigned by teachers or eliminating it altogether in lower grades.

In Greenville, South Carolina, the 74-school district reduced the amount of time students had to spend on assignments each night and limited how much homework could count toward a final grade. At Sparhawk, a private school in Amesbury, Massachusetts, homework was eliminated until January of third grade. At Wellesley High School in Wellesley, Massachusetts, juniors will now spend 10 days in history class writing a required thesis–work which they previously did at home. At Harvard-Westlake, an independent middle and high school in Los Angeles, homework now has a three-hour per course, per week limit, and anonymous surveys are given out every semester to gauge the workload.

The movement towards reduced homework, according to the article, is being fueled by both The Case Against Homework and The Homework Myth. Still, though, national statistics show that the amount of homework is continuing to grow.

Read the entire article to get more ideas on what you might want to ask for at your school.