"We don't have time for Harry Potter, do we?" Ironflower asked resignedly the other night. She had just completed her homework - after two hours of Theater Week rehearsal and an hour and a half of dance class. And a full day of school. Being pretty strict about an early bedtime (Lovebug gets up at 6:30am, every day, regardless of when he goes to bed - and that means the other two are always up soon after, regardless of when they go to bed) means that we don't get to Harry Potter some nights because Ironflower's doing homework too late.
And I loathe it. I guarantee my daughter learns more from reading Harry Potter with me and her brothers than she does completing the same kind of math problems she did in class that day and copying words she already knows how to spell.
I feel like homework was born out of some belief that kids don't learn from anything they do at home; that if we don't give them homework they'll fall behind. Which is bull. As if doing a worksheet can teach you more than reading, or figuring out how to double a recipe, or building a Lego model, or creating a game. I know of preschools around here that give homework; it kills me.
My kids go to this well-respected school with extremely high test scores. But the test scores have nothing to do with the amount of homework they are given. I don't even know how much the test scores have to do with the (copious) amount of test preparation that they do. The test scores have to do with the fact that the vast majority of the kids at their school come from homes where someone spent hours talking to them and reading to them when they were little, where someone took them to the park and the museum over the weekend, where someone is able to buy them plenty of healthy food to eat, where parents spend so much time and money on helping the school add things like Theater Week and science experiences and iPads, where their mothers did not drink or do drugs or starve during pregnancy, where everyone around them is encouraging and positive.
I would venture to say that our kids would do even better on the tests if we spent an hour every night talking to them, reading with them, making up games with them, playing games with them or taking them somewhere new instead of just supervising them doing their homework.
I think most parents get that learning shouldn't just stop at the end of the school day. But the countries beating us on international tests don't have their kids spend hours on homework. I think it's time to stop this (false) belief that homework will make our kids smarter. It's certainly not going to make them love learning, I can tell you that. The way my bright, curious kids talk about homework - and schoolwork in general - depresses the hell out of me. Teachers (around here, and in my old urban district, and probably in most districts) are required to give it, though - regardless of how they feel about it.
But I'm done. The next time Ironflower has to choose between completing her homework and listening to Harry Potter? I'm emailing her teacher and letting her know that I prevented Ironflower from doing her homework. And if anyone gives me any crap about it, I'm flooding the school board and the principals with data about how homework doesn't help elementary school students.
What are your thoughts and experiences on homework?
3 comments:
My thoughts and experiences with homework? Oh dear, don't get me started.
I don't think my second grader has too much homework. Hers rarely takes more than 15 minutes and I wouldn't mind if she had more because she likes to be busy and have projects and so forth. I know because my son went to the same elementary school that it varies a surprising amount by teacher. But the same homework also varies by kid. Some, like my daughter, will whip through it, and some like my son, will plod.
My son is in seventh grade and drowning in his homework. He does play in the school band and he practices a lot but often he's up late, and then goes to bed without finishing it and without having had time for anything else but school work and music. This is school nights, weekends, school breaks, etc. Partly this is because he's in an accelerated program, and partly because he has some special needs. We are in the process of trying to figure out his high school options so he can still be challenged but not overwhelmed. I am actually writing a blog post about this right now.
@Steph - Can't wait to read your post. It doesn't usually take my kids that long, but I just feel like they'd benefit more from so many other things.
My children aren't in school yet but I can already tell that me and the school system are NOT going to get along.
Some of the homework I have seen or heard of being given to young kids is ridiculous. At no point in time should a first, second or third grader and even older have so much work that they don't get to have family time.
So I am already preparing for an ongoing battle and resisting the thought of homeschooling for the next 16 years.
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