Homework Is Killing Kids

[Bobblehead]

Originally Posted by ericschand

Don't know if this a good thread for this, but what about
Montessori schools? Anyone have a child in one?
How is it? What are your experiences with it?

It addresses some of the items in this thread; learning
enviornment, homework, etc.

Mine is in a Monetssori pre-school, and will be attending
Montessori ECS and school in the following years.

Montessori Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montessori

ers

Just saw an article on this. link

[CaramonLS]

Originally Posted by return to the red

my main concern is the difference between homework and STUDYING. When I was going through grade school homework was material you couldn't get through in class and worked through on your own time.
Studying was reviewing that material.

Fortunately I was blessed a genius and was always a chapter or two ahead in math, social studies and Science so I didn't have much homework.

Studying didn't come into play either until university when I killed off everything I learned that day with the booze at night thus leaving me in the position of reviewing everything over

Great point. I found doing homework in JR High/Elementry tedious at best, and not very beneficial. One can only do "Johnny has 3 apples, takes away 2 so how many does he have left" only so many times before you actually get it.

It would make sense because the concepts at the lower levels are fairly simple and either you understand them or you don't. Really, no amount of homework is going to do much to influence that.

However, I did find studying concepts, especially in HS and University (well, absolutely nessesary in Uni) a requirement. I find that learning a language at my age (24) requires a LOT of actual homework to get it ingrained into my head.

[MacDougalbry]

Originally Posted by Bobblehead

Just saw an article on this. link

Another alternative is the Calgary Waldorf school. We had looked at this for our two kids but couldn't commit financially to keeping them in their until Grade 3, as they don't follow the provincial in K and grade 1.

http://www.calgarywaldorf.org/cws/ViewPage.action

They claim their program is especially good for boys, as they don't emphasize a lot of book work in the early years and the kids get lots of hands on activities.

[WesternCanadaKing]

Well, as I high school student at one of the toughest public schools in the city (Western) I can hardly read this and NOT love this man, who can say no to less homework?

But, I think he's got some things mixed up, you definitely need homework to be successful in things like math and science. Like, today for example I had a test in math, and there was a question that I was able to do the day before, and felt I understood it and didn't do the my homework. Today I just started at, drawing a blank. I knew if I had just done a few practice problems yesterday I would have gotten straight away.

Also last year, I didn't study for my math final at all. I didn't review one note, and man did that come back to bite me in the ass. I got a 48% on the test and dropped from a 86 in the class to 68.

[Iowa_Flames_Fan]

Not to be snippy, but why do people always respond to statistical analyses with anecdotal evidence to the contrary? If the statistics show homework doesn't work, then one of two things is true:
1. The analysis is flawed, either in how they gather or how they interpret the data.
2. The statistical analysis is correct.

In either case, saying "homework really works for me" doesn't really refute anything. It may work for you--and it still may be a lousy way to teach, by and large.

Also, FWIW, the study seems to deal primarily with homework at the elementary and junior high school levels.

[Phanuthier]

Pft, "toughest high school" just wait till university

I went to your rival school SWC, was in IB, and some of the dumbest of my peers would be above average in IB.

I think you confuse homework with understanding. If you have no idea what your doing, then yes you should be studying. You study until you understand it, there's no point in putting a time limit on it.

What I object to is the "here is how you do derivatives, now do questions 1 to 250" - you got to be joking. After the 5th time, I think I know what I'm doing. Understanding enables innovation, but repeition kills creativity. That's the buttom line for homework.

In university (engineering, at least... 4th year) you do a total of 15 total questions (worth assignments) before you write your midterm, and 25 total questions before you write your final exam. If your lucky, you get examples. I don't get any examples in one of my classes (plasma physics) just theory, so your left to decifer what this linear algabra within partial differential equations is supposed to physically mean (its not "just math" but you have to know what those damn equations mean, and where they come from). Not to mention it takes an hour to do one question too.

A couple coarses in university I don't have to study for (logic... economics... volts for dolts... teaching engineers about management) ... but almost everything else, I do.

Study until you understand it. Give it a whirl or two. But once you know it, no point beating down the same path, or else your just a monkey jumping through a hoop.

[Winsor_Pilates]

Does the study specify what "homework" is? I don't think it can be taken seriously if it doesn't. That's too broad of a term to make any meaningful claims about.

[Iowa_Flames_Fan]

Originally Posted by Winsor_Pilates

Does the study specify what "homework" is? I don't think it can be taken seriously if it doesn't. That's too broad of a term to make any meaningful claims about.

In truth, none of us know anything about the study's methodology--the link is to an interview where the author talks about his book. I think it's actually kind of a highly dogmatic "lit review" of a number of studies, but I could be wrong. I'll see what I can scare up on the net.

[Iowa_Flames_Fan]

An executive summary from Time of Alfie Kohn's The Homework Myth and The Case Against Homework, which is a different book on the same topic by Sara Bennett and Nancy Kalish:

Both books cite studies, surveys, statistics, along with some hair-raising anecdotes, on how a rising tide of dull, useless assignments is oppressing families and making kids hate learning. A few highlights from the books and my own investigation:
• According to a 2004 national survey of 2,900 American children conducted by the University of Michigan, the amount of time spent on homework is up 51% since 1981.
• Most of that increase reflects bigger loads for little kids. An academic study found that whereas students ages 6 to 8 did an average of 52 min. of homework a week in 1981, they were toiling 128 min. weekly by 1997. And that's before No Child Left Behind kicked in. An admittedly less scientific poll of parents conducted this year for AOL and the Associated Press found that elementary school students were averaging 78 min. a night.
• The onslaught comes despite the fact that an exhaustive review by the nation's top homework scholar, Duke University's Harris Cooper, concluded that homework does not measurably improve academic achievement for kids in grade school. That's right: all the sweat and tears do not make Johnny a better reader or mathematician.
• Too much homework brings diminishing returns. Cooper's analysis of dozens of studies found that kids who do some homework in middle and high school score somewhat better on standardized tests, but doing more than 60 to 90 min. a night in middle school and more than 2 hr. in high school is associated with, gulp, lower scores.
• Teachers in many of the nations that outperform the U.S. on student achievement tests--such as Japan, Denmark and the Czech Republic--tend to assign less homework than American teachers, but instructors in low-scoring countries like Greece, Thailand and Iran tend to pile it on.

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/ar...376208,00.html

I'll see if I can figure out what definitions they're using--though I'll tell you right now I ain't sifting through pages and pages of Google hits. (feels too much like homework... )

[Nehkara]

Originally Posted by Frank the Tank

WOW. That is scary. I was lucky and never really stressed about much (still don't) but I know people who were basket cases at school stressing about everything.

Yah, I developed severe gastrointestinal distress related to stress in the 1st semester of grade 11. I missed from from late October until mid December, and I was still ill for the rest of the school year quite often (at least once a week). I had tons of tests done on me to find out what was wrong and in the end it all came down to severe stress.

I had "front-loaded" my courses into grade 11 so I could take more spares in grade 12.

Edit: Got the time frame slightly wrong. Fixed now.

[Winsor_Pilates]

It seems like they're saying at a certain point there becomes too much homework and the results deminish, as opposed to just "homework is bad for kids".
It seems much more reasonable in that case. I guess it's true, too much of anything is bad for you.

[Ch40s]

I'm currently in High School, and have a pretty packed semester at the moment. I do maybe ~10 minutes of homework a day, partly because I try to finish things in class, and partly because I'm way too lazy to do more when I get home.

I have made honors with distinction every term throughout High School (85%+ average throughout all your courses), despite being too lazy to do homework everyday.

I feel homework is, though, directly tied to how you do in school. Tests you must study for, projects you must spend time on, and information you need to familiarize yourself with are all vital to how you do in courses. I'm lucky that I'm a quick learner, listening to the lecture, taking down notes, and doing a few questions is enough for me, while for other kids it is not, and they need to do homework to make up for it.

In Junior High we were always told we'd have at least a half hour of homework a day, but I rarely ever did any. The same can be said for most of my peers. So when I hear people talking about having massive amounts of homework, I think they're just being compulsive about school, or just not paying attention in class. In my opinion, my generation has not been given too much homework.

[PYroMaNiaC]

My daughter is in Grade 8. She spends 1.5 hours after school doing homework in the backroom of my workplace. Anything that she is having difficulties in, she puts off to the side until we get home and then we spend another hour together trying to figure it out while I make dinner. Admittedly she struggles with school. She has to work very hard to make decent grades. The biggest problem that I am now encountering is that she hates it. Whan a child learns to hate learning, it doesn't bode well for the future. Some nights I let it slide because I know that she's unhappy with all the work and would rather be outside, or listening to music, or yakking on the phone, but then we have to work harder to catch her back up.

They don't slow down. They won't slow down. She's embarrassed to ask for help in class about concepts they learned the day before. They try and cram more and more concepts into their heads without being sure the first ones are understood. She often comes home frustrated and upset.

Somedays, it takes all my efforts just to keep her from beinig discouraged. Every single one of her triumphs we celebrate, because that's the only way for us to get through it. Homework is a problem when it's become a gruelling 2.5 hour marathon.

[Phanuthier]

If you want, I can offer some advice since I just went through that (4 years ago in HS). What subject is she having trouble with?

ie. science... the best way to explain science is analogous. Sometimes, reading a sceice textbook can get convoluted.

[PYroMaNiaC]

Originally Posted by Phanuthier

If you want, I can offer some advice since I just went through that (4 years ago in HS). What subject is she having trouble with?

ie. science... the best way to explain science is analogous. Sometimes, reading a sceice textbook can get convoluted.

Usually English, but on occasion, math too. Science and Social studies she seems to do okay in. Well, no major problems, anyway.

[Phanuthier]

Originally Posted by PYroMaNiaC

Usually English, but on occasion, math too. Science and Social studies she seems to do okay in. Well, no major problems, anyway.

English I found very frustrating. I was a 70% student in Engl 10, 60% student in Engl 20 and 80% student in Engl 30.

Writing or reading? For those that struggle with writing, 90% of them fall under the "the longer, the more words, the better" which is not the case. Short, sweet and to the point. Your teacher doesn't want to have to dig up a dictionary to read your essay.

Math - I used to tutor math. What I found is certain points or concepts may be suttle, and poorly approached. My biggest recommendation is to try and attack the problem another way - is there another way you can explain the concept? (ie. for quantum mechanics, if you want to explain tunnelling... wow, thats confusing... explain it using an anology, it makes sense!). There is often many ways to approach a problem or concept, and teachers don't aways approach it the right way. Alot of times (esp in Jr high, and HS) they get caught up in "steps" - instead, you should be asking yourself "what are they REALLY asking for?" I remember in Chem 30, there was this big long list of steps you had to go through in acid-base neautralization, and the marks were dispersed by how well you were able to memorize the steps. I just intuitively thought "what are they really asking me?" and never really bothered to learn their steps, and aced the test while the next highest mark was 20% below me (in a class of ~30). People forget steps, everyone does. People forget trival facts, everyone does, and they're not fun to learn. Students also get caught up with numbers, if you know what the concepts are, numbers are just a plug-and-chug. Try using variable (ie. 'x' vs '2x') you'll get alot more information at the end about what the formula just told you. That's probably why your daughter is struggling with Jr High or HS stuff, not because of intelligence, but poorly taught ways of attacking problems.

So in summary for math... don't get caught up in steps, but what is the point of what you are trying to do?

[PYroMaNiaC]

The problem is her imagination. You need some for both subjects. The teacher asks for a paper and she's so straight forward that she sums everything in up in about 4 concise sentences. No explanation, no decription. Here it is. (Which is why science and social are not too difficult - they are fairly straightforward.)

With math, if she is struggling with a concept, I need to go through three, four, five different "look at it differently" techniques before I hit one that computes. She sees all the words in an problem and it takes a long time for her to decide which parts of the problem are important and which are not and in which order they need go.

For example, we had a question the other night that went like this: You have two numbers whose mean is 11. When you add a third number the mean is 15. What is the third number?

I read it and knew that you had to deal with the second sentence first, but she couldn't recognize that. Her natural tendancy is to deal with things in the order in which they appear. It took 3 different attempts for her to understand how to tackle the problem.

The next night, she had a similar question and it wasn't an issue at all, so once she's seen something, grasped it, she retains it, but every concept has to be taught again in a different way.

Sometimes, I run out of ideas on how to reteach something before I find the trigger for her.

[Jake]

The teacher asks for a paper and she's so straight forward that she sums everything in up in about 4 concise sentences. No explanation, no decription. Here it is. (Which is why science and social are not too difficult - they are fairly straightforward.)

Thats actually a good thing when it comes to science. At the begining of first and second year science there is at least one lab in almost every subject that is supposed to help you with concise writing. They want you to say something in one sentence, instead of 5. It shows you understand the concept better.

On a side note I think those labs are a waste of time for most people

[Phanuthier]

Maybe its because you've only listed a small portion here, but could it be because she is jumping the gun to fast on the problem?

The most obvious sign is in Math. It seems like she's solving the quesiton, before she knows what's asked. Its best to write down what you are looking for (unknowns) then write down the information your given, and think "I have these tools, I need to get this built, what tool box do I need?"

Same thing with English. She's jumping the gun, because her ideas arn't organized. I'd say tell her to list out her ideas for a essay, then flow through it sequantially. What points need to be added for this point?

[kootenayguy9]

One of the things we do at our school in Math (14 level) is the students progress at their own pace and work through modules. Once they believe they have reached a level of Mastery in the concept they write the test. If they pass the test they move on to the next module.

I agree sending home a million questions to do is pointless if you have reached a level of mastery in the concept but for courses in Humanities it is important for students to use their class time wisely. I have seen many students through the years basically waste all their time in class then complain they have a ton of homework because they did nothing all day in class.