No homework???

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Parents rights. Parent chooses how kid spends time at home.

But not abortion?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Parents rights. Parent chooses how kid spends time at home.

If it works for you, then do it. 😀

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just started teaching in FCPS. We give minimal homework and only because they said we have to this year. I have 90 minutes of planning time twice a week to get ready for 6 hours of teaching a day, plus all the ridiculous nonsense admin insists we do that does nothing but add work. We haven't even started the year and I've barely slept all week, hardly had time to eat, and am already feeling like I'm going to either cry or throw up at the amount of work I am expected to do before Monday. I haven't seen my children or husband all week, and the year hasn't even started. It's going to be a million times worse next week.

So no, I'm not sending a bunch of work home so you can feel good about it and it can add to my already enormous grading workload. I'm at my limit. Your kid doesn't need homework. Studies show it doesn't even make any difference.

It works if it’s done right. Curious. What did teachers do 20 years ago when they were regularly assigning homework?

Twenty years ago, there were fewer demands on teachers to be social works, emotional trainers, and hallway disciplinarians. Twenty years ago, teachers had planning periods and time at work to do their job. 20 years ago, there were fewer professional development requirements and teacher work days actually let teachers work. Twenty years ago, teachers were not required to completed paper work for nearly as many kids with IEPs and attend nearly as many meetings for kids with IEPs.

Teachers are overwhelmed today because we are asking them to do way too much that is outside of actual teaching.

Signed, a Parent who is not a teacher but sees how things have changed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just started teaching in FCPS. We give minimal homework and only because they said we have to this year. I have 90 minutes of planning time twice a week to get ready for 6 hours of teaching a day, plus all the ridiculous nonsense admin insists we do that does nothing but add work. We haven't even started the year and I've barely slept all week, hardly had time to eat, and am already feeling like I'm going to either cry or throw up at the amount of work I am expected to do before Monday. I haven't seen my children or husband all week, and the year hasn't even started. It's going to be a million times worse next week.

So no, I'm not sending a bunch of work home so you can feel good about it and it can add to my already enormous grading workload. I'm at my limit. Your kid doesn't need homework. Studies show it doesn't even make any difference.

It works if it’s done right. Curious. What did teachers do 20 years ago when they were regularly assigning homework?

Not a teacher but I think part of it is that kids had textbooks back then. My teachers used them and did not invent their own HW. HW was “do questions 1-30 on page 123”. And there just weren’t really the IEP/504 mtgs and issues to deal with.

And then we would swap textbooks and peer grade it.

+1, it wasn’t additional work for the teacher.

Back then if I asked a question in Geometry my teacher told you the page number where the ONE example was - there was very little teaching. Teaching was actually an easy job.

Everyone in the class was doing the same thing. Few small groups, little if any differentiation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just started teaching in FCPS. We give minimal homework and only because they said we have to this year. I have 90 minutes of planning time twice a week to get ready for 6 hours of teaching a day, plus all the ridiculous nonsense admin insists we do that does nothing but add work. We haven't even started the year and I've barely slept all week, hardly had time to eat, and am already feeling like I'm going to either cry or throw up at the amount of work I am expected to do before Monday. I haven't seen my children or husband all week, and the year hasn't even started. It's going to be a million times worse next week.

So no, I'm not sending a bunch of work home so you can feel good about it and it can add to my already enormous grading workload. I'm at my limit. Your kid doesn't need homework. Studies show it doesn't even make any difference.

What grade do you teach?

High school. And yes, I also taught back before it was like this. Before we had millions of meetings about nothing and when we actually had textbooks and were given a curriculum. I have been given nothing, absolute zilch. I have no textbook, no curriculum other than a vague list of SOL's in random order, no materials whatsoever, and classes with students that range from not speaking a word of English or having a severe disability to getting ready to go to college (all in the same class). I have four classes and three different subjects and two different grade levels and three co-teachers I am expected to plan with every day (but we have no common planning time, which means after school and weekends). Two of my co-teachers have never taught before in their lives and I am expected to teach them everything as well. I'm still grateful to have them, but this is the fastest I've ever felt this exhausted and burnt out in all my 20 years of teaching. I've been working twelve-hour days all week and then going home and working more, and now admin wants me to write every day's learning target on the board and they are going to come into my classroom and quiz random students to make sure they can tell them the learning target and also explain why they need to learn it. I hope they don't ask one of the kids who doesn't speak English yet.

A lot of teachers just don't really care, and this is why. Because it's nearly impossible to do a good job in these circumstances unless you work around the clock, and then it's still impossible, and it's probably just easier to spend days posting learning targets and making sure kids are ready for random admin quizzes than it is to actually teach something.

This is seriously concerning. For you and your students.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just started teaching in FCPS. We give minimal homework and only because they said we have to this year. I have 90 minutes of planning time twice a week to get ready for 6 hours of teaching a day, plus all the ridiculous nonsense admin insists we do that does nothing but add work. We haven't even started the year and I've barely slept all week, hardly had time to eat, and am already feeling like I'm going to either cry or throw up at the amount of work I am expected to do before Monday. I haven't seen my children or husband all week, and the year hasn't even started. It's going to be a million times worse next week.

So no, I'm not sending a bunch of work home so you can feel good about it and it can add to my already enormous grading workload. I'm at my limit. Your kid doesn't need homework. Studies show it doesn't even make any difference.

It works if it’s done right. Curious. What did teachers do 20 years ago when they were regularly assigning homework?

Not a teacher but I think part of it is that kids had textbooks back then. My teachers used them and did not invent their own HW. HW was “do questions 1-30 on page 123”. And there just weren’t really the IEP/504 mtgs and issues to deal with.

And then we would swap textbooks and peer grade it.

+1, it wasn’t additional work for the teacher.

Back then if I asked a question in Geometry my teacher told you the page number where the ONE example was - there was very little teaching. Teaching was actually an easy job.

Everyone in the class was doing the same thing. Few small groups, little if any differentiation.

Quoting myself to add that a lot of the small group work and differentiation has now gone away with Benchmark.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:all kids need practice in spelling and math.

have you seen what the schools have been churning out lately?

Examples please?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just started teaching in FCPS. We give minimal homework and only because they said we have to this year. I have 90 minutes of planning time twice a week to get ready for 6 hours of teaching a day, plus all the ridiculous nonsense admin insists we do that does nothing but add work. We haven't even started the year and I've barely slept all week, hardly had time to eat, and am already feeling like I'm going to either cry or throw up at the amount of work I am expected to do before Monday. I haven't seen my children or husband all week, and the year hasn't even started. It's going to be a million times worse next week.

So no, I'm not sending a bunch of work home so you can feel good about it and it can add to my already enormous grading workload. I'm at my limit. Your kid doesn't need homework. Studies show it doesn't even make any difference.

What grade do you teach?

High school. And yes, I also taught back before it was like this. Before we had millions of meetings about nothing and when we actually had textbooks and were given a curriculum. I have been given nothing, absolute zilch. I have no textbook, no curriculum other than a vague list of SOL's in random order, no materials whatsoever, and classes with students that range from not speaking a word of English or having a severe disability to getting ready to go to college (all in the same class). I have four classes and three different subjects and two different grade levels and three co-teachers I am expected to plan with every day (but we have no common planning time, which means after school and weekends). Two of my co-teachers have never taught before in their lives and I am expected to teach them everything as well. I'm still grateful to have them, but this is the fastest I've ever felt this exhausted and burnt out in all my 20 years of teaching. I've been working twelve-hour days all week and then going home and working more, and now admin wants me to write every day's learning target on the board and they are going to come into my classroom and quiz random students to make sure they can tell them the learning target and also explain why they need to learn it. I hope they don't ask one of the kids who doesn't speak English yet.

A lot of teachers just don't really care, and this is why. Because it's nearly impossible to do a good job in these circumstances unless you work around the clock, and then it's still impossible, and it's probably just easier to spend days posting learning targets and making sure kids are ready for random admin quizzes than it is to actually teach something.

This is seriously concerning. For you and your students.

This is a common example. Teachers are exhausted by the 1st week.

[Anonymous]

As a parent I hate homework because my kids have poor executive function and always need help remembering what they need to do. DH probably spends an hour or more each night helping them with math. I don’t think the homework should be something that kids can’t accomplish on their own, although I know they need to figure out how to do this for college.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As a parent I hate homework because my kids have poor executive function and always need help remembering what they need to do. DH probably spends an hour or more each night helping them with math. I don’t think the homework should be something that kids can’t accomplish on their own, although I know they need to figure out how to do this for college.

I’ve been thinking about this. I think a child should be able to work on hw independently, but what if they are practicing incorrectly? For math particularly, wouldn’t that be doing more harm than good? And if the hw is being done correctly, and the child understands it, is the hw really necessary?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As a parent I hate homework because my kids have poor executive function and always need help remembering what they need to do. DH probably spends an hour or more each night helping them with math. I don’t think the homework should be something that kids can’t accomplish on their own, although I know they need to figure out how to do this for college.

I’ve been thinking about this. I think a child should be able to work on hw independently, but what if they are practicing incorrectly? For math particularly, wouldn’t that be doing more harm than good? And if the hw is being done correctly, and the child understands it, is the hw really necessary?

Practice is good at re-enforcing concepts learned throughout the day and more time can be given to understanding the concepts or differentiation. Math homework used to provide varying degrees of a complexity to a given concept(s). Some problems were easy and some were hard. This also provides differentiation and challenges. Of course, if you ignore your kid’s homework, then you wont know where they stand. But if you do a check on learning, then provide guidance, it can be beneficial and/or confirm your child’s current understanding.

If you need to spend time to help with HW, then there is maybe a deficiency. This is valuable knowledge. If they are cruising through, then you can build some trust in the process/class/teacher/childs own skills. Also valuable.

If you just wait for a few weeks to find out your kid is struggling because the teacher is struggling to deal with the workload and differentiation, you may not be happy with the results.

Same goes for reading books. I believe, and maybe im in the minority, that reading is hugely important. But it can be time consuming and should be done outside of class in most cases.

If you just want to drop your kid off at school and hope the teacher can do it all and not be engaged at home, well, thats your choice, but the PP who said she is a teacher is not going to be able to give a lot of time to any of the kids as they are overworked.

[Anonymous]

Honestly, I think it's about policing homework. With the proliferation of "problem solving" websites, there really is very little benefit of assigning homework. I'm not sure it's about having to grade the assignment (you can use a Google form and it's relatively very low burden to teachers). I think in general teachers don't find it useful anymore because there's no way to suss out whether the student is using a tool to do the homework. If they are, what is actually the point of going through that effort? I used to be heavily pro-homework and was appalled with the FCPS policy but as I've experienced with my own two kids, homework assignments are a very intangible measure.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Honestly, I think it's about policing homework. With the proliferation of "problem solving" websites, there really is very little benefit of assigning homework. I'm not sure it's about having to grade the assignment (you can use a Google form and it's relatively very low burden to teachers). I think in general teachers don't find it useful anymore because there's no way to suss out whether the student is using a tool to do the homework. If they are, what is actually the point of going through that effort? I used to be heavily pro-homework and was appalled with the FCPS policy but as I've experienced with my own two kids, homework assignments are a very intangible measure.

I’m definitely not in favor of he being graded. The teacher doesn’t know who did the work or how much assistance was given vs how independent the student was in completing it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I just started teaching in FCPS. We give minimal homework and only because they said we have to this year. I have 90 minutes of planning time twice a week to get ready for 6 hours of teaching a day, plus all the ridiculous nonsense admin insists we do that does nothing but add work. We haven't even started the year and I've barely slept all week, hardly had time to eat, and am already feeling like I'm going to either cry or throw up at the amount of work I am expected to do before Monday. I haven't seen my children or husband all week, and the year hasn't even started. It's going to be a million times worse next week.

So no, I'm not sending a bunch of work home so you can feel good about it and it can add to my already enormous grading workload. I'm at my limit. Your kid doesn't need homework. Studies show it doesn't even make any difference.

What grade do you teach?

High school. And yes, I also taught back before it was like this. Before we had millions of meetings about nothing and when we actually had textbooks and were given a curriculum. I have been given nothing, absolute zilch. I have no textbook, no curriculum other than a vague list of SOL's in random order, no materials whatsoever, and classes with students that range from not speaking a word of English or having a severe disability to getting ready to go to college (all in the same class). I have four classes and three different subjects and two different grade levels and three co-teachers I am expected to plan with every day (but we have no common planning time, which means after school and weekends). Two of my co-teachers have never taught before in their lives and I am expected to teach them everything as well. I'm still grateful to have them, but this is the fastest I've ever felt this exhausted and burnt out in all my 20 years of teaching. I've been working twelve-hour days all week and then going home and working more, and now admin wants me to write every day's learning target on the board and they are going to come into my classroom and quiz random students to make sure they can tell them the learning target and also explain why they need to learn it. I hope they don't ask one of the kids who doesn't speak English yet.

A lot of teachers just don't really care, and this is why. Because it's nearly impossible to do a good job in these circumstances unless you work around the clock, and then it's still impossible, and it's probably just easier to spend days posting learning targets and making sure kids are ready for random admin quizzes than it is to actually teach something.

This is seriously concerning. For you and your students.

Welcome to America in 2025. What isn’t concerning in our country?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As a parent I hate homework because my kids have poor executive function and always need help remembering what they need to do. DH probably spends an hour or more each night helping them with math. I don’t think the homework should be something that kids can’t accomplish on their own, although I know they need to figure out how to do this for college.

I’ve been thinking about this. I think a child should be able to work on hw independently, but what if they are practicing incorrectly? For math particularly, wouldn’t that be doing more harm than good? And if the hw is being done correctly, and the child understands it, is the hw really necessary?

That's why the research says kids don't learn from homework. Many will practice incorrectly and not learn.

The kids who do the homework correctly, whether it's by themselves or with the help of a parent, still need practice in order to master the skills. Reading comp and math skills need repetition in order to be fully internalized.

Homework is helpful to learning when it's done right--with monitoring and assistance. That's why parents go to enrichment centers and buy workbooks. The schools don't provide homework, and so families with means find their own ways to provide their children with extra practice.