What happens in MCPS (and others) if your child does not do the homework,

[Anonymous]

I'm not sure about MCPS, but in the schools I've taught in, the philosophy has been to go further into the curriculum, rather than teach different material/skills. So, ask the teacher to take a look at Bloom's Taxonomy and come up with some alternative assignments that could be more meaningful. For instance, rather than doing a worksheet full of division problems, your child can create their own word problems using the same skill.

Rather than dismissing homework altogether, find a way to make it more meaningful for your student. But, I guess it goes back to the point you made about not having time for homework because of all the extra-curriculars.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:In elementary school, our curriculum doesn't allow too much time for the study of basic facts or what I feel is enough repetition and practice. This quarter, I'm supposed to teach 85 math lessons in 45 days.

The students who do their homework and study their facts at home are much farther ahead than those who don't. Similarly, the students that do their word study homework each night do the best on their tests and usage of the word patterns in their daily writing. It's great that Duke researchers have published all these studies, but I'm speaking from my first-hand experience.

Knowing the difference completing homework makes (on many different levels) will influence the bringing up of my own children, who will most definitely be getting their work done every night.

Correlation doesn't equal causation, though. I'm not saying you are wrong, but there are too many variables going into any particular child's success or failure in school other than just doing homework.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As a physician, teacher, scientist, researcher and parent I think you are spot on.

To whom are you referring?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In elementary school, our curriculum doesn't allow too much time for the study of basic facts or what I feel is enough repetition and practice. This quarter, I'm supposed to teach 85 math lessons in 45 days.

The students who do their homework and study their facts at home are much farther ahead than those who don't. Similarly, the students that do their word study homework each night do the best on their tests and usage of the word patterns in their daily writing. It's great that Duke researchers have published all these studies, but I'm speaking from my first-hand experience.

Knowing the difference completing homework makes (on many different levels) will influence the bringing up of my own children, who will most definitely be getting their work done every night.

Correlation doesn't equal causation, though. I'm not saying you are wrong, but there are too many variables going into any particular child's success or failure in school other than just doing homework.

True. Maybe it's that the children that come from these homework-doing families are better at disciplining and instilling value and self-motivation in their children.

[Anonymous]

In elementary school, our curriculum doesn't allow too much time for the study of basic facts or what I feel is enough repetition and practice. This quarter, I'm supposed to teach 85 math lessons in 45 days.

The students who do their homework and study their facts at home are much farther ahead than those who don't. Similarly, the students that do their word study homework each night do the best on their tests and usage of the word patterns in their daily writing. It's great that Duke researchers have published all these studies, but I'm speaking from my first-hand experience.

Knowing the difference completing homework makes (on many different levels) will influence the bringing up of my own children, who will most definitely be getting their work done every night.

This teacher is in the trenches. I value her first hand observations. She is spot on. There is no reason to dispute her claim her better students in reading and math are those that do their practise exercises at home (homework)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:In elementary school, our curriculum doesn't allow too much time for the study of basic facts or what I feel is enough repetition and practice. This quarter, I'm supposed to teach 85 math lessons in 45 days.

The students who do their homework and study their facts at home are much farther ahead than those who don't. Similarly, the students that do their word study homework each night do the best on their tests and usage of the word patterns in their daily writing. It's great that Duke researchers have published all these studies, but I'm speaking from my first-hand experience.

Knowing the difference completing homework makes (on many different levels) will influence the bringing up of my own children, who will most definitely be getting their work done every night.

That 85 lessons in 45 days is the problem of the county curriculum, not the studentsSomething is wrong. Seems like you are COVERING the material, but not teaching it, then it is the responsibility of the parents to teach?
I am tired of seeing silly number puzzles coming home as "homework". We look the answers up online. If it is not that, it is busy work.

[Anonymous]

True. Maybe it's that the children that come from these homework-doing families are better at disciplining and instilling value and self-motivation in their children.

Sounds like homework may be good for something...collateral benefits.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

In elementary school, our curriculum doesn't allow too much time for the study of basic facts or what I feel is enough repetition and practice. This quarter, I'm supposed to teach 85 math lessons in 45 days.

The students who do their homework and study their facts at home are much farther ahead than those who don't. Similarly, the students that do their word study homework each night do the best on their tests and usage of the word patterns in their daily writing. It's great that Duke researchers have published all these studies, but I'm speaking from my first-hand experience.

Knowing the difference completing homework makes (on many different levels) will influence the bringing up of my own children, who will most definitely be getting their work done every night.

This teacher is in the trenches. I value her first hand observations. She is spot on. There is no reason to dispute her claim her better students in reading and math are those that do their practise exercises at home (homework)

Maybe the ones who "do" the homework do it because they do not see it as a challenge, and would perform well anyway.
Best way to test this is to ask those students to do no homework and see if the short term and long term outcome is any different.

[Anonymous]

Is it the responsibility of the parent or the school to teach?

In my experience the most successful students come from families where parents and siblings teach their loved ones and not wholly outsource to some private or public school system.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

I agree that some repetition and practice is necessary in the early elementary years. However, most of that should be accomplished during school hours. SOME homework -- about 10 minutes per grade level in the early elementary years -- seems reasonable to me. But more than about 30 -40 minutes a night for a fourth grader, shouldn't be necessary.

You are very specific about homework duration down to minutes. What data are you using to arrive at your timelines or is this your gut feeling?

I'm using no data -- this is "gut" from an experienced elementary school teacher, and mother of 2 school aged children.

Homework (as I understand it) is supposed to be something kids basically do themselves. Your average 1st grader can be expected to sit down and do about 10 to 20 minutes of seat work at home -- after a long day at school, and in between other things like snack, playing on the playground, goofing aroudn with legos, whatever. 10 to 20 minutes seems like a reasonable about of time to me for a first or second grader. When I had a first or second grade child, I did not have any problems with making them sit down and complete some simple homework that took about this much time.

But when you ask a child of that age to sit down for 30 or 40 minutes -- or an hour -- that just really got in the way -- in the way of family life, of valuable after school activities.

As my children have gotten older, they seem to be able to handle longer amounts of self-directed time at homework. So something under an hour for up to 6th grade does seem reasonable to me -- more, not so much. Remember -- these kids have been in class for 6 hours each day.

Expecting parents (especially those with several children, and some who maybe have been at work till 6, and are just getting home to work on dinner and then the long battle that is homework) to individually supervise and actively TEACH math facts and sight words and so on-- for MORE than 10 or 20 minutes per day for a first or second grader -- I don't care what the studies say, I think that is just unworkable.

If elementary schools aren't allowing enough time for mastery of basic facts or for repetition, then that is a problem.

Especially because in many schools, it seems a lot of recess, art, music, and "fun" activities have been cast by the wayside because there isn't enough time for them, either. Kind of makes you wonder, what exactly IS being taught in schools any more, if there's no time for any of this?

Anyhow, my basic point is that a small amount or review/practice for homework seems legitimate to me, but teachers shoudl really take care that the homework they assign isn't extending too much into family life and afterschool activities -- unless they are damn sure that the homework is extremely valuable to the child -- more so than the activities that the child would otherwise be engaged in.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

In elementary school, our curriculum doesn't allow too much time for the study of basic facts or what I feel is enough repetition and practice. This quarter, I'm supposed to teach 85 math lessons in 45 days.

The students who do their homework and study their facts at home are much farther ahead than those who don't. Similarly, the students that do their word study homework each night do the best on their tests and usage of the word patterns in their daily writing. It's great that Duke researchers have published all these studies, but I'm speaking from my first-hand experience.

Knowing the difference completing homework makes (on many different levels) will influence the bringing up of my own children, who will most definitely be getting their work done every night.

This teacher is in the trenches. I value her first hand observations. She is spot on. There is no reason to dispute her claim her better students in reading and math are those that do their practise exercises at home (homework)

Sure there is. Maybe some of the kids who don't do homework regularly come from abusive households and witness fight after fight when they get home. Or maybe they have a single mom working double shifts who can't be there to help the kid sit down and do his homework. Or maybe there's an undiagnosed learning disability. Maybe the parents are not well educated and don't understand some of the homework that's coming home (and therefore can't help). Maybe the kid has to work himself and doesn't have time to do the homework.

[Anonymous]

Clearly we all have our own opinions, and that is fine.

From my teaching experience, I see the need for homework and will enforce this requirement in my own home. If I wanted to know if a certain medication was right for my child, I would ask a doctor. If I wanted help getting my child to sleep through the night, I would ask a parent that has been successful. Not that their way would be the only way, but I would value their experience and expertise.

Truly, I would not want to be a 4th grade child that comes in with no or incomplete homework each day. I see two things happening (beyond any academic impact): the other children labeling the child as different (and not in a good way) and the child developing an attitude about being above everyone else, including the teacher.

[Anonymous]

Expecting parents (especially those with several children, and some who maybe have been at work till 6, and are just getting home to work on dinner and then the long battle that is homework) to individually supervise and actively TEACH math facts and sight words and so on-- for MORE than 10 or 20 minutes per day for a first or second grader -- I don't care what the studies say, I think that is just unworkable.

If elementary schools aren't allowing enough time for mastery of basic facts or for repetition, then that is a problem.

Exactly!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Is it the responsibility of the parent or the school to teach?

In my experience the most successful students come from families where parents and siblings teach their loved ones and not wholly outsource to some private or public school system.

If I am hiring a school to teach my child basic math and reading, social studies and science, and am sending my child to that school for more than 6 hours each and every day, I would expect it is the job of that school to teach my child basic math and reading, and the basics of science and social studies at that child's grade level.


I would expect to help my child out if he were having some difficulties, but I'd expect the basics -- including necessary repetition and review -- to be covered in the class. This includes handwriting practice, practice with counting, practice with addition and subtraction and doing mental math, the basics of learning how to spell, memorizing the times tables, and so on. That is the basic job of the teachers att hat school.

If they aren't going to do all that -- what will they be doing instead with my child all day?

[Anonymous]

Maybe the ones who "do" the homework do it because they do not see it as a challenge, and would perform well anyway.
Best way to test this is to ask those students to do no homework and see if the short term and long term outcome is any different.

Alternatively, have your children not do homework for the next 3 months and see how they perform.

I know when my children are haphazard with their homework their grades on class exams reflect this.