The Homework Dilemma: Part 1

Contributed by Harvey Craft -- Retired educator, consultant, freelance writer, and blogger

My Opinion for What it’s Worth

Teachers give homework — it’s part of what they do. I gave it when I was a teacher back when the earth was still cooling.  Eventually I gave very little homework — mostly to encourage studying before tests, but sometimes not even then. Homework didn’t seem to work in the best interest of my students, and I thought I was using it incorrectly — based on what I now know, I was.

I stopped grading homework long ago. After all, it results in lots of zeroes and my students didn’t need those. Really, if an assessment is consistently producing zeroes, shouldn’t teachers wonder about its usefulness? In those days we didn’t talk about formative and summative assessments. Assigned work was about grades.

I know it is popular to assume that students are being irresponsible when homework is not done, but teachers are supposed to be able to find what works. We are not supposed to call the student irresponsible, stupid, bad, lazy, etc. and move on — we find a way, not a way out. Sometimes we fail and the student fails, but we must commit ourselves to get better and adopt better methods rather than apply the “same old, same old” and expect students to adapt to us. Teachers are the experts — or should be — where teaching methods are concerned.  

I never saw any real evidence that it made students more responsible, although some teachers continue to claim it is so. Research on homework is inconclusive. There certainly are no landmark studies that show unequivocally that homework is essential to teaching and learning, although there is some pretty good evidence that it is of little or no value for elementary students. There seems to be some benefit for high school students from homework, but it’s limited.

Let me be clear— I didn’t just ride into town on a turnip truck. I know the language of research. I understand correlation, meta-analysis, z-scores. I have read the works of Harris Cooper, Robert Marzano, Thomas Guskey, and many others. I have a well-founded professional opinion on homework and I have a personal one.

What do the Polls Say about Homework?

Although parents often hold opinions on education that don’t necessarily reflect best practice, their opinions must be respected simply because schools educate their children. Regrettably, a clear understanding of what parents think about homework is hard to ascertain. My experience as a teacher and administrator has convinced me that parents generally support, or at least accept, various instructional methods — especially those applied in the schools their children attend.

Surveys and polls produce a bewildering variation in results. A mumsnet.com survey from October 2008 had a reasonable sample of 1,036 respondents to the question “Are you happy with the amount of homework your child is required to complete?” Fifty-six percent responded, “Yes it's just about right,” while 27% said, “No they get too much.”

Mumsnet is a site for parents, and surveys offered by websites are generally not conducted with scientific controls for validity, but provide information of interest to a specific group at a specific time.

On the other hand, smartgirl.org,  a website that attracts a wide age-range of young females conducted a survey concerning  a number of school issues. The poll is over a decade old, but of the 484 respondents, 274 — about 57% — responded that they had too much homework. Interestingly, about 27% admitted to cheating on homework at least “sometimes.”

A November 18, 2011, Timeforkids poll was in close agreement with Smartgirls, with 57% claiming too much homework. Again, there are no controls on this poll to assure accuracy.

Harrisinteractive displays the results from a poll from March 2008 that seems to have some scientific controls, although an exact description of the polling process is not described. The results show that 60% of the parents and 81% of the teachers agreed that the amount of homework given was “about right.” There is also close agreement on the “importance of doing homework.” Fifty-six percent of parents said doing homework is “very important,” compared with 50% of teachers.

Polls don’t give us much information about homework. They lack validity and depth. The most important issues about homework concern how educators apply what they know — or should know — about teaching and learning.

That will be the topic for Part Two.

 

Harvey Craft  is a retired educator. He continues to research, consult, and write about education, and maintains an education blog — “Dissenting Opinions,” at  http://teachingdoneright.blogspot.com/.

Here's what Harvey has to say:  "The blog title reveals its purpose is to identify and remove or improve bad educational practices. I invite controversy and lively discourse.

I spent 31 years in education as a science teacher and administrator in schools and at the district office level. I returned to teaching for the last five years of my career and became NBPTS certified in Adolescent Science. I wanted to return to the classroom where I felt I could make the most positive contributions. 

I continue to research, write, and consult. I write freelance on a number of topics, but mainly education. I have over 125 education articles published on the Internet and in educational journals. I also read daily on some aspect of education.

I exercise with long, fast bicycle rides, heavy duty gardening, and going to the gym. My most enjoyable hobby is photography. I am a nice guy, and I am passionate about education. I enjoy lively discourse."

Pants on the Ground

Contributed by Michael Kalnbach, Administrator at Glenn Middle School, San Angelo, TX

     Do we really understand who we teach?  We spend a lot of time and money determining what to teach, and when and how to teach it, but how much time do we spend studying who we teach?  Nearly every other profession focuses primarily on the people it serves.  The business world spends billions in market research to understand everything about its customers.  Medical professionals would not dare progress with treatment without knowing everything there was to know about the patient.  Tech companies like Google are founded on understanding every tendency and online habit of its constituents.  Yet, we in education often continue with the same methods and decision making we have used since the 1930s without the effort to truly understand those who enter our classrooms every day.

     Students today are profoundly different than previous generations.  9/11, the subsequent cultural changes, and the rapid advancement of technology affected this generation in ways sociologists still do not fully understand. Their ideas about education differ from the adults in their lives.  Their moral compass does not have absolutes.  They hold to different views of respect, authority and leadership.  They exhibit many well documented positive characteristics, but they simply are not the same as their predecessors.  If we are to reach them, we must truly understand them.

     My department ran a comprehensive study of our 656 high school freshmen to gain a better understanding of our students.  We asked a series of questions to which the students' responses would give us a clear picture of their ethical and moral boundaries, their feelings about education, leadership and authority, and their ideas about life after high school.  We then gave the same survey to our teachers which gave us the ability to cross reference the data.  The study showed extreme differences between the students and teachers.  One example is the response to a question regarding cheating.  The question read, "Is it okay to cheat?"  100% of the teachers chose the response, "It is always wrong to cheat."  Only 22% of the students chose that response.   47% of the students chose the response, "It is okay to cheat when you have been treated unfairly (not given enough time to complete assignments, not given enough time to study, etc.)"  Another 21% chose the response, "It is okay to cheat if you have no other option to get a passing grade on the assignment."  This is one simple example of the insight we gained about the students' attitudes about situational ethics.  The most revealing aspect of the study was the discrepancy between the teachers' and students' ethical standards.  100% of our teachers chose this response to another question:  “those in authority deserve respect simply because of the position they hold.”  Only 14% of our students chose that response.  Over 75% chose the response:  “those in authority must earn my respect before I will give it to them.”  These examples represent the numerous differences in the way adults and students understand the world and our culture.

    After full evaluation of the survey data, our teachers began to see the profound differences between them  and  their students.  We teach from a certain perspective based on our life experiences, particularly our experiences related to our education.  Our students are listening from an entirely different perspective generated from their own experiences which we have established are much different than any other generation.  Often what we say and do from our perspective is received in a much different way, and the results are much different than what we as teachers intended them to be.  We then get frustrated and do not understand why our students are not learning, and why they do not seem to care.

     I was captivated by a goofy performance of a middle aged man in the early stages of the American Idol competition.  He sang a song called, "Pants on the Ground."  He was lamenting over the fact that the young guys sag their pants below their waist line.  It was hilarious.  It struck a chord with many educators.  It is a battle fought in almost every school in America.  The issue however is a glaring example of the disconnect between adults and young people.  Will we continue to complain about the attitudes and actions of the students, and forge ahead with the same methods based on our perspectives without an understanding of why they do what they do?  Can we commit to study them, to learn from them, to spend quality time with them, to fully understand them so that we will be able to engage them in learning?  Will we learn what motivates them, what inspires them, and avoid what alienates them?  Can we stop complaining about the clothes they wear and the attitudes they have toward leadership and responsibility and figure out why they think and act the way they do?  The stakes are high.  If we cannot change, we run the risk of these students choosing to raise themselves.  If we can, we will earn the right to be heard, and we will be given the incredible opportunity to teach them.