A classroom teacher’s view on homework

When considering homework, instructors discover it advantageous to communicate their policy with the families of their students. After just recently completing a Learners Edge course, Jennifer Lindsey, a fourth grade teacher from Pennsylvania, reviewed her research approach that includes the purposeful roles teachers and households play.

LE: What is your position on the concern of homework?
When I answer this question, I answer as a teacher and as the parent of school age kids. I do see homework as having a function in the educational procedure and I do not agree with Alfie Kohn (see short article), who appears to believe homework is useless, or worse, has an unfavorable impact. While Kohn asserts there is practically no research that proves research to be useful, I did not see a convincing quantity of difficult data to support getting rid of all homework.
Yes, the amount of research need to be based on the students age and grade level. As most Kindergarten-3rd grade teachers are self-contained, it should be reasonably easy to offer math research one night, reading or spelling one night, etc to prevent overwhelming 5 to 8-year-olds. I see homework to extend learning.
Our textbook points out it can take 24 repeatings of an ability for a trainee to reach 80% proficiency. I believe practicing abilities is worthwhile. Kohns contrast with tennis does not make sense to me. There are abilities in tennis you should practice to improve. There are basic math abilities children should practice to develop a strong foundation prior to carrying on to higher-level math skills. Kohn points out how students may progress at remembering, however not believing. I see this as 2 different things; we require students to bear in mind particular realities and after that carry on to utilizing those abilities as thinkers and issue solvers.
As a parent, it can be hard to squeeze in research some nights! We do the finest we can, and if we have issues or issues, I reach out to the instructor. Again, great teachers make it a point to understand what some home scenarios might be like and to customize appropriately.

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I do see research as having a function in the academic process and I do not agree with Alfie Kohn (see article), who appears to believe homework is worthless, or even worse, has an unfavorable impact. While Kohn asserts there is nearly no research that proves homework to be beneficial, I did not see a convincing quantity of hard information to support doing away with all homework.
Yes, the quantity of research must be based on the students age and grade level. As many Kindergarten-3rd grade teachers are self-contained, it ought to be fairly simple to provide math homework one night, spelling or checking out one night, and so on to avoid overloading 5 to 8-year-olds. Research can be a dissentious topic in the education community, and we hope you can appreciate this instructors point of view.

Homework can be a divisive topic in the education neighborhood, and we hope you can value this teachers point of view. How do you communicate with households about research?

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