<p>
</p>
<p>Why would a teacher give a make up test using the exact same test? Seems to kind of miss the point if you want the student to actually demonstrate their knowledge (unless you are just interested in them regurgitating certain information–Uhm…I guess that has a place)</p>
<p>How many parents on this forum had regular homework the way our kids have it now? I never had regular homework until 7th grade! Yes, we had occasional book reports and other reports, and spelling tests for which the classroom work prepared us just fine, but not homework every night. In elementary school, we played after school. Outside! And we did chores. And we read books. We had to organize our own games because we did not have sports organized by parents. I did perfectly fine with college and career, and my executive functioning skills developed early, as did those of most of my generation. I think that we are expecting kids to do way more than is appropriate for their developmental level these days if parents have to help organize homework, scan rooms, etc. It’s the kids’ homework, not ours! I actually think that homework is promoting the opposite of executive functioning skills - by encouraging too much parental oversight, by giving it before the kids are developmentally ready to go off by themselves and do it independently. (I always subscribed to the philosophy that it was their homework, not mine, but they still were too young to go off by themselves, and had to do it in the kitchen while I was cooking - they all had desks but never used them. This just created bad habits in my opinion - and stuff all over the kitchen!) Wouldn’t it be great if their homework was to clean the bathroom? This would teach way more responsibility than the homework that they get!</p>
<p>levirm - well said. i think homework can be seen as the great “equalizer” in the schools. it’s a method used for raising grades for the lower proficiency students.</p>
<p>
I think the article is referring to middle school. I’m not for massive amounts of homework before that time. I don’t remember elementary school, but I’m sure I had regular homework assignments in both middle school and high school. I finished it very quickly but my siblings and many of my classmates took longer.</p>
<p>We also managed to play, do chores, and participate in various activities. And believe it or not, we did not always spend our time in important, meaningful activites. If we had them, I’m sure we woudl have poent a lot of it on video games, or tried to.</p>
<p>And I distinctly remeber my parents telling me I had much less homework than they did. In fact, my dad who went to Catholic schookl actually saved a lot of his and woukd pull out reams of it in case one of us started to complain.</p>
<p>I will admit my own kid was loaded earlier with a lot more busywork. But that still doesn’t mean meaningful out of class assignments are not beneficial.</p>
<p>I distinctly remember having homework from Grade 1 on (mostly writing at that point). Catholic school. Nothing too demanding and there was still time to play, etc.</p>
<p>Judging by my post above, I obviously didn’t have enough spelling homework. Or typing.</p>
<p>Yes, I remember my neighbor who went to Catholic school had way more homework than I had at public school.
Yes, the article is about middle school. I was just responding to people who were talking about homework in elementary school. I agree that middle schoolers can handle homework, but a reasonable amount of it. We should just be careful about giving kids work that they are not ready for developmentally and creating counter-productive work habits and family patterns (such as too much parental oversight) by doing this.</p>