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I am not to the point of saying 'no' to homework. But I am starting to question a few things. First off, my situation is not the norm anymore. Not only am I th

by NDizzle 11y ago

I am not to the point of saying 'no' to homework. But I am starting to question a few things. First off, my situation is not the norm anymore. Not only am I the single earner in my 5 person household, but I work from home full time. I am extremely active in my kids lives. My kids are very fortunate in that they always have one and often times both parents to help out with school work. My oldest is 9 - 4th grade. I have a 5 year old in Junior-Kindergarten. Both have homework. (My 2 year old doesn't count here, except when he's literally eating their homework.) I coach little league, and I talk to a lot of the parents. Some of the parents have kids in the same class as my 9 year old. These are households where both parents work and have more than one child in school. There is a drastic difference in support that the children receive. Now, I'm not smart. I have a high school education from Arkansas, which is always fighting with Mississippi for the worst rank in education standards. However, I consider my problem solving skills outstanding. I am not doing my kids homework, but I do look at my kids homework. Every night. I help them sometimes. I get on the white board and we go over things. I have them teach the methods back to me. It's a difference that just last night, a mother of one of the kids came up to me and was talking about the math homework they had today. Her daughter had spent an hour on it before the game and still doesn't get it. I hadn't even looked at the homework yet, so I asked my daughter what was going on with the math homework tonight. Her response? Oh yeah, that's super easy. You can look at it when we get home. So you have something that takes at least 1 hour (I'll find out more about it later if anyone cares!) for one student compared to something that is a nonissue for another student. In 4th grade. That isn't really sustainable. And I'll go out on a limb here and say that her friend who is having a bit more trouble isn't dumb by any means. I've coached her for two years in softball. And we're not special in the other direction, either. Oh yeah - my 5 year old in Jr K - she has monthly homework assignments. Things like gather fall leaves and glue them to a piece of paper. Trace your hand and stick leaves on it to make a bird. Fun things like that. Not real homework. But she does have things to do at home to gear her up for the future. Anyways. There are my personal experiences with this stuff in California's central valley.

wisty 11y ago
It's not easy for low SES students to learn much from homework. Schools are designed by upper-middle-class people who care a lot about school. The problem students are from a very different background. It's nice to say that teachers should be doing parenting for kids (building their self esteem, helping them develop as people, etc), but that's just glorified daycare. The poor students need to be taught to read, write, and do math, because that's what their parents can't help them with. Education is meant to give every child a chance. I really think poor people have decent general cognitive skills (problem solving, relationships, etc), but really need a leg-up when it comes to formal academic work. I don't think schools are really helping kids, when they shunt the fundamentals off to parents, as homework. 6 hours a day should be plenty to develop basic numeracy and literacy. But that's often not a priority to educators. It's more fun for teachers to tell themselves they're being parents - teaching kids how to develop as people.
vacri 11y ago
I remember being a TA at uni, and taking a practical class on electricity with some first-years, one of the questions involved multiplying 4 by 0.2. One student reached for her calculator and I said "No, you're not allowed to use the calculator for that". She just stared at me like a doe frozen in headlights for a painful 10 seconds until I broke: "Okay, what's 4 by 2?" => "Ooohhhh". Yes, different people have different aptitudes, but some people simply don't want to engage their brain. It's definitely a multivariate problem...

by NDizzle 11y ago

wisty 11y ago

It's not easy for low SES students to learn much from homework. Schools are designed by upper-middle-class people who care a lot about school. The problem students are from a very different background. It's nice to say that teachers should be doing parenting for kids (building their self esteem, helping them develop as people, etc), but that's just glorified daycare. The poor students need to be taught to read, write, and do math, because that's what their parents can't help them with. Education is meant to give every child a chance. I really think poor people have decent general cognitive skills (problem solving, relationships, etc), but really need a leg-up when it comes to formal academic work. I don't think schools are really helping kids, when they shunt the fundamentals off to parents, as homework. 6 hours a day should be plenty to develop basic numeracy and literacy. But that's often not a priority to educators. It's more fun for teachers to tell themselves they're being parents - teaching kids how to develop as people.

vacri 11y ago

I remember being a TA at uni, and taking a practical class on electricity with some first-years, one of the questions involved multiplying 4 by 0.2. One student reached for her calculator and I said "No, you're not allowed to use the calculator for that". She just stared at me like a doe frozen in headlights for a painful 10 seconds until I broke: "Okay, what's 4 by 2?" => "Ooohhhh". Yes, different people have different aptitudes, but some people simply don't want to engage their brain. It's definitely a multivariate problem...