4 ms·

I figured I'd share a relevant anecdote: throughout most of my school (at least by seventh grade) I did virtually no homework. Not with the blessing of my teach

by adrusi 11y ago

I figured I'd share a relevant anecdote: throughout most of my school (at least by seventh grade) I did virtually no homework. Not with the blessing of my teacher, nor of my parents. But I knew that my parents wanted to shut their eyes and pretend that my grades were improving for as long as they could until the report card came home. I knew that most teachers could be convinced into letting me make up some work at the end of the quarter to turn my Ds into Cs if need be. And I knew that without doing the homework, I could still swing a 90% or greater in the remaining assignments. I could sit down in class and be fully engaged an learn everything I need to and more. While I avoided some higher-level classes because often they were just the same as the regular classes with more homework, most of the classes I took were of the advanced level. I wasn't just coasting. I repeatedly tried throughout high school to change my habits, but for various reasons, many personal, these attempts were doomed to fail. I know I'm not the average case, but clearly homework is not at all necessary for every kid to do well in school. Other commentors have given the opposite anecdote, saying they did only homework and did well. I think maybe we should accept that these grading policies should be tailored to the student. At the risk of just rambling off my life story, I'm going to continue to show how these homework problems affected me beyond high school. Despite these problems, I was admitted to a good state university. I had a 3.0ish GPA because I brought it up with easy A classes like band, and because I had several classes that where homework comprised only 5-10% of the grade. I guess that. combined with my above-average extracurriculars got me in. I then essentially flunked out after two semesters. It's not that I didn't have the study habits. They were probably lacking a little for the academic environment, but I definitely knew how learn independently. I was just so completely used to ignoring my academic responsibilities that I couldn't stop. When you've been saying "I don't need to do this homework" for years, it's very easy to say "I don't need to study this thing" even though you know very well that you have a lapse in understanding. I'm convinced that I would have done at least somewhat better in college if only not doing homework in high school didn't feel like not doing something that I had to do; if my parents and teachers hadn't treated not doing homework as a bad thing. Obviously it was in fact a bad thing, but it didn't have to be.

protomyth 11y ago
Did you happen to have a job during high school?
- adrusi 11y ago
  No, I wanted to work, but my parents wouldn't allow it because they felt it would make my academic performance even worse.
  - protomyth 11y ago
    I get the feeling it would have actually improved your academic performance. It worked for quite a few people I know.
TeMPOraL 11y ago
Yeah, I could share a similar anecdote. I went through most of my school years ignoring as much homework I could get away with while still keeping good grades (the unspoken rule at home was that A-C were ok, anything below was unacceptable). I could learn a lot from just listening to the teacher during lesson and an occasional skimming on textbooks, and any significant effort that I put was just before important exams. This has served me well in some ways - I owe most of my general knowledge as well as the whole career to basically ignoring school and doing whatever the hell I wanted (it happened to be programming). But then the university started, and by the third year I was in full panic mode, fighting fires. Not because things were hard, but because I've never learned the necessary endurance for systematic work (and powering through make-work bullshit). I ended up just with BSc, because I didn't give my Masters thesis in time. I had probably the most ambitious project in the entire year, but I didn't manage to wrap it up to into an acceptable Masters project (simultaneously working full-time at the time didn't help). The end result is, I didn't learn discipline. The very things that enabled me to pursue software career are the things that are now seriously damaging my work output. That's the flip side of going for what intrests you - the modern workplace is something where you mostly have to power through boring things. Being self-educated can actually make you misadapted to the society if you don't learn some discipline along the way. It's funny - most of the people I worked along with were hard-working but struggling to become good programmers. I was already a decent programmer; I was the one struggling to become a good employee.

by adrusi 11y ago

protomyth 11y ago

Did you happen to have a job during high school?

adrusi 11y ago
No, I wanted to work, but my parents wouldn't allow it because they felt it would make my academic performance even worse.
- protomyth 11y ago
  I get the feeling it would have actually improved your academic performance. It worked for quite a few people I know.

TeMPOraL 11y ago

Yeah, I could share a similar anecdote. I went through most of my school years ignoring as much homework I could get away with while still keeping good grades (the unspoken rule at home was that A-C were ok, anything below was unacceptable). I could learn a lot from just listening to the teacher during lesson and an occasional skimming on textbooks, and any significant effort that I put was just before important exams. This has served me well in some ways - I owe most of my general knowledge as well as the whole career to basically ignoring school and doing whatever the hell I wanted (it happened to be programming). But then the university started, and by the third year I was in full panic mode, fighting fires. Not because things were hard, but because I've never learned the necessary endurance for systematic work (and powering through make-work bullshit). I ended up just with BSc, because I didn't give my Masters thesis in time. I had probably the most ambitious project in the entire year, but I didn't manage to wrap it up to into an acceptable Masters project (simultaneously working full-time at the time didn't help). The end result is, I didn't learn discipline. The very things that enabled me to pursue software career are the things that are now seriously damaging my work output. That's the flip side of going for what intrests you - the modern workplace is something where you mostly have to power through boring things. Being self-educated can actually make you misadapted to the society if you don't learn some discipline along the way. It's funny - most of the people I worked along with were hard-working but struggling to become good programmers. I was already a decent programmer; I was the one struggling to become a good employee.