quotes about why students shouldn't have homework

7 Research-Based Reasons Why Students Should Not Have Homework: Academic Insights, Opposing Perspectives & Alternatives

The push against homework is not just about the hours spent on completing assignments; it’s about rethinking the role of education in fostering the well-rounded development of young individuals. Critics argue that homework, particularly in excessive amounts, can lead to negative outcomes such as stress, burnout, and a diminished love for learning. Moreover, it often disproportionately affects students from disadvantaged backgrounds, exacerbating educational inequities. The debate also highlights the importance of allowing children to have enough free time for play, exploration, and family interaction, which are crucial for their social and emotional development.

Checking 13yo’s math homework & I have just one question. I can catch mistakes & help her correct. But what do kids do when their parent isn’t an Algebra teacher? Answer: They get frustrated. Quit. Get a bad grade. Think they aren’t good at math. How is homework fair??? — Jay Wamsted (@JayWamsted) March 24, 2022

As we delve into this discussion, we explore various facets of why reducing or even eliminating homework could be beneficial. We consider the research, weigh the pros and cons, and examine alternative approaches to traditional homework that can enhance learning without overburdening students.

Once you’ve finished this article, you’ll know:

Insights from Teachers and Education Industry Experts: Diverse Perspectives on Homework

Here are the insights and opinions from various experts in the educational field on this topic:

“I teach 1st grade. I had parents ask for homework. I explained that I don’t give homework. Home time is family time. Time to play, cook, explore and spend time together. I do send books home, but there is no requirement or checklist for reading them. Read them, enjoy them, and return them when your child is ready for more. I explained that as a parent myself, I know they are busy—and what a waste of energy it is to sit and force their kids to do work at home—when they could use that time to form relationships and build a loving home. Something kids need more than a few math problems a week.” — Colleen S. , 1st grade teacher

“The lasting educational value of homework at that age is not proven. A kid says the times tables [at school] because he studied the times tables last night. But over a long period of time, a kid who is drilled on the times tables at school, rather than as homework, will also memorize their times tables. We are worried about young children and their social emotional learning. And that has to do with physical activity, it has to do with playing with peers, it has to do with family time. All of those are very important and can be removed by too much homework.” — David Bloomfield , education professor at Brooklyn College and the City University of New York graduate center

“Homework in primary school has an effect of around zero. In high school it’s larger. (…) Which is why we need to get it right. Not why we need to get rid of it. It’s one of those lower hanging fruit that we should be looking in our primary schools to say, ‘Is it really making a difference?’” — John Hattie , professor

”Many kids are working as many hours as their overscheduled parents and it is taking a toll – psychologically and in many other ways too. We see kids getting up hours before school starts just to get their homework done from the night before… While homework may give kids one more responsibility, it ignores the fact that kids do not need to grow up and become adults at ages 10 or 12. With schools cutting recess time or eliminating playgrounds, kids absorb every single stress there is, only on an even higher level. Their brains and bodies need time to be curious, have fun, be creative and just be a kid.” — Pat Wayman, teacher and CEO of HowtoLearn.com

7 Reasons Why Students Should Not Have Homework

Let’s delve into the reasons against assigning homework to students. Examining these arguments offers important perspectives on the wider educational and developmental consequences of homework practices.

1. Elevated Stress and Health Consequences

This data paints a concerning picture. Students, already navigating a world filled with various stressors, find themselves further burdened by homework demands. The direct correlation between excessive homework and health issues indicates a need for reevaluation. The goal should be to ensure that homework if assigned, adds value to students’ learning experiences without compromising their health and well-being.

2. Inequitable Impact and Socioeconomic Disparities

Moreover, the approach to homework varies significantly across different types of schools. While some rigorous private and preparatory schools in both marginalized and affluent communities assign extreme levels of homework, many progressive schools focusing on holistic learning and self-actualization opt for no homework, yet achieve similar levels of college and career success. This contrast raises questions about the efficacy and necessity of heavy homework loads in achieving educational outcomes.

3. Negative Impact on Family Dynamics

The issue is not confined to specific demographics but is a widespread concern. Samantha Hulsman, a teacher featured in Education Week Teacher , shared her personal experience with the toll that homework can take on family time. She observed that a seemingly simple 30-minute assignment could escalate into a three-hour ordeal, causing stress and strife between parents and children. Hulsman’s insights challenge the traditional mindset about homework, highlighting a shift towards the need for skills such as collaboration and problem-solving over rote memorization of facts.

4. Consumption of Free Time

Authors Sara Bennett and Nancy Kalish , in their book “The Case Against Homework,” offer an insightful window into the lives of families grappling with the demands of excessive homework. They share stories from numerous interviews conducted in the mid-2000s, highlighting the universal struggle faced by families across different demographics. A poignant account from a parent in Menlo Park, California, describes nightly sessions extending until 11 p.m., filled with stress and frustration, leading to a soured attitude towards school in both the child and the parent. This narrative is not isolated, as about one-third of the families interviewed expressed feeling crushed by the overwhelming workload.

5. Challenges for Students with Learning Disabilities

In conclusion, the conventional homework paradigm needs reevaluation, particularly concerning students with learning disabilities. By understanding and addressing their unique challenges, educators can create a more inclusive and supportive educational environment. This approach not only aids in their academic growth but also nurtures their confidence and overall development, ensuring that they receive an equitable and empathetic educational experience.

6. Critique of Underlying Assumptions about Learning

7. issues with homework enforcement, reliability, and temptation to cheat, addressing opposing views on homework practices, 1. improvement of academic performance, 2. reinforcement of learning, 3. development of time management skills, 4. preparation for future academic challenges, 5. parental involvement in education, exploring alternatives to homework and finding a middle ground, alternatives to traditional homework, ideas for minimizing homework, useful resources, leave a comment cancel reply.

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Homework Quotes

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Nothing is more powerful for your future than being a gatherer of good ideas and information. That's called doing your homework.

A genius is a talented person who does his homework.

Homework strongly indicates that the teachers are not doing their jobs well enough during the school day. It's not like they'll let you bring your home stuff to school and work on it there. You can't say, 'I didn't finish sleeping at home, so I have to work on finishing my sleep here.

Genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration. As a result, a genius is often a talented person who has simply done all of his homework.

Homework is a term that means grown up imposed yet self-afflicting torture.

Persistence is important in every endeavor. Whether it's finishing your homework, completing school, working late to finish a project, or "finishing the drill" in sports, winners persist to the point of sacrifice in order to achieve their goals.

I like a teacher who gives you something to take home to think about besides homework.

Homework, I have discovered, involves a sharp pencil and thick books and long sighs.

You will never get anywhere if you do not do your homework.

We're doing our homework to make sure we're prepared.

Do your homework or hire wise experts to help you. Never jump into a business you have no idea about.

When was the last time you used the words 'teach me'? Maybe not since you started first grade? Here's an irony about school: The daily grind of tests, homework, and pressures sometimes blunts rather than stimulates a thirst for knowledge.

The more you do your homework, the more you're free to be intuitive. But you've got to put the work in.

College is about three things: homework, fun, and sleep...but you can only choose two.

The best schools tend to have the best teachers, not to mention parents who supervise homework, so there is less need for self-organised learning. But where a child comes from a less supportive home environment, where there are family tensions perhaps, their schoolwork can suffer. They need to be taught to think and study for themselves.

One of life's most painful moments comes when we must admit that we didn't do our homework, that we are not prepared.

To overcome stress you have to find out something. You've got to do some research and homework. You need to find out who you are today.

My life is a black hole of boredom and despair." "So basically you've been doing homework." "Like I said, black hole.

Do your homework, study the craft, believe in yourself, and out-work everyone.

Do as much homework as you can. Learn everybody's job and don't just settle.

If you want to be lucky, do your homework.

I'm learning skills I will use for the rest of my life by doing homework...procrastinating and negotiation.

You have got to pay attention, you have got to study and you have to do your homework. You have to score higher than everybody else. Otherwise, there is always somebody there waiting to take your place.

You don’t get rich off your day job, you get rich off your homework.

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Should I Stop Assigning Homework?

What if my students think my class is too easy? And how will we ever get through  A Tale of Two Cities ?

I have written in the past about my hatred of homework from the perspective of both a teacher and a parent, so when I heard about a teacher who had ditched the practice of assigning homework altogether, I was intrigued and skeptical. Former teacher Mark Barnes wrote in a post called “ Homework: It fails our students and undermines American education ”:

Students often ask me why I don’t assign homework. “I don’t believe in it,” I quickly respond. “It doesn’t tell me what you’re learning.” They forge ahead with furrowed eyebrows. “Then why do all of our other teachers assign homework?” Although I typically leave that one alone, my experience tells me that the answer isn’t at all elusive. The average educator was taught in her pre-service days that homework is a part of every teacher’s instructional handbag. You lecture, model, assign a worksheet and follow that up with homework that, in many cases, looks a lot like the worksheet. Then you test and move on. Students who don’t complete homework receive zeroes, but they learn a valuable lesson about responsibility, many teachers argue, even though there’s no legitimate research connecting responsibility to homework. 

While I’ve read the research , and I know that there’s little academic benefit to homework before middle school, and even then, the benefit is limited, I’ve continued to assign homework all these years for a couple of reasons. One, students, teachers, parents, and administrators expect me to, and when I don’t I am labeled an “easy” teacher, viewed as less serious or rigorous than my colleagues. Parents may rage about the veritable avalanche of homework that threatens to suffocate their children, but in my experience, parents also view that avalanche as a badge of honor, evidence of academic rigor.

Two, I have tried reducing the homework load to almost nothing, and it has proven a real challenge. I have taught writing, Latin, and English. Writing is easy enough to deal with; we simply do all of our work in class. The assignments may proceed slowly, but at least I know all of the work is the students’. Latin is more of a challenge in a homework-free classroom, but after some tweaking, I managed to eradicate all but the most important and relevant homework assignments.

I remained a homework holdout when it came to English class, however. I have always taught novels as a cornerstone of my English curriculum, and without reading homework, we’d be lucky to get through a novel a year. I teach plenty of works, such as Shakespeare, rhetoric, and short stories, that function beautifully and efficiently as in-class readings, but I also teach Great Expectations and A Tale of Two Cities . I love reading to my students, and do a lot of it (complete with the voices and accents, of course) but without homework time spent on reading in preparation for class discussion, we’d get through one, maybe two novels a year. In addition, my students practice grammar exercises and study vocabulary and spelling as their homework. I tried to picture a school year in which I shoehorn all of this work in to class time. I hardly complete a year’s worth of material as it is; a year without any homework at all seemed like a disaster in the making.

I presented all of this information to Mark Barnes, who taught seventh, eighth, and 10 th grades over his 20-year career in a suburb of Cleveland, Ohio, and he responded in the form of his own novel-length treatise on the benefits of eradicating homework.

Barnes was a “traditional” teacher for a long time, using what he calls the “circle of learning,” made up of lecture, practice, homework, test, grade, move on. After about 12 years of this practice, he realized, “homework was hurting my students more than it was helping them.” His last year spent in the circle of learning resulted in a negative teaching experience for Mark, and poor learning experience for his students. Barnes spent that summer immersed in research on learning and homework, and returned in the 14th year of his teaching career determined to do away with homework and create what he calls a “results-only learning environment.”

Contrary to my first concern, Barnes found that most parents were in favor of his doing away with homework, particularly once he outlined the research for them. He shared what he had learned with his principals, and they signed off on his efforts. “Ironically, the people who often struggled with my no-homework policy the most were colleagues. They were getting pushback from students, who argued, ‘Mr. Barnes doesn’t assign it, so why do you?’” he wrote. Barnes points out that a no-homework policy does not mean that his students never work outside of class; indeed, they often do, because they enjoy the learning and want it to continue outside of class.

While this all sounds lovely to me, and I can get behind his enthusiasm, I had to bring the conversation back to my English-class dilemma. Barnes reminded me that he, too, was an English teacher, but conceded that he did not teach many novels in class in favor of shorter works. His class was a project-based classroom, so many students did choose to prepare for their projects outside of class. Barnes eliminated all work that required rote memory, and leaned more on context clues and word roots instead. “The result of eliminating traditional, mostly rote memory, homework was one of the most rewarding experiences of my teaching career,” Barnes wrote.

Barnes said that his students typically out-performed their grade-level peers whose teachers relied on homework and memorization methods in their classrooms.

Barnes concluded his email with a final assessment of his six years as a no-homework teacher:

Above all else, my students enjoyed class and become intrinsically motivated independent learners. They loved that I didn’t assign traditional nightly homework. We discussed it often, and the consensus was that kids want more time for sports and other co-curricular activities. They want to play with their friends and spend time with family. Bottom line, homework gets in the way, and the research supporting it as a learning tool is sketchy, at best. I would add for the no-homework skeptics, and they are legion, you have to keep in mind that any research that supports homework is based almost universally on test results. Teachers create tests, based on the practice activities they create. If a student practices memorizing Spanish words by writing them over and over, and then takes a multiple-choice test on those words, she’ll likely do well on the test. These manufactured results say nothing about real learning.

A year and a half ago, when I first started questioning my own homework practices, I looked to my own children as a barometer of what I deemed a reasonable homework load versus an unacceptable intrusion on free time--the time children need in order to relax, play, be quiet, and imagine. At the beginning of this journey, I was willing to admit that “ teachers who sacrifice these vital elements of childhood for anything less than the most valuable homework assignments are being derelict in their duty to their students and the teaching profession .” But in light of Mark Barnes’s experience with what sounds like a balanced and vital classroom culture, I am left to wonder how long homework will be a part of my own classroom repertoire.

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This post has been updated as of December 2017.

It’s not uncommon to hear students, parents, and even some teachers always complaining about homework. Why, then, is homework an inescapable part of the student experience? Worksheets, busy work, and reading assignments continue to be a mainstay of students’ evenings.

Whether from habit or comparison with out-of-class work time in other nations, our students are getting homework and, according to some of them, a LOT of it. Educators and policy makers must ask themselves—does assigning homework pay off?

Is there evidence that homework benefits students younger than high school?

The Scholastic article Is Homework Bad? references Alfie Kohn’s book The Homework Myth: Why Our Kids Get Too Much of a Bad Thing , in which he says, “There is no evidence to demonstrate that homework benefits students below high school age.”

The article goes on to note that those who oppose homework focus on the drawbacks of significant time spent on homework, identifying one major negative as homework’s intrusion into family time. They also point out that opponents believe schools have decided homework is necessary and thus assign it simply to assign some kind of homework, not because doing the work meets specifically-identified student needs.

“Busy work” does not help students learn

Students and parents appear to carry similar critiques of homework, specifically regarding assignments identified as busy work—long sheets of repetitive math problems, word searches, or reading logs seemingly designed to make children dislike books.

When asked how homework can negatively affect children, Nancy Kalish, author of The Case Against Homework: How Homework is Hurting Our Children and What We Can Do About It , says that many homework assignments are “simply busy work” that makes learning “a chore rather than a positive, constructive experience.”

Commenters on the piece, both parents and students, tended to agree. One student shared that on occasion they spent more time on homework than at school, while another commenter pointed out that, “We don’t give slow-working children a longer school day, but we consistently give them a longer homework day.”

Without feedback, homework is ineffective

The efficacy of the homework identified by Kalish has been studied by policy researchers as well. Gerald LeTendre, of Penn State’s Education Policy Studies department points out that the shotgun approach to homework, when students all receive the same photocopied assignment which is then checked as complete rather than discussed individually with the student, is “not very effective.”  He goes on to say that, “If there’s no feedback and no monitoring, the homework is probably not effective.”

Researchers from the Curry School of Education at the University of Virginia had similar findings in their study, “ When Is Homework Worth The Time ?” According to UVAToday, these researchers reported no “substantive difference” in the grades of students related to homework completion.

As researcher Adam Maltese noted, “Our results hint that maybe homework is not being used as well as it could be.” The report further suggested that while not all homework is bad, the type and quality of assignments and their differentiation to specific learners appears to be an important point of future research.

If homework is assigned, it should heighten understanding of the subject

The Curry School of Education report did find a positive association between standardized test performance and time spent on homework, but standardized test performance shouldn’t be the end goal of assignments—a heightened understanding and capability with the content material should.

As such, it is important that if/when teachers assign homework assignments, it is done thoughtfully and carefully—and respectful of the maximum times suggested by the National Education Association, about 10 minutes per night starting in the first grade, with an additional 10 minutes per year after.

Continue reading — The Homework Debate: How Homework Benefits Students

Monica Fuglei is a graduate of the University of Nebraska in Omaha and a current adjunct faculty member of Arapahoe Community College in Colorado, where she teaches composition and creative writing.

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Why homework matters

Homework is the perennial bogeyman of K–12 education. Any given year, you’ll find people arguing that students, especially those in elementary school, should have far less homework—or none at all . I have the opposite opinion. The longer I run schools—and it has now been more than sixteen years—the more convinced I am that homework is not only necessary, but a linchpin to effective K–12 education.

It is important to remember that kids only spend a fraction of their time in school. The learning that does or does not take place in the many hours outside of school has a monumental effect on children’s academic success and is a root cause of educational inequity.

The pandemic gave us a stark demonstration of this reality. Achievement gaps widened between affluent and low-income children not only because low-income students received less in-person or high-quality online instruction during the years of disrupted school, but also because children of college-educated and affluent parents were already less dependent on schools for learning. Affluent children are far more likely to have the privilege of tutors or other types of supplementary instruction, as well as a family culture of reading, and opportunities to travel, visit museums, and more. Homework is a powerful tool to help narrow these inequities, giving children from all backgrounds the opportunity to keep learning when they are not in school.

At Success Academy, the charter school network I founded and lead, we seek to develop students as lifelong learners who have the confidence and curiosity to pursue and build knowledge in all facets of their lives. Homework cultivates these mindsets and habits. Indeed, when teachers don’t assign homework, it reflects an unconscious conviction that kids can’t learn without adults. Kids internalize this message and come to believe they need their teacher to gain knowledge. In reality, they are more than capable of learning all sorts of things on their own. Discovering this fact can be both incredibly exciting and deeply empowering for them.

We also know that none of these benefits accrue when homework is mere busywork. Low-quality homework is likely what drives the mixed research evidence on the impact of homework on student achievement. It also sends the message to kids that doing it is simply an exercise in compliance and not worth their time. Homework must be challenging and purposeful for kids to recognize its value.

For this reason, at Success, we take great care with the design of our homework assignments, ensuring they are engaging and relevant to what takes place in class the next day. When done well, homework can be a form of the “flipped classroom”—a model developed by ed tech innovators to make large college lecture classes more engaging. In flipped classrooms, students learn everything they can on their own at home (in the original conception, via recorded lectures); class time builds on what they learned to address confusion and elevate their thinking to a more sophisticated level. It’s an approach that both respects kids’ capacity to learn independently, and assumes that out-of-class learning will drive the content and pace of the in-person lesson. 

Students always need a “why” for the things we ask them to do, and designing homework this way is motivating for them because it gives them that clear why. Class is engaging and interesting when they are prepared; when they aren’t, they won’t have the satisfaction of participating.

At this point, some teachers may be saying, “I can’t get my kids to hand in a worksheet, let alone rely on them to learn on their own.” And of course, effective use of homework in class relies on creating a strong system of accountability for getting kids to do it. This can be hard for teachers. It’s uncomfortable to lean into students’ lives outside of school, and many educators feel they don’t have that right. But getting over that discomfort is best for kids.

Educators should embrace setting an exacting norm for completing homework. This should include a schoolwide grading policy—at Success schools, missing and incomplete homework assignments receive a zero; students can get partial credit for work handed in late; and middle and high schoolers can revise their homework for a better grade—as well as consistently and explicitly noticing when kids are or are not prepared and offering praise and consequences. Enlisting parents’ help in this area is also highly effective. I guarantee they will be grateful to be kept informed of how well their children are meeting their responsibilities!

Ultimately, minimizing homework or getting rid of it entirely denies children autonomy and prevents them from discovering what they are capable of. As we work to repair the academic damage from the last two-plus years, I encourage educators to focus not on the quantity of homework, but instead on its quality—and on using it effectively in class. By doing so, they will accelerate kids’ engagement with school, and propel them as assured, autonomous learners and thinkers who can thrive in college and beyond.

Eva Moskowitz is the CEO of Success Academy Charter Schools .

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Is it time to get rid of homework? Mental health experts weigh in.

It's no secret that kids hate homework. And as students grapple with an ongoing pandemic that has had a wide range of mental health impacts, is it time schools start listening to their pleas about workloads?

Some teachers are turning to social media to take a stand against homework. 

Tiktok user @misguided.teacher says he doesn't assign it because the "whole premise of homework is flawed."

For starters, he says, he can't grade work on "even playing fields" when students' home environments can be vastly different.

"Even students who go home to a peaceful house, do they really want to spend their time on busy work? Because typically that's what a lot of homework is, it's busy work," he says in the video that has garnered 1.6 million likes. "You only get one year to be 7, you only got one year to be 10, you only get one year to be 16, 18."

Mental health experts agree heavy workloads have the potential do more harm than good for students, especially when taking into account the impacts of the pandemic. But they also say the answer may not be to eliminate homework altogether.

Emmy Kang, mental health counselor at Humantold , says studies have shown heavy workloads can be "detrimental" for students and cause a "big impact on their mental, physical and emotional health."

"More than half of students say that homework is their primary source of stress, and we know what stress can do on our bodies," she says, adding that staying up late to finish assignments also leads to disrupted sleep and exhaustion.

Cynthia Catchings, a licensed clinical social worker and therapist at Talkspace , says heavy workloads can also cause serious mental health problems in the long run, like anxiety and depression. 

And for all the distress homework  can cause, it's not as useful as many may think, says Dr. Nicholas Kardaras, a psychologist and CEO of Omega Recovery treatment center.

"The research shows that there's really limited benefit of homework for elementary age students, that really the school work should be contained in the classroom," he says.

For older students, Kang says, homework benefits plateau at about two hours per night. 

"Most students, especially at these high achieving schools, they're doing a minimum of three hours, and it's taking away time from their friends, from their families, their extracurricular activities. And these are all very important things for a person's mental and emotional health."

Catchings, who also taught third to 12th graders for 12 years, says she's seen the positive effects of a no-homework policy while working with students abroad.

"Not having homework was something that I always admired from the French students (and) the French schools, because that was helping the students to really have the time off and really disconnect from school," she says.

The answer may not be to eliminate homework completely but to be more mindful of the type of work students take home, suggests Kang, who was a high school teacher for 10 years.

"I don't think (we) should scrap homework; I think we should scrap meaningless, purposeless busy work-type homework. That's something that needs to be scrapped entirely," she says, encouraging teachers to be thoughtful and consider the amount of time it would take for students to complete assignments.

The pandemic made the conversation around homework more crucial 

Mindfulness surrounding homework is especially important in the context of the past two years. Many students will be struggling with mental health issues that were brought on or worsened by the pandemic , making heavy workloads even harder to balance.

"COVID was just a disaster in terms of the lack of structure. Everything just deteriorated," Kardaras says, pointing to an increase in cognitive issues and decrease in attention spans among students. "School acts as an anchor for a lot of children, as a stabilizing force, and that disappeared."

But even if students transition back to the structure of in-person classes, Kardaras suspects students may still struggle after two school years of shifted schedules and disrupted sleeping habits.

"We've seen adults struggling to go back to in-person work environments from remote work environments. That effect is amplified with children because children have less resources to be able to cope with those transitions than adults do," he explains.

'Get organized' ahead of back-to-school

In order to make the transition back to in-person school easier, Kang encourages students to "get good sleep, exercise regularly (and) eat a healthy diet."

To help manage workloads, she suggests students "get organized."

"There's so much mental clutter up there when you're disorganized. ... Sitting down and planning out their study schedules can really help manage their time," she says.

Breaking up assignments can also make things easier to tackle.

"I know that heavy workloads can be stressful, but if you sit down and you break down that studying into smaller chunks, they're much more manageable."

If workloads are still too much, Kang encourages students to advocate for themselves.

"They should tell their teachers when a homework assignment just took too much time or if it was too difficult for them to do on their own," she says. "It's good to speak up and ask those questions. Respectfully, of course, because these are your teachers. But still, I think sometimes teachers themselves need this feedback from their students."

More: Some teachers let their students sleep in class. Here's what mental health experts say.

More: Some parents are slipping young kids in for the COVID-19 vaccine, but doctors discourage the move as 'risky'

Why I Think All Schools Should Abolish Homework

H ow long is your child’s workweek? Thirty hours? Forty? Would it surprise you to learn that some elementary school kids have workweeks comparable to adults’ schedules? For most children, mandatory homework assignments push their workweek far beyond the school day and deep into what any other laborers would consider overtime. Even without sports or music or other school-sponsored extracurriculars, the daily homework slog keeps many students on the clock as long as lawyers, teachers, medical residents, truck drivers and other overworked adults. Is it any wonder that,deprived of the labor protections that we provide adults, our kids are suffering an epidemic of disengagement, anxiety and depression ?

With my youngest child just months away from finishing high school, I’m remembering all the needless misery and missed opportunities all three of my kids suffered because of their endless assignments. When my daughters were in middle school, I would urge them into bed before midnight and then find them clandestinely studying under the covers with a flashlight. We cut back on their activities but still found ourselves stuck in a system on overdrive, returning home from hectic days at 6 p.m. only to face hours more of homework. Now, even as a senior with a moderate course load, my son, Zak, has spent many weekends studying, finding little time for the exercise and fresh air essential to his well-being. Week after week, and without any extracurriculars, Zak logs a lot more than the 40 hours adults traditionally work each week — and with no recognition from his “bosses” that it’s too much. I can’t count the number of shared evenings, weekend outings and dinners that our family has missed and will never get back.

How much after-school time should our schools really own?

In the midst of the madness last fall, Zak said to me, “I feel like I’m working towards my death. The constant demands on my time since 5th grade are just going to continue through graduation, into college, and then into my job. It’s like I’m on an endless treadmill with no time for living.”

My spirit crumbled along with his.

Like Zak, many people are now questioning the point of putting so much demand on children and teens that they become thinly stretched and overworked. Studies have long shown that there is no academic benefit to high school homework that consumes more than a modest number of hours each week. In a study of high schoolers conducted by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), researchers concluded that “after around four hours of homework per week, the additional time invested in homework has a negligible impact on performance.”

In elementary school, where we often assign overtime even to the youngest children, studies have shown there’s no academic benefit to any amount of homework at all.

Our unquestioned acceptance of homework also flies in the face of all we know about human health, brain function and learning. Brain scientists know that rest and exercise are essential to good health and real learning . Even top adult professionals in specialized fields take care to limit their work to concentrated periods of focus. A landmark study of how humans develop expertise found that elite musicians, scientists and athletes do their most productive work only about four hours per day .

Yet we continue to overwork our children, depriving them of the chance to cultivate health and learn deeply, burdening them with an imbalance of sedentary, academic tasks. American high school students , in fact, do more homework each week than their peers in the average country in the OECD, a 2014 report found.

It’s time for an uprising.

Already, small rebellions are starting. High schools in Ridgewood, N.J. , and Fairfax County, Va., among others, have banned homework over school breaks. The entire second grade at Taylor Elementary School in Arlington, Va., abolished homework this academic year. Burton Valley Elementary School in Lafayette, Calif., has eliminated homework in grades K through 4. Henry West Laboratory School , a public K-8 school in Coral Gables, Fla., eliminated mandatory, graded homework for optional assignments. One Lexington, Mass., elementary school is piloting a homework-free year, replacing it with reading for pleasure.

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Across the Atlantic, students in Spain launched a national strike against excessive assignments in November. And a second-grade teacher in Texas, made headlines this fall when she quit sending home extra work , instead urging families to “spend your evenings doing things that are proven to correlate with student success. Eat dinner as a family, read together, play outside and get your child to bed early.”

It is time that we call loudly for a clear and simple change: a workweek limit for children, counting time on the clock before and after the final bell. Why should schools extend their authority far beyond the boundaries of campus, dictating activities in our homes in the hours that belong to families? An all-out ban on after-school assignments would be optimal. Short of that, we can at least sensibly agree on a cap limiting kids to a 40-hour workweek — and fewer hours for younger children.

Resistance even to this reasonable limit will be rife. Mike Miller, an English teacher at Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology in Alexandria, Va., found this out firsthand when he spearheaded a homework committee to rethink the usual approach. He had read the education research and found a forgotten policy on the county books limiting homework to two hours a night, total, including all classes. “I thought it would be a slam dunk” to put the two-hour cap firmly in place, Miller said.

But immediately, people started balking. “There was a lot of fear in the community,” Miller said. “It’s like jumping off a high dive with your kids’ future. If we reduce homework to two hours or less, is my kid really going to be okay?” In the end, the committee only agreed to a homework ban over school breaks.

Miller’s response is a great model for us all. He decided to limit assignments in his own class to 20 minutes a night (the most allowed for a student with six classes to hit the two-hour max). His students didn’t suddenly fail. Their test scores remained stable. And they started using their more breathable schedule to do more creative, thoughtful work.

That’s the way we will get to a sane work schedule for kids: by simultaneously pursuing changes big and small. Even as we collaboratively press for policy changes at the district or individual school level, all teachers can act now, as individuals, to ease the strain on overworked kids.

As parents and students, we can also organize to make homework the exception rather than the rule. We can insist that every family, teacher and student be allowed to opt out of assignments without penalty to make room for important activities, and we can seek changes that shift practice exercises and assignments into the actual school day.

We’ll know our work is done only when Zak and every other child can clock out, eat dinner, sleep well and stay healthy — the very things needed to engage and learn deeply. That’s the basic standard the law applies to working adults. Let’s do the same for our kids.

Vicki Abeles is the author of the bestseller Beyond Measure: Rescuing an Overscheduled, Overtested, Underestimated Generation, and director and producer of the documentaries “ Race to Nowhere ” and “ Beyond Measure. ”

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The Caravan

Students shouldn’t have homework on weekends.

Jonathan Kuptel '22 , Staff Writer | November 7, 2021

Jonathan Kuptel

MC senior Imari Price works on a assignment for 21st-Century Media class.

Teachers and students have different opinions about homework. Saying it is not fair is the usual argument, but being fair is not the issue. It is about students being prepared. Daily homework assignments can be difficult, and weekends homework assignments are worse. Students operate best when they are well-rested and ready to go. A weekend with no homework would help them to be fresh and ready on Monday morning. Weekend assignments tend to be longer and more difficult. 

The students have a difficult day with classes, practices, and going to school. By Friday, (test day) they are near exhaustion. Most tests are given on Fridays. Homework on Monday-Thursday is time-consuming. Some weekends will include assignments in more than 1 class. Those who go to Mount Carmel are near the end of their rope by 2:40 PM on Friday. I have had other discussions with the senior class and we all feel pretty tired at the end of the day at 2:40 PM. A free weekend helps to get prepared for the next grind to start. No homework weekends assures better sleep cycles and a body that has recovered and refreshed. Weekends include chores around the house and family commitments. This plus weekends assignments lead to a lack of sleep. This means Monday will have a positive attitude. No homework on weekends also means more family time. This is a bonus. 

Alfie Kohn in his book The Homework Myth: Why Are Kids Get Too Much Of A Bad Thing says, “There is no evidence to demonstrate that homework benefits students.” The homework on weekends starts in elementary school and continues throughout high school. 

Mr. Kohn states that homework on weekends starts in elementary school and continues throughout high school. This supports the argument that weekend homework starts in elementary school and now students at Mount Carmel High School have to deal with weekend assignments. The weekend assignments take too much time and are a waste of students’ time. 

Nancy Kalish , author of The Case Against Homework: How Homework Is Hurting Our Children And What We Can Do About It, says “simply busy work” makes learning “a chore rather than a positive, constructive experience.” 

Receiving weekend homework that is not discussed in class and counts only as “busy work” is counterproductive. Students finish the assignments because they are required to be done. When the homework is not reviewed on Monday, it leads to frustration. Busy homework that serves no purpose is never a good idea. 

Gerald LeTender of Penn State’s Education Policy Studies Department points out the “shotgun approach to homework when students receive the same photocopied assignment which is then checked as complete rather than discussed is not very effective.” Some teachers discuss the homework assignments and that validates the assignment. Some teachers however just check homework assignments for completion. LeTender goes on to say, “If there’s no feedback and no monitoring, the homework is probably not effective.” Researchers from the Curry School of Education at the University of Virginia had similar findings in their study “ When Is Homework Worth The Time?” Researchers reported no substantive difference in the grades of students who had homework completion. Adam Maltese, a researcher , noted , “Our results hint that maybe homework is not being used as well as it could be. Even one teacher who assigns busy shotgun homework is enough to be a bad idea. 

Students come to know when homework is the “shotgun approach.” They find this kind of assignment dull. Students have no respect for assignments like this. Quality assignments are appreciated by students. 

Etta Kralovec and John Buell in their book How Homework Disrupts Families, Overburdens Children, And Limits Learning assert that homework contributes to a corporate style, competitive U.S. culture that overvalued work to the detriment of personal and familial well being. They go on to call for an end to homework, but to extend the school day. 

Cooper, Robinson, and Patalc, in 2006 warned that homework could become counter productive. Homework is counterproductive when it is a (shotgun) assignment. To reiterate, not all homework is bad. Bad homework which is not reviewed in class just plain “busy work” is not positive and could be counterproductive. 

Sara Croll, Literacy Coach and Author, believes too much homework causes stress for students. Diana Stelin, teacher, artist, and mother says, “I’m absolutely in favor of this ban. Homework is homework, it doesn’t matter what class it comes from. What it does is create negative associations in students of all ages, takes away their innate desire to learn, and makes the subject a dreaded chore.” 

When students come to dread their homework, they do not do a great job on these assignments. Making students do a lot of homework isn’t beneficial because they get drowsy when they work at it for hours and hours at a time. It is hard for the brain to function properly when it is tired and boring. 

Pat Wayman, Teacher and CEO of HowtoLearn.com says, “Many kids are working as many hours as their overscheduled parents and it is taking a toll.” “Their brains and their bodies need time to be curious, have fun, be creative and just be a kid.” 

No homework on weekends is not just a wish, but it is supported by all of these educators and authors. They all champion limiting homework are totally opposed to homework assignments. Educators and students agree that no homework on weekends is a good idea. Meaningful homework, a longer school day, and discussion of homework are what these educators and authors encourage. 

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Should homework be banned?

Social media has sparked into life about whether children should be given homework - should students be freed from this daily chore? Dr Gerald Letendre, a professor of education at Pennsylvania State University, investigates.

We’ve all done it: pretended to leave an essay at home, or stayed up until 2am to finish a piece of coursework we’ve been ignoring for weeks. Homework, for some people, is seen as a chore that’s ‘wrecking kids’ or ‘killing parents’, while others think it is an essential part of a well-rounded education. The problem is far from new: public debates about homework have been raging since at least the early-1900s, and recently spilled over into a Twitter feud between Gary Lineker and Piers Morgan.

Ironically, the conversation surrounding homework often ignores the scientific ‘homework’ that researchers have carried out. Many detailed studies have been conducted, and can guide parents, teachers and administrators to make sensible decisions about how much work should be completed by students outside of the classroom.

So why does homework stir up such strong emotions? One reason is that, by its very nature, it is an intrusion of schoolwork into family life. I carried out a study in 2005, and found that the amount of time that children and adolescents spend in school, from nursery right up to the end of compulsory education, has greatly increased over the last century . This means that more of a child’s time is taken up with education, so family time is reduced. This increases pressure on the boundary between the family and the school.

Plus, the amount of homework that students receive appears to be increasing, especially in the early years when parents are keen for their children to play with friends and spend time with the family.

Finally, success in school has become increasingly important to success in life. Parents can use homework to promote, or exercise control over, their child’s academic trajectory, and hopefully ensure their future educational success. But this often leaves parents conflicted – they want their children to be successful in school, but they don’t want them to be stressed or upset because of an unmanageable workload.

However, the issue isn’t simply down to the opinions of parents, children and their teachers – governments also like to get involved. In the autumn of 2012, French president François Hollande hit world headlines after making a comment about banning homework, ostensibly because it promoted inequality. The Chinese government has also toyed with a ban, because of concerns about excessive academic pressure being put on children.

The problem is, some politicians and national administrators regard regulatory policy in education as a solution for a wide array of social, economic and political issues, perhaps without considering the consequences for students and parents.

Does homework work?

Homework seems to generally have a positive effect for high school students, according to an extensive range of empirical literature. For example, Duke University’s Prof Harris Cooper carried out a meta-analysis using data from US schools, covering a period from 1987 to 2003. He found that homework offered a general beneficial impact on test scores and improvements in attitude, with a greater effect seen in older students. But dig deeper into the issue and a complex set of factors quickly emerges, related to how much homework students do, and exactly how they feel about it.

In 2009, Prof Ulrich Trautwein and his team at the University of Tübingen found that in order to establish whether homework is having any effect, researchers must take into account the differences both between and within classes . For example, a teacher may assign a good deal of homework to a lower-level class, producing an association between more homework and lower levels of achievement. Yet, within the same class, individual students may vary significantly in how much homework improves their baseline performance. Plus, there is the fact that some students are simply more efficient at completing their homework than others, and it becomes quite difficult to pinpoint just what type of homework, and how much of it, will affect overall academic performance.

Over the last century, the amount of time that children and adolescents spend in school has greatly increased

Gender is also a major factor. For example, a study of US high school students carried out by Prof Gary Natriello in the 1980s revealed that girls devote more time to homework than boys, while a follow-up study found that US girls tend to spend more time on mathematics homework than boys. Another study, this time of African-American students in the US, found that eighth grade (ages 13-14) girls were more likely to successfully manage both their tasks and emotions around schoolwork, and were more likely to finish homework.

So why do girls seem to respond more positively to homework? One possible answer proposed by Eunsook Hong of the University of Nevada in 2011 is that teachers tend to rate girls’ habits and attitudes towards work more favourably than boys’. This perception could potentially set up a positive feedback loop between teacher expectations and the children’s capacity for academic work based on gender, resulting in girls outperforming boys. All of this makes it particularly difficult to determine the extent to which homework is helping, though it is clear that simply increasing the time spent on assignments does not directly correspond to a universal increase in learning.

Can homework cause damage?

The lack of empirical data supporting homework in the early years of education, along with an emerging trend to assign more work to this age range, appears to be fuelling parental concerns about potential negative effects. But, aside from anecdotes of increased tension in the household, is there any evidence of this? Can doing too much homework actually damage children?

Evidence suggests extreme amounts of homework can indeed have serious effects on students’ health and well-being. A Chinese study carried out in 2010 found a link between excessive homework and sleep disruption: children who had less homework had better routines and more stable sleep schedules. A Canadian study carried out in 2015 by Isabelle Michaud found that high levels of homework were associated with a greater risk of obesity among boys, if they were already feeling stressed about school in general.

For useful revision guides and video clips to assist with learning, visit BBC Bitesize . This is a free online study resource for UK students from early years up to GCSEs and Scottish Highers.

It is also worth noting that too much homework can create negative effects that may undermine any positives. These negative consequences may not only affect the child, but also could also pile on the stress for the whole family, according to a recent study by Robert Pressman of the New England Centre for Pediatric Psychology. Parents were particularly affected when their perception of their own capacity to assist their children decreased.

What then, is the tipping point, and when does homework simply become too much for parents and children? Guidelines typically suggest that children in the first grade (six years old) should have no more that 10 minutes per night, and that this amount should increase by 10 minutes per school year. However, cultural norms may greatly affect what constitutes too much.

A study of children aged between 8 and 10 in Quebec defined high levels of homework as more than 30 minutes a night, but a study in China of children aged 5 to 11 deemed that two or more hours per night was excessive. It is therefore difficult to create a clear standard for what constitutes as too much homework, because cultural differences, school-related stress, and negative emotions within the family all appear to interact with how homework affects children.

Should we stop setting homework?

In my opinion, even though there are potential risks of negative effects, homework should not be banned. Small amounts, assigned with specific learning goals in mind and with proper parental support, can help to improve students’ performance. While some studies have generally found little evidence that homework has a positive effect on young children overall, a 2008 study by Norwegian researcher Marte Rønning found that even some very young children do receive some benefit. So simply banning homework would mean that any particularly gifted or motivated pupils would not be able to benefit from increased study. However, at the earliest ages, very little homework should be assigned. The decisions about how much and what type are best left to teachers and parents.

As a parent, it is important to clarify what goals your child’s teacher has for homework assignments. Teachers can assign work for different reasons – as an academic drill to foster better study habits, and unfortunately, as a punishment. The goals for each assignment should be made clear, and should encourage positive engagement with academic routines.

Parents should inform the teachers of how long the homework is taking, as teachers often incorrectly estimate the amount of time needed to complete an assignment, and how it is affecting household routines. For young children, positive teacher support and feedback is critical in establishing a student’s positive perception of homework and other academic routines. Teachers and parents need to be vigilant and ensure that homework routines do not start to generate patterns of negative interaction that erode students’ motivation.

Likewise, any positive effects of homework are dependent on several complex interactive factors, including the child’s personal motivation, the type of assignment, parental support and teacher goals. Creating an overarching policy to address every single situation is not realistic, and so homework policies tend to be fixated on the time the homework takes to complete. But rather than focusing on this, everyone would be better off if schools worked on fostering stronger communication between parents, teachers and students, allowing them to respond more sensitively to the child’s emotional and academic needs.

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This is why we should stop giving homework

At Human Restoration Project, one of the core systemic changes we suggest is the elimination of homework. Throughout this piece, I will outline several research studies and reports that demonstrate how the negative impact of homework is so evident that any mandated homework, outside of some minor catching up or for incredibly niche cases, simply does more harm than good.

I’ll summarize four main reasons why homework just flat out doesn’t make sense.

• Achievement, whether that be measured through standardized tests or general academic knowledge, isn’t correlated to assigning or completing homework.
• Homework is an inequitable practice that harms certain individuals more than others, to the detriment of those with less resources and to minor, if any, improvement for those with resources.
• It contributes to negative impacts at home with one’s family, peer relationships, and just general school-life balance, which causes far more problems than homework is meant to solve.
• And finally, it highlights and exacerbates our obsession with ultra-competitive college admissions and job opportunities, and other detrimental faults of making everything about getting ahead .

Does Homework Make Us Learn More?

Homework is such a ubiquitous part of school that it’s considered radical to even suggest that lessening it could be good teaching. It’s completely normal for families to spend extra hours each night, even on weekends, completing projects, reports, and worksheets. On average, teenagers spend about an hour a day completing homework, which is up 30-45 minutes from decades past. Kindergartners, who are usually saved from completing a lot of after school work, average about 25 minutes of homework a night (which to note, is 25 minutes too much than is recommended by child development experts).

The “10-minute rule”, endorsed by the National Parent Teacher Association and National Education Association, is incorporated into most school policies: there’s 10 minutes of homework per day per grade level – as in 20 minutes a day in second grade or 2 hours a day in 12th grade. 

It’s so normalized that it was odd, when seemingly out of nowhere the President of Ireland recently suggested that homework should be banned . (And many experts were shocked at this suggestion.)

Numerous studies on homework reflect inconsistent results on what it exactly achieves. Homework is rarely shown to have any impact on achievement, whether that be measured through standardized testing or otherwise. As I’ll talk about later, the amount of marginal gains homework may lead to aren’t worth its negative trade-offs.

Let’s look at a quick summary of various studies:

• ‍ First off, the book National Differences, Global Similarities: World Culture and the Future of Schooling by David P. Baker and Gerald K. LeTendre draws on a 4 year investigation of schools in 47 countries. It’s the largest study of its type: looking at how schools operate, their pedagogy, their procedures, and the like. They made a shocking discovery: countries that assigned the least amount of homework: Denmark and the Czech Republic, had much higher test scores than those who assigned the most amount of homework: Iran and Thailand. The same work indicated that there was no correlation between academic achievement and homework with elementary students, and any moderate positive correlation in middle or high school diminished as more and more homework was assigned. ‍
• A study in Contemporary Educational Psychology of 28,051 high school seniors concluded that quality of instruction, motivation, and ability are all correlated to a student’s academic success. However, homework’s effectiveness was marginal or perhaps even counterproductive: leading to more academic problems than it hoped to solve. ‍
• The Teachers College Record published that homework added academic pressure and societal stress to those already experiencing pressures from other forces at home. This caused a further divide in academic performance from those with more privileged backgrounds. We’ll talk about this more later. ‍
• A study in the Journal of Educational Psychology examined 2,342 student attitudes toward homework in foreign language classes. They found that time spent on homework had a significant negative impact on grades and standardized test scores. The researchers concluded that this may be because participants had to spend their time completing worksheets rather than spend time practicing skills on their own time.
• Some studies are more positive. In fact, a meta-analysis of 32 homework studies in the Review of Educational Research found that most studies indicated a positive correlation between achievement and doing homework. However, the researchers noted that generally these studies made it hard to draw causal conclusions due to how they were set up and conducted. There was so much variance that it was difficult to make a claim one way or another, even though the net result seemed positive. This often cited report led by Dr. Harris Cooper at Duke University is the most commonly used by proponents of the practice. But popular education critic Alfie Kohn believes that this study fails to establish, ironically, causation among other factors. ‍
• And that said in a later published study in The High School Journal , researchers concluded that in all homework assigned, there were only modest linkages to improved math and science standardized test scores, with no difference in other subjects between those who were assigned homework and those who were not. None of the homework assigned had any bearing on grades. The only difference was for a few points on those particular subject’s standardized test scores.

All in all, the data is relatively inconclusive. Some educational experts suggest that there should be hours of homework in high school, some homework in middle school, and none in elementary school. Some call for the 10-minute rule. Others say that homework doesn’t work at all. It’s still fairly unstudied how achievement is impacted as a result of homework. But as Alfie Kohn says , “The better the research, the less likely one is to find any benefits from homework.” That said, when we couple this data with the other negative impacts of assigning homework: how it impacts those at the margins, leads to anxiety and stress, and takes away from important family time – it really makes us question why this is such a ubiquitous practice. 

Or as Etta Kralovec and John Buell write in The End of Homework: How Homework Disrupts Families, Overburdens Children, and Limits Learning,

‘Extensive classroom research of ‘time on task’ and international comparisons of year-round time for study suggest that additional homework might promote U.S. students’ achievement.’  This written statement by some of the top professionals in the field of homework research raises some difficult questions. More homework might promote student achievement? Are all our blood, sweat, and tears at the kitchen table over homework based on something that merely might be true? Our belief in the value of homework is akin to faith. We assume that it fosters a love of learning, better study habits, improved attitudes toward school, and greater self-discipline; we believe that better teachers assign more homework and that one sign of a good school is a good, enforced homework policy.

Our obsession with homework is likely rooted in select studies that imply it leads to higher test scores. The authors continue by deciphering this phenomena:

“[this is] a problem that routinely bedevils all the sciences: the relationship between correlation and causality. If A and B happen simultaneously, we do not know whether A causes B or B causes A, or whether both phenomena occur casually together or are individually determined by another set of variables…Thus far, most studies in this area have amounted to little more than crude correlations that cannot justify the sweeping conclusions some have derived from them.”

Alfie Kohn adds that even the correlation between achievement and homework doesn’t really matter. Saying,

“If all you want is to cram kids’ heads with facts for tomorrow’s tests that they’re going to forget by next week, yeah, if you give them more time and make them do the cramming at night, that could raise the scores…But if you’re interested in kids who know how to think or enjoy learning, then homework isn’t merely ineffective, but counterproductive… The practice of homework assumes that only academic growth matters, to the point that having kids work on that most of the school day isn’t enough…”

Ramping Up Inequity

Many justify the practice of assigning homework with the well-intentioned belief that we’ll make a more equitable society through high standards. However, it seems to be that these practices actually add to inequity. “Rigorous” private and preparatory schools – whether they be “no excuses” charters in marginalized communities or “college ready” elite suburban institutions, are notorious for extreme levels of homework assignment. Yet, many progressive schools who focus on holistic learning and self-actualization assign no homework and achieve the same levels of college and career success.

Perhaps this is because the largest predictor of college success has nothing to do with rigorous preparation, and everything to do with family income levels. 77% of students from high income families graduated from a highly competitive college, whereas 9% of students from low income families did the same .

It seems like by loading students up with mountains of homework each night in an attempt to get them into these colleges, we actually make their chances of success worse .

When assigning homework, it is common practice to recommend that families provide a quiet, well-lit place for the child to study. After all, it’s often difficult to complete assignments after a long day. Having this space, time, and energy must always be considered in the context of the family’s education, income, available time, and job security. For many people, jobs have become less secure and less well paid over the course of the last two decades.

In a United States context, we work the longest hours of any nation . Individuals in 2006 worked 11 hours longer than their counterparts in 1979. In 2020, 70% of children lived in households where both parents work. We are the only country in the industrial world without guaranteed family leave. And the results are staggering: 90% of women and 95% of men report work-family conflict . According to the Center for American Progress , “the United States today has the most family-hostile public policy in the developed world due to a long-standing political impasse.”

As a result, parents have much less time to connect with their children. This is not a call to a return to traditional family roles or to have stay-at-home parents – rather, our occupation-oriented society is structured inadequately which causes problems with how homework is meant to function. 

For those who work in entry level positions, such as customer service and cashiers, there is an average 240% turnover per year due to lack of pay, poor conditions, work-life balance, and mismanagement. Family incomes continue to decline for lower- and middle-class Americans, leaving more families to work increased hours or multiple jobs. In other words, families, especially poor families, have less opportunities to spend time with their children, let alone foster academic “gains” via homework.

Even for students with ample resources who attend “elite schools”, the amount of homework is stressful. In a 2013 study in The Journal of Experiential Education, researchers conducted a survey of 4,317 students in 10 high-performing upper middle class high schools. These students had an average of more than 3 hours of homework a night. In comparison to their peers, they had more academic stress, notable physical health problems, and spent a worrying amount of time focused entirely on school and nothing else. Competitive advantage came at the cost of well-being and just being a kid.

A similar study in Frontiers of Psychology found that students pressured in the competitive college admissions process , who attended schools assigning hours of homework each night and promoting college-level courses and resume building extracurriculars, felt extreme stress. Two-thirds of the surveyed students reported turning to alcohol and drugs to cope.

In fact, a paper published by Dr. Suniya Luthar and her colleagues concluded that upper middle-class youth are actually more likely to be troubled than their middle class peers . There is an extreme problem with academic stress, where young people are engaging in a rat race toward the best possible educational future as determined by Ivy League colleges and scholarships. To add fuel to the fire, schools continue to add more and more homework to have students get ahead – which has a massively negative impact on both ends of the economic spectrum.

A 2012 study by Dr. Jonathan Daw indicated that their results,

“...imply that increases in the amount of homework assigned may increase the socioeconomic achievement gap in math, science, and reading in secondary school.”

In an effort to increase engagement with homework, teachers have been encouraged to create interesting, creative assignments. In fact, most researchers seem to agree that the quality of assignments matters a whole lot . After all, maybe assigning all of this homework won’t matter as long as it’s interesting and relevant to students? Although this has good intentions, rigorous homework with increased complexity places more impetus on parents. As researcher and author Gary Natrillo, an initial proponent of creative homework , stated later:

…not only was homework being assigned as suggested by all the ‘experts,’ but the teacher was obviously taking the homework seriously, making it challenging instead of routine and checking it each day and giving feedback. We were enveloped by the nightmare of near total implementation of the reform recommendations pertaining to homework…More creative homework tasks are a mixed blessing on the receiving end. On the one hand, they, of course, lead to higher engagement and interest for children and their parents. On the other hand, they require one to be well rested, a special condition of mind not often available to working parents…

Time is a luxury to most people. With increased working hours, in conjunction with extreme levels of stress, many people don’t have the necessary mindset to adequately supply children with the attention to detail for complex homework. As Kralovec and Buell state,

To put it plainly, I have discovered that after a day at work, the commute home, dinner preparations, and the prospect of baths, goodnight stories, and my own work ahead, there comes a time beyond which I cannot sustain my enthusiasm for the math brain teaser or the creative story task.

Americans are some of the most stressed people in the world. Mass shootings, health care affordability, discrimination, racism, sexual harassment, climate change, the presidential elections, and literally: staying informed on current events have caused roughly 70% of people to report moderate or extreme stress , with increased rates for people of color, LGBTQIA Americans, and other discriminated groups. 90% of high schoolers and college students report moderate or higher stress, with half reporting depression and a lack of energy and motivation .

In 2015, 1,100 parents were surveyed on the impact of homework on family life. Fights over homework were 200% more likely in families where parents didn’t have a college degree. Generally, these families believed that if their children didn’t understand a homework assignment then they must have been not paying attention at school. This led to young people feeling dumb or upset, and parents feeling like their child was lying or goofing off. The lead researcher noted, 

All of our results indicate that homework as it is now being assigned discriminates against children whose parents don’t have a college degree, against parents who have English as a second language, against, essentially, parents who are poor.

Schooling is so integrated into family life that a group of researchers noted that “...homework tended to recreate the problems of school, such as status degradation.” An online survey of over 2,000 students and families found that 90% of students reported additional stress from homework, and 40% of families saw it as nothing more than busy work. Authors Sara Bennett and Nancy Kalish wrote the aptly titled The Case Against Homework which conducted interviews across the mid-2000s with families and children, citing just how many people are burdened with overscheduling homework featuring over-the-top assignments and constant work. One parent remarked,

I sit on Amy's bed until 11 p.m. quizzing her, knowing she's never going to use this later, and it feels like abuse," says Nina of Menlo Park, California, whose eleven-year-old goes to a Blue Ribbon public school and does at least three-and-a-half hours of homework each night. Nina also questions the amount of time spent on "creative" projects. "Amy had to visit the Mission in San Francisco and then make a model of it out of cardboard, penne pasta, and paint. But what was she supposed to be learning from this? All my daughter will remember is how tense we were in the garage making this thing. Then when she handed it in, the teacher dropped it and all the penne pasta flew off." These days, says Nina, "Amy's attitude about school has really soured." Nina's has, too. "Everything is an emergency and you feel like you're always at battle stations."

1/3rd of the families interviewed felt “crushed by the workload.” It didn’t matter if they lived in rural or suburban areas, or if they were rich or poor.

Learning this way is also simply ineffective because well, that’s just not how kids learn! Young people build upon prior knowledge. They use what they know to make what they’re currently doing easier. Adding more and more content to a student’s plate – having to connect the dots and build upon more information – especially with the distractions of home life is unrealistic. Plus, simply put…it’s just not fun! Why would I want to spend all of my free time on homework rather than hanging out with my friends or playing video games?

Even with all that said – if other countries demonstrate educational success on standardized testing with little to no assigned homework and limited school hours (nevermind the fact that this is measured through the questionable method of standardized testing), shouldn’t we take a step back and analyze the system as a whole, rather than figure out better homework policies? If other countries do this with limited to no homework , why can’t everyone else?

Investigating Systemic Problems

Perhaps the solution to academic achievement in America isn’t doubling down on increasing the work students do at home, but solving the underlying systemic inequities: the economic and discriminatory problems that plague our society. Yes, the United States tends to fall behind other countries on math and reading scores. Many countries impose increased workloads on students because they are afraid that they will fall behind economically with the standard of living to the rest of the world. But perhaps the problem with education doesn’t lie in not having enough “rigorous” methods, but with how easy it is for a family to simply live and be content.

Finland, frequently cited as a model education system which grew to prominence during the 2000s through popular scholars like Pasi Sahlberg, enjoys some of the highest standards of living in the world:

• Finland’s life expectancy is 81.8 years, compared to the US’ 78.7 years . Unlike Finland, there’s a notable difference between the richest and poorest Americans . The richest Americans are expected to live, on average, nearly 15 years longer than the poorest. Further, America’s life expectancy is declining, the only industrialized country with this statistic .
• Finland’s health care is rated best in the world and only spends $3,078 per capita, compared to $8,047 in the US.
• Finland has virtually no homelessness , compared to the 500,000 (and growing) homeless population in the United States .
• Finland has the lowest inequality levels in the EU , compared to the United States with one of the highest inequality levels in the world . Research has demonstrated that countries with lower inequality levels are happier and healthier .

These statistics reflect that potentially — instead of investing hundreds of millions of dollars in initiatives to increase national test scores , such as homework strategies, curriculum changes, and nationwide “raising the bar” initiatives — that we should invest in programs that improve our standard of living, such as universal healthcare and housing. The solution to test scores is rooted in solving underlying inequities in our societies — shining a light on our core issues — rather than making teachers solve all of our community’s problems.

This doesn’t mean that there’s no space for improving pedagogy, schooling, or curriculums, but at the end of the day the solution cannot solely be by improving education.

‍ Creating Future Workers

Education often equates learning with work. As a teacher, I had to stop myself from behaving like an economics analyst: telling students to quit “wasting time”, stating that the purpose of the lesson is useful for securing a high salary career, seeing everything as prep for college and career (and college’s purpose as just for more earnings in a career), and making blanket assumptions that those who aren’t motivated will ultimately never contribute to society, taking on “low levels” of work that “aren’t as important” as other positions.

A common argument exists that the pressure of homework mirrors the real world – that we should assign homework because that’s “just the way things are.” If we want kids to succeed in the “real world”, they need to have this pressure.

But this mentality is unhealthy and unjust. The purpose of education should be to develop purpose. People live happier and healthier lives as a result of pursuing and developing a core purpose. Some people’s purpose is related to their line of work, but there is not necessarily a connection. However, the primary goal for education stated by districts, states, and the national government is to make “productive members of society” – those who are “prepared for the future” through “college and career readiness.” When we double down on economic principles, rather than look to developmental psychology and holistic care, to raise young people, it’s no wonder we’re seeing such horrific statistics related to childhood .

Further, the consistent pressure to solely learn for future economic gain raises generations of young people to believe that wealth is a measurement of success, and that specific lines of work create happiness. Teachers and parents are told to make their children “work hard” for future success and develop “grit.” Although grit is an important indicator of overcoming obstacles , it is not developed by enforcing grit through authoritarian classrooms or meaningless, long tasks like homework. In fact, an argument could be made that many Americans accept their dramatically poor work-life balance and lack of access to needs such as affordable health care by being brought up in a society that rewards tasks of “working through it” to “eventually achieve happiness.”

Many families have shifted from having children participate in common household chores and activities to have them exclusively focus on their school work. Americans have more difficulty than ever raising children, with increasing demands of time and rising childcare costs . When teachers provide more and more homework, they take away from the parents’ ability to structure their household according to their needs. In fact, children with chores show completely positive universal growth across the board , from time management skills to responsibility to managing a healthy work-life balance. 

Of course, this is not to say that it is all the teacher’s fault. Educators face immense pressure to carry out governmental/school policies that place test scores at the forefront. Plus, most families had homework themselves – so continuing the practice only makes sense. Many of these policies require homework, and an educator’s employment is centered on enacting these changes. Barbara Stengel , an education professor, noted that the reason why so much homework isn’t necessarily interesting or applicable to a student’s lived experience is because “some of the people who would really have pushed the limits of that are no longer in teaching.” The constant pressure on teachers to raise test scores while simultaneously being overworked and underpaid is making many leave the profession. Etta Kralovec and John Buell add:

As more academic demands are placed on teachers, homework can help lengthen the school day and thus ensure ‘coverage’ — that is, the completion of the full curriculum that each teacher is supposed to cover during the school year…This in itself places pressure on teachers to create meaningful homework and often to assign large amounts of it so that the students’ parents will think the teacher is rigorous and the school has high academic standards. Extensive homework is frequently linked in our minds to high standards.

Therefore, there’s a connection to be made between the school- or work-life balance of children and the people who are tasked with teaching them. 8% of the teacher workforce leaves every year , with one of the primary reasons being poor work-life balance . Perhaps teachers see an increased desire to “work” students in their class and at home due to the pressures they face in their own occupation?

The more we equate work with learning, and the more we accept that a school’s primary purpose is to prepare workers, the less we actually succeed at promoting academics. Instead, we bolster the neoliberal tendencies of the United States (and others like it) to work hard, yet comparably to other countries’ lifestyle gains, achieve little.

This is why so many families demand that their children have ample amounts of homework. In fact, the majority of parents believe their students have just the right amount. They’re afraid that their kids are going to fall behind, doomed to a life within an increasingly hostile and inequitable society. They want the best for their children, and taking the risk of not assigning homework means that someone else may take that top slot. The same could be said for many parts of the “tracks toward college and career readiness” that professor William Deresiewicz refers to as “zombication” – lurching through each stage of the rat race in competitive admissions: a lot of assignments, difficult courses, sports, clubs, forced volunteerism, internships, and other things to pack our schedules.

The United States must examine the underlying inequities of peoples’ lives, rather than focus on increasing schools’ workloads and lessening children’s free time for mythical academic gains that lead to little change. Teacher preparation programs and popular authors need to stop promoting “interesting and fun ways to teach ‘x’!” and propose systemic changes that radically change the way education is done, including systemic changes to society at large. Only then will the United States actually see improved livelihoods and a better education system for all.

And what could be done instead? Much of the research and writing on homework tends to conclude that we should find a “happy middle ground” to continue the practice of homework, just in case it does indeed work. However, based on the decades of studies we have on this issue…I’m not really sure. It seems the best practice, by far, is to eliminate homework altogether outside of incredibly niche and rare scenarios. If a student asks for more things to do at home because they want to explore something that interests them, great! But that doesn’t need to be mandated homework.

Human Restoration Project believes that the four recommendations of the late educator and scholar Ken Robinson allows young people to learn for themselves and make the most of their lives:

• Let children spend time with their families. The single strongest predictor of academic success and fewer behavioral problems for a child, 3-12 years old, is eating as a family. Make planned time during the day to catch up with children, talking to them about what they’re learning, and encouraging them to achieve.
• Give children time to play outside or create something, preferably not always with a screen. Let them dive into their passions and plan a trip to a library, park, or museum. Explore free online resources to discover new skills and interests.
• Give children opportunities to read by themselves or with their family. One of the best ways to learn about the world is developing a lifelong love of reading. Children who prioritize reading are more motivated to learn and see drastically improved academic outcomes.
• Let children sleep! Elementary students should sleep at least 10 hours each night and adolescents, 9 hours. Being awake and ready to tackle each day keeps us energized and healthy.

If you’re interested in learning more, see The Case Against Homework by Nancy Kalish and Sara Bennett, The Homework Myth by Alfie Kohn, The End of Homework by Etta Kralovec and John Muelle, or one of the many citations linked in the show notes.

You can also watch a modified video version of this piece on our YouTube channel:

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I think when we were talking about what it gives us time to do, folks are able to get up and learn to paint, play guitar. What have folks been learning. This time isn't lost. Learning looks differently but I think we can lean into that. Who are the transmitters of knowledge? What does knowledge transmission look like? How do we constitute learning and what do those content areas look like in how we might think of things as more of...someone might call it transdisciplinary. So those are just what I was thinking but I think it's certainly a time. And we should, at least I'll say in my opinion, not think of this so much as a learning loss. It doesn't value what families and communities have been doing during this time and only puts out how knowledge translates in this academic sense and these structures that aren't always as flexible as we might add.

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Education scholar Denise Pope has found that too much homework has negative effects on student well-being and behavioral engagement. (Image credit: L.A. Cicero)

A Stanford researcher found that too much homework can negatively affect kids, especially their lives away from school, where family, friends and activities matter.

“Our findings on the effects of homework challenge the traditional assumption that homework is inherently good,” wrote Denise Pope , a senior lecturer at the Stanford Graduate School of Education and a co-author of a study published in the Journal of Experimental Education .

The researchers used survey data to examine perceptions about homework, student well-being and behavioral engagement in a sample of 4,317 students from 10 high-performing high schools in upper-middle-class California communities. Along with the survey data, Pope and her colleagues used open-ended answers to explore the students’ views on homework.

Median household income exceeded $90,000 in these communities, and 93 percent of the students went on to college, either two-year or four-year.

Students in these schools average about 3.1 hours of homework each night.

“The findings address how current homework practices in privileged, high-performing schools sustain students’ advantage in competitive climates yet hinder learning, full engagement and well-being,” Pope wrote.

Pope and her colleagues found that too much homework can diminish its effectiveness and even be counterproductive. They cite prior research indicating that homework benefits plateau at about two hours per night, and that 90 minutes to two and a half hours is optimal for high school.

Their study found that too much homework is associated with:

* Greater stress: 56 percent of the students considered homework a primary source of stress, according to the survey data. Forty-three percent viewed tests as a primary stressor, while 33 percent put the pressure to get good grades in that category. Less than 1 percent of the students said homework was not a stressor.

* Reductions in health: In their open-ended answers, many students said their homework load led to sleep deprivation and other health problems. The researchers asked students whether they experienced health issues such as headaches, exhaustion, sleep deprivation, weight loss and stomach problems.

* Less time for friends, family and extracurricular pursuits: Both the survey data and student responses indicate that spending too much time on homework meant that students were “not meeting their developmental needs or cultivating other critical life skills,” according to the researchers. Students were more likely to drop activities, not see friends or family, and not pursue hobbies they enjoy.

A balancing act

The results offer empirical evidence that many students struggle to find balance between homework, extracurricular activities and social time, the researchers said. Many students felt forced or obligated to choose homework over developing other talents or skills.

Also, there was no relationship between the time spent on homework and how much the student enjoyed it. The research quoted students as saying they often do homework they see as “pointless” or “mindless” in order to keep their grades up.

“This kind of busy work, by its very nature, discourages learning and instead promotes doing homework simply to get points,” Pope said.

She said the research calls into question the value of assigning large amounts of homework in high-performing schools. Homework should not be simply assigned as a routine practice, she said.

“Rather, any homework assigned should have a purpose and benefit, and it should be designed to cultivate learning and development,” wrote Pope.

High-performing paradox

In places where students attend high-performing schools, too much homework can reduce their time to foster skills in the area of personal responsibility, the researchers concluded. “Young people are spending more time alone,” they wrote, “which means less time for family and fewer opportunities to engage in their communities.”

Student perspectives

The researchers say that while their open-ended or “self-reporting” methodology to gauge student concerns about homework may have limitations – some might regard it as an opportunity for “typical adolescent complaining” – it was important to learn firsthand what the students believe.

The paper was co-authored by Mollie Galloway from Lewis and Clark College and Jerusha Conner from Villanova University.

Media Contacts

Denise Pope, Stanford Graduate School of Education: (650) 725-7412, [email protected] Clifton B. Parker, Stanford News Service: (650) 725-0224, [email protected]

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Why Students Should not Have Homework

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Time for balance and well-being, enhanced learning experiences, development of independent learning, social and emotional growth.

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Inspired Together Teachers

10 Reasons Why Students Don’t Do Homework

January 18, 2019 by Inspired Together Teachers 3 Comments

Though the issue of homework is complicated and often involves a debate of whether or not homework is actually beneficial, the fact remains that most teachers still assign homework and some students will not do their homework.

If we can understand why students don’t do their homework, we have a better chance of both assigning homework that students will do and in doing what we can to create the motivation for them to do it. At the very least, understanding that there are many reasons that students don’t do homework can help teachers to realize that it isn’t personal. Students often don’t do homework for reasons that aren’t even about you, your teaching, or your subject matter.

Here is a list of 10 reasons that students don’t do homework, aligned with suggestions that may help to alleviate the problem.

They don’t know how to do the assignment. 

In order to do their work, students need to understand the directions and have the basic skills need in order to complete the task. This usually means that students have been introduced to a topic, have had some instruction and are not trying to learn something new and difficult on their own. The material also needs to be at the students’ instructional or independent level. Be sure your directions are clear and specific and that the level of the work is appropriate for the students.

They don’t understand the purpose for the assignment.

When students understand the importance of something they are learning, they are more likely to feel compelled to do it. We want to know and do things that are going to help us in our lives. When students perceive an assignment as busywork, they often rebel. If a student can do ten math problems correctly, doing one hundred math problems is overkill and perceived as busywork. So is spending hours using a dictionary to define words. Make sure that students know how the homework will help them. Help them to connect the content to real world tasks.

Students are overwhelmed by the enormity of the task.

We’ve all had experiences where we have felt overloaded with too much to do. As adults, we have also figured out ways to break down tasks. Students are still learning to manage large tasks. Help them to break down large assignments into smaller parts. Instead of assigning a large project due in three weeks, help students to break down the project into smaller chunks and then assign smaller chunks for homework in the days leading up to the due date for a big project.

Assignments are based on low level tasks.

Basic recall gets boring quickly. An assignment such as giving students fifty sentences and having them underline the noun once and the verb twice is drudgery and doesn’t engage them. How much more fun would it be to have a contest to see who could correctly incorporate the most verbs in a sentence?  Consider homework that require higher thinking levels such as application, analysis, synthesis and evaluation.

Students have too many assignments. 

This is a particular danger in middle and high school when students have many different teachers. At this level, teachers often don’t know what other teachers are assigning. You may think that homework will only take them thirty minutes. But if they have seven subjects and every teacher gives them thirty minutes of homework, the student is facing three to four hours of homework. Good teaching teams often discuss homework assignments and try to balance the load so that students don’t have many big assignments due at the same time.

Students don’t have time.

Many students are involved in many extracurricular activities. This is positive and those activities often help students to be engaged with school. When you add practices or games into the mix, it often becomes impossible to do hours of homework on any given night. Older students may have jobs or other responsibilities. Consider giving students assignments ahead of time so they can work on them throughout the week rather than assigning everything to be due the next day.

Students don’t get feedback on their work .

When a student turns in an assignment, they expect feedback. They may get a grade, but they also want comments, especially on written work. Homework should be an opportunity for learning. Students need feedback in order to learn. Teachers can read student work and provide feedback, or use homework in classroom discussions and activities in ways that allow students to get feedback or use their work for a purposeful activity.

Sometimes, the reason that students don’t do work is not related to you or your content. These are more difficult to control, but there are usually positive things you can do to help with the situation.

Students don’t have an appropriate environment to do work at home .

Let’s face it, some students live in chaotic environments. They may not have a quiet place to work or the tools they need in order to do homework. Having a one-on-one conversation with students can help. Talk about what they need in order to do their work and how they might get it. Could they stay at school and extra hour and work in a quiet room? Could they go to the public library? Could they carve a quiet corner of their home?

The student’s family is not supportive of education.

As much as we wish it weren’t true, some students come from families that do not value education. The student is not then likely to get the support or encouragement to do homework. Other families value education, but parents are absent or unable to help their children with homework. Your first instinct might be to “fix” the family. An easier route is to work with the student. Be their encourager. Let them know that you think they can succeed. Let them know how valuable a good education might be to them. We know of a first grader whose parent would not read with him. The teacher made a deal that the student could read to his baby brother, his dog, or even a stuffed animal. If he did that, he could sign his own name on the form that parents usually signed stating that they read together.

The student is rebelling against a parent.

If a parent cares about a student’s grades and a student is trying to rebel, often a quick way to do so is to stop doing homework. This usually gets the parent’s attention quickly. This is particularly true in cases where parents are very demanding and very controlling. Sometimes, the only way an adolescent knows how to rebel is to refuse to do something. This causes grief for both parties. Guiding the parent and student to compromise can be successful.  Essentially, help them to negotiate trade. For example, if the student agrees to do homework each night when he chooses to do it, the parent gives up the demand that it be done immediately when the student gets home from school. Both parties can even sign a contract.

If you suspect a student is rebelling, see if you can find out why. That will also help you see possible solutions. Don’t hesitate to get help and support from a guidance counselor, instructional coach or administrator.

These are some of the most common reasons students don’t complete homework. There are undoubtedly many more possible reasons. Though you can’t control all things, you can try to identify why students aren’t doing the homework and then see if there are ways to fix the problem. If we keep our eye on the goal, which is learning, it is less likely that we will fall into the “blame and punish” game that many teachers engage in. Blaming and punishing don’t usually result in more learning!

What are some of the effective strategies you have used to increase homework completion? We would love to hear your ideas in the comments below.

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October 3, 2022 at 11:41 pm

For me, I struggled to do homework as a child because my attention needs were not met. I had no friends in school and spent the whole day wishing to be with family who loved me, only to be forced into isolation again for an hour of homework that I couldn’t always do alone and made me feel inferior and hopeless about myself and the future. Meanwhile, everyone else, in my mind, was doing something fun together while that was happening and I felt like I was being punished.

In adulthood, work has taken the place of homework and I am even more unhappy, isolated and have no life outside work that makes up for it. Luckily, I am not the type to become addicted to substances.

So, don’t let you child’s fate be like mine. Make sure your child’s needs for love are met, and that way they will have the internal strength to do an unfun task, and each one thereafter.

October 5, 2022 at 2:59 pm

Hi Christine, Thank you for sharing your experiences. You are not alone in your struggles either as a child or now as an adult. I hope that you are getting help for your depression. You can get better! There are ways to shift your mindset and to discover ways to be happier. No one has a perfect life, but we can all find ways to enjoy life. I hope you can find someone to talk to who can help you through your struggles. You are worth it!

[…] you know that one of the top 10 reasons kids don’t do their homework is lack of an appropriate space to do assignments at […]

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Kids Should Not Have Homework: 5 Arguments To Support Your Point

Homework has been a part of students’ lives for so long that the idea of not doing it can seem incredible, surreal, or even impossible. But if you stop to think about it, the truth is that homework is not necessary. Do you have trouble believing that? Well, here are a few great arguments that will definitely convince you.

Without further ado, here are the top five best arguments that will definitely convince any naysayers that homework is not something that should be done by kids.

• Kids already have seven hours of school. You start school at eight and go home at three. That’s a full day of school. Most adults work similar lengths of time at work and come home exhausted. Yet they can’t understand when their kids have trouble focusing at the end of a full day of learning. And that brings us to our next point.
• It’s counterintuitive to make children spend too many hours studying. If an adult has attention problems, that’s nothing compared to a kid. Children are still growing, their brains aren’t yet fully developed, and it’s crucial that they get a lot of exercise and free time. Something that they could do in thirty minutes if fully rested and energized will drag on for four hours if they’re restless and can’t focus because they left seven hours of school to directly jump into three hours of homework.
• Getting sun and exercise is crucial for your health. If you’re cooped up in school during the day, then have to do your homework when you get home, you’ll develop poor health. A much better solution would be to do all the learning you need to do in one place, in a short amount of time. When you stop school, that’s the time for you to play and go outside and get exercise.
• Seven hours of school should be enough to learn anything. Sure, let’s say that you have recess and lunch--there’s still a good five hours where you’re studying. If you can’t learn what you need in that time, there’s a problem. Rather than giving you lots of homework after school to compensate, schools should look at how they can rework teaching systems in class to make the most of the time you have in school.
• Having a social and family life is important. In short, you should have a balanced life. Many adults get angry if their work life spills over into their personal life. They like to go out after work and spend time with friends. But children should get the same respect. School is a time for learning, and it takes up much of the day. After school is the time for pursuing your own hobbies and personal pastimes.
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5 reasons young students should not be assigned homework.

• In Education
• August 17, 2016

For ages, homework has been a somewhat universally despised notion by kids across the globe. As if having to be in class all day wasn’t enough, extra work is being handed out to take home!

Well, Harris Cooper , author of The Battle over Homework: Common Ground for Administrators, Teachers, and Parents , and professor of Psychology and Neuroscience at Duke University, has been conducting research on homework for over 25 years. And he’s found some pretty interesting stuff.

Homework, at the high school level, is actually seen to provide great benefit to students. However, this benefit becomes less and less as you move down the academic hierarchy. Middle school students do not benefit nearly as much, and elementary school students don’t benefit from homework at all.

And others agree, like University of Arizona Education professor, Etta Kralovec .

Why homework should not be assigned to elementary school students

The research has pointed out a few reasons that homework should be done away with at the elementary school level:

1. Children at this level are just beginning their academic careers. Homework has been seen to have a negative impact on young students’ attitudes toward school, so making them dislike it from the start is counter-intuitive. Learning at this level should be fun and engaging. Having them read is noted as the better solution by researchers.

2. Homework is largely designed to build the relationship between parents and children, by having the parents get involved, but it has been seen to have the opposite effect on elementary school students. Because they need to be reminded about their homework at this age, kids and parents will often battle because doing more work before bedtime is not something they’re often interested in. This relationship can carry into later years of schooling where homework actually provides the most benefit.

3. Children gain a false sense of responsibility from homework. Many supporters of homework claim that regular homework gives children a sense of responsibility, but this has only been found to be true when they are older. Having to remind a child of homework every night destroys this sense of responsibility.

4. Homework takes up time that should be spent doing kid-stuff. Research has found that kids don’t exercise as much as they should. Physical activities in the evenings and over the holidays, like team sports or just playing outside, benefit children much more than homework.

5. Rest is key to a child’s productivity in school. At this age, elementary school students should be getting about 10 hours of sleep per day, and homework often cuts into this time. If you want your child to be 100 percent ready to take on their day, they need that rest time.

This article was republished under creative commons licensing from Expanded Consciousness . 

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Major 10 Reasons Why Students Should Not Have Homework In 2023

Homework – something students always get, but is it good or just extra work? People, like parents and teachers, have different thoughts on this. In this blog, we are going to dig deep into 10 reasons why students should avoid homework.

We will also determine when students can bring their phones to school in 2023. First, let’s understand what homework really is and why some folks say it’s not so great. We will learn about the good side of no homework and discover some interesting facts that support saying no to homework. So, let’s see if homework is helpful or not. 

Stay tuned to learn more about 10 reasons why students should not have homework.

What Is Homework?

Table of Contents

Homework is a school task that teachers give to students to do outside of the classroom. It’s like extra practice to help you learn more about what you study in school. Homework can be reading a book, doing math problems, writing about a topic, or other assignments. When you finish your homework, you show what you’ve learned and get better at your school subjects.

Homework is also a way for teachers to see how well you understand what they taught in class. It’s like a way for you to show what you’ve learned. Most homework assignments have a deadline, therefore it is critical that you complete it on time in order to gain knowledge and advance your abilities. It is a chance to practice and get better at the things you’re learning in school, which can help you do well in your tests and exams.

Why Is Homework Bad?

Homework can sometimes be bad for a few reasons. First, it can lead to stress and burnout, overwhelming students with too much work. Second, it can take away time that kids need for other important things like family time, sports, or just relaxing. Additionally, it might not always be useful, as some homework tasks might not help students learn better. Moreover, it can create inequality, as not all students have the same resources or help at home to complete their homework. Lastly, it can sometimes feel boring and repetitive, making kids dislike learning.

• Causes stress and burnout
• Takes away time from other important activities
• It may not always be useful for learning
• Creates inequality between students
• It can be boring and repetitive, leading to a dislike of learning

10 Reasons Why Students Should Not Have Homework 

Here we will discuss 10 reasons why students should not have homework: 

1. Too Much Work

Homework can be like having too much to do. Students get many assignments, and it can become very stressful. This means they have less time for fun things like sports, hanging out with friends, or just relaxing. This stress can make them feel anxious, and it can be challenging to find a balance in their lives. Students need time to breathe and be kids.

2. Less Family Time

Homework takes away time that students could spend with their families. They end up spending long hours doing homework, which leaves less time to be with their parents, siblings, or other family members. This can lead to weaker family bonds and make it harder to build good relationships. Strong families are important for kids’ happiness and growth.

3. Health Problems

Too much homework can harm a student’s health. It can make them lose sleep, worry a lot, and even cause physical health problems like headaches or stomachaches. It’s important for students to be healthy and happy, so too much homework isn’t good for them. Good health is the foundation of a good life.

4. Less Time to Explore

Homework can stop students from trying new things and finding their interests. When they have to spend so much time on homework, they can’t explore their interests or develop their hobbies. This can hold them back from personal growth. Exploring and learning about the world is an important part of growing up.

5. Unequal Opportunities

Not all students have the same help and resources for homework. Some have more support and better tools, while others may not. This can make educational inequalities worse, as students with less support can struggle more, making it harder for them to succeed in school. Every student deserves a fair chance.

6. Boring and Repetitive

Homework can become very boring and repetitive. When students do the same kinds of assignments over and over, it can make them lose interest in learning. They may just do the work to finish it, without really understanding or enjoying the subject. Learning should be fun and exciting.

7. Not Really Learning

Homework can lead to memorization without real understanding. Instead of really learning, students might just try to finish the assignments as quickly as possible. This doesn’t help them learn well in the long run. We want students to understand and enjoy what they’re learning.

8. No Personal Time

Students need time for themselves to relax, do things they enjoy, and take care of themselves. Too much homework means they have very little time for these important activities. Learning how to manage time and take care of oneself is important for their growth. Personal time is crucial for a well-rounded life.

9. Kills Creativity

Homework can make it hard for students to think creatively and solve problems. With so much work to do, they don’t have time for open-minded, creative thinking. This kind of thinking is important for solving real-life problems and coming up with new ideas. Creative thinking helps us tackle the big challenges of the world.

10. Debate Over Value

People don’t all agree on whether homework really helps students learn. Some studies say it does, while others say it doesn’t make much difference. Since it’s not clear, it’s worth thinking about whether the time spent on homework could be used for other activities that we know help students learn better. It’s important to use time wisely and focus on what really works for students.

Advantages Of Having No Homework

Here are some advantages of having no homework: 

1. More Free Time

Not having homework means students have more free time after school. This extra time can be used for hobbies, sports, spending time with family, or simply relaxing. It allows kids to be more well-rounded and happy.

2. Less Stress

Without homework, students experience less stress. They don’t have to worry about tight deadlines or piles of assignments, so they can focus on learning in a more relaxed and healthier way.

3. Better Sleep

No homework means better sleep. Students can go to bed at a reasonable time, ensuring they are well-rested and ready to concentrate during school hours.

4. Opportunities for Exploration

When there’s no homework, students have more opportunities to explore their interests and learn about things they are passionate about. They can read books, explore new topics, or work on personal projects.

5. Improved Family Time

The absence of homework allows for improved family time. Parents and kids can get to know each other, share experiences, and make the home a loving and caring place. This strengthens family relationships and creates a more positive atmosphere.

Read More 

How To Stop Procrastinating On Homework

How to Get Motivated to Do Homework

Interesting Facts On Why Homework Should Be Banned

Here are some interesting facts on why homework should be banned: 

1. Negative Impact on Health

Homework should be banned because it can have a negative impact on a student’s health. Spending long hours on homework can lead to stress, sleep deprivation, and a sedentary lifestyle, which are harmful to physical and mental well-being.

2. Reduces Family Time

Homework takes away precious family time. When students are buried in assignments, they have less time to spend with their families, leading to a decrease in family bonding and support.

3. Inequality in Resources

Homework can lead to inequality. Not all students have access to the same resources, such as a quiet place to study, internet, or parental assistance, making it unfair to some students.

4. No Proven Benefits

Despite its prevalence, homework doesn’t always show clear academic benefits. Research suggests that the advantages of homework are often minimal, and banning it might not affect students’ learning negatively.

5. Increased Stress Levels

Homework can increase stress levels, which can be detrimental to a student’s mental health. Stress can make you anxious, depressed, and not want to learn.

6. Encourages Cheating

The pressure to complete homework on time can encourage cheating and plagiarism, undermining the honesty and integrity of education.

7. Reduces Creativity

Homework can be rigid and repetitive, leaving little room for creativity and independent thinking, which are essential for a well-rounded education. Banning homework can encourage more creative and flexible learning approaches.

Is Homework Is Bad Or Good For Students – From Parents & Teachers Perspective

From a parent’s perspective, homework can be a topic of debate. Some parents see both the downsides and benefits of homework, and it’s essential to consider both sides:

On the Bad Side

• Excessive Stress: Many parents worry that homework can cause their children excessive stress and anxiety, especially when the workload is overwhelming.
• Less Family Time: Homework can reduce the quality family time parents can spend with their children. They may want to prioritize bonding and relaxation.
• Struggle with Complex Subjects : Parents may find it challenging to help their children with complex or unfamiliar subjects, leading to frustration for both.
• Lack of Playtime: Homework can limit a child’s playtime, which is vital for their physical and social development .
• Dislike for Learning: If homework becomes too burdensome or boring, it can lead to children developing a dislike for learning, which parents want to avoid.

On the Good Side

• Practice and Reinforcement: Homework provides an opportunity for children to practice and reinforce what they’ve learned in school.
• Preparation for Responsibility: Homework teaches kids responsibility and time management, valuable life skills.
• Parental Involvement: Homework allows parents to be involved in their children’s education, offering support and guidance.
• Monitoring Progress : It enables parents to monitor their child’s academic progress and identify areas where additional help may be needed.
• Preparation for the Real World: Students can get ready for the tasks and due dates they will face in the future by doing their homework.

From a teacher’s perspective, homework is a topic with its own set of pros and cons:

• Inequality in Resources: Teachers might be concerned that some students have better resources at home, such as access to the internet or parental assistance, creating inequality in completing homework.
• Overburdening Students: Teachers may worry about overburdening students with excessive homework, potentially causing stress, burnout, and negatively impacting their well-being.
• Lack of Proven Benefits: Some teachers may question the effectiveness of homework, as research does not always clearly demonstrate its academic advantages.
• Cheating and Plagiarism: Teachers have to be vigilant about cheating and plagiarism, as the pressure to complete homework may push students to unethical behaviors.
• Potential for Repetition: Teachers might be concerned that homework assignments could become repetitive and dull, leading to a decrease in students’ motivation to learn.
• Reinforcement of Learning: Homework provides students with opportunities to reinforce what they’ve learned in class, which is important for understanding and retaining the material.
• Preparation for Responsibility: Homework helps students develop responsibility, time management, and organizational skills, which are valuable for their future.
• Parental Involvement: Homework encourages parental involvement in a child’s education, allowing for a stronger partnership between teachers and parents.
• Assessment of Progress: Teachers can see how their students are doing and see where they might need more help by giving them homework.
• Preparation for the Real World: Students can become more responsible and disciplined by doing their homework. It helps them get used to the duties and limits they will face in real life.

Debate about homework continues, and there are ten good reasons why students should not have homework. First, it can make kids stressed and tired. It also takes away time from family and fun activities, which are important. Homework might not help students learn much. 

Moreover, it can even make some students cheat or copy from others. Many students and parents say we should have less or no homework. They believe that focusing on good teaching in class is better than too much homework. So, the idea of reducing homework or even getting rid of it is something many people support.

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Students Should NOT Have Homework

After hours and hours and hours of doing homework a student starts crying. He hits his head on the wall, knowing that he won’t solve the math problem, knowing that he won’t be able to finish his homework for his other classes the next day. So many students suffer every day from doing homework. Should it be acceptable for students to be experiencing his? No, definitely not. Students in grades K-8 should not experiencing this not until high school. There is no academic benefit of homework in grades K-8. According to Alfie Kohn “… No study has ever demonstrated any academic benefit to assign homework before children are in high school” (Edutopia). Osiris Contreras from Centennial Middle School said, “I think there shouldn’t be homework. I waste more time doing it, and I don’t see any benefits”, she thinks she is wasting her time on homework. Homework also negatively affects students’ health. Students get stressed from homework. Their head hurts, they don’t want to hear anything, and they start hitting them selves. Students can actually get sick from homework. No one has gone as far as the American Child Association did in the 1930s when it pinned homework and child labor as leading killers of children who contracted tuberculosis and heart disease (The Washington Post). Students need to play to be healthy. According to Alfie Kohn play is so important to optima child development that it has been recognized by the United Nations High Commission for Human Rights as a right of every child. Homework can affect kids’ health by turning them into “couch potatoes” as they spend more time studying than playing outside. Mary Bousted, General Secretary of the ATL (Association of Teachers and Lecturers), said “I think a lot of homework is a waste of time. It puts a huge amount of stress particularly on disadvantaged children from disadvantaged homes” (The Telegraph). Grades K-8 should definitely not have homework. Students need to play and have time for them selves, not be stuck always doing homework. They should just go to school to study and from school to their house to have free time not to think about homework. All that homework does is creating stress and that’s not good. Go out side and enjoy the world!!! Play, sing, jump, and don’t worry about homework live the crazy life at least until high school. JJ

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im doing a debate and this helped me very much thxz

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Student athletes can’t escape homework struggle. Does it matter?

Cries of teen frustration about homework often pop up on social media as a weekend closes and the impending Monday looms over a stack of unfinished reading or worksheets.

Seeing memes for “Sunday homework got me like... ” might elicit a chuckle. But the sentiment is real. It’s not only Sunday — that’s just the inevitable buildup to a week of juggling class, practice, regular meals, games, homework, chores. Maybe also a paying job.

And high school athletes feel the pressure — more than many of their peers who are simply busy — often in exponential ways during the season that could be hard to understand if you aren’t playing sports.

Trying to get through studying like.. 😴😴😴 pic.twitter.com/VVmbDGyTug — Get Schooled (@getschooled) January 27, 2016

“There are definitely nights where it’s overwhelming,” says Brazil Rule, a senior on the Shenandoah Marlins competitive swim team based in Waynesboro who leaves the house to swim before 5 a.m. most days of the week. “The next morning, I will take practice off, or I’ll have to have a mental health day.”

Makenzie Gray, a sophomore and multi-sport athlete at Stuarts Draft, says it’s the logistics that can be hard to surmount sometimes. Part of the scheduling rigor involves making time for your body to repair itself after a hard game or practice.

Juggling school & sports? "I study or do homework before the bus leaves or even on the bus." Casey Taylor, Lee High pic.twitter.com/5IxAdiDZXa — wmramsey (@wmramsey) January 30, 2016

“It's usually days when we have an away game where we don't get back until late that I have to make the choice whether to do my homework or sleep,” she says. “For me, sleep suffers. I always feel bad if I don't do my homework.”

The issues are nationwide, really, in almost every high school with traditional sports.

Kayla Rodriguez, a sophomore in Oviedo, Fla., is one of the thousands of teens who talk on social media about their busy schedules.

Sunday night homework got me like 🤕 pic.twitter.com/LjIzv71Wyz — Get Schooled (@getschooled) October 25, 2015

“I often miss out on hanging out with my friends and having a relationship because the little free time I have is spent doing all my homework,” she says. “Sometimes I have to get up early because I can't stay up all night and do my homework!”

FLAT GROWTH IN AMOUNT

A recent Brown Center report on American education pegs the growth of assigned homework as flat over the years — not supporting any hypothesis that the schedule tension for athletes is new. Or if it is increasing, it might not stem from an uptick in homework itself.

it's so hard to manage school and sports, so much homework and not enough time to do it... — A$AP K-ROD (@kaylaskye5678) January 21, 2016

Could distractions like social media and video streaming be more of a factor for teens than an actual change over the years in assignments?

“The current study finds little evidence that the homework load has increased for the average student,” reads the Brown report. “Those with a heavy burden, two or more hours of homework per night, do indeed exist, but they are a distinct minority.”

Robert Pondiscio, a senior fellow at the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, has studied the issue. He advises a network of charter schools in Harlem and writes about education and reform. “The ‘over-scheduled kid’ is one of those phenomena that dominate the conversation in media, but there’s a lot less evidence for it than you might think,” Pondiscio says. “The opposite seemed to be true: participation in organized extracurricular activities is closely related (even when controlled for socioeconomic status) to a broad range of positive outcomes.”

Less than 15 percent of students had what was deemed heavy daily homework, even as 17-year-olds.

His own daughter is a student athlete — better organized than he ever was, Pondiscio says.

George Laase, baseball coach at Robert E. Lee High School, isn't sure that athletes are dealing with any more assignments at home than previous generations.

"With block scheduling and the efforts of our teaching staff, students have a chance to begin or finish homework before the end of class," he says. "There are less books being taken home and more technology available to help complete the task. But regardless of the amount assigned per day, I still believe (letting it pile up) really becomes a matter of choice by the student."

And things like Netflix tempt teens away from work they know they need to do, says Rule, the swimmer.

POSITIVE EFFECTS?

Being busy with all of it, sports and school, does have helpful effects, the studies show: on physical safety and psychological well-being, supportive relationships with peers and adults, higher self-esteem, reduced alcohol and drug use and higher high school graduation rates.

Martha Mikell, a teacher at Stuarts Draft High School, says she sees this phenomena play out.

“As strange as it may sound, I actually see students do a better job keeping on top of things when they are in season,” Mikell says. “The more rigid schedule forces them to allocate their time wisely and reduces procrastination. After all, if you have a project due Friday and games late on Tuesday and Thursday, you better do it on Wednesday.”

I honestly don't understand how people can balance school, multiple sports, jobs, social life, homework, and chores.....like help me. — Elizabeth Racławski (@bissy__) January 21, 2016

Mikell does encourage parents to help their teens build in some downtime. Without that, they can struggle even more, given diminishing returns of chugging ahead all the time without a regular pause to recharge.

Parents themselves say they feel the stress of balancing everything, and especially of knowing when to push their athlete about homework, or not.

Catie Young of Waynesboro talked about it recently after a bout of parental anxiety triggered by homework.

She has a sophomore, Libby, who swims and runs track, plus two kids in middle school.

Do you help them manage sports and homework, or butt out? Young admits to the natural lectures to her children like “don’t suddenly remember at 9 p.m. Sunday that your special group project is due Monday morning."

“I get uncomfortable when the kids don’t do things when I think they should,” she says. “What I would like to do is lecture them — mom knows best. Instead, I try to step back and remember how thankful I am to no longer be a teenager.”

Young and her husband usually let things play out unless something gets majorly out of whack.

“We expect the children to communicate with their coaches and teachers when they have to make accommodations for athletics or academics,” Young says. “Homework that requires computer time or Internet access is difficult to complete while on the road with a team, though. Long competitions make this particularly challenging.”

In Karen Gray’s house in Draft, it is sleep that suffers even as her daughter’s grades remain solid.

“The struggle for me is watching her balance everything and being so hard on herself,” Gray says. “She wants to excel in both, and sleep seems to be the area that is neglected.”

An extensive study based on a nationally representative database of 5,000 families and their kids, and how they spend their time, concluded there was "very limited empirical support for the over-scheduling hypothesis."

Colin Whitmore, a senior at Stuart Hall, plays four sports. Those demands on his body mean he can’t crimp his sleeping schedule too much.

Instead, he tries to get up a little earlier to work when he is fresh. Or he dedicates his study hall or lunch period at school to finishing homework.

“Personally, I deeply value my sleep — I have found that I feel and function much better when I get quality sleep rather than gutting out a late night to finish a paper or project,” Whitmore says. “When I have something due the next day that could keep me up all night, rather than stressing endlessly over it, I normally just go to bed.”

"I had a 10 hour work day today" Bruhhhhh "7 hrs school + 3 hours sports +3 hours homework= 13 hours everyday" — G Cancilla (@GCancilla21) January 21, 2016

In the end, it may just be good practice for these athletes. They will face similar demands in college, if that’s where they are headed.

And most adults have faced the prospect of coffee-guzzling to get through a work day on fumes because parenting, work or going out with friends kept them up late the night before.

Dylan Wimer, a senior at Robert E. Lee High, says meeting that challenge — as best he can — is giving him coping skills for life.

“You have to prioritize,” he says. “Every day I have to plan out what I am going to do — school, track practice, shower, game, go home, study.

“You lose a little sleep.”

THE NEWS LEADER

Advice for winning the homework battle