Homework horror stories are as timeworn as school bullies and cafeteria mystery meat. But as high stakes testing pressures have mounted over the past decadeand global rankings for americas schools have declinedhomework has come under new scrutiny. Diane lowrie says she fled an ocean county, new jersey, school district three years ago when she realized her first graders homework load was nearly crushing him.

Reading logs, repetitive math worksheets, and regular social studies reports turned their living room into an anguished battleground. Tears were shed, every night, says lowrie, 47, an environmental educator, who tried to convince school district administrators that the work was not only numbing, but harmful. Iain started to hate school, to hate learning, and he was only 6 years old, she told me in a recent interview. A 2003 brookings institution study suggests that iains experience may be typical of a few children in pressure cooker schools, but its not a widespread problem. Still, a 2004 university of michigan survey of 2,900 six to seventeen year old children found that time spent each week on homework had increased from 2 hours 38 minutes to 3 hours 58 minutes since 1981. And in his 2001 and 2006 reviews of academic studies of homework outcomes, harris cooper, a professor of psychology and neuroscience at duke university, found little correlation between the amount of homework and academic achievement in elementary school though higher in middle school and high school. Cooper supports the influential ten minute homework rule, which recommends adding ten daily minutes of homework per grade beginning in first grade, up to a maximum of two hours.

The question of how much homework is enough is widely debated and was a focus of the 2009 documentary race to nowhere. A galvanizing cri de coeur about the struggles of kids in high performing schools. I cant remember the last time i had the chance to go in the backyard and just run around, a teenage girl laments in the film. A bewildered looking third girl says: i would spend six hours a night on my homework.

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David baker and gerald letendre, professors of education at penn state, found that in countries with the most successful school systems, like japan, teachers give small amounts homework, while teachers in those with the lowest scores, such as greece and iran, give a lot. The united states falls somewhere in the middleaverage amounts of homework and average test results. Finnish teachers tend to give minimal amounts of homework throughout all the grades the new york times reported finnish high school kids averaged only one half hour a night. Sara bennett, a brooklyn criminal attorney and mother of two, began a second career as an anti homework activist when her first grade son brought home homework only a parent could complete. Is credited with propelling a nationwide parent movement calling for time limits on homework. Last year, the affluent village of ridgewood, new jersey, was shaken by two young suicides, causing school officials to look for ways they could ease kids anxieties.

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Anthony orsini, principal of ridgewoods benjamin franklin middle school, eliminated homework for elective courses and set up an online system that lets families know how long many homework assignments should take. The trend, instead, is to lessen the quantity while improving the quality of homework by using it to complement classroom work, says cathy vatterott, a professor of education at university of missouri at st. Louis and author of rethinking homework: best practices that support diverse needs 2009.

Cynthia schneider, principal of world journalism preparatory school in queens for 570 sixth through twelfth graders, plans to encourage all students to read for pleasure every night, then write a thoughtful response. As for diane lowrie, who left ocean county because of too much homework, she says iain, now 10 and heading for fifth grade in roosevelt, new jersey, is less stressed out. He recently spent 40 hours working on a book report and diorama about the battle of yorktown. I believe in homework because it serves as an opportunity for the student to display his or her understanding of the day's lessons without direct help from the teacher. Too much is when the time reserved for homework is more than forty five minutes to an hour depending on the age and performance level. It has to be understood that parents were the first teachers their child ever had and they need to interact with the child and see how well he comprehending.

Nicks, ville platte, la, first grade my rule for my fourth graders is that if they are overwhelmed by homework, they can send a note from home saying they have tried but can't figure it out. I believe homework is a way for students to practice, not to fail or become discouraged. The work that gets taken home is not homework it is class work that is not finished in class.

Why is it not finished? because the students are wasting their time doing other things. I wish i were able to send home actual homework, as it is an important learning tool. This is my first year teaching, and i have already decided that homework and class work will be two different things next year. What i have found is that the amount of homework is just right but that many kids do so many after school activities that they don't have time at home.

They must sacrifice family time and/or church on wednesday night and on sunday in order to keep up. I am in college now and i cannot attend church at all this semester because of the workload. I can say as a student that when i am given so much work, i am so busy rushing to get it done that i do not learn any of the material. Doesn't that defeat the purpose of going to school? educators need to rethink their objectives and give appropriate lessons to be learned, not just rushed through.

So much time is wasted just looking for ruled notebook paper, colored pencils, or an eraser. When they have a long term assignment due, they don't know what needs to be done first. They don't know how to organize their ideas to write a report in a logical sequence from introduction to conclusion. If students don't acquire these skills in elementary school, they are going to be in over their heads the first week of middle school. As a mother of a first grader, an elementary substitute teacher, and a homework associate for a family of four boys, my answer is a definite yes! i was assured that my son would have 20 minutes of homework during school nights, and no homework on the weekends. Yet, my son is sent home every weekend with his sight word vocabulary box, and a literature book read in class during the week.

Homework definitely doesn't mesh with family time, as many households have two working parents. Some students with learning issues need twice the amount of time to do their homework, while still needing time to connect with their parents, siblings, and neighborhood friends. I praise the teachers that assign the week's homework ahead of time, for example, sending home the assignments for monday through friday. It also helps students to better organize their personal time! a no homework month would be wonderful, even though that sounds far fetched. The cherubs would definitely be smiling and the teachers might be too! michelle izzo, commack, ny, grades k 8 i think that students are receiving too much homework. Students also need to make some choices of their own, because if they learn about what they love, they will love to learn. It is important that we sometimes do things we don't like, but the time spent at home should be quality time with families, as well as extracurricular and safe social activities.

Bogging children down with homework deprives them of learning some important social skills. My daughter has had way too much homework in both fifth and sixth grades! she is also in the band, and this makes it difficult for her to practice playing her instrument 30 minutes every night. Do american students get too much homework students are searching: write my paper for me more than ever before. There are also more companies answering their plea to: write an essay for me and some are much better than others. Students should consider the following points when looking for essay writing services to write essay for me. This is one of the main concerns of students, as they do not have a lot of cash to spend freely. A company should offer their services at reasonable prices, but this should be compared to the quality of their services.