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HOMEWORK – Article #1How much homework are students really doing? Enough or too much?Author(s):Maureen DowneyThe media tends to portray homework as a Goldilocks tale: There's either too much or too little. It's never just right.Yet, national surveys show most parents feel their children's daily homework demands are, in fact, about right. And there's no evidence that the amount of homework has changed much in three decades. So, why is the media fixated on homework horrors?The press often highlights a narrow band of high achievers --- the students who yearn to attend Yale, Duke or Georgia Tech and are taking four Advanced Placement classes, captaining the Mock Trial team and running cross country.But there are many students who aren't doing anything extraordinary. These students aren't overbooked. They're spending evenings playing video games, socializing with pals and posting photos to Instagram. They're content with B's and C's and, while they may belong to a club or two, aren't angling to be valedictorian, class president or an Ivy League graduate.These more typical students may get overlooked in press accounts of homework wars, but they're visible in the annual Brown Center Report on American Education from the Brookings Institution.Looking at data sources that chronicle American education over time, the Brookings study attempted to answer several questions about homework: How much homework do American students have today? Has the homework burden increased, gone down or remained about the same? What do parents think about the homework load?Despite headlines about third graders devoting three hours a night on homework, the Brookings report found only 5 percent of 9-year-olds --- one out of 20 --- spent more than two hours a night on homework; 22 percent had no homework. Only 13 percent of 17-year-olds --- typically juniors or seniors in high school --- spent more than two hours a night on homework. A surprising 27 percent of 17-year-olds had no homework.While there's been a rise in parents protesting homework overload, the Brookings reports notes that when surveyed about the amount of homework their children have, more than 60 percent of parents rate the amount of homework as good or excellent, and about two-thirds also give high ratings to the quality of the homework.Respondents who complain their kids have too much homework never exceed more than 20 percent in surveys, said Brookings researcher Tom Loveless on a web discussion of his report, adding, "The parents who are unhappy with homework and want to see less homework tend to have a philosophical problem with homework. They don't think it's meaningful. They think it's intrusive into family life."Homework rates have remained constant over 30 years, with one exception. "We do see more 9-year-olds who have any homework at all," said Loveless. "So the percentage of 9-year-olds who had no homework has gone down and percentage with some --- meaning a half-hour or less or homework --- has gone up."The report didn't address a big question about homework: Does it matter? A 2006 Duke study found homework improved academic performance of older students. A 2012 study out of the University of Virginia found time spent on math and science homework had no impact on course grades, but modestly improved standardized test scores.It's difficult to correlate time on homework with academic achievement because of the variables in why students may do more homework, said Loveless. For example, younger students who report lots of homework may have a learning problem that causes them to take longer to finish their work; a reading disability may escalate a simple 10-minute assignment into a 50-minute slog. High school presents the opposite scenario. Because high school students choose most of their classes, the teens reporting hours of homework often are high achievers enrolled in Advanced Placement classes.And there is evidence that high achievers do more homework. A recent Stanford study sampled 4,317 students from 10 high-performing high schools in upper-middle-class California communities and found students there average about 3.1 hours of homework each night. The students reported stress, sleep deprivation and less time for friends, families and extracurricular activities as a result of their homework burden.Maureen DowneySource Citation (MLA 7th Edition)Downey, Maureen. "How much homework are students really doing? Enough or too much?" Atlanta Journal-Constitution [Atlanta, GA] 31 Mar. 2014: A12. General OneFile. Web. 21 Oct. 2014.HOMEWORK – Article #2Stanford Research Shows Pitfalls of HomeworkSTANFORD, Calif., March 10 -- Stanford University issued the following news release: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 actThe 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 paradoxIn 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 perspectivesThe 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.Source Citation (MLA 7th Edition)"Stanford Research Shows Pitfalls of Homework." Targeted News Service [TNS] 11 Mar. 2014. Infotrac Newsstand. Web. 21 Oct. 2014.HOMEWORK – Article #3Studies show homework isn't much of a burdenByline: Eleanor ChutePITTSBURGH _ Two complaints parents have about homework are: There's too much and there's too little.In a report released Tuesday from the Brown Center on Education Policy at Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C., senior fellow Tom Loveless says those who think there is too little homework as having the more common complaint.But he adds that those complaining about too much homework get most of the attention."The homework horror stories need to be read in a proper perspective," he wrote. "They seem to originate from the very personal discontents of a small group of parents. They do not reflect the experience of the average family with school-age children."And, Loveless continues, media reports about increasingly overburdened children are real but atypical."The homework load has been pretty stable over the last two to three decades," he said in an interview.Both the National PTA and the National Education Association favor the rule-of-thumb limiting homework in all subjects to 10 minutes times the grade level. Thus, a first grader should have no more than 10 minutes of homework a night, a sixth grader up to 60 minutes, and a high school senior up to two hours.Some schools have policies, such as the Quaker Valley elementary schools in western Pennsylvania, where kindergarten homework is limited to 10 to 15 minutes a night, growing to 40 to 60 minutes in grade 5."I think homework is a good time for kids to practice the skills they've learned in the classroom," said Jillian Bichsel, director of academic services in Quaker Valley.The actual amount of homework can vary widely.Take these three Pittsburgh Public Schools students, all members of the TeenBloc at A+ Schools.Imani Downing, of the North Side, a sophomore at Pittsburgh Perry High School, said she rarely gets homework and usually in just one class."I feel like we should have homework in every class," she said, explaining that would give "more learning and just a better chance to understand things and take advantage of it."Amma Ababio, of Highland Park, an 11th-grader at Pittsburgh Allderdice High School who is taking advanced classes, figures she does homework from about 5 p.m. to 11:30 p.m. on school nights. She said her phone is off, her computer is off except for research and she even does homework while she eats dinner."I have homework in every single class," she said.Jermalle Johns, of the North Side, a sophomore at Pittsburgh Obama 6-12, is between the two. He figures he spends "maybe an hour on homework tops."He doesn't think the homework helps because he learns from paying attention in class. "I get it done because it's another grade that helps me get an 'A.'"And the Brookings report doesn't address homework quality, a topic of many studies.Alan Lesgold, dean of the School of Education at the University of Pittsburgh, summarized the studies this way:"Bottom line is that it depends heavily on the quality of the assignment, the extent of quick feedback, whether the student is motivated to do it, and possibly whether there is support outside of school, especially for the kind of big projects that can be demanding of a lot of parent time that may be less available when the parents are working multiple minimum-wage jobs."Loveless based his conclusions on data from three surveys: a student survey that was part of the National Assessment of Educational Progress, also known as NAEP or the Nation's Report Card; a MetLife annual survey of parents and students; and a survey of college freshmen by the Higher Education Research Institute at UCLA.In the 2012 college freshmen survey, students were asked how much they spent per week on various activities in their last year of high school. Nearly two-thirds said they spent six or more hours a week socializing with friends.But only 38.4 percent spent that same amount of time on studying or homework their last year in high school. Homework came in behind not only socializing but also exercise or sports as well as working for pay.That percentage is less than in 1986, when 49.5 percent of college freshmen said they spent six or more hours a week studying and doing homework in their last year of high school."When I give this talk and show the college freshman data to college professors, they gasp and they all nod their heads, like, 'We thought there was a problem,'" Loveless said.The long-term trend NAEP asks students in 2012 how much time they spent on homework yesterday.In all three age groups questioned, more than a fifth had no homework at all: 22 percent of 9-year-olds; 21 percent of 13-year-olds; and 27 percent of 17-year-olds.For most, that was close to 1984 except for 9-year-olds, whose 1984 results show 35 percent didn't have homework.Of 9-year-olds, 57 percent said they received homework but less than an hour. The percentages were 44 percent at age 13 and 26 percent at age 17.As for those receiving more than two hours of homework, the percentages in 2012 were within a point or two of those in 1984.In 2012, 5 percent of those age 9, 7 percent of those age 13, and 13 percent of those age 17 reported they had more than two hours of homework the previous night."The bottom line: regardless of how the question is posed, NAEP data do not support the view that the homework burden is growing, nor do they support the belief that the proportion of students with a lot of homework has increased in recent years," the Brookings report stated.The homework conclusions are part of the 2014 Brown Center Report on American Education. The report can be found at brookings.edu/BrownCenterReport.By Eleanor ChuteSource Citation (MLA 7th Edition)"Studies show homework isn't much of a burden." Pittsburgh Post-Gazette [Pittsburgh, PA] 19 Mar. 2014. General OneFile. Web. 21 Oct. 2014.HOMEWORK – Article #4Study: Homework Doesn’t Mean Better Grades, But Maybe Better Standardized Test ScoresNOVEMBER 20, 2012The time students spend on math and science homework doesn’t necessarily mean better grades, but it could lead to better performance on standardized tests, a new study finds.“When Is Homework Worth The Time?” was recently published by lead investigator Adam Maltese, assistant professor of science education at Indiana University, and co-authors Robert H. Tai, associate professor of science education at the University of Virginia’s Curry School of Education, and Xitao Fan, dean of education at the University of Macau. Maltese is a Curry alumnus, and Fan is a former Curry faculty member.The authors examined survey and transcript data of more than 18,000 10th-grade students to uncover explanations for academic performance. The data focused on individual classes, examining student outcomes through the transcripts from two nationwide samples collected in 1990 and 2002 by the National Center for Education Statistics.Contrary to much published research, a regression analysis of time spent on homework and the final class grade found no substantive difference in grades between students who complete homework and those who do not. But the analysis found a positive association between student performance on standardized tests and the time they spent on homework.“Our results hint that maybe homework is not being used as well as it could be,” Maltese said.Tai said that homework assignments cannot replace good teaching.“I believe that this finding is the end result of a chain of?unfortunate educational decisions, beginning with the content coverage requirements that push too much information into too little time to learn it in the classroom,” Tai said. “The overflow typically results in more homework assignments. However, students spending more time on something that is not easy to understand or needs to be explained by a teacher does not help these students learn and, in fact, may confuse them.“The results from this study imply that homework should be purposeful,” he added, “and that the purpose must be understood by both the teacher and the students.”The authors suggest that factors such as class participation and attendance may mitigate the association of homework to stronger grade performance. They also indicate the types of homework assignments typically given may work better toward standardized test preparation than for retaining knowledge of class material.Maltese said the genesis for the study was a concern about whether a traditional and ubiquitous educational practice, such as homework, is associated with students achieving at a higher level in math and science. Many media reports about education compare U.S. students unfavorably to high-achieving math and science students from across the world. The 2007 documentary film “Two Million Minutes” compared two Indiana students to students in India and China, taking particular note of how much more time the Indian and Chinese students spent on studying or completing homework.“We’re not trying to say that all homework is bad,” Maltese said. “It’s expected that students are going to do homework. This is more of an argument that it should be quality over quantity. So in math, rather than doing the same types of problems over and over again, maybe it should involve having students analyze new types of problems or data. In science, maybe the students should write concept summaries instead of just reading a chapter and answering the questions at the end.”This issue is particularly relevant given that the time spent on homework reported by most students translates into the equivalent of 100 to 180 50-minute class periods of extra learning time each year.The authors conclude that given current policy initiatives to improve science, technology, engineering and math, or STEM, education, more evaluation is needed about how to use homework time more effectively. They suggest more research be done on the form and function of homework assignments.“In today’s current educational environment, with all the activities taking up children’s time both in school and out of school, the purpose of each homework assignment must be clear and targeted,” Tai said. “With homework, more is not better.” – Article #5Survey on Homework Reveals Acceptance, Despite Some GripesAuthor(s):Debra ViaderoWashington -- Despite debates in the media over whether American students are academically overburdened, 85 percent of parents believe their children are doing the "right amount" or "too little" homework, and three-quarters of students say they have enough time to complete their assignments, according to a survey released this week."This is a much-needed corrective to many current portrayals of homework," said Harris Cooper, the author of several books and study reviews on the topic. He is not connected to the new survey, which was commissioned by the MetLife Inc. insurance company of New York City.A perennial parade of authors, newspaper stories, and parents have raised questions over whether the nation's schoolchildren are doing too much homework, or doing it at too young an age, and whether too much of it is busywork.In contrast, the MetLife poll uncovered widespread support for the practice among teachers, parents, and students. According to the survey, 77 percent of students and more than 80 percent of teachers and parents say homework is important or very important.Belief in the value of homework is even more prevalent, the survey found, among African-American and Hispanic parents. Members of those racial or ethnic groups were more likely than white parents, on average, to say that homework is important, that it helps students learn more in school, and that the practice will help their children reach their goals after high school."This is in keeping with an existing body of survey research which says these complaints about homework are coming from a small minority," said Tom Loveless, the director of the Brown Center on Education Policy at the Washington-based Brookings Institution, who has also studied the topic. "We're just not talking about a large number of children who are overworked."Cracking the BooksThe MetLife findings are based on an online survey of more than 1,000 teachers, 501 parents, and 2,101 K-12 students. Harris Interactive, the Rochester, N.Y., polling organization, conducted the survey between March and June of last year. The results were released here during a Feb. 14 press conference hosted by the Washingtonbased Committee on Economic Development.Overall, the survey found, three-quarters of students say they do at least 30 minutes of homework on a typical school day, and 45 percent spend an hour or more cracking the books each weeknight.That's slightly less time, though, than their teachers spend on homework-related work. Teachers said they spend an average of 8.5 hours per week preparing or grading homework.While many students seem to feel they have enough time to finish their homework, a large majority report that it still causes them anxiety. Nearly 90 percent of students reported feeling stressed about doing homework, and one-third felt that way frequently. Also, a sizable proportion of secondary students--about one-quarter--described their homework assignments as mostly busywork. That's a decrease, though, from 2002, when nearly three-quarters of middle and high school students described their schoolwork that way in a similar survey.The study also found that the students with the lowest opinions of homework or those who felt most pressed by it tended to be a more academically worrisome group. They were more likely than other students to earn mostly C's or lower grades; to have no plans for college; and to rate the quality of their schooling as fair or poor. They also spent less time than A students did on their homework and completed it less often.The case was similar for parents who were most critical of the practice. As a group, they appeared to be more alienated from their children's schools, expressing dissatisfaction, for example, with the frequency of contact they had with the school or teachers and the amount of guidance they got on how to help their children with their homework. More of those parents also felt awkward about approaching a teacher about their children's academic progress and said the amount of time their children spend on homework frequently interferes with family life.While most parents did not report that homework got in the way of family life, a sizable group did have concerns about the quality of their children's homework assignments. Forty percent said a great deal of the homework their children do is busywork, and one-third rate the quality of their children's assignments as fair or poor."That's a signal to our educators that they need to do more parent education in this realm," said Mary Brabeck, the dean of the Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development at New York University in New York City. "We also need to do more to improve what's done in these assignments."Teacher ExperienceIn marked contrast to parents and students, only 16 percent of teachers rated the quality of the homework assignments given out at their schools as low. In fact, the survey found, the percentage of teachers rating their schools' homework assignments as excellent has doubled over the past 20 years, growing from 12 percent in 1987 to 24 percent last year.Among teachers, the biggest supporters of homework were those who had been on the job the longest. Teachers who had taught for 21 or more years were more likely than newcomers to say that doing homework helps students learn more in school and that it helps students reach their posthigh school goals.They also felt more prepared than teachers who had been on the job less than five years to create engaging assignments and to regularly review homework in class and talk to other teachers about how much homework they are assigning."Maybe homework is something teachers learn on the job," said Brookings' Mr. Loveless. "And maybe our education schools need to do a better job of teaching new teachers about homework."The survey also revealed some discrepancies among parents, teachers, and students in reports of the amount of homework that students are doing.Marisol Williams, a Bethesda, Md., student who spoke at the press conference, said she suspects she knows the reason why. "Students are spending a lot of time 'IM'ing [instant messaging] friends while they're doing their homework behind closed doors, and parents don't always see that," said the senior at Bethesda-Chevy Chase High School.While the survey's findings were extensive, experts cautioned that they still leave unanswered questions."We don't know anything new from the study other than the fact that most people still believe homework is valuable," said Etta Kralovec, the co-author of a 2000 critique of homework. "Whether that belief is grounded in research we just don't know."Debra ViaderoSource Citation (MLA 7th Edition)Viadero, Debra. "Survey on Homework Reveals Acceptance, Despite Some Gripes." Education Week 20 Feb. 2008: 10. Academic OneFile. Web. 21 Oct. 2014.HOMEWORK – Article #6The Destructive ‘Too Much Homework’ MythBy JESSICA LAHEY MARCH 6, 2012 1:59 PMAcross the country, voices are raised in protest over the skyrocketing homework load inflicted on American students. Parents challenge teachers to re-evaluate homework policies. Anti-homework nonprofits circulate no-homework pledges. Writers and filmmakers make careers out of their anti-homework stance. The current generation of schoolchildren, they say, is enslaved by four to five hours of homework a night, toiling into the wee hours of the morning with no time for family or friends, driven to drugs, cheating and mental illness.This would be a sad state of affairs indeed – if only it were true.I teach middle school Latin and English, and, as I have stated here on Motherlode, I hate homework. If American students really were laboring under this sort of untenable workload, I would be leading the charge for the emancipation of our children. But when I set out to adjust the amount of homework I assigned in my own classes earlier this year, I started looking at those national averages — and I found that most American kids aren’t overburdened with homework at all.According to the Brown Center Report on American Education, American students have one of the lightest homework loads in the world, typically less than one hour per day. Fully half of U.S. students are assigned no homework at all, even in middle and high school. Who is doing more homework, according to “The Michigan Study,” research often cited as proof of the aforementioned “skyrocketing?” Twenty years ago, the first and second graders averaged about 8 minutes a day on homework. Now they average about 17 minutes a day.Even the vocal parents protesting excessive homework loads are the exception rather than the norm. The Brown Center report reveals that most parents – 64 percent to be exact – feel that their children’s homework load is “just about right,” and among the parents who were unsatisfied with their children’s homework load, 5 out of 7 wanted more homework for their children, not less.When I asked teachers in both public and private schools to explain the divide between the well-publicized homework horror stories and the reality as depicted in the research, their answers pointed in the obvious direction: demographics. Anecdotally, they saw wealthier students enrolled in college preparatory schools doing more homework than students in low-income public schools, and recent research on the experience of those lower-income youth bears them out. “Students overall did not have much assigned homework, and reported little or no consequences if they did not complete their assigned tasks.”The supposed homework burden? It’s upper middle class parent myopia, a problem whose limits they’re too close to see. Robert Pondiscio, former fifth-grade teacher at P.S. 277 in the South Bronx, agreed, via e-mail:The battle over homework is one of those things that differentiates education among the privileged and everyone else. At the low end you have abysmal standards of academic proficiency that create the illusion of achievement where little exists. At the high end, you have earnest parents who worry about uptown problems like overscheduling kids and the hothouse environment of elite schools. They fret about the pressures their kids face while continuing to worship at the altar of getting them into just the right college. Meanwhile inner city teachers work night and day to try to get kids to the point where they can compete for any kind of college opportunity whatsoever.I am not in favor of an increase in homework load, thank you very much. But when we manage to have a national conversation about education, homework is a red herring. Some otherwise privileged children may have too much, but the real issue lies in places where there is too little. When we do talk about homework, we shouldn’t forget that. ................
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