The Effects of Too Much Homework
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Tesfanesh Peterson
“Homework in primary [elementary] school has an effect of around zero,” says Professor John Hattie. Homework is most often defined as, “Assigned to students by school teachers that are meant to be carried out during non-school hours,” (Cooper, 1989a, p.7).
A number of synthesis studies have been done on homework, with a wide range of methodologies and levels of specificity. Throughout the beginning of the 20th century, educators believed that homework helped create disciplined minds. By the 1940s, people started to become concerned that homework interferes with other home activities. In the 1950s opinions reversed when the Soviets launched Sputnik, and people preserved the United States education system lacking rigor. With that educators thought that if they added more rigorous homework to the education system that would partially help solve the problem. By the 1980s people started to see homework as detrimental to students' mental health.
The article, The Case Against Homework: How Homework Is Hurting Our Children and What We Can Do About It also discusses this topic. They provided information saying that too much homework harms students’ health and family time. Also that teachers are not being trained on how to assign homework and how much to assign (Bennett and Kalish 2006). Research has shown that students regularly receive higher amounts of homework than recommended by experts, which can cause negative health effects in students. This can make kids feel like they are only as smart as how they do on their homework. As you can probably assume, this could snowball fairly quickly into their teenage years in high school where the homework load picks up.
I think we tend to get overly obsessed with homework. Being fixated on the amount of time students spend on homework is missing the point. Giving busy work as homework is counterproductive. A large portion of research done on homework has indicated that the positive effects of homework are in correlation to the amount of homework that is completed rather than the amount of homework actually assigned. “The data shows that homework over this level is not only not beneficial to children's grades or GPAs, but there’s really a plethora of evidence that it’s detrimental to their attitude about school, their grades their self-confidence, their social skills, and their quality of life,” Donaldson-Pressman tells CNN.
It is no secret that homework takes a large toll on high school students' mental health, yet we choose to ignore it. A study was conducted on 4,300 high schoolers in California, and when it came to stress, more than 70% of students said that they were “often or always stressed over schoolwork,” with 56% saying that homework is a primary stressor in their lives. Less than 1% of those students said that they did not consider homework a stressor. The interesting part is when the researchers asked the students whether they experienced physical symptoms of stress, like headaches, exhaustion, sleep deprivation, weight loss, and stomach problems, more than 80% of the students said they have at least one of the related stress symptoms. Also, 44% said they experienced three or more of the listed symptoms. A smaller New York study published in 2015 also noted serious health effects for high schoolers such as chronic stress, emotional exhaustion, and alcohol and drug use. The study was also done on juniors in high school. Approximately half of those students said they received at least three hours of homework per night and faced pressure to take college level classes and to excel in sports outside of school. That's making for 12 hour days- seven for school, two for sports, and three for homework.
Homework helps contribute to corporate-style America (Kralovec and Buell, 2000). Homework is teaching students to work on their own and not work with peers. In short, it's individual work. John Hattie spoke on this topic discussing how students gain a tremendous amount of their learning from other students. Variability is the way that you can get more of that type of learning out of students. Students are becoming burned out before they even get to college. These juniors in the prior New York study also said they felt like they were being asked to work as hard as adults and noted that they feel their workload is inappropriate for their developmental level, and that they had little time for relaxing and socializing. More than two-thirds of the students said they used alcohol and drugs - mostly marijuana to cope with stress. This is an alarming statistic. If we see that the issue of underage drug use and alcohol consumption has a direct correlation to homework, why aren't we doing anything to limit that? These statistics are showing that the homework load is so stressful to the point where students feel the need to find an unhealthy way to cope. Is this the future of elementary school kids? Let's do something to change it. Homework, of all things, should not result in so much stress to the point of feeling obligated to make life altering decisions for the worse.
So, how do we fix it? We need to focus on quality not quantity. Currently, homework is very much quantity over quality, so we need to flip the narrative. John Hattie says that, “...Five to ten minutes has the same effect of an hour to two hours [of homework].” I think reducing the amount of homework is the first step, as there is no need to be doing so much homework per night to the point it becomes counterproductive. The research is showing that too much homework is not only resulting in drug and alcohol usage but also making students not meet their developmental needs and not have the time to learn critical life skills. Many students are forgoing activities, not seeing friends or family, and not participating in hobbies. Many students are feeling obligated to choose homework over developing their talents and relationships with family and friends. Teachers should design valuable assignments and avoid homework over breaks and holidays. Those breaks are meant for students and teachers to rest, not to do homework or grade homework.
Homework should not just be assigned as a matter of policy. With this, schools need to alter the homework policy accordingly to help the students achieve to the best of their abilities.
Educators can develop the most effective homework practices by assessing their students in the classroom and seeing how they learn best. When teachers are teaching the exact same way for five to ten years or more, that's a problem. Generations change and students change each year. Going from a big class of 30 students one year then to a class of 15 the next, the teaching style and homework load have to adapt too. The students that teachers have one year differ from the students that teachers will have the next year. We don’t all learn the same. Teachers have to see that and plan homework accordingly for the best of the class. Homework isn’t something we have to completely rule out, but we need to do it right and to the best of our ability. I assure you that students know how to learn without being bombarded with homework assignments that are only adding stress without adding usefulness.
Let's work to make school a less stressful place. School is stressful enough without the added pressure of homework assignments that aren't designed for students' developmental levels. Making homework beneficial is no easy task; it takes time and precision. But if it makes elementary school kids less likely to end up using drugs and alcohol in their high school and young adult years, I deem that it as worth it.
Sources:
Levy, S. (2019, August 22). Why Homework is Bad: Stress and Consequences. Healthline. Retrieved January 6, 2023, from https://www.healthline.com/health-news/children-more-homework-means-more-stress-031114#Consequences-for-high-school-students-
Marzano, R. J., & Pickering, D. J. (2007, March 04/05/2007). Special Topic / The Case For and Against Homework. Lincoln Public Schools. Retrieved January 6, 2023, from https://www.lincnet.org/cms/lib05/MA01001239/Centricity/Domain/108/Homework.pdf
Waack, S. (2014, September 11). "Homework in primary school has an effect of zero" (J. Hattie). Visible Learning. Retrieved January 6, 2023, from https://visible-learning.org/2014/09/john-hattie-interview-bbc-radio-4/
Kralovec, & Buell. (200). The End of Homework: How Homework Disrupts Families, Overburdens Children, and Limits Learning. Beacon Press.
Bennett, S., & Kalish, N. (2006). The Case Against Homework: How Homework Is Hurting Our Children and What We Can Do About It. New York : Crown Publishers, c2006.
Cooper, H. M. (2007). The Battle Over Homework (3rd edition ed.). Corwin.
