Some students, apparently, are complaining there’s too much homework and that they’re staying up until midnight completing what’s assigned.
What’s your opinion? Do you think that you have too much homework? On average how many hours (minutes?) do you spend doing homework per night? Do you usually have homework on weekends? If so, how much?
Of course, students have been complaining about homework since the days of the ancient Greeks, but have you noticed a recent change in the amount of homework required?
Finally, two things: do you sometimes learn from homework? And, are you one of those students who leaves the big stuff—reports and projects—until the very last minute?
Write about these things.
Homework: it’s not exactly my best friend, but we get along. In that sense, I mean that while homework can be a total pain in the behind, it can also be a helpful resource. Don’t get me wrong; I do not enjoy homework AT ALL. After school being six hours, field hockey being another three hours, and work until eight, at that point I am ready to go home, shower, eat, and pass out. Ha, I wish. That never happens. Most nights I am up until at least ten or eleven. If I am up until midnight, it is doing a big assignment I forgot about or just left for last minute. Sometimes, you need those assignments that keep you up late because you wake up in the morning and you have a mini reality check that puts you in your place for a few weeks and makes you get all your stuff done earlier.
Being a teenager, sleep is a necessity and if I do not get my sleep I will be in an unbearably bitchy mood. I personally can not complain about the amount of homework I have, but I have had a few late nights so far. This year, my teachers are fairly reasonable, and if I am doing something last minute I only have myself to blame. No teacher assigns a five page research paper due the next day; therefore I believe that it is a students fault if they leave a long paper or a tedious project until the night before. I try not to do this too often, but then again three are those mini reality checks…
I believe that homework is not given out as a punishment. Although it may not be a reward, you can most likely learn from the work you do at home on your own time. When you are by yourself, you should be able to do the same work. If you are struggling with homework it might be because a) your teacher can not teach for his or her life, or b) you spent more time saying, “Hey, what did you get for number fourteen?,” then actually doing class work in the class.
As far as leaving things for last minute, it is a habit that I know I can break. Unfortunately, sometimes it is more entertaining to sit on Facebook and scroll through people’s lame statuses than to do fifty math problems that take a page of work each. As much as I know that homework is helpful, sometimes I do not use it to my advantage. However, you do not need homework to reinforce what you teach in class. In my Psychology class, we never have homework, but at the same time I have a one hundred in that class, and I legitimately have a one hundred on every single assignment. I learn a lot in that class, and according to my sister who had the same teacher five years ago, you will never forget the information she teaches you.
In summation, homework does not make you a good teacher or a bad teacher. Teachers who overload on homework only get back negligence and a hidden hatred – it is something that is uncontrollable and will never stop. Therefore, you will never hear the end of the homework complaints, so just keep doing what you do as long as it is working for you, and as long as kids are understanding what you teach.
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