Did you ever imagine or experience, as a teacher, your students say to you that the homework you give to them is too much, or they even do not do it with no reason? Did you ever think that homework is really helpful as it’s supposed to be? Well, by being a teacher you will possibly face problems that you couldn’t even imagine before and your job is solving those problems effectively somehow. Currently, there are arguments in the internet questioning how helpful or effectively homework can be. Some say it’s pointless but some say it’s helpful. In this article, I am going to talk about it.

Homework is something many or most teachers see as the tool to help students master the related materials, and it always goes that way. Nowadays, students seem to be easily bored while they get something similar and repetitive. "On the other hand, homework that is repetitive, boring, too easy or difficult for students does not contribute to new learning." -Prof Horsley of Noosa-based CQ University. So if this happened that would be common if they didn’t do the homework and prefer playing and having fun, as they always do. Even if they do the homework they’ll become stressful influencing their mentality also their ability in absorbing information, because something too much is bad. ”When children have too much homework, then they’re not doing the things that are their real homework: playing outside, learning how to make friends, learning how to communicate,” -Stephanie Donaldson-Pressman of the New England Centre for Paediatric Psychology.

So how can we as teachers overcome the problem, since too many homework is pointless while less homework isn’t effective as well? Then teachers have to make really effective homework, also the quality should be considered. "The value and effectiveness of homework depend on its quality,"-Prof Horsley of Noosa-based CQ University. The question is how we construct such qualified homework, here are the characteristics of a qualified homework provided by Vatterott;

First, a quality homework task has a clear academic purpose, such as practice, checking for understanding, or applying knowledge or skills. Second, the task is efficient in terms of time required to demonstrate student learning. Third, the task promotes student ownership of learning by offering choices and by being personally relevant. Fourth, the task instils a sense of competence —the student can successfully complete it without help. And last, the task is aesthetically pleasing to the student—it appears enjoyable and interesting (Vatterott, 2009).

So homework is considered as good if it has a clear academic purpose, homework typically supports learning in one of four ways: pre-learning, checking for understanding, practice, or processing. “The ultimate goal of the assignment—pre-learning, checking for understanding, practice, or processing—should be clearly communicated to the student” (Marzano, Pickering, and Pollock, 2001; Pink, 2009). Students should easily understand the value of the task, or be told explicitly how it helps to learn. Students should have no trouble connecting the purpose of homework to classroom learning. Some traditional tasks may be inefficient—either because they show no evidence of learning or because they take an inordinate amount of time but yield little learning (Vatterott, 2010). Teachers should think twice before giving new things to students so they cannot easily get confused, for instance, new vocabulary should be put directly in sentences so it can be easily understood. “The meanings of new words are best learned by using them in context.” (David, 2010). Teachers should also consider the level of ability in his/her class, by knowing this at least teachers can easily pick the proper materials that fit the students’ ability levels. “Since learners differ in readiness and may vary in their pace and development of intellectual skills, differentiation of homework tasks is an important strategy for developing competence.” (Margolis, 2005; Minotti, 2005; Tomlinson and Imbeau, 2010). By considering all those things or factors, teachers are expected to be able to make good homework and avoiding complaint from students.

Basically, teachers have the instinct to make good homework, but keep in mind that good homework consists of purpose, efficiency, competence and ownership. As a teacher once said, "I never heard of a student not doing his work; it's our work he's not doing." When we customize tasks to fit student learning styles and interests, the task becomes theirs, not ours. The goal of ownership is to create a personal relationship between the student and the content (Vatterott, 2009). It all goes back to the teachers’ hand how to build a good and qualified homework, remember that teachers have to help students in every way so they can succeed not to make them “lose before the war”. It all really goes back to you, teachers.






References



3.Five characteristics of quality homework, Paris International Conference on Education, Economy, and Society, Paris, France 20-­‐23 July 2011.

4.HOMEWORK: QUALITY OVER QUANTITY, Convention Delegates May 8, 2014
Tags: EducationWriting

Wayan Endra

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