More homework, please

Today is Parent Teacher Conference.  I've met with only a handful of students' parents, but I've already received feedback from half of them that they are surprised by and even disappointed in the fact that their child does not have much homework.

I teach 11 year-old children.  They go to school 7 hours a day.  Adults traditionally work 8 hours per day.  Why would I require an 11 year-old to work more hours than their parents?

We work incredibly hard at school.  We are never idle.  Even during transitions, we recite factual jingles, poetry, or math facts.  I'm exhausted by the end of the day.  Many of the students are, too.

I also am a firm believer in teaching time management and organization.  If you work hard at school, prioritize well, and focus, you can get a lot of things done.  Why should I add more to a child's workload if he's already proved proficiency?

I also hate busy work.  Hate it.  If I send something home as homework, it's intentional.  It means that the students need more practice than can be provided at school and needs to dedicate more time to it at home so that we can progress faster in school.

Also, I believe that nothing, absolutely nothing, should be assigned to be completed independently without the guidance of the teacher who provided the instruction unless the student has proven to have mastered the skills necessary to complete the task.  Otherwise, all that results is frustrated parents trying to guess what their child is supposed to do and overwhelmed children who can't figure it out.  The children who have mastered it have no trouble with it and probably didn't need it as homework in the first place.  The children who haven't mastered it need the support of an educated professional who can provide the appropriate scaffolding necessary for success.  The homework, if it is too challenging, is often done by the parent--literally in his/her hand or with the completed assignment being the words or prompts of the adult helping the child.

As a 6th grade teacher, I hope to teach/reinforce organization and time management.  Since these are skills that is still in embryo with some of my students, I think it is important to demonstrate the power of excellent time management.  If a student works hard and works well in class, he should be rewarded with an evening free of homework.  If a student doesn't work well in class, the natural consequence is to require the student to complete the assignment on his own time--as homework.

Homework has to be collected or corrected to hold students accountable.  Collecting the homework takes up some of my valuable time as a professional who is responsible for carefully crafting effective instruction.  I would rather use that time seeking out a new resource or finding a better way to present the material than putting check marks on a stack of paper and entering grades.  If homework is corrected by the students as a class, it takes up valuable instruction time.  (I do like having the students correct their own work, because it provides them with immediate feedback.  However, this year, I stopped having the students correct their spelling tests, because it was taking 13 minutes.  Since no skills could be taught or reinforced during a spelling correction period, I opted to use those 13 minutes for additional instruction.  I guess I could have sent home an assignment as 13 minutes of homework instead.)