Homework
Common homework assignments may include required reading, a writing or typing project, mathematical exercises to be completed, information to be reviewed before a test, or other skills to be practiced.
Proponents claim that assigning homework to young children helps them learn good study habits.
[5] Epstein (1988) found a near-zero correlation between the amount of homework and parents' reports on how well their elementary school students behaved.
[12] Leone & Richards (1989) found that students generally had negative emotions when completing homework and reduced engagement compared to other activities.
[18] Homework has been identified in numerous studies and articles as a dominant or significant source of stress and anxiety for students.
[20][21] Cheung & Leung-Ngai (1992) surveyed 1,983 students in Hong Kong, and found that homework led not only to added stress and anxiety, but also physical symptoms, such as headaches and stomachaches.
[22] Homework can cause tension and conflict in the home as well as at school, and can reduce students' family and leisure time.
In the MetLife study, high school students reported spending more time completing homework than performing home tasks.
[23] Kohn (2006) argued that homework can create family conflict and reduce students' quality of life.
The authors of Sallee & Rigler (2008), both high school English teachers, reported that their homework disrupted their students' extracurricular activities and responsibilities.
Galloway, Conner & Pope (2013) recommended further empirical study relating to this aspect due to the difference between student and parent observations.
A University of Michigan Institute for Social Research nationally representative survey of American 15- to 17-year olds, conducted in 2003, found an average of 50 minutes of homework each weekday.
The change in this demographic's average daily time spent doing homework (during the school year) increased by about 16 minutes from 2003-2006 to 2014-2017.
[25] A 2019 nationally representative survey of 95,505 freshmen at U.S. colleges, conducted by the UCLA Higher Education Research Institute, asked respondents, "During your last year in high school, how much time did you spend during a typical week studying/doing homework?"
[27] Proponents also argue that homework makes it more likely that students will develop and maintain proper study habits that they can use throughout their educational career.
With few students able to pursue higher education, and with many children and teenagers needing to dedicate significant amounts of time to chores and farm work, homework was disliked not only by parents, but also by some schools.
[10] In 1880, Francis Amasa Walker convinced the school board in Boston to prohibit teachers from assigning math homework under normal circumstances.
[10] In the 1950s, with increasing pressure on the United States to stay ahead in the Cold War, homework made a resurgence, and children were encouraged to keep up with their Russian counterparts.
[10] At that time, American schools were overwhelmingly in favor of issuing some homework to students of all grade levels.
[30] Homework and its effects, justifications, motivations and alleged benefits have been the subject of sharp criticism among many education experts and researchers.
It is often the case that children procrastinate on doing their homework until late at night, which can lead to sleep disorders and unhealthy stress.
