The Polish government has introduced strict limits on the amount of homework pupils must do in a bid to modernise the education system. But some parents and teachers aren't convinced by the changes. #EuropeNews
Homework is quite handy, but homework should not be the “making” part, but rather the “info” part. Teachers should rather spend time doing stuff in class in stead of presenting and explaining when students could easily read a book at home or watch a video. The paractical stuff is much more important and the guidance of a teacher is much more valuable in the practical part of the lesson.
Education at later levels is pretty much all homework. Teachers go over tricky to understand parts and practical explanations whilst the child does the actual studying independently.
My kids grew up with homework and it was never received as much of a chore. Mostly was completed in less than an hour. The trick is to pay attention in class and do the homework pretty much as soon as it is assigned.
Now they are at university, having the ability to study independently is paying off.
Not sure of the ages of your children, but as a 52yo who grew up in the States, I averaged 2-3 hours of homework a night in grade school. They’d tell us “oh, it’s only about 15-20 minutes per class” which doesn’t sound terrible, except that it was more like 20-30 minutes of work x 4-6 classes. By 7th grade I burned out and realized that the world didn’t end if I started skipping homework, and my test grades remained about the same. I just had to live with the stifling anxiety over getting in trouble for not getting my homework done.
Thankfully by the time my kids came along schools started pulling back on the volumes of unnecessary homework. I also never pressured them to get every assignment done, but instead asked them if they understood what they were doing. As adults having completed further educational programs, they did just fine. I’m glad that as time goes on, kids are getting more of a chance to be kids.
I can’t imagine learing math without running equations myself. Once reading and math skills are proficient students need to be doing some independent study.
That is to be expected and is something you can prepare for. Easiest solution is that those kids could read the stuff in class and do the practical stuff at home. They’ll soon learn to prepare if they don’t want to get extra homework. There’s probably better solutions though.
Good luck trying to watch over 30 kids doing the practical part.
The biggest problem is the size of classes imo. If you have 10 pupils you don’t have the same pressure to neglect children who can’t match the speed of the curriculum.
Agreed. Teaching is a fun job, but not getting to do the best parts because of bad funding, more administration, bigger groups, bad salary, etc… is sucking the fun out of it.
I remember when I was a kid and we were learning algebra and no one ever explained why on Earth we would ever need it. It would have been vastly more helpful if practical examples had been given rather than us being given a bunch of homework.
A much better homework assignment would be “These are the scenarios under which you would need algebra. See if you can find them in your everyday life.” But nope, just more arbitrary questions.
Homework is quite handy, but homework should not be the “making” part, but rather the “info” part. Teachers should rather spend time doing stuff in class in stead of presenting and explaining when students could easily read a book at home or watch a video. The paractical stuff is much more important and the guidance of a teacher is much more valuable in the practical part of the lesson.
No that wouldn’t work at all. Kids would show up without having learned the concepts, except for the most studious.
Education at later levels is pretty much all homework. Teachers go over tricky to understand parts and practical explanations whilst the child does the actual studying independently.
My kids grew up with homework and it was never received as much of a chore. Mostly was completed in less than an hour. The trick is to pay attention in class and do the homework pretty much as soon as it is assigned.
Now they are at university, having the ability to study independently is paying off.
Not sure of the ages of your children, but as a 52yo who grew up in the States, I averaged 2-3 hours of homework a night in grade school. They’d tell us “oh, it’s only about 15-20 minutes per class” which doesn’t sound terrible, except that it was more like 20-30 minutes of work x 4-6 classes. By 7th grade I burned out and realized that the world didn’t end if I started skipping homework, and my test grades remained about the same. I just had to live with the stifling anxiety over getting in trouble for not getting my homework done.
Thankfully by the time my kids came along schools started pulling back on the volumes of unnecessary homework. I also never pressured them to get every assignment done, but instead asked them if they understood what they were doing. As adults having completed further educational programs, they did just fine. I’m glad that as time goes on, kids are getting more of a chance to be kids.
I can’t imagine learing math without running equations myself. Once reading and math skills are proficient students need to be doing some independent study.
That is to be expected and is something you can prepare for. Easiest solution is that those kids could read the stuff in class and do the practical stuff at home. They’ll soon learn to prepare if they don’t want to get extra homework. There’s probably better solutions though.
Are you disconnected from reality?
Homework. You’ve just described homework.
You don’t seem like a very nice person to have a discussion with. So I’ll leave it at that, that’s how disconnected from reality I am.
Good luck trying to watch over 30 kids doing the practical part.
The biggest problem is the size of classes imo. If you have 10 pupils you don’t have the same pressure to neglect children who can’t match the speed of the curriculum.
Agreed. Teaching is a fun job, but not getting to do the best parts because of bad funding, more administration, bigger groups, bad salary, etc… is sucking the fun out of it.
I remember when I was a kid and we were learning algebra and no one ever explained why on Earth we would ever need it. It would have been vastly more helpful if practical examples had been given rather than us being given a bunch of homework.
A much better homework assignment would be “These are the scenarios under which you would need algebra. See if you can find them in your everyday life.” But nope, just more arbitrary questions.
It’s probably something personal, but I never questioned that. For me it was an abstract challenge, and that was rewarding enough.
I also intentionally moved into a field that heavily relies on math afterwards (computer graphics), so maybe I’m just weird like that.