HOMEWORK and PARENT INVOLVEMENT: PART 3-

Dear subscribers and readers,

Before I begin this almost final installment on homework, please accept my prayers and wishes for a new year of good health, love, happiness, fulfillment, and sweet dreams.
"Joy and Temperance and Repose
Slam the door in the doctor's nose"
~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow~
TIP OF THE WEEK- 1/7/13
LET'S REVIEW
The two previous blogs about homework were my attempt to share some of the thought provoking ideas and propositions presented in Alfie Kohn's book, "The Homewoek Myth: Why Our Kids Get Too Much Of A Bad Thing." First he proposes that homework is boring, useless, mindless, repetitive, and is not supported wholeheartedly in the research as being linked to student achievement. Kohn offers this quote from an article in Parents Magazine:
"If children are not required to learn useless and meaningless things, homework is entirely unnecessary for the learning of common school subjects.. But when a school requires the amassing of many facts which have little or no significance to the child,, learning is so slow and painful that the school is obliged to turn to the home for help out of the mess the school has created. "(Kohn,1995) p. 5.
This Parents Magazine article was published in November, 1937. Since then, according to Kohn,Parents Magazine has published articles that extol the virtues of homework-even in first grade.
Furthermore, homework is stressful for kids and parents and may lead to family conflicts and less interest in learning. It steals time from both children and parents who could be engaging in other family activities. The kids should playing and exercising and not

Ask The Principal