[This post is from a series written during the first weeks of the COVID crisis.]
It’s hard enough navigating the COVID crisis without reams of unnecessary homework.
Yes. No one has to lug an unwieldy backpack to school anymore, but the “psychic” backpack remains, and with it, its oppression.
Studies everywhere are questioning the nature of homework, and it’s important that we identify different kinds and different contexts.*
Reading a story, so everyone can participate, is one thing.
Endless standardized textbook problem sets – to keep up with district or state mandated pacing – is another. Should our children be grist for a textbook mill, or are they unique pages of their own, to be read, tended to, and shared?
We can debate quantity, and practicing problem sets, but as a staple of American education – as the method is currently practiced – it has gone too far.
It is said that the rests between the notes are what makes the music.
Children need more time between moments of relevance to make their own.
* “The Cult of Homework,” Joel Pinsker, The Atlantic, March 28, 2019 https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2019/03/homework-research-how-much/585889/ ...among others.