Homework has been the source of ongoing controversy between the education bodies, parents and teachers. Almost every student has to dedicate some time to do homework. There are a lot of questions on whether we really need homework and how much time the children should spend doing homework. To help you understand, I have listed down the pros and cons of homework to let you decide whether it is good for your child or not.
Pros:
1. Increases knowledge: Giving out assignments, marking them and give them back to the student is a way of learning and increasing knowledge on a particular subject.
2. Go deeper on the subject: During school hours, the student may not have enough time to complete all school work and giving them assignment will enable them to go deeper on a particular subject.
3. Learn responsibility: Giving homework will enable a student to learn how to schedule their time away from class work on how to complete the given assignment.
4. Helps create an ideal learning condition: At home, the student can create an ideal learning condition based on their learning needs and preference. Some need a quiet place to focus on their studies or listen to music while doing homework.
5. Makes up for the insufficient time at school: Students may not have sufficient time to learn on their own at school and giving them homework gives them an extra time they need to solve problems and grasp new knowledge.
6. Discipline: It enables students to learn what to prioritize and also learn discipline as they focus on doing the task they are expected to submit the following day.
7. Get support from parents: Parents can help the children do the assignments and can also know what the children are learning at school. It can act as a way of bonding with the child.
8. Reduce television time: Giving assignments and projects to do at home enable the children to acquire good studying habits at an early age. This reduces the time they spend watching TV or playing games with their gadgets.
9. Communication network: Homework act as a bridge between the school, teacher and the parent and through homework the parent can know the weaknesses and strength of the child.
10. Comfortable place to learn: When at home you feel safe and more comfortable, thus the students will be more motivated to do assignments at home.
Cons:
1. Different learning needs: All the students have different learning needs and giving out homework may not fully address the needs of every student. Some students may find it difficult to sit alone and do the homework.
2. Family time: Students may be given a lot of homework in almost every subject such that they spend most of their evenings doing homework, this gets in the way of the family time.
3. Stressful for young kids: Giving young kid’s homework can be too stressful for them to handle especially when they had a busy day at school and already tired.
4. Not effective: It is not a guarantee that the student will learn more skills and absorb what they learned on a certain subject through homework because the parents may do the assignment instead of the student.
5. Does not improve performance: Homework does not motivate students to improve their performance. There is no correlation between homework and how students perform.
6. Not every home is a good learning environment: In some homes, the parents may not invest in supporting the children in the learning process. Others may wish to but there are barriers that prevent them.
7. Discourages creative endeavors: When students spent more than an hour doing homework, they will not have time to develop their creative skills or pursue hobbies.
8. Difficult to enforce: Some students don’t care about homework as long as their doing well in school they may not put an effort in doing the homework.
9. Encourages cheating: Students who don’t like to do homework at home can cheat by copying from those who have done it.
10. Too much homework: Most of times students find themselves with too much work to do every night.
