The Homework Myth: Why Our Kids Get Too Much of a Bad Thing by Alfie Kohn (PDF)

Description

Death and taxes come later; what seems inevitable for children is the idea that, after spending the day at school, they must then complete more academic assignments at home. The predictable results: stress and conflict, frustration and exhaustion. Parents respond by reassuring themselves that at least the benefits outweigh the costs. But what if they don’t? In The Homework Myth, nationally known educator and parenting expert Alfie Kohn systematically examines the usual defenses of homework–that it promotes higher achievement, “reinforces” learning, and teaches study skills and responsibility. None of these assumptions, he shows, actually passes the test of research, logic, or experience. So why do we continue to administer this modern cod liver oil — or even demand a larger dose? Kohn’s incisive analysis reveals how a mistrust of children, a set of misconceptions about learning, and a misguided focus on competitiveness have all left our kids with less free time and our families with more conflict. Pointing to parents who have fought back — and schools that have proved educational excellence is possible without homework — Kohn shows how we can rethink what happens during and after school in order to rescue our families and our children’s love of learning.

User’s Reviews

Editorial Reviews: Review “A good book to have on hand when defending the idea of homework-free elementary schooling.”–“San Antonio Express-News””[The Schools Our Children Deserve is]…a remarkable book that should become a classic in the field.” — Jonathan Kozol”Alfie Kohn holds a crucial position in the American dialog about parenting.” — Michael Gurian”Perhaps the country’s most outspoken critic of education’s fixation on grades [and] test scores.””The most energetic and charismatic figure standing in the way of [making] standardized curriculums and tests a fact of life in every U.S. school.” About the Author Alfie Kohn is the author of fourteen previous books, including Punished by Rewards, The Schools Our Children Deserve, and Unconditional Parenting. He lives in the Boston area.

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐Kohn leads off with some solid observations. Some children are given what seems to them and their parents to be a lot of homework. It is often more than the rule of thumb guideline of 10 minutes per day per grade. And, as Kohn points out, that rule of thumb has never been so subjected to any empirical test of reasonableness.It is also true, as he claims, that some homework is just pure busywork. Before the national Council on Teaching Mathematics recanted and went back to basics this year, they endorsed some pretty dumb ideas. My kids laboriously cut out little squares of paper, arranged them in into rectangles, and counted the squares. We built a replica of Hadrian’s Wall with rocks and glue.Thirdly, his claim that there is not much of a scientific basis for formulating homework assignments is also true. Teachers are not taught how to make homework assignments. it is also true, although not central to his point, that teachers are not taught how to make in-class examinations and quizzes. For all of the research that goes on in our schools of education, there is an awful lot that we just don’t know. I will add as a graduates student of education myself that a vastly disproportionate amount of the research in education goes into a single topic, the black-white test score gap, and such diversion of research funding to questions of equality appears to starve research in fundamental questions of how children learn and fundamental teaching techniques.Kohn does not define homework. It is assumed that he means specific assignments, such as sheets that are handed out to be filled in. He does not explicitly indicate that it includes studying for tests, or researching papers. My definition would be fairly broad. I would include under the title of homework every thing that a student does at home that is school related. I would even venture to assign value to different kinds of activities. For a student to study foreign language vocabulary on their own, or commit equations for geometric forms to memory, shows a lot more initiative and academic bent than filling in some stupid busywork assignment.Kohn’s arguments against homework are similar to his arguments against testing. He complains about criterion-referenced tests (like NCLB, with a fixed pass-fail criterion) because they are not norm-referenced (like the SAT, with each examinee measured against other examinees; in other words graded on the curve), and norm-referenced tests because they are not criterion referenced. He complains about time limits on speeded tests. He complains about the way distractors (attractive wrong answers) are used on multiple-choice tests. Kohn doesn’t like testing. His position on testing is that because there can never be totally fair test, there should be no tests at all. His position on homework is thus pretty predicable. Because it isn’t perfect, we ought to do away with it.Kohn says he is unaware of studies have addressed the question of whether homework enhances the depth of students’ understanding. It is a question of how people learn The theoretical basis for assuming that homework would help is well established in the field of psychology. Homework has a student collect data in their short-term memory, organize them, and move them as “chunks” of knowledge into long-term memory. It is a process that can and does of course happen in the classroom. However, as should be evident, not every student picks up every point that a teacher delivers orally in class. Homework has the virtue of taking place at the student’s own pace, giving them the opportunity to internalize material at the rate at which they can absorb it.Kohn says that there is no value to homework in elementary school. I would argue that homework has to develop on a continuum. At the far end, adult life is a matter of homework assignments that we give ourselves. In graduate school homework consists of large projects that we conceive on our own, with guidance from our professors. At the undergraduate level it is a mixture of short assignments and projects. In high school the emphasis is more on short-term assignments, and so on down to elementary school, at which level most of the assignments are fairly brief and highly structured. Kohn’s stance on homework in elementary school begs the question. Where on the continuum should one start?One of the problems with Kohn’s analysis is that he leaves ability out of the question of correlation. A number of students in my kids’ schools use tutors. It is safe to some that the kids who have tutors spend more time on homework than the kids who don’t. It is also safe to as some that the best students don’t need tutors. Right off the top, it ought to be evident that time spent on homework doesn’t correlate with superior ability. If we leap to the conclusion that superior ability correlates to high grades, we would expect that the time spent on a homework correlates negatively with grades. Kohn’s correlations don’t make sense without taking ability into question, but the fact is that schools haven’t given IQ tests for 30 years or more and they don’t have any objective measures of the kids’ native abilities. Neither he nor the researchers he cites, such as Harris Cooper, could do it. Significantly, Cooper’s experimental-method studies (take equivalent students, give some of them homework, others none) show the most positive correlation between homework and achievement.Kohn claims that homework destroys the desire to learn. It is hard to square this claim with what we observe in university enrollments. More and more people are going to the University, and more and more are in graduate school. If they couldn’t do homework, they wouldn’t be there. At a minimum they get used to it, in Kohn’s parlance. And in some cases, they even develop interests in the subject matter that is covered by assigned homework.Kohn surely knows that homework is here to stay. He could make a bigger contribution to education, though he might sell a few fewer books, if he confined himself to suggestions as to how to make it better. There is ample room for improvement. I should add that my area of professional interest is in helping kids find the quickest and easiest way to get whatever homework they happen to be assigned done. They all have computers, but for the most part nobody tells them the best techniques to use those computers to get the job of a student done. More information on my web site.

⭐I began reading Kohn’s books with the book, “The Case Against Competition”. I really enjoyed that book and it informed my own educational experiences. The basic premise in this book appears to follow the lines of: it something is worth doing, it’s worth doing for its own sake, and not because anyone has to force you to do it or else. Here, the or else is the threat of grades and ultimately failure.Kohn explores the reasons for the premise and comes up with no much at all to say in favor of homework. If this is truly what the science shows, and it appears to be so (the book is fairly well referenced) then it’s worth considering changing it.Personally, I was never a big fan of homework, but I did it because I wanted good grades and I thought thats what you were supposed to do (an idea Kohn examines at some length). Now, after reading his book, it appears there are better ways to motivate children and better ways to give them a lifelong passion for learning. That is, if you agree that this is a goal of education or should be so.Great title! Worth a read if it strikes your fancy.

⭐For the most part, all of us have grown up doing homework while going to school. However, has doing hours of homework made any of us better students or more knowledgeable in the subjects we are learning? That, in essence, is the question being posed by the author of this book. And, his answer is a resounding no, especially when dealing with children who are younger than high school age.I have watched my daughter do homework from the time she was in kindergarten and wondered at the point of it all. Most of the time it was worksheets that seemed to be little more than an attempt to pound information through her head. However, as a gifted student, she already understood the material and only ended up frustrated at having to spend more and more of her spare time doing work she already knew. She went from being a student who loved to go to school to one who cringes at the thought and I suspect homework is one main reason.The studies presented in the book by the author that show homework is of little value validate what I have been saying for years. I found it very interesting that there is no correlation between increased homework and better grades or improved test scores on standardized tests. However, as we move to a more “test” driven world, class time becomes much more valuable and increases in homework become the norm, to the point where many students end up having no life left after school and homework.My daughter, although still in high school, is taking a college course at a local community college. It was fascinating to read the policies of the college. One states that to get an A in a three credit course, the student is expected to do 7 ½ hours of homework a week. When multiplied by 6 courses, which is what my daughter takes at high school, the amount of homework expected for a top grade is 45 hours. When class time is included, that makes a total of about 60 hours a week. Yet at the high school, she is in class for 35 hours a week and has about 30 hours of homework assigned each week. So, she is doing more work in high school than would be expected in college. Something is very wrong with this picture.All parents should read this book and understand the contents. If you don’t read it and complain now, your child will lose more and more of their free time as they get older. It won’t make them better students; just bitter at the experience.

⭐Kohn clearly proves using extensive research that homework is generally bad for students’ health and family life while providing no academic benefit. He certainly convinced me.

⭐Spoiler alert – Kohn doesn’t think kids should have homework.I had high hopes for this book but it fell well short of the professional discussion I was hoping for. Apart from the blatant bias, it took 146 pages to hash out the answer to one question; is homework effective? In the first three pages Kohn identifies the problems with answering such a general question but he does nothing to address these. When we finally got to the crux of the issue (what tasks are effective when completed at home) Kohn was woefully out of date and failed to recognise 21st Century teaching. Maybe my fault for buying a book that was published in 2006. I will learn from my mistake.

⭐As an educator who has set homework religiously and with purpose for many years this book questions the very foundation of that premise and forces you to rethink your attitude and ultimately to stop setting homework. In essence, with increasing mental health issues for young people we must do all we can to reduce that level of pressure on them and allow them free time to explore their own passions and to relax. How many parents have their children going to bed at 11:00 at night after just finishing homework ? What about family time ?

⭐Kohn’s book on homework is superb. He systematically demolishes the ‘popular culture perspective’ on the benefits of homework and what it is designed to accomplish and highlights that, as prescribed, it can have a deleterious effect upon children and families. He is critical but not totally anti- homework – just anti-homework-as-homework-is-done. I like how he writes – and have read a few of his other books as well – and find even where I disagree, I am better off from being provoked into thinking about an issue from his perspective than I would otherwise have been.

⭐confirmed what ten years of teaching has told me. homework sucks. I’ve adapted my own homework provision to a more open, project based approach that has proved very popular, and hasn’t put a dint in my children’s progress. only problem is convincing other staff/parents to try out the ideas in the book.

⭐A must read for every educator. Stop the damage.

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