One reason that some students skip homework is because they think that they shouldn’t be doing it. Kids are naturally lazy, and that laziness is often a reason that students don’t get their work done on time. However, if a student does not feel like they are making the effort to do homework, they will often simply stop going. This is a bad strategy for almost every teacher, since many assignments are meant to be studied, reviewed, and then further worked on during a late night, or early morning study period.
When I ask what homework does to students, the first answer that I normally hear is that students need to put in “quality” time doing homework. In other words, the teacher needs to spend more time making sure that the work is actually completed. This usually results in the student putting in less time than is necessary to complete the work, which usually ends up as uneaten leftover food on the kitchen table after the school bell rings.
The second common answer that I hear is that students shouldn’t be required to do their schoolwork at school. Teachers say that students can learn about responsibility by doing their homework on their own. This is obviously a flawed argument, as there are two major problems with it. The first is that when a student completes his or her homework, he or she often doesn’t take the responsibility of making sure that it is done properly back to the teacher. This inevitably leads to criticism, not completion of coursework. The second problem is that many students are just too lazy or don’t want to put in the work to complete it, so they just leave it until it is due.
The third most common answer that I hear is that what homework does to students is that students shouldn’t be expected to do their work alone. Again, this answer makes a lot of sense but is also problematic. After all, who goes to school without a personal assistant? After all, work that has to be done by oneself often gets left behind when children head off to school.
Of course, by themselves, the students can’t really do what homework is. That is why teachers usually provide help in the form of doing their assignments with books, calculators, etc… However, the problem is that some of the responsibility still has to be dealt with individually by the student.
For one thing, it is important for students to understand the importance of homework. They must know the value of getting good grades and keeping their homework complete. And although most kids recognize that they shouldn’t slack off on schoolwork, they don’t always realize what kind of pressure that comes with it. As a result, many students find that they don’t do well at school because they don’t feel like they are responsible enough to do the work that is assigned to them.
One solution that I have found to be very effective in dealing with both the problem of what homework does to students and the pressure that it causes, is to make sure that my children understand the importance of completing their homework on time. In fact, I have made it part of my weekly routine to have my son bring in his work for the next week and to also make sure that I review it with him before I start my lesson. And although he doesn’t get to do it with me, he knows that his homework is going to help him do well in school. This has been working wonders for me and has saved me a lot of headaches and lost sleep over the course of my son’s childhood.
