Homework doesn't Make the Grade (Video)

Does homework make a grade? Not if the school administration gets it way. Listen to this first reading of a proposal to do away with homework grades.

I think it should be up to the individual teacher.

Why change the homework policy to accomodate your lowest common factor?  This is nothing more than the dumbing down of the School system to accomodate your lowest performing students.

The fact that some parents do not get involed in their kids lives is that families problem and not the whole school system.  Yes I make my son do his homework until it is right, how else is he going to learn, as he sure as hell is not going to learn by policy changes like these. Next you will have the school Board  outlawing Pop Quizzes because some students don't do well on tests.

Pacman wrote: Why change the homework policy to accomodate your lowest common factor?  This is nothing more than the dumbing down of the School system to accomodate your lowest performing students. The fact that some parents do not get involed in their kids lives is that families problem and not the whole school system.  Yes I make my son do his homework until it is right, how else is he going to learn, as he sure as hell is not going to learn by policy changes like these. Next you will have the school Board  outlawing Pop Quizzes because some students don't do well on tests.   If you constantly are trying to accomodate your lowest scoring students you will eventually have nothing but that.    Just another reason my son will be out of the Middletown School System next year.

Perhaps the idea is to change the policy to address what is best for the majority of students. Middletown is not (for example) Mason, and many of the same people who would complain endlessly about how our students' scores are so terrible would fail to take into account that there are a lot of poor people in this community, and a lot of students without any sort of help outside of school to complete their homework. This change might in your opinion lower the quality of education your own child receives in our system, in which case you can feel quite justified in taking your son to another district, but the issue is whether this would help the majority. That said, Meg Dyer makes a great point that this is more of a social and economic issue than it is a purely educational issue, and on that basis I think her case is quite valid.

Pacman wrote: Bill show me some statistics that say that the majority if kids in Middletown can not get adequate help with their homework, r they will benefit from this policy change.   Homework has been around for years and I will admit that when I was in elementary school homework was not handed out on a regular basis, but I also wasn't starting to do Algebra in the 5th grade.   By using your logic testing should not be graded either because a majority of kids will benfit by receiving no grades as it has been stated that many people are not effective intaking tests.   There is more to doing homework than just getting the assignment right it instills a work ethic into the children that most will need for their entire educational life.   Sorry but i just don't buy this oh woe is the few that we must change the policy for.

There's no one to say that a teacher can't suggest work to do at home. There's no one to say you can't supervise your own child, and apply your supervision to helping him study his material without getting a grade for it. Those concerned, responsible parents like you can still see that their children get their learning in and their work ethics instilled, and those children with parents that don't help them at home will be graded with more of a focus on how much they know the material rather than how much busywork they completed at home.