From: Dale
To: comp-l@uxa.ecn.bgu.edu
Subject: homework

During my 301 observations last spring, my supervising teacher did not give homework, and asked the same of me not to assign any. This blew my mind!! Homework is supposed to be a reinforcement tool. If a student only did math problems in class, he or she would not learn the material as quickly, nor as much of it at the end of the year. I pointed this out to this teacher that all cognitive ability is used by this same principle. Her response: The kids aren't going to do it, anyway.

I didn't really care for this "teacher." On Fridays, the only things that got done were a spelling test and "fun worksheets"--a student sees a bag of food with a plus side near it with the letter "st" followed by another plus sign and a boat's paddle, guess what the classic concentration word is: grocery store--so much Fun and so informative!!

The students were great, but I frequently returned home being disappointed. This teacher and I differed a lot. Sadly, the no homework philosophy has developed a large following--some for good reasons, other times it is out of bad ones (like a teacher's own laziness). My cousin Tod and his wife are teachers up in Michigan. They bang their heads a lot about what they cannot do. Their school's policy is that no homework assignment should be given that takes more than approximately 15 minutes. STUPID!!

The reason for this is because there are 8 classes--that means it adds up to 2 hours of homework each day. Even the math teacher has to follow this absurd rule. Some math lesson--4 problems??

Homework is needed. Why do I have a feeling that I'm not going to care about going to teaching conferences? Certain W.I.U. professors who spoke at last fall's Quincy confernce were cool, but then there are the idiots who preach about no homework and other new theories. Ug!