Kelly Elementary School in Holyoke fulfilled the dream of students everywhere this year. They cancelled homework.
To compensate for their homework ban, the school district will be extending elementary school hours for two hours from 8:00 to 4:00 instead of 9:00 to 3:00. Kelly Elementary’s Principal Jackie Glasheen told ABC News that “Face time with a teacher… is going to impact their learning more than doing skill-and-practice work at home,” she said.
The former Massachusetts secretary of education Paul Reville called homework an old fashioned concept on Boston Public Radio Thursday. “I think we are in a period of reexamining even what we mean by homework,” Reville said.
As technology has gotten more advanced at connecting students and teachers, Reville says he has witnessed the lines between the home and school begin to blur. “Students are actually seeing the lectures at home, and doing what would have historically been considered as homework back in the classroom,” Reville said.
Reville recognizes the importance of continuing education outside of the classroom though and believes that the length of time students spend in class is not enough for a well-rounded education.“Children only spend 20 percent of their waking hours in school,” Reville said. “School is a relatively weak intervention, and it does not consume much time. The idea that they are going to have to do some learning activity outside of school seems to me to be not only intuitive but practically speaking, essential.”
Reville sees the school day extension as a positive opportunity for less affluent children who do not have as many options to continue learning outside of school. “There are a lot of students who when assigned homework that simply don’t do it because they have no place to do it at home, they have no support for doing it, life at home is so disruptive that it doesn't allow for it, or they may not be motivated to do it. For those students, adding a couple of hours of supervised time is a benefit.”
