how does homework have no real impact on performance

Does Homework Really Help Students Learn?

A conversation with a Wheelock researcher, a BU student, and a fourth-grade teacher

“Quality homework is engaging and relevant to kids’ lives,” says Wheelock’s Janine Bempechat. “It gives them autonomy and engages them in the community and with their families. In some subjects, like math, worksheets can be very helpful. It has to do with the value of practicing over and over.” Photo by iStock/Glenn Cook Photography

Do your homework.

If only it were that simple.

Educators have debated the merits of homework since the late 19th century. In recent years, amid concerns of some parents and teachers that children are being stressed out by too much homework, things have only gotten more fraught.

“Homework is complicated,” says developmental psychologist Janine Bempechat, a Wheelock College of Education & Human Development clinical professor. The author of the essay “ The Case for (Quality) Homework—Why It Improves Learning and How Parents Can Help ” in the winter 2019 issue of Education Next , Bempechat has studied how the debate about homework is influencing teacher preparation, parent and student beliefs about learning, and school policies.

She worries especially about socioeconomically disadvantaged students from low-performing schools who, according to research by Bempechat and others, get little or no homework.

BU Today  sat down with Bempechat and Erin Bruce (Wheelock’17,’18), a new fourth-grade teacher at a suburban Boston school, and future teacher freshman Emma Ardizzone (Wheelock) to talk about what quality homework looks like, how it can help children learn, and how schools can equip teachers to design it, evaluate it, and facilitate parents’ role in it.

BU Today: Parents and educators who are against homework in elementary school say there is no research definitively linking it to academic performance for kids in the early grades. You’ve said that they’re missing the point.

Bempechat : I think teachers assign homework in elementary school as a way to help kids develop skills they’ll need when they’re older—to begin to instill a sense of responsibility and to learn planning and organizational skills. That’s what I think is the greatest value of homework—in cultivating beliefs about learning and skills associated with academic success. If we greatly reduce or eliminate homework in elementary school, we deprive kids and parents of opportunities to instill these important learning habits and skills.

We do know that beginning in late middle school, and continuing through high school, there is a strong and positive correlation between homework completion and academic success.

That’s what I think is the greatest value of homework—in cultivating beliefs about learning and skills associated with academic success.

You talk about the importance of quality homework. What is that?

Quality homework is engaging and relevant to kids’ lives. It gives them autonomy and engages them in the community and with their families. In some subjects, like math, worksheets can be very helpful. It has to do with the value of practicing over and over.

What are your concerns about homework and low-income children?

The argument that some people make—that homework “punishes the poor” because lower-income parents may not be as well-equipped as affluent parents to help their children with homework—is very troubling to me. There are no parents who don’t care about their children’s learning. Parents don’t actually have to help with homework completion in order for kids to do well. They can help in other ways—by helping children organize a study space, providing snacks, being there as a support, helping children work in groups with siblings or friends.

Isn’t the discussion about getting rid of homework happening mostly in affluent communities?

Yes, and the stories we hear of kids being stressed out from too much homework—four or five hours of homework a night—are real. That’s problematic for physical and mental health and overall well-being. But the research shows that higher-income students get a lot more homework than lower-income kids.

Teachers may not have as high expectations for lower-income children. Schools should bear responsibility for providing supports for kids to be able to get their homework done—after-school clubs, community support, peer group support. It does kids a disservice when our expectations are lower for them.

The conversation around homework is to some extent a social class and social justice issue. If we eliminate homework for all children because affluent children have too much, we’re really doing a disservice to low-income children. They need the challenge, and every student can rise to the challenge with enough supports in place.

What did you learn by studying how education schools are preparing future teachers to handle homework?

My colleague, Margarita Jimenez-Silva, at the University of California, Davis, School of Education, and I interviewed faculty members at education schools, as well as supervising teachers, to find out how students are being prepared. And it seemed that they weren’t. There didn’t seem to be any readings on the research, or conversations on what high-quality homework is and how to design it.

Erin, what kind of training did you get in handling homework?

Bruce : I had phenomenal professors at Wheelock, but homework just didn’t come up. I did lots of student teaching. I’ve been in classrooms where the teachers didn’t assign any homework, and I’ve been in rooms where they assigned hours of homework a night. But I never even considered homework as something that was my decision. I just thought it was something I’d pull out of a book and it’d be done.

I started giving homework on the first night of school this year. My first assignment was to go home and draw a picture of the room where you do your homework. I want to know if it’s at a table and if there are chairs around it and if mom’s cooking dinner while you’re doing homework.

The second night I asked them to talk to a grown-up about how are you going to be able to get your homework done during the week. The kids really enjoyed it. There’s a running joke that I’m teaching life skills.

Friday nights, I read all my kids’ responses to me on their homework from the week and it’s wonderful. They pour their hearts out. It’s like we’re having a conversation on my couch Friday night.

It matters to know that the teacher cares about you and that what you think matters to the teacher. Homework is a vehicle to connect home and school…for parents to know teachers are welcoming to them and their families.

Bempechat : I can’t imagine that most new teachers would have the intuition Erin had in designing homework the way she did.

Ardizzone : Conversations with kids about homework, feeling you’re being listened to—that’s such a big part of wanting to do homework….I grew up in Westchester County. It was a pretty demanding school district. My junior year English teacher—I loved her—she would give us feedback, have meetings with all of us. She’d say, “If you have any questions, if you have anything you want to talk about, you can talk to me, here are my office hours.” It felt like she actually cared.

Bempechat : It matters to know that the teacher cares about you and that what you think matters to the teacher. Homework is a vehicle to connect home and school…for parents to know teachers are welcoming to them and their families.

Ardizzone : But can’t it lead to parents being overbearing and too involved in their children’s lives as students?

Bempechat : There’s good help and there’s bad help. The bad help is what you’re describing—when parents hover inappropriately, when they micromanage, when they see their children confused and struggling and tell them what to do.

Good help is when parents recognize there’s a struggle going on and instead ask informative questions: “Where do you think you went wrong?” They give hints, or pointers, rather than saying, “You missed this,” or “You didn’t read that.”

Bruce : I hope something comes of this. I hope BU or Wheelock can think of some way to make this a more pressing issue. As a first-year teacher, it was not something I even thought about on the first day of school—until a kid raised his hand and said, “Do we have homework?” It would have been wonderful if I’d had a plan from day one.

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Sara Rimer A journalist for more than three decades, Sara Rimer worked at the Miami Herald , Washington Post and, for 26 years, the New York Times , where she was the New England bureau chief, and a national reporter covering education, aging, immigration, and other social justice issues. Her stories on the death penalty’s inequities were nominated for a Pulitzer Prize and cited in the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision outlawing the execution of people with intellectual disabilities. Her journalism honors include Columbia University’s Meyer Berger award for in-depth human interest reporting. She holds a BA degree in American Studies from the University of Michigan. Profile

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There are 81 comments on Does Homework Really Help Students Learn?

Insightful! The values about homework in elementary schools are well aligned with my intuition as a parent.

when i finish my work i do my homework and i sometimes forget what to do because i did not get enough sleep

same omg it does not help me it is stressful and if I have it in more than one class I hate it.

Same I think my parent wants to help me but, she doesn’t care if I get bad grades so I just try my best and my grades are great.

I think that last question about Good help from parents is not know to all parents, we do as our parents did or how we best think it can be done, so maybe coaching parents or giving them resources on how to help with homework would be very beneficial for the parent on how to help and for the teacher to have consistency and improve homework results, and of course for the child. I do see how homework helps reaffirm the knowledge obtained in the classroom, I also have the ability to see progress and it is a time I share with my kids

The answer to the headline question is a no-brainer – a more pressing problem is why there is a difference in how students from different cultures succeed. Perfect example is the student population at BU – why is there a majority population of Asian students and only about 3% black students at BU? In fact at some universities there are law suits by Asians to stop discrimination and quotas against admitting Asian students because the real truth is that as a group they are demonstrating better qualifications for admittance, while at the same time there are quotas and reduced requirements for black students to boost their portion of the student population because as a group they do more poorly in meeting admissions standards – and it is not about the Benjamins. The real problem is that in our PC society no one has the gazuntas to explore this issue as it may reveal that all people are not created equal after all. Or is it just environmental cultural differences??????

I get you have a concern about the issue but that is not even what the point of this article is about. If you have an issue please take this to the site we have and only post your opinion about the actual topic

This is not at all what the article is talking about.

This literally has nothing to do with the article brought up. You should really take your opinions somewhere else before you speak about something that doesn’t make sense.

we have the same name

so they have the same name what of it?

lol you tell her

totally agree

What does that have to do with homework, that is not what the article talks about AT ALL.

Yes, I think homework plays an important role in the development of student life. Through homework, students have to face challenges on a daily basis and they try to solve them quickly.I am an intense online tutor at 24x7homeworkhelp and I give homework to my students at that level in which they handle it easily.

More than two-thirds of students said they used alcohol and drugs, primarily marijuana, to cope with stress.

You know what’s funny? I got this assignment to write an argument for homework about homework and this article was really helpful and understandable, and I also agree with this article’s point of view.

I also got the same task as you! I was looking for some good resources and I found this! I really found this article useful and easy to understand, just like you! ^^

i think that homework is the best thing that a child can have on the school because it help them with their thinking and memory.

I am a child myself and i think homework is a terrific pass time because i can’t play video games during the week. It also helps me set goals.

Homework is not harmful ,but it will if there is too much

I feel like, from a minors point of view that we shouldn’t get homework. Not only is the homework stressful, but it takes us away from relaxing and being social. For example, me and my friends was supposed to hang at the mall last week but we had to postpone it since we all had some sort of work to do. Our minds shouldn’t be focused on finishing an assignment that in realty, doesn’t matter. I completely understand that we should have homework. I have to write a paper on the unimportance of homework so thanks.

homework isn’t that bad

Are you a student? if not then i don’t really think you know how much and how severe todays homework really is

i am a student and i do not enjoy homework because i practice my sport 4 out of the five days we have school for 4 hours and that’s not even counting the commute time or the fact i still have to shower and eat dinner when i get home. its draining!

i totally agree with you. these people are such boomers

why just why

they do make a really good point, i think that there should be a limit though. hours and hours of homework can be really stressful, and the extra work isn’t making a difference to our learning, but i do believe homework should be optional and extra credit. that would make it for students to not have the leaning stress of a assignment and if you have a low grade you you can catch up.

Studies show that homework improves student achievement in terms of improved grades, test results, and the likelihood to attend college. Research published in the High School Journal indicates that students who spent between 31 and 90 minutes each day on homework “scored about 40 points higher on the SAT-Mathematics subtest than their peers, who reported spending no time on homework each day, on average.” On both standardized tests and grades, students in classes that were assigned homework outperformed 69% of students who didn’t have homework. A majority of studies on homework’s impact – 64% in one meta-study and 72% in another – showed that take home assignments were effective at improving academic achievement. Research by the Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA) concluded that increased homework led to better GPAs and higher probability of college attendance for high school boys. In fact, boys who attended college did more than three hours of additional homework per week in high school.

So how are your measuring student achievement? That’s the real question. The argument that doing homework is simply a tool for teaching responsibility isn’t enough for me. We can teach responsibility in a number of ways. Also the poor argument that parents don’t need to help with homework, and that students can do it on their own, is wishful thinking at best. It completely ignores neurodiverse students. Students in poverty aren’t magically going to find a space to do homework, a friend’s or siblings to help them do it, and snacks to eat. I feel like the author of this piece has never set foot in a classroom of students.

THIS. This article is pathetic coming from a university. So intellectually dishonest, refusing to address the havoc of capitalism and poverty plays on academic success in life. How can they in one sentence use poor kids in an argument and never once address that poor children have access to damn near 0 of the resources affluent kids have? Draw me a picture and let’s talk about feelings lmao what a joke is that gonna put food in their belly so they can have the calories to burn in order to use their brain to study? What about quiet their 7 other siblings that they share a single bedroom with for hours? Is it gonna force the single mom to magically be at home and at work at the same time to cook food while you study and be there to throw an encouraging word?

Also the “parents don’t need to be a parent and be able to guide their kid at all academically they just need to exist in the next room” is wild. Its one thing if a parent straight up is not equipped but to say kids can just figured it out is…. wow coming from an educator What’s next the teacher doesn’t need to teach cause the kid can just follow the packet and figure it out?

Well then get a tutor right? Oh wait you are poor only affluent kids can afford a tutor for their hours of homework a day were they on average have none of the worries a poor child does. Does this address that poor children are more likely to also suffer abuse and mental illness? Like mentioned what about kids that can’t learn or comprehend the forced standardized way? Just let em fail? These children regularly are not in “special education”(some of those are a joke in their own and full of neglect and abuse) programs cause most aren’t even acknowledged as having disabilities or disorders.

But yes all and all those pesky poor kids just aren’t being worked hard enough lol pretty sure poor children’s existence just in childhood is more work, stress, and responsibility alone than an affluent child’s entire life cycle. Love they never once talked about the quality of education in the classroom being so bad between the poor and affluent it can qualify as segregation, just basically blamed poor people for being lazy, good job capitalism for failing us once again!

why the hell?

you should feel bad for saying this, this article can be helpful for people who has to write a essay about it

This is more of a political rant than it is about homework

I know a teacher who has told his students their homework is to find something they are interested in, pursue it and then come share what they learn. The student responses are quite compelling. One girl taught herself German so she could talk to her grandfather. One boy did a research project on Nelson Mandela because the teacher had mentioned him in class. Another boy, a both on the autism spectrum, fixed his family’s computer. The list goes on. This is fourth grade. I think students are highly motivated to learn, when we step aside and encourage them.

The whole point of homework is to give the students a chance to use the material that they have been presented with in class. If they never have the opportunity to use that information, and discover that it is actually useful, it will be in one ear and out the other. As a science teacher, it is critical that the students are challenged to use the material they have been presented with, which gives them the opportunity to actually think about it rather than regurgitate “facts”. Well designed homework forces the student to think conceptually, as opposed to regurgitation, which is never a pretty sight

Wonderful discussion. and yes, homework helps in learning and building skills in students.

not true it just causes kids to stress

Homework can be both beneficial and unuseful, if you will. There are students who are gifted in all subjects in school and ones with disabilities. Why should the students who are gifted get the lucky break, whereas the people who have disabilities suffer? The people who were born with this “gift” go through school with ease whereas people with disabilities struggle with the work given to them. I speak from experience because I am one of those students: the ones with disabilities. Homework doesn’t benefit “us”, it only tears us down and put us in an abyss of confusion and stress and hopelessness because we can’t learn as fast as others. Or we can’t handle the amount of work given whereas the gifted students go through it with ease. It just brings us down and makes us feel lost; because no mater what, it feels like we are destined to fail. It feels like we weren’t “cut out” for success.

homework does help

here is the thing though, if a child is shoved in the face with a whole ton of homework that isn’t really even considered homework it is assignments, it’s not helpful. the teacher should make homework more of a fun learning experience rather than something that is dreaded

This article was wonderful, I am going to ask my teachers about extra, or at all giving homework.

I agree. Especially when you have homework before an exam. Which is distasteful as you’ll need that time to study. It doesn’t make any sense, nor does us doing homework really matters as It’s just facts thrown at us.

Homework is too severe and is just too much for students, schools need to decrease the amount of homework. When teachers assign homework they forget that the students have other classes that give them the same amount of homework each day. Students need to work on social skills and life skills.

I disagree.

Beyond achievement, proponents of homework argue that it can have many other beneficial effects. They claim it can help students develop good study habits so they are ready to grow as their cognitive capacities mature. It can help students recognize that learning can occur at home as well as at school. Homework can foster independent learning and responsible character traits. And it can give parents an opportunity to see what’s going on at school and let them express positive attitudes toward achievement.

Homework is helpful because homework helps us by teaching us how to learn a specific topic.

As a student myself, I can say that I have almost never gotten the full 9 hours of recommended sleep time, because of homework. (Now I’m writing an essay on it in the middle of the night D=)

I am a 10 year old kid doing a report about “Is homework good or bad” for homework before i was going to do homework is bad but the sources from this site changed my mind!

Homeowkr is god for stusenrs

I agree with hunter because homework can be so stressful especially with this whole covid thing no one has time for homework and every one just wants to get back to there normal lives it is especially stressful when you go on a 2 week vaca 3 weeks into the new school year and and then less then a week after you come back from the vaca you are out for over a month because of covid and you have no way to get the assignment done and turned in

As great as homework is said to be in the is article, I feel like the viewpoint of the students was left out. Every where I go on the internet researching about this topic it almost always has interviews from teachers, professors, and the like. However isn’t that a little biased? Of course teachers are going to be for homework, they’re not the ones that have to stay up past midnight completing the homework from not just one class, but all of them. I just feel like this site is one-sided and you should include what the students of today think of spending four hours every night completing 6-8 classes worth of work.

Are we talking about homework or practice? Those are two very different things and can result in different outcomes.

Homework is a graded assignment. I do not know of research showing the benefits of graded assignments going home.

Practice; however, can be extremely beneficial, especially if there is some sort of feedback (not a grade but feedback). That feedback can come from the teacher, another student or even an automated grading program.

As a former band director, I assigned daily practice. I never once thought it would be appropriate for me to require the students to turn in a recording of their practice for me to grade. Instead, I had in-class assignments/assessments that were graded and directly related to the practice assigned.

I would really like to read articles on “homework” that truly distinguish between the two.

oof i feel bad good luck!

thank you guys for the artical because I have to finish an assingment. yes i did cite it but just thanks

thx for the article guys.

Homework is good

I think homework is helpful AND harmful. Sometimes u can’t get sleep bc of homework but it helps u practice for school too so idk.

I agree with this Article. And does anyone know when this was published. I would like to know.

It was published FEb 19, 2019.

Studies have shown that homework improved student achievement in terms of improved grades, test results, and the likelihood to attend college.

i think homework can help kids but at the same time not help kids

This article is so out of touch with majority of homes it would be laughable if it wasn’t so incredibly sad.

There is no value to homework all it does is add stress to already stressed homes. Parents or adults magically having the time or energy to shepherd kids through homework is dome sort of 1950’s fantasy.

What lala land do these teachers live in?

Homework gives noting to the kid

Homework is Bad

homework is bad.

why do kids even have homework?

Comments are closed.

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Credit: August de Richelieu

Does homework still have value? A Johns Hopkins education expert weighs in

Joyce epstein, co-director of the center on school, family, and community partnerships, discusses why homework is essential, how to maximize its benefit to learners, and what the 'no-homework' approach gets wrong.

By Vicky Hallett

The necessity of homework has been a subject of debate since at least as far back as the 1890s, according to Joyce L. Epstein , co-director of the Center on School, Family, and Community Partnerships at Johns Hopkins University. "It's always been the case that parents, kids—and sometimes teachers, too—wonder if this is just busy work," Epstein says.

But after decades of researching how to improve schools, the professor in the Johns Hopkins School of Education remains certain that homework is essential—as long as the teachers have done their homework, too. The National Network of Partnership Schools , which she founded in 1995 to advise schools and districts on ways to improve comprehensive programs of family engagement, has developed hundreds of improved homework ideas through its Teachers Involve Parents in Schoolwork program. For an English class, a student might interview a parent on popular hairstyles from their youth and write about the differences between then and now. Or for science class, a family could identify forms of matter over the dinner table, labeling foods as liquids or solids. These innovative and interactive assignments not only reinforce concepts from the classroom but also foster creativity, spark discussions, and boost student motivation.

"We're not trying to eliminate homework procedures, but expand and enrich them," says Epstein, who is packing this research into a forthcoming book on the purposes and designs of homework. In the meantime, the Hub couldn't wait to ask her some questions:

What kind of homework training do teachers typically get?

Future teachers and administrators really have little formal training on how to design homework before they assign it. This means that most just repeat what their teachers did, or they follow textbook suggestions at the end of units. For example, future teachers are well prepared to teach reading and literacy skills at each grade level, and they continue to learn to improve their teaching of reading in ongoing in-service education. By contrast, most receive little or no training on the purposes and designs of homework in reading or other subjects. It is really important for future teachers to receive systematic training to understand that they have the power, opportunity, and obligation to design homework with a purpose.

Why do students need more interactive homework?

If homework assignments are always the same—10 math problems, six sentences with spelling words—homework can get boring and some kids just stop doing their assignments, especially in the middle and high school years. When we've asked teachers what's the best homework you've ever had or designed, invariably we hear examples of talking with a parent or grandparent or peer to share ideas. To be clear, parents should never be asked to "teach" seventh grade science or any other subject. Rather, teachers set up the homework assignments so that the student is in charge. It's always the student's homework. But a good activity can engage parents in a fun, collaborative way. Our data show that with "good" assignments, more kids finish their work, more kids interact with a family partner, and more parents say, "I learned what's happening in the curriculum." It all works around what the youngsters are learning.

Is family engagement really that important?

At Hopkins, I am part of the Center for Social Organization of Schools , a research center that studies how to improve many aspects of education to help all students do their best in school. One thing my colleagues and I realized was that we needed to look deeply into family and community engagement. There were so few references to this topic when we started that we had to build the field of study. When children go to school, their families "attend" with them whether a teacher can "see" the parents or not. So, family engagement is ever-present in the life of a school.

My daughter's elementary school doesn't assign homework until third grade. What's your take on "no homework" policies?

There are some parents, writers, and commentators who have argued against homework, especially for very young children. They suggest that children should have time to play after school. This, of course is true, but many kindergarten kids are excited to have homework like their older siblings. If they give homework, most teachers of young children make assignments very short—often following an informal rule of 10 minutes per grade level. "No homework" does not guarantee that all students will spend their free time in productive and imaginative play.

Some researchers and critics have consistently misinterpreted research findings. They have argued that homework should be assigned only at the high school level where data point to a strong connection of doing assignments with higher student achievement . However, as we discussed, some students stop doing homework. This leads, statistically, to results showing that doing homework or spending more minutes on homework is linked to higher student achievement. If slow or struggling students are not doing their assignments, they contribute to—or cause—this "result."

Teachers need to design homework that even struggling students want to do because it is interesting. Just about all students at any age level react positively to good assignments and will tell you so.

Did COVID change how schools and parents view homework?

Within 24 hours of the day school doors closed in March 2020, just about every school and district in the country figured out that teachers had to talk to and work with students' parents. This was not the same as homeschooling—teachers were still working hard to provide daily lessons. But if a child was learning at home in the living room, parents were more aware of what they were doing in school. One of the silver linings of COVID was that teachers reported that they gained a better understanding of their students' families. We collected wonderfully creative examples of activities from members of the National Network of Partnership Schools. I'm thinking of one art activity where every child talked with a parent about something that made their family unique. Then they drew their finding on a snowflake and returned it to share in class. In math, students talked with a parent about something the family liked so much that they could represent it 100 times. Conversations about schoolwork at home was the point.

How did you create so many homework activities via the Teachers Involve Parents in Schoolwork program?

We had several projects with educators to help them design interactive assignments, not just "do the next three examples on page 38." Teachers worked in teams to create TIPS activities, and then we turned their work into a standard TIPS format in math, reading/language arts, and science for grades K-8. Any teacher can use or adapt our prototypes to match their curricula.

Overall, we know that if future teachers and practicing educators were prepared to design homework assignments to meet specific purposes—including but not limited to interactive activities—more students would benefit from the important experience of doing their homework. And more parents would, indeed, be partners in education.

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More than two hours of homework may be counterproductive, research suggests.

A Stanford education researcher found that too much homework can negatively affect kids, especially their lives away from school, where family, friends and activities matter.   "Our findings on the effects of homework challenge the traditional assumption that homework is inherently good," wrote Denise Pope , a senior lecturer at the Stanford Graduate School of Education and a co-author of a study published in the Journal of Experimental Education .   The researchers used survey data to examine perceptions about homework, student well-being and behavioral engagement in a sample of 4,317 students from 10 high-performing high schools in upper-middle-class California communities. Along with the survey data, Pope and her colleagues used open-ended answers to explore the students' views on homework.   Median household income exceeded $90,000 in these communities, and 93 percent of the students went on to college, either two-year or four-year.   Students in these schools average about 3.1 hours of homework each night.   "The findings address how current homework practices in privileged, high-performing schools sustain students' advantage in competitive climates yet hinder learning, full engagement and well-being," Pope wrote.   Pope and her colleagues found that too much homework can diminish its effectiveness and even be counterproductive. They cite prior research indicating that homework benefits plateau at about two hours per night, and that 90 minutes to two and a half hours is optimal for high school.   Their study found that too much homework is associated with:   • Greater stress : 56 percent of the students considered homework a primary source of stress, according to the survey data. Forty-three percent viewed tests as a primary stressor, while 33 percent put the pressure to get good grades in that category. Less than 1 percent of the students said homework was not a stressor.   • Reductions in health : In their open-ended answers, many students said their homework load led to sleep deprivation and other health problems. The researchers asked students whether they experienced health issues such as headaches, exhaustion, sleep deprivation, weight loss and stomach problems.   • Less time for friends, family and extracurricular pursuits : Both the survey data and student responses indicate that spending too much time on homework meant that students were "not meeting their developmental needs or cultivating other critical life skills," according to the researchers. Students were more likely to drop activities, not see friends or family, and not pursue hobbies they enjoy.   A balancing act   The results offer empirical evidence that many students struggle to find balance between homework, extracurricular activities and social time, the researchers said. Many students felt forced or obligated to choose homework over developing other talents or skills.   Also, there was no relationship between the time spent on homework and how much the student enjoyed it. The research quoted students as saying they often do homework they see as "pointless" or "mindless" in order to keep their grades up.   "This kind of busy work, by its very nature, discourages learning and instead promotes doing homework simply to get points," said Pope, who is also a co-founder of Challenge Success , a nonprofit organization affiliated with the GSE that conducts research and works with schools and parents to improve students' educational experiences..   Pope said the research calls into question the value of assigning large amounts of homework in high-performing schools. Homework should not be simply assigned as a routine practice, she said.   "Rather, any homework assigned should have a purpose and benefit, and it should be designed to cultivate learning and development," wrote Pope.   High-performing paradox   In places where students attend high-performing schools, too much homework can reduce their time to foster skills in the area of personal responsibility, the researchers concluded. "Young people are spending more time alone," they wrote, "which means less time for family and fewer opportunities to engage in their communities."   Student perspectives   The researchers say that while their open-ended or "self-reporting" methodology to gauge student concerns about homework may have limitations – some might regard it as an opportunity for "typical adolescent complaining" – it was important to learn firsthand what the students believe.   The paper was co-authored by Mollie Galloway from Lewis and Clark College and Jerusha Conner from Villanova University.

Clifton B. Parker is a writer at the Stanford News Service .

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Student Opinion

Should We Get Rid of Homework?

Some educators are pushing to get rid of homework. Would that be a good thing?

By Jeremy Engle and Michael Gonchar

Do you like doing homework? Do you think it has benefited you educationally?

Has homework ever helped you practice a difficult skill — in math, for example — until you mastered it? Has it helped you learn new concepts in history or science? Has it helped to teach you life skills, such as independence and responsibility? Or, have you had a more negative experience with homework? Does it stress you out, numb your brain from busywork or actually make you fall behind in your classes?

Should we get rid of homework?

In “ The Movement to End Homework Is Wrong, ” published in July, the Times Opinion writer Jay Caspian Kang argues that homework may be imperfect, but it still serves an important purpose in school. The essay begins:

Do students really need to do their homework? As a parent and a former teacher, I have been pondering this question for quite a long time. The teacher side of me can acknowledge that there were assignments I gave out to my students that probably had little to no academic value. But I also imagine that some of my students never would have done their basic reading if they hadn’t been trained to complete expected assignments, which would have made the task of teaching an English class nearly impossible. As a parent, I would rather my daughter not get stuck doing the sort of pointless homework I would occasionally assign, but I also think there’s a lot of value in saying, “Hey, a lot of work you’re going to end up doing in your life is pointless, so why not just get used to it?” I certainly am not the only person wondering about the value of homework. Recently, the sociologist Jessica McCrory Calarco and the mathematics education scholars Ilana Horn and Grace Chen published a paper, “ You Need to Be More Responsible: The Myth of Meritocracy and Teachers’ Accounts of Homework Inequalities .” They argued that while there’s some evidence that homework might help students learn, it also exacerbates inequalities and reinforces what they call the “meritocratic” narrative that says kids who do well in school do so because of “individual competence, effort and responsibility.” The authors believe this meritocratic narrative is a myth and that homework — math homework in particular — further entrenches the myth in the minds of teachers and their students. Calarco, Horn and Chen write, “Research has highlighted inequalities in students’ homework production and linked those inequalities to differences in students’ home lives and in the support students’ families can provide.”

Mr. Kang argues:

But there’s a defense of homework that doesn’t really have much to do with class mobility, equality or any sense of reinforcing the notion of meritocracy. It’s one that became quite clear to me when I was a teacher: Kids need to learn how to practice things. Homework, in many cases, is the only ritualized thing they have to do every day. Even if we could perfectly equalize opportunity in school and empower all students not to be encumbered by the weight of their socioeconomic status or ethnicity, I’m not sure what good it would do if the kids didn’t know how to do something relentlessly, over and over again, until they perfected it. Most teachers know that type of progress is very difficult to achieve inside the classroom, regardless of a student’s background, which is why, I imagine, Calarco, Horn and Chen found that most teachers weren’t thinking in a structural inequalities frame. Holistic ideas of education, in which learning is emphasized and students can explore concepts and ideas, are largely for the types of kids who don’t need to worry about class mobility. A defense of rote practice through homework might seem revanchist at this moment, but if we truly believe that schools should teach children lessons that fall outside the meritocracy, I can’t think of one that matters more than the simple satisfaction of mastering something that you were once bad at. That takes homework and the acknowledgment that sometimes a student can get a question wrong and, with proper instruction, eventually get it right.

Students, read the entire article, then tell us:

Should we get rid of homework? Why, or why not?

Is homework an outdated, ineffective or counterproductive tool for learning? Do you agree with the authors of the paper that homework is harmful and worsens inequalities that exist between students’ home circumstances?

Or do you agree with Mr. Kang that homework still has real educational value?

When you get home after school, how much homework will you do? Do you think the amount is appropriate, too much or too little? Is homework, including the projects and writing assignments you do at home, an important part of your learning experience? Or, in your opinion, is it not a good use of time? Explain.

In these letters to the editor , one reader makes a distinction between elementary school and high school:

Homework’s value is unclear for younger students. But by high school and college, homework is absolutely essential for any student who wishes to excel. There simply isn’t time to digest Dostoyevsky if you only ever read him in class.

What do you think? How much does grade level matter when discussing the value of homework?

Is there a way to make homework more effective?

If you were a teacher, would you assign homework? What kind of assignments would you give and why?

Want more writing prompts? You can find all of our questions in our Student Opinion column . Teachers, check out this guide to learn how you can incorporate them into your classroom.

Students 13 and older in the United States and Britain, and 16 and older elsewhere, are invited to comment. All comments are moderated by the Learning Network staff, but please keep in mind that once your comment is accepted, it will be made public.

Jeremy Engle joined The Learning Network as a staff editor in 2018 after spending more than 20 years as a classroom humanities and documentary-making teacher, professional developer and curriculum designer working with students and teachers across the country. More about Jeremy Engle

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As the Covid-19 pandemic began and students logged into their remote classrooms, all work, in effect, became homework. But whether or not students could complete it at home varied. For some, schoolwork became public-library work or McDonald’s-parking-lot work.

Luis Torres, the principal of PS 55, a predominantly low-income community elementary school in the south Bronx, told me that his school secured Chromebooks for students early in the pandemic only to learn that some lived in shelters that blocked wifi for security reasons. Others, who lived in housing projects with poor internet reception, did their schoolwork in laundromats.

According to a 2021 Pew survey , 25 percent of lower-income parents said their children, at some point, were unable to complete their schoolwork because they couldn’t access a computer at home; that number for upper-income parents was 2 percent.

The issues with remote learning in March 2020 were new. But they highlighted a divide that had been there all along in another form: homework. And even long after schools have resumed in-person classes, the pandemic’s effects on homework have lingered.

Over the past three years, in response to concerns about equity, schools across the country, including in Sacramento, Los Angeles , San Diego , and Clark County, Nevada , made permanent changes to their homework policies that restricted how much homework could be given and how it could be graded after in-person learning resumed.

Three years into the pandemic, as districts and teachers reckon with Covid-era overhauls of teaching and learning, schools are still reconsidering the purpose and place of homework. Whether relaxing homework expectations helps level the playing field between students or harms them by decreasing rigor is a divisive issue without conclusive evidence on either side, echoing other debates in education like the elimination of standardized test scores from some colleges’ admissions processes.

I first began to wonder if the homework abolition movement made sense after speaking with teachers in some Massachusetts public schools, who argued that rather than help disadvantaged kids, stringent homework restrictions communicated an attitude of low expectations. One, an English teacher, said she felt the school had “just given up” on trying to get the students to do work; another argued that restrictions that prohibit teachers from assigning take-home work that doesn’t begin in class made it difficult to get through the foreign-language curriculum. Teachers in other districts have raised formal concerns about homework abolition’s ability to close gaps among students rather than widening them.

Many education experts share this view. Harris Cooper, a professor emeritus of psychology at Duke who has studied homework efficacy, likened homework abolition to “playing to the lowest common denominator.”

But as I learned after talking to a variety of stakeholders — from homework researchers to policymakers to parents of schoolchildren — whether to abolish homework probably isn’t the right question. More important is what kind of work students are sent home with and where they can complete it. Chances are, if schools think more deeply about giving constructive work, time spent on homework will come down regardless.

There’s no consensus on whether homework works

The rise of the no-homework movement during the Covid-19 pandemic tapped into long-running disagreements over homework’s impact on students. The purpose and effectiveness of homework have been disputed for well over a century. In 1901, for instance, California banned homework for students up to age 15, and limited it for older students, over concerns that it endangered children’s mental and physical health. The newest iteration of the anti-homework argument contends that the current practice punishes students who lack support and rewards those with more resources, reinforcing the “myth of meritocracy.”

But there is still no research consensus on homework’s effectiveness; no one can seem to agree on what the right metrics are. Much of the debate relies on anecdotes, intuition, or speculation.

Researchers disagree even on how much research exists on the value of homework. Kathleen Budge, the co-author of Turning High-Poverty Schools Into High-Performing Schools and a professor at Boise State, told me that homework “has been greatly researched.” Denise Pope, a Stanford lecturer and leader of the education nonprofit Challenge Success, said, “It’s not a highly researched area because of some of the methodological problems.”

Experts who are more sympathetic to take-home assignments generally support the “10-minute rule,” a framework that estimates the ideal amount of homework on any given night by multiplying the student’s grade by 10 minutes. (A ninth grader, for example, would have about 90 minutes of work a night.) Homework proponents argue that while it is difficult to design randomized control studies to test homework’s effectiveness, the vast majority of existing studies show a strong positive correlation between homework and high academic achievement for middle and high school students. Prominent critics of homework argue that these correlational studies are unreliable and point to studies that suggest a neutral or negative effect on student performance. Both agree there is little to no evidence for homework’s effectiveness at an elementary school level, though proponents often argue that it builds constructive habits for the future.

For anyone who remembers homework assignments from both good and bad teachers, this fundamental disagreement might not be surprising. Some homework is pointless and frustrating to complete. Every week during my senior year of high school, I had to analyze a poem for English and decorate it with images found on Google; my most distinct memory from that class is receiving a demoralizing 25-point deduction because I failed to present my analysis on a poster board. Other assignments really do help students learn: After making an adapted version of Chairman Mao’s Little Red Book for a ninth grade history project, I was inspired to check out from the library and read a biography of the Chinese ruler.

For homework opponents, the first example is more likely to resonate. “We’re all familiar with the negative effects of homework: stress, exhaustion, family conflict, less time for other activities, diminished interest in learning,” Alfie Kohn, author of The Homework Myth, which challenges common justifications for homework, told me in an email. “And these effects may be most pronounced among low-income students.” Kohn believes that schools should make permanent any moratoria implemented during the pandemic, arguing that there are no positives at all to outweigh homework’s downsides. Recent studies , he argues , show the benefits may not even materialize during high school.

In the Marlborough Public Schools, a suburban district 45 minutes west of Boston, school policy committee chair Katherine Hennessy described getting kids to complete their homework during remote education as “a challenge, to say the least.” Teachers found that students who spent all day on their computers didn’t want to spend more time online when the day was over. So, for a few months, the school relaxed the usual practice and teachers slashed the quantity of nightly homework.

Online learning made the preexisting divides between students more apparent, she said. Many students, even during normal circumstances, lacked resources to keep them on track and focused on completing take-home assignments. Though Marlborough Schools is more affluent than PS 55, Hennessy said many students had parents whose work schedules left them unable to provide homework help in the evenings. The experience tracked with a common divide in the country between children of different socioeconomic backgrounds.

So in October 2021, months after the homework reduction began, the Marlborough committee made a change to the district’s policy. While teachers could still give homework, the assignments had to begin as classwork. And though teachers could acknowledge homework completion in a student’s participation grade, they couldn’t count homework as its own grading category. “Rigorous learning in the classroom does not mean that that classwork must be assigned every night,” the policy stated . “Extensions of class work is not to be used to teach new content or as a form of punishment.”

Canceling homework might not do anything for the achievement gap

The critiques of homework are valid as far as they go, but at a certain point, arguments against homework can defy the commonsense idea that to retain what they’re learning, students need to practice it.

“Doesn’t a kid become a better reader if he reads more? Doesn’t a kid learn his math facts better if he practices them?” said Cathy Vatterott, an education researcher and professor emeritus at the University of Missouri-St. Louis. After decades of research, she said it’s still hard to isolate the value of homework, but that doesn’t mean it should be abandoned.

Blanket vilification of homework can also conflate the unique challenges facing disadvantaged students as compared to affluent ones, which could have different solutions. “The kids in the low-income schools are being hurt because they’re being graded, unfairly, on time they just don’t have to do this stuff,” Pope told me. “And they’re still being held accountable for turning in assignments, whether they’re meaningful or not.” On the other side, “Palo Alto kids” — students in Silicon Valley’s stereotypically pressure-cooker public schools — “are just bombarded and overloaded and trying to stay above water.”

Merely getting rid of homework doesn’t solve either problem. The United States already has the second-highest disparity among OECD (the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) nations between time spent on homework by students of high and low socioeconomic status — a difference of more than three hours, said Janine Bempechat, clinical professor at Boston University and author of No More Mindless Homework .

When she interviewed teachers in Boston-area schools that had cut homework before the pandemic, Bempechat told me, “What they saw immediately was parents who could afford it immediately enrolled their children in the Russian School of Mathematics,” a math-enrichment program whose tuition ranges from $140 to about $400 a month. Getting rid of homework “does nothing for equity; it increases the opportunity gap between wealthier and less wealthy families,” she said. “That solution troubles me because it’s no solution at all.”

A group of teachers at Wakefield High School in Arlington, Virginia, made the same point after the school district proposed an overhaul of its homework policies, including removing penalties for missing homework deadlines, allowing unlimited retakes, and prohibiting grading of homework.

“Given the emphasis on equity in today’s education systems,” they wrote in a letter to the school board, “we believe that some of the proposed changes will actually have a detrimental impact towards achieving this goal. Families that have means could still provide challenging and engaging academic experiences for their children and will continue to do so, especially if their children are not experiencing expected rigor in the classroom.” At a school where more than a third of students are low-income, the teachers argued, the policies would prompt students “to expect the least of themselves in terms of effort, results, and responsibility.”

Not all homework is created equal

Despite their opposing sides in the homework wars, most of the researchers I spoke to made a lot of the same points. Both Bempechat and Pope were quick to bring up how parents and schools confuse rigor with workload, treating the volume of assignments as a proxy for quality of learning. Bempechat, who is known for defending homework, has written extensively about how plenty of it lacks clear purpose, requires the purchasing of unnecessary supplies, and takes longer than it needs to. Likewise, when Pope instructs graduate-level classes on curriculum, she asks her students to think about the larger purpose they’re trying to achieve with homework: If they can get the job done in the classroom, there’s no point in sending home more work.

At its best, pandemic-era teaching facilitated that last approach. Honolulu-based teacher Christina Torres Cawdery told me that, early in the pandemic, she often had a cohort of kids in her classroom for four hours straight, as her school tried to avoid too much commingling. She couldn’t lecture for four hours, so she gave the students plenty of time to complete independent and project-based work. At the end of most school days, she didn’t feel the need to send them home with more to do.

A similar limited-homework philosophy worked at a public middle school in Chelsea, Massachusetts. A couple of teachers there turned as much class as possible into an opportunity for small-group practice, allowing kids to work on problems that traditionally would be assigned for homework, Jessica Flick, a math coach who leads department meetings at the school, told me. It was inspired by a philosophy pioneered by Simon Fraser University professor Peter Liljedahl, whose influential book Building Thinking Classrooms in Mathematics reframes homework as “check-your-understanding questions” rather than as compulsory work. Last year, Flick found that the two eighth grade classes whose teachers adopted this strategy performed the best on state tests, and this year, she has encouraged other teachers to implement it.

Teachers know that plenty of homework is tedious and unproductive. Jeannemarie Dawson De Quiroz, who has taught for more than 20 years in low-income Boston and Los Angeles pilot and charter schools, says that in her first years on the job she frequently assigned “drill and kill” tasks and questions that she now feels unfairly stumped students. She said designing good homework wasn’t part of her teaching programs, nor was it meaningfully discussed in professional development. With more experience, she turned as much class time as she could into practice time and limited what she sent home.

“The thing about homework that’s sticky is that not all homework is created equal,” says Jill Harrison Berg, a former teacher and the author of Uprooting Instructional Inequity . “Some homework is a genuine waste of time and requires lots of resources for no good reason. And other homework is really useful.”

Cutting homework has to be part of a larger strategy

The takeaways are clear: Schools can make cuts to homework, but those cuts should be part of a strategy to improve the quality of education for all students. If the point of homework was to provide more practice, districts should think about how students can make it up during class — or offer time during or after school for students to seek help from teachers. If it was to move the curriculum along, it’s worth considering whether strategies like Liljedahl’s can get more done in less time.

Some of the best thinking around effective assignments comes from those most critical of the current practice. Denise Pope proposes that, before assigning homework, teachers should consider whether students understand the purpose of the work and whether they can do it without help. If teachers think it’s something that can’t be done in class, they should be mindful of how much time it should take and the feedback they should provide. It’s questions like these that De Quiroz considered before reducing the volume of work she sent home.

More than a year after the new homework policy began in Marlborough, Hennessy still hears from parents who incorrectly “think homework isn’t happening” despite repeated assurances that kids still can receive work. She thinks part of the reason is that education has changed over the years. “I think what we’re trying to do is establish that homework may be an element of educating students,” she told me. “But it may not be what parents think of as what they grew up with. ... It’s going to need to adapt, per the teaching and the curriculum, and how it’s being delivered in each classroom.”

For the policy to work, faculty, parents, and students will all have to buy into a shared vision of what school ought to look like. The district is working on it — in November, it hosted and uploaded to YouTube a round-table discussion on homework between district administrators — but considering the sustained confusion, the path ahead seems difficult.

When I asked Luis Torres about whether he thought homework serves a useful part in PS 55’s curriculum, he said yes, of course it was — despite the effort and money it takes to keep the school open after hours to help them do it. “The children need the opportunity to practice,” he said. “If you don’t give them opportunities to practice what they learn, they’re going to forget.” But Torres doesn’t care if the work is done at home. The school stays open until around 6 pm on weekdays, even during breaks. Tutors through New York City’s Department of Youth and Community Development programs help kids with work after school so they don’t need to take it with them.

As schools weigh the purpose of homework in an unequal world, it’s tempting to dispose of a practice that presents real, practical problems to students across the country. But getting rid of homework is unlikely to do much good on its own. Before cutting it, it’s worth thinking about what good assignments are meant to do in the first place. It’s crucial that students from all socioeconomic backgrounds tackle complex quantitative problems and hone their reading and writing skills. It’s less important that the work comes home with them.

Jacob Sweet is a freelance writer in Somerville, Massachusetts. He is a frequent contributor to the New Yorker, among other publications.

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August 16, 2021

Is it time to get rid of homework? Mental health experts weigh in

by Sara M Moniuszko

It's no secret that kids hate homework. And as students grapple with an ongoing pandemic that has had a wide-range of mental health impacts, is it time schools start listening to their pleas over workloads?

Some teachers are turning to social media to take a stand against homework .

Tiktok user @misguided.teacher says he doesn't assign it because the "whole premise of homework is flawed."

For starters, he says he can't grade work on "even playing fields" when students' home environments can be vastly different.

"Even students who go home to a peaceful house, do they really want to spend their time on busy work? Because typically that's what a lot of homework is, it's busy work," he says in the video that has garnered 1.6 million likes. "You only get one year to be 7, you only got one year to be 10, you only get one year to be 16, 18."

Mental health experts agree heavy work loads have the potential do more harm than good for students, especially when taking into account the impacts of the pandemic. But they also say the answer may not be to eliminate homework altogether.

Emmy Kang, mental health counselor at Humantold, says studies have shown heavy workloads can be "detrimental" for students and cause a "big impact on their mental, physical and emotional health."

"More than half of students say that homework is their primary source of stress, and we know what stress can do on our bodies," she says, adding that staying up late to finish assignments also leads to disrupted sleep and exhaustion.

Cynthia Catchings, a licensed clinical social worker and therapist at Talkspace, says heavy workloads can also cause serious mental health problems in the long run, like anxiety and depression.

And for all the distress homework causes, it's not as useful as many may think, says Dr. Nicholas Kardaras, a psychologist and CEO of Omega Recovery treatment center.

"The research shows that there's really limited benefit of homework for elementary age students, that really the school work should be contained in the classroom," he says.

For older students, Kang says homework benefits plateau at about two hours per night.

"Most students, especially at these high-achieving schools, they're doing a minimum of three hours, and it's taking away time from their friends from their families, their extracurricular activities. And these are all very important things for a person's mental and emotional health."

Catchings, who also taught third to 12th graders for 12 years, says she's seen the positive effects of a no homework policy while working with students abroad.

"Not having homework was something that I always admired from the French students (and) the French schools, because that was helping the students to really have the time off and really disconnect from school ," she says.

The answer may not be to eliminate homework completely, but to be more mindful of the type of work students go home with, suggests Kang, who was a high-school teacher for 10 years.

"I don't think (we) should scrap homework, I think we should scrap meaningless, purposeless busy work-type homework. That's something that needs to be scrapped entirely," she says, encouraging teachers to be thoughtful and consider the amount of time it would take for students to complete assignments.

The pandemic made the conversation around homework more crucial

Mindfulness surrounding homework is especially important in the context of the last two years. Many students will be struggling with mental health issues that were brought on or worsened by the pandemic, making heavy workloads even harder to balance.

"COVID was just a disaster in terms of the lack of structure. Everything just deteriorated," Kardaras says, pointing to an increase in cognitive issues and decrease in attention spans among students. "School acts as an anchor for a lot of children, as a stabilizing force, and that disappeared."

But even if students transition back to the structure of in-person classes, Kardaras suspects students may still struggle after two school years of shifted schedules and disrupted sleeping habits.

"We've seen adults struggling to go back to in-person work environments from remote work environments. That effect is amplified with children because children have less resources to be able to cope with those transitions than adults do," he explains.

'Get organized' ahead of back-to-school

In order to make the transition back to in-person school easier, Kang encourages students to "get good sleep, exercise regularly (and) eat a healthy diet."

To help manage workloads, she suggests students "get organized."

"There's so much mental clutter up there when you're disorganized... sitting down and planning out their study schedules can really help manage their time," she says.

Breaking assignments up can also make things easier to tackle.

"I know that heavy workloads can be stressful, but if you sit down and you break down that studying into smaller chunks, they're much more manageable."

If workloads are still too much, Kang encourages students to advocate for themselves.

"They should tell their teachers when a homework assignment just took too much time or if it was too difficult for them to do on their own," she says. "It's good to speak up and ask those questions. Respectfully, of course, because these are your teachers. But still, I think sometimes teachers themselves need this feedback from their students."

©2021 USA Today Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

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Does homework really work?

by: Leslie Crawford | Updated: December 12, 2023

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You know the drill. It’s 10:15 p.m., and the cardboard-and-toothpick Golden Gate Bridge is collapsing. The pages of polynomials have been abandoned. The paper on the Battle of Waterloo seems to have frozen in time with Napoleon lingering eternally over his breakfast at Le Caillou. Then come the tears and tantrums — while we parents wonder, Does the gain merit all this pain? Is this just too much homework?

However the drama unfolds night after night, year after year, most parents hold on to the hope that homework (after soccer games, dinner, flute practice, and, oh yes, that childhood pastime of yore known as playing) advances their children academically.

But what does homework really do for kids? Is the forest’s worth of book reports and math and spelling sheets the average American student completes in their 12 years of primary schooling making a difference? Or is it just busywork?

Homework haterz

Whether or not homework helps, or even hurts, depends on who you ask. If you ask my 12-year-old son, Sam, he’ll say, “Homework doesn’t help anything. It makes kids stressed-out and tired and makes them hate school more.”

Nothing more than common kid bellyaching?

Maybe, but in the fractious field of homework studies, it’s worth noting that Sam’s sentiments nicely synopsize one side of the ivory tower debate. Books like The End of Homework , The Homework Myth , and The Case Against Homework the film Race to Nowhere , and the anguished parent essay “ My Daughter’s Homework is Killing Me ” make the case that homework, by taking away precious family time and putting kids under unneeded pressure, is an ineffective way to help children become better learners and thinkers.

One Canadian couple took their homework apostasy all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada. After arguing that there was no evidence that it improved academic performance, they won a ruling that exempted their two children from all homework.

So what’s the real relationship between homework and academic achievement?

How much is too much?

To answer this question, researchers have been doing their homework on homework, conducting and examining hundreds of studies. Chris Drew Ph.D., founder and editor at The Helpful Professor recently compiled multiple statistics revealing the folly of today’s after-school busy work. Does any of the data he listed below ring true for you?

• 45 percent of parents think homework is too easy for their child, primarily because it is geared to the lowest standard under the Common Core State Standards .

• 74 percent of students say homework is a source of stress , defined as headaches, exhaustion, sleep deprivation, weight loss, and stomach problems.

• Students in high-performing high schools spend an average of 3.1 hours a night on homework , even though 1 to 2 hours is the optimal duration, according to a peer-reviewed study .

Not included in the list above is the fact many kids have to abandon activities they love — like sports and clubs — because homework deprives them of the needed time to enjoy themselves with other pursuits.

Conversely, The Helpful Professor does list a few pros of homework, noting it teaches discipline and time management, and helps parents know what’s being taught in the class.

The oft-bandied rule on homework quantity — 10 minutes a night per grade (starting from between 10 to 20 minutes in first grade) — is listed on the National Education Association’s website and the National Parent Teacher Association’s website , but few schools follow this rule.

Do you think your child is doing excessive homework? Harris Cooper Ph.D., author of a meta-study on homework , recommends talking with the teacher. “Often there is a miscommunication about the goals of homework assignments,” he says. “What appears to be problematic for kids, why they are doing an assignment, can be cleared up with a conversation.” Also, Cooper suggests taking a careful look at how your child is doing the assignments. It may seem like they’re taking two hours, but maybe your child is wandering off frequently to get a snack or getting distracted.

Less is often more

If your child is dutifully doing their work but still burning the midnight oil, it’s worth intervening to make sure your child gets enough sleep. A 2012 study of 535 high school students found that proper sleep may be far more essential to brain and body development.

For elementary school-age children, Cooper’s research at Duke University shows there is no measurable academic advantage to homework. For middle-schoolers, Cooper found there is a direct correlation between homework and achievement if assignments last between one to two hours per night. After two hours, however, achievement doesn’t improve. For high schoolers, Cooper’s research suggests that two hours per night is optimal. If teens have more than two hours of homework a night, their academic success flatlines. But less is not better. The average high school student doing homework outperformed 69 percent of the students in a class with no homework.

Many schools are starting to act on this research. A Florida superintendent abolished homework in her 42,000 student district, replacing it with 20 minutes of nightly reading. She attributed her decision to “ solid research about what works best in improving academic achievement in students .”

More family time

A 2020 survey by Crayola Experience reports 82 percent of children complain they don’t have enough quality time with their parents. Homework deserves much of the blame. “Kids should have a chance to just be kids and do things they enjoy, particularly after spending six hours a day in school,” says Alfie Kohn, author of The Homework Myth . “It’s absurd to insist that children must be engaged in constructive activities right up until their heads hit the pillow.”

By far, the best replacement for homework — for both parents and children — is bonding, relaxing time together.

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Homework: No Proven Benefits

Why homework is a pointless and outdated habit.

This is an excerpt from Alfie Kohn's recently published book The Homework Myth: Why Our Kids Get Too Much of a Bad Thing. For one teacher's response to this excerpt, read In Defense of Homework: Is there Such a Thing as Too Much? .

It may surprise you, as it did me, to learn that no study has ever demonstrated any academic benefit to assigning homework before children are in high school. In fact, even in high school, the association between homework and achievement is weak -- and the data don't show that homework is responsible for higher achievement. (Correlation doesn't imply causation.)

Finally, there isn't a shred of evidence to support the folk wisdom that homework provides nonacademic benefits at any age -- for example, that it builds character, promotes self-discipline, or teaches good work habits. We're all familiar with the downside of homework: the frustration and exhaustion, the family conflict, time lost for other activities, and possible diminution of children's interest in learning. But the stubborn belief that all of this must be worth it, that the gain must outweigh the pain, relies on faith rather than evidence.

So why does homework continue to be assigned and accepted? Possible reasons include a lack of respect for research, a lack of respect for children (implicit in a determination to keep them busy after school), a lack of understanding about the nature of learning (implicit in the emphasis on practicing skills and the assertion that homework "reinforces" school lessons), or the top-down pressures to teach more stuff faster in order to pump up test scores so we can chant "We're number one!"

All of these explanations are plausible, but I think there's also something else responsible for our continuing to feed children this latter-day cod-liver oil. We don't ask challenging questions about homework because we don't ask challenging questions about most things. Too many of us sound like Robert Frost's neighbor, the man who "will not go behind his father's saying." Too many of us, when pressed about some habit or belief we've adopted, are apt to reply, "Well, that's just the way I was raised" -- as if it were impossible to critically examine the values one was taught. Too many of us, including some who work in the field of education, seem to have lost our capacity to be outraged by the outrageous; when handed foolish and destructive mandates, we respond by asking for guidance on how best to carry them out.

Passivity is a habit acquired early. From our first days in school we are carefully instructed in what has been called the "hidden curriculum": how to do what one is told and stay out of trouble. There are rewards, both tangible and symbolic, for those who behave properly and penalties for those who don't. As students, we're trained to sit still, listen to what the teacher says, run our highlighters across whatever words in the book we'll be required to commit to memory. Pretty soon, we become less likely to ask (or even wonder) whether what we're being taught really makes sense. We just want to know whether it's going to be on the test.

When we find ourselves unhappy with some practice or policy, we're encouraged to focus on incidental aspects of what's going on, to ask questions about the details of implementation -- how something will get done, or by whom, or on what schedule -- but not whether it should be done at all. The more that we attend to secondary concerns, the more the primary issues -- the overarching structures and underlying premises -- are strengthened. We're led to avoid the radical questions -- and I use that adjective in its original sense: Radical comes from the Latin word for "root." It's partly because we spend our time worrying about the tendrils that the weed continues to grow. Noam Chomsky put it this way: "The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum -- even encourage the more critical and dissident views. That gives people the sense that there's free thinking going on, while all the time the presuppositions of the system are being reinforced by the limits put on the range of the debate."

Parents have already been conditioned to accept most of what is done to their children at school, for example, and so their critical energies are confined to the periphery. Sometimes I entertain myself by speculating about how ingrained this pattern really is. If a school administrator were to announce that, starting next week, students will be made to stand outside in the rain and memorize the phone book, I suspect we parents would promptly speak up . . . to ask whether the Yellow Pages will be included. Or perhaps we'd want to know how much of their grade this activity will count for. One of the more outspoken moms might even demand to know whether her child will be permitted to wear a raincoat.

Our education system, meanwhile, is busily avoiding important topics in its own right. For every question that's asked in this field, there are other, more vital questions that are never raised. Educators weigh different techniques of "behavior management" but rarely examine the imperative to focus on behavior -- that is, observable actions -- rather than on reasons and needs and the children who have them. Teachers think about what classroom rules they ought to introduce but are unlikely to ask why they're doing so unilaterally, why students aren't participating in such decisions. It's probably not a coincidence that most schools of education require prospective teachers to take a course called Methods, but there is no course called Goals.

And so we return to the question of homework. Parents anxiously grill teachers about their policies on this topic, but they mostly ask about the details of the assignments their children will be made to do. If homework is a given, it's certainly understandable that one would want to make sure it's being done "correctly." But this begs the question of whether, and why, it should be a given. The willingness not to ask provides another explanation for how a practice can persist even if it hurts more than helps.

For their part, teachers regularly witness how many children are made miserable by homework and how many resist doing it. Some respond with sympathy and respect. Others reach for bribes and threats to compel students to turn in the assignments; indeed, they may insist these inducements are necessary: "If the kids weren't being graded, they'd never do it!" Even if true, this is less an argument for grades and other coercive tactics than an invitation to reconsider the value of those assignments. Or so one might think. However, teachers had to do homework when they were students, and they've likely been expected to give it at every school where they've worked. The idea that homework must be assigned is the premise, not the conclusion -- and it's a premise that's rarely examined by educators.

Unlike parents and teachers, scholars are a step removed from the classroom and therefore have the luxury of pursuing potentially uncomfortable areas of investigation. But few do. Instead, they are more likely to ask, "How much time should students spend on homework?" or "Which strategies will succeed in improving homework completion rates?," which is simply assumed to be desirable.

Policy groups, too, are more likely to act as cheerleaders than as thoughtful critics. The major document on the subject issued jointly by the National PTA and the National Education Association, for example, concedes that children often complain about homework, but never considers the possibility that their complaints may be justified. Parents are exhorted to "show your children that you think homework is important" -- regardless of whether it is, or even whether one really believes this is true -- and to praise them for compliance.

Health professionals, meanwhile, have begun raising concerns about the weight of children's backpacks and then recommending . . . exercises to strengthen their backs! This was also the tack taken by People magazine: An article about families struggling to cope with excessive homework was accompanied by a sidebar that offered some "ways to minimize the strain on young backs" -- for example, "pick a [back]pack with padded shoulder straps."

The People article reminds us that the popular press does occasionally -- cyclically -- take note of how much homework children have to do, and how varied and virulent are its effects. But such inquiries are rarely penetrating and their conclusions almost never rock the boat. Time magazine published a cover essay in 2003 entitled "The Homework Ate My Family." It opened with affecting and even alarming stories of homework's harms. Several pages later, however, it closed with a finger-wagging declaration that "both parents and students must be willing to embrace the 'work' component of homework -- to recognize the quiet satisfaction that comes from practice and drill." Likewise, an essay on the Family Education Network's Web site: "Yes, homework is sometimes dull, or too easy, or too difficult. That doesn't mean that it shouldn't be taken seriously." (One wonders what would have to be true before we'd be justified in not taking something seriously.)

Nor, apparently, are these questions seen as appropriate by most medical and mental health professionals. When a child resists doing homework -- or complying with other demands -- their job is to get the child back on track. Very rarely is there any inquiry into the value of the homework or the reasonableness of the demands.

Sometimes parents are invited to talk to teachers about homework -- providing that their concerns are "appropriate." The same is true of formal opportunities for offering feedback. A list of sample survey questions offered to principals by the central office in one Colorado school district is typical. Parents were asked to indicate whether they agree or disagree with the following statements: "My child understands how to do his/her homework"; "Teachers at this school give me useful suggestions about how to help my child with schoolwork"; "Homework assignments allow me to see what my student is being taught and how he/she is learning"; and "The amount of homework my child receives is (choose one): too much/just right/too little."

The most striking feature of such a list is what isn't on it. Such a questionnaire seems to have been designed to illustrate Chomsky's point about encouraging lively discussion within a narrow spectrum of acceptable opinion, the better to reinforce the key presuppositions of the system. Parents' feedback is earnestly sought -- on these questions only. So, too, for the popular articles that criticize homework, or the parents who speak out: The focus is generally limited to how much is being assigned. I'm sympathetic to this concern, but I'm more struck by how it misses much of what matters. We sometimes forget that not everything that's destructive when done to excess is innocuous when done in moderation. Sometimes the problem is with what's being done, or at least the way it's being done, rather than just with how much of it is being done.

The more we are invited to think in Goldilocks terms (too much, too little, or just right?), the less likely we become to step back and ask the questions that count: What reason is there to think that any quantity of the kind of homework our kids are getting is really worth doing? What evidence exists to show that daily homework, regardless of its nature, is necessary for children to become better thinkers? Why did the students have no chance to participate in deciding which of their assignments ought to be taken home?

And: What if there was no homework at all?

Does Homework Serve a Purpose?

Finding the right balance between schoolwork and home life..

Posted November 5, 2018 | Reviewed by Ekua Hagan

Homework — a dreaded word that means more work and less play. The mere thought of doing additional work after a seven-hour day (that begins extremely early) can be gruesome. Not to mention, many teens have other commitments after the school day ends.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, nearly 57 percent of children between the ages of 6 and 17 years old participate in at least one after-school extracurricular activity. And that’s a good thing because youth extracurricular involvement comes with benefits such as boosting academic performance, reducing risky behaviors (i.e., drug use and drinking), promoting physical health, and providing a safe structured environment. However, tag these extracurricular activities onto the end of a school day and you’ll find that many teens don’t get home until it's dark outside.

What about the teen who works a 15- to 20-hour job on top of an extracurricular activity? The US Department of Labor reports that one in five high school students have a part-time job, and those jobs too can come with added benefits. Teens who work often learn the value of a hard-earned dollar. They learn how to manage their money, learn to problem solve, and most importantly, they learn how to work with people. Plus, a job in high school is a great way to add valuable experience to a resume.

With so many after school opportunities available for teens, it can be extremely difficult for them to balance homework with their other commitments. Oftentimes, active kids simply don’t have enough time in a day to get all that’s asked of them finished. When it comes homework, in all my years of working in the public school system, I have never seen a student jump for joy when homework was assigned. Of course, there are some who were anxious to complete the assignment, but that was more to get it off their busy plate. Which brings us to the essential question — does homework serve a purpose?

There are those who stand firm and back the claim that homework does serve a purpose . They often cite that homework helps prepare students for standardized tests, that it helps supplement and reinforce what’s being taught in class, and that it helps teach fundamental skills such as time management , organization, task completion, as well as responsibility (extracurricular activities and work experience can also teach those fundamental skills).

Another argument for homework is that having students complete work independently shows that they can demonstrate mastery of the material without the assistance of a teacher. Additionally, there have been numerous studies supporting homework, like a recent study that shows using online systems to assign math homework has been linked to a statistically significant boost in test scores. So, there you have it: Homework has a lot of perks and one of those involves higher test scores, particularly in math. But don’t form your opinion just yet.

Although many people rally for and support homework, there is another school of thought that homework should be decreased, or better yet, abolished. Those who join this group often cite studies linking academic stress to health risks. For example, one study in the Journal of Educational Psychology showed that when middle school students were assigned more than 90 to 100 minutes of daily homework, their math and science test scores began to decline.

The Journal of Experimental Education published research indicating that when high school students were assigned too much homework, they were more susceptible to serious mental and physical health problems, high-stress levels, and sleep deprivation. Stanford University also did a study that showed more than a couple of hours of homework a night was counterproductive. Think about it — teens spend an entire day at school, followed by extracurricular activities and possibly work, and then they get to end their day with two to three hours of homework. Now that’s a long day! No wonder so many of our teens are sleep-deprived and addicted to caffeine? On average most teens only get about 7.4 hours of sleep per night but according to the American Academy of Pediatrics , they need 8 to 10 hours.

Regardless of where you stand on the homework debate, a few things are certain: If homework is given, it should be a tool that’s used to enhance learning. Also, teachers should take into account the financial requirements of assignments, electronic accessibility, and they should be familiar with student needs as well as their other commitments. For example, not all students have equal opportunities to finish their homework, so incomplete work may not be a true reflection of their ability—it may be the result of other issues they face outside of school.

Many of today's teens are taking college-level courses as early as the ninth and tenth grades. With the push of programs such as Advanced Placement, International Baccalaureate, Early College Programs, and Dual Enrollment, today’s teens are carrying academic loads that surpass past generations. The result of this push for rigor can lead to high levels of stress, exhaustion, sleep deprivation, depression , anxiety , and early burnout . Too many teens are already running on empty. With more than half of teens reporting school and homework as a primary source of their stress, it’s evident that academic pressure is becoming a burden.

On the flip side, not all students spend a lot of time doing homework. What takes one student an hour to complete may take another three hours. Too often educators don’t take this into account when assigning homework. According to the University of Phoenix College of Education teacher survey, high school students can get assigned up to 17.5 hours of homework each week. To top it off, a Today article reported that teachers often underestimate the amount of homework they assign by as much as 50%. Now that’s a huge miscalculation, and our nation's youth have to suffer the consequences of those errors.

There are definitely pros and cons to doing homework. I think the bigger question that educators need to address is, “what’s the purpose of the assignment?” Is it merely a way to show parents and administration what's going on in the class? Is it a means to help keep students' grades afloat by giving a grade for completion or is the assignment being graded for accuracy? Does the assignment enhance and supplement the learning experience? Furthermore, is it meaningful or busywork?

The homework debate will likely continue until we take a good, hard look at our current policies and practices. What side of the line do you stand on when it comes to homework? Perhaps you’re somewhere in the middle?

Please weigh in with your thoughts. I am always eager to hear students’ voices in this discussion. If you are a student, please share what’s on your plate and how much time you spend doing homework each night.

Challenge Success White Paper: http://www.challengesuccess.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/ChallengeSuc…

Cooper, H., et al. (meta analysis): https://www.jstor.org/stable/3700582?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents

Marzano, R., et al.: http://www.marzanocenter.com/2013/01/17/have-you-done-your-homework-on-…

NEA (National Education Association): http://www.nea.org/tools/16938.htm

Pope, Brown, and Miles (2015), Overloaded and Underprepared. (Brief synopsis here: https://www.learningandthebrain.com/blog/overloaded-and-underprepared-s… )

Raychelle Cassada Lohman n , M.S., LPC, is the author of The Anger Workbook for Teens .

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Is Homework Necessary? Education Inequity and Its Impact on Students

The Problem with Homework: It Highlights Inequalities

How much homework is too much homework, when does homework actually help, negative effects of homework for students, how teachers can help.

Schools are getting rid of homework from Essex, Mass., to Los Angeles, Calif. Although the no-homework trend may sound alarming, especially to parents dreaming of their child’s acceptance to Harvard, Stanford or Yale, there is mounting evidence that eliminating homework in grade school may actually have great benefits , especially with regard to educational equity.

In fact, while the push to eliminate homework may come as a surprise to many adults, the debate is not new . Parents and educators have been talking about this subject for the last century, so that the educational pendulum continues to swing back and forth between the need for homework and the need to eliminate homework.

One of the most pressing talking points around homework is how it disproportionately affects students from less affluent families. The American Psychological Association (APA) explained:

“Kids from wealthier homes are more likely to have resources such as computers, internet connections, dedicated areas to do schoolwork and parents who tend to be more educated and more available to help them with tricky assignments. Kids from disadvantaged homes are more likely to work at afterschool jobs, or to be home without supervision in the evenings while their parents work multiple jobs.”

[RELATED] How to Advance Your Career: A Guide for Educators >> 

While students growing up in more affluent areas are likely playing sports, participating in other recreational activities after school, or receiving additional tutoring, children in disadvantaged areas are more likely headed to work after school, taking care of siblings while their parents work or dealing with an unstable home life. Adding homework into the mix is one more thing to deal with — and if the student is struggling, the task of completing homework can be too much to consider at the end of an already long school day.

While all students may groan at the mention of homework, it may be more than just a nuisance for poor and disadvantaged children, instead becoming another burden to carry and contend with.

Beyond the logistical issues, homework can negatively impact physical health and stress — and once again this may be a more significant problem among economically disadvantaged youth who typically already have a higher stress level than peers from more financially stable families .

Yet, today, it is not just the disadvantaged who suffer from the stressors that homework inflicts. A 2014 CNN article, “Is Homework Making Your Child Sick?” , covered the issue of extreme pressure placed on children of the affluent. The article looked at the results of a study surveying more than 4,300 students from 10 high-performing public and private high schools in upper-middle-class California communities.

“Their findings were troubling: Research showed that excessive homework is associated with high stress levels, physical health problems and lack of balance in children’s lives; 56% of the students in the study cited homework as a primary stressor in their lives,” according to the CNN story. “That children growing up in poverty are at-risk for a number of ailments is both intuitive and well-supported by research. More difficult to believe is the growing consensus that children on the other end of the spectrum, children raised in affluence, may also be at risk.”

When it comes to health and stress it is clear that excessive homework, for children at both ends of the spectrum, can be damaging. Which begs the question, how much homework is too much?

The National Education Association and the National Parent Teacher Association recommend that students spend 10 minutes per grade level per night on homework . That means that first graders should spend 10 minutes on homework, second graders 20 minutes and so on. But a study published by The American Journal of Family Therapy found that students are getting much more than that.

While 10 minutes per day doesn’t sound like much, that quickly adds up to an hour per night by sixth grade. The National Center for Education Statistics found that high school students get an average of 6.8 hours of homework per week, a figure that is much too high according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). It is also to be noted that this figure does not take into consideration the needs of underprivileged student populations.

In a study conducted by the OECD it was found that “after around four hours of homework per week, the additional time invested in homework has a negligible impact on performance .” That means that by asking our children to put in an hour or more per day of dedicated homework time, we are not only not helping them, but — according to the aforementioned studies — we are hurting them, both physically and emotionally.

What’s more is that homework is, as the name implies, to be completed at home, after a full day of learning that is typically six to seven hours long with breaks and lunch included. However, a study by the APA on how people develop expertise found that elite musicians, scientists and athletes do their most productive work for about only four hours per day. Similarly, companies like Tower Paddle Boards are experimenting with a five-hour workday, under the assumption that people are not able to be truly productive for much longer than that. CEO Stephan Aarstol told CNBC that he believes most Americans only get about two to three hours of work done in an eight-hour day.

In the scope of world history, homework is a fairly new construct in the U.S. Students of all ages have been receiving work to complete at home for centuries, but it was educational reformer Horace Mann who first brought the concept to America from Prussia. 

Since then, homework’s popularity has ebbed and flowed in the court of public opinion. In the 1930s, it was considered child labor (as, ironically, it compromised children’s ability to do chores at home). Then, in the 1950s, implementing mandatory homework was hailed as a way to ensure America’s youth were always one step ahead of Soviet children during the Cold War. Homework was formally mandated as a tool for boosting educational quality in 1986 by the U.S. Department of Education, and has remained in common practice ever since.  

School work assigned and completed outside of school hours is not without its benefits. Numerous studies have shown that regular homework has a hand in improving student performance and connecting students to their learning. When reviewing these studies, take them with a grain of salt; there are strong arguments for both sides, and only you will know which solution is best for your students or school. 

Homework improves student achievement.

• Source: The High School Journal, “ When is Homework Worth the Time?: Evaluating the Association between Homework and Achievement in High School Science and Math ,” 2012. 
• Source: IZA.org, “ Does High School Homework Increase Academic Achievement? ,” 2014. **Note: Study sample comprised only high school boys. 

Homework helps reinforce classroom learning.

• Source: “ Debunk This: People Remember 10 Percent of What They Read ,” 2015.

Homework helps students develop good study habits and life skills.

• Sources: The Repository @ St. Cloud State, “ Types of Homework and Their Effect on Student Achievement ,” 2017; Journal of Advanced Academics, “ Developing Self-Regulation Skills: The Important Role of Homework ,” 2011.
• Source: Journal of Advanced Academics, “ Developing Self-Regulation Skills: The Important Role of Homework ,” 2011.

Homework allows parents to be involved with their children’s learning.

• Parents can see what their children are learning and working on in school every day. 
• Parents can participate in their children’s learning by guiding them through homework assignments and reinforcing positive study and research habits.
• Homework observation and participation can help parents understand their children’s academic strengths and weaknesses, and even identify possible learning difficulties.
• Source: Phys.org, “ Sociologist Upends Notions about Parental Help with Homework ,” 2018.

While some amount of homework may help students connect to their learning and enhance their in-class performance, too much homework can have damaging effects. 

Students with too much homework have elevated stress levels. 

• Source: USA Today, “ Is It Time to Get Rid of Homework? Mental Health Experts Weigh In ,” 2021.
• Source: Stanford University, “ Stanford Research Shows Pitfalls of Homework ,” 2014.

Students with too much homework may be tempted to cheat. 

• Source: The Chronicle of Higher Education, “ High-Tech Cheating Abounds, and Professors Bear Some Blame ,” 2010.
• Source: The American Journal of Family Therapy, “ Homework and Family Stress: With Consideration of Parents’ Self Confidence, Educational Level, and Cultural Background ,” 2015.

Homework highlights digital inequity. 

• Sources: NEAToday.org, “ The Homework Gap: The ‘Cruelest Part of the Digital Divide’ ,” 2016; CNET.com, “ The Digital Divide Has Left Millions of School Kids Behind ,” 2021.
• Source: Investopedia, “ Digital Divide ,” 2022; International Journal of Education and Social Science, “ Getting the Homework Done: Social Class and Parents’ Relationship to Homework ,” 2015.
• Source: World Economic Forum, “ COVID-19 exposed the digital divide. Here’s how we can close it ,” 2021.

Homework does not help younger students.

• Source: Review of Educational Research, “ Does Homework Improve Academic Achievement? A Synthesis of Researcher, 1987-2003 ,” 2006.

To help students find the right balance and succeed, teachers and educators must start the homework conversation, both internally at their school and with parents. But in order to successfully advocate on behalf of students, teachers must be well educated on the subject, fully understanding the research and the outcomes that can be achieved by eliminating or reducing the homework burden. There is a plethora of research and writing on the subject for those interested in self-study.

For teachers looking for a more in-depth approach or for educators with a keen interest in educational equity, formal education may be the best route. If this latter option sounds appealing, there are now many reputable schools offering online master of education degree programs to help educators balance the demands of work and family life while furthering their education in the quest to help others.

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Effects of homework creativity on academic achievement and creativity disposition: Evidence from comparisons with homework time and completion based on two independent Chinese samples

Huiyong fan.

1 College of Educational Science, Bohai University, Jinzhou, China

2 Research Center of Brain and Cognitive Neuroscience, Liaoning Normal University, Dalian, China

Jianzhong Xu

3 Department of Counseling, Educational Psychology, and Foundations, College of Education, Mississippi State University, MS, United States

Shengli Guo

Associated data.

The raw data supporting the conclusions of this article will be made available by the authors, without undue reservation.

During the past several decades, the previous studies have been focusing on the related theoretical issues and measuring tool of homework behaviors (mainly including homework time, completion, and homework creativity). However, the effects of these homework behaviors on general creativity remain unknown. Employing a number of questionnaires, this study investigated two samples from middle schools of Mainland China. The results showed that (1) the eight-item version of Homework Creativity Behaviors Scale had acceptable validity and reliability; (2) compared with homework completion and homework time, homework creativity explained less variety of academic achievement (3.7% for homework creativity; 5.4% for completion and time); (3) homework creativity explained more variance of general creativity than that of homework completion and homework time accounted (7.0% for homework creativity; 1.3% for completion and time); and (4) homework creativity was negatively associated with grade level. Contrary to the popular beliefs, homework completion and homework creativity have positive effects on the students’ general creativity. Several issues that need further studies were also discussed.

Introduction

Homework is an important part of the learning and instruction process. Each week, students around the world spend 3–14 hours on homework, with an average of 5 hours a week ( Dettmers et al., 2009 ; OECD, 2014 ). The results of the previous studies and meta-analysis showed that the homework time is correlated significantly with students’ gains on the academic tests ( Cooper et al., 2012 ; Fan et al., 2017 ; Fernández-Alonso et al., 2019 ).

Homework is a multi-faceted process which has many attributes – each attribute can be identified, defined, and measured independently ( Guo and Fan, 2018 ). Some attributes, such as homework time ( Núñez et al., 2013 ; Kalenkoski and Pabilonia, 2017 ), homework frequency ( Fernández-Alonso et al., 2015 ), homework completion ( Rosário et al., 2015 ), homework effort ( Trautwein and Lüdtke, 2007 ; Fernández-Alonso et al., 2015 ), homework purpose ( Trautwein and Lüdtke, 2009 ; Xu, 2010 , 2021 ), homework performance and problems ( Power et al., 2007 ), homework management behavior ( Xu, 2008 ), homework expectation ( Xu, 2017 ), and self-regulation of homework behavior ( Yang and Tu, 2020 ), have been well recorded in the literature, and operationally defined and measured.

Recently, a research community has noticed the “creativity” in homework (in short form, “homework creativity”) who have raised some speculations about its effects on students’ academic achievement and general creativity disposition ( Kaiipob, 1951 ; Beghetto and Kaufman, 2007 ; Kaufman and Beghetto, 2009 ; Guo, 2018 ; Guo and Fan, 2018 ; Chang, 2019 ). However, the scientific measurement of homework creativity has not been examined systematically. The relationship between homework creativity, academic achievement, and general creativity disposition, as well as the grade difference in homework creativity, are still in the state of conjectures consequently.

As a scientific probe to homework creativity, this study included three main sections. In the “Literature Review” section, the conceptualization and relevant measurement of homework creativity were summarized; the relationship between homework behaviors and academic achievements, general creativity, and the grade difference in homework behaviors and general creativity were also evaluated. These four main results related to the four research questions were also presented in the body of this article. They are reliability and validity of homework creativity behavior scale (HCBS), the relationships between the scores of HCBS and those of general creativity and academic achievement, and the grade effects of scores of HCBS. In the “Discussion” section, the scientific contributions and interpretations of the findings of this study were elaborated.

Homework creativity

Conceptual background of homework creativity.

As an attribute of homework process, homework creativity refers to the novelty and uniqueness of homework ( Guo and Fan, 2018 ). Specifically, the ways relating to homework creativity with extant theoretical literature are presented below.

First, creativity is a natural part of homework process which serves as a sub-process of learning. Guilford (1950) is the first psychologist who linked creativity with learning, pointing out that the acquisition of creativity is a typical quality of human learning, and that a complete learning theory must take creativity into account.

Second, according to the Four-C Model of Creativity (e.g., Kaufman and Beghetto, 2009 ), the homework creativity can be divided mainly into the category of “Transformative Learning” (Mini-C creativity), which is different from the “Everyday Innovation” (Little-C creativity), “Professional Expertise” (Pro-C creativity), or “Eminent Accomplishments” (Big-C creativity, Beghetto and Kaufman, 2007 ; Kaufman and Beghetto, 2009 ; Kozbelt et al., 2011 ).

The Mini-C is defined as a type of intrapersonal creativity which has personal meaning, not solid contribution or breakthrough in a field ( Beghetto and Kaufman, 2007 , p. 76, Table 1 ). The most important point which distinguishes Mini-C from other types of creativity is the level of novelty of product. The Mini-C creativity involves the personal insight or interpretation which is new to a particular individual, but may be ordinary to others. The Little-C creativity refers to any small, but solid innovation in daily life. The Pro-C creativity is represented in the form of professional contribution which is still not a breakthrough. The Big-C creativity generates a real breakthrough appears in some field which is considered as something new to all human beings. The other difference is related with the subjects of sub-types of creativity. The Mini-C creativity mainly happens in all kinds of students. The Little-C creativity can be widely found in normal people. The Pro-C creativity’s masters are those who are proficient in some field. The Big-C creativity is related frequently with those giants who has made eminent contribution to human being.

Basic information of samples 1 and 2 included.

The Mini-C creativity frequently happens in learning process. When the contribution of the Mini-C creativity grows big enough, it can move into the category of the Little-C creativity, or the Big-C creativity. Most homework creativity is of Mini-C creativity, and of which a small part may grow as the Little-C and Big-C creativities. For example, when students independently find a unique solution to a problem in homework which has scientific meaning, a Little-C or Big-C occurs.

Third, the education researchers have observed homework creativity for many years and been manipulating them in educational practice. Kaiipob (1951) described that homework is a semi-guide learning process in which homework such as composition, report, public speech, difficult and complex exercises, experiments, and making tools and models consumes a lot of time and accelerate the development of students’ creativity disposition (p. 153).

In the recent years, creativity has become a curriculum or instruction goal in many countries (the case of United Kingdom, see Smith and Smith, 2010 ; Chinese case, see Pang and Plucker, 2012 ). Homework is the most important way that accomplish this goal. Considering Chinese in primary and secondary schools in China as an example, the curriculum standards have clearly required homework to cultivate students’ creative spirit, creative thinking, and ability to imagination since the year 2000. The results of Qian’s (2006) investigation revealed that the percent of these creative homework items in each unit fluctuates between 29 and 45%.

Previous instruments of homework behaviors

Those existent instruments measuring homework behavior can be divided into the following two categories: The single-indicator instruments and the multi-dimension instruments ( Guo and Fan, 2018 ). The single-indicator instruments employ only one item to measure homework attributes, such as homework time (e.g., Trautwein and Lüdtke, 2007 ), homework frequency (e.g., De Jong et al., 2000 ), homework completion (e.g., Xu et al., 2019 ), and effort (e.g., Liu et al., 2013 ).

The typical multi-dimension instruments include Homework Process Inventory ( Cooper et al., 1998 ), Homework Purpose Scale ( Xu, 2010 ), Homework Performance Questionnaire ( Pendergast et al., 2014 ), Homework Management Scale (HMS; Xu and Corno, 2003 ), Homework Evaluating Scale ( Fernández-Alonso et al., 2015 ), Homework Problem Checklist ( Anesko et al., 1987 ), Science Homework Scale ( Tas et al., 2016 ), Homework Expectancy Value Scale ( Yang and Xu, 2017 ), and Online Homework Distraction Scale ( Xu et al., 2020 ).

Although the previous tools measured some dimensions of homework ( Guo and Fan, 2018 ), there is hardly any tool that can be employed to gauge the homework creativity. Guo and Fan (2018) extracted several attributes (i.e., time, completion, quality, purpose, effort, creativity, sociality, liking) represented in the existent instruments of homework behaviors, and put forth a multi-faceted model of homework behaviors which intuitionally predicts the existence of homework creativity.

Under the guideline of the multi-faceted model ( Guo and Fan, 2018 ), Guo (2018) developed a multi-dimensional homework behavior instrument, which detected the homework creativity as a dimension in the homework behavior of middle school students. A typical item of homework creativity in Guo (2018) is “The way I do my homework is different from others.” The subscale homework creativity reported by Guo (2018) needs to be improved because it has a small number of items with lower reliability.

Following Guo’s (2018) work, Chang (2019) conducted a new investigation focusing on homework creativity behavior. Using an open-ended questionnaire, a total of 30 students from primary, middle, and high schools were invited to answer this question, that is, “What characteristics can be considered as creative in the process of completing the homework?” Here, “creativity” refers to novelty, uniqueness, and high quality. A group of 23 specific behaviors were reported, among which the top 10 are as follows: Learning by analogy, open minded, one question with multiple solutions, unique solution, summarizing the cause of errors, constructing a personal understanding, analyzing knowledge points clearly, classifying homework contents, making more applications, having rich imagination, and a neat handwriting (see Chang, 2019 , Table 4 , p. 14). Based on these results of open-ended questionnaire, Chang (2019) invented a nine-item scale (see Table 1 and Supplementary Table S3 for details) called as the HCBS which has a good reliability coefficient (α = 0.87).

Regression analyses of homework creative behavior on academic achievement and general creativity.

AA, academic achievement; WCAPt, total score of WCAP; TWk, time spent on homework in week days; TWw, time spent on homework in weekend; HCp, homework completion; HCb, homework creativity behavior.

Previous studies on the relationship between homework behaviors and academic achievement

In the literature, homework behaviors is one cluster of variables typically including homework time, homework completion, effort, purpose, frequency, etc. Academic achievement is an outcome of homework which is operationally measured using the scores on the standardized tests, or non-standardized tests (including final examinations, or teachers’ grades, or estimations by participants themselves, those forms were used widely in the literature, see Fan et al., 2017 ). Academic achievement may be affected by a lot of factors inherited in the process of learning (see Hattie, 2009 for an overview of its correlates). The relationship between homework behaviors and academic achievement is one of the most important questions in homework field, because it is related to the effectiveness of homework ( Cooper et al., 2006 , 2012 ; Fan et al., 2017 ).

Most of the previous studies focused on the relationship between homework time and academic achievement. Cooper et al. (2006) synthesized the primary studies published from 1989 to 2003, and found that the correlation between homework time of America students and their academic achievement was about 0.15. Fan et al. (2017) reviewed those individual studies published before June 2015, and reported that the averaged correlation between homework time of international students and their science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) academic achievement was about 0.20. Fernández-Alonso et al. (2017) investigated a representative sample of Spanish students (more than 26,000), and the results of multi-level analysis indicated that the correlation between homework time and academic achievement was negative at student level, but positive at school level ( r = 0.16). Fernández-Alonso et al. (2019) took a survey on a big sample from 16 countries from Latin America, and reported that the relationship between homework time and academic achievement was very weak. Valle et al. (2019) analyzed the homework time, time management, and achievement of 968 Spain students finding that homework time management was positively related to academic achievement. Taken all these together, we will find that the homework has some small significant correlations with academic achievement, the average r = 0.15.

The correlation between homework completion and academic achievement has also been investigated for decades. Based on a review of 11 primary studies, Fan et al. (2017) reported a high correlation of 0.59 between them. Rosário et al. (2015) investigated 638 students, and demonstrated a correlation of 0.22 between amount of homework completed and math test scores. Xu et al. (2019) took a survey using a sample of 1,450 Chinese eighth graders, and found that the correlations between homework completion and the gains in math test scores ranged from 0.25 to 0.28. Dolean and Lervag (2022) employed the Randomized Controlled Trial design, and demonstrated that amount of homework completed has immediate effect on writing competency in which the effect of moderate amount of homework can last for 4 months. Integrating the aforementioned results, we can find that the averaged correlation between homework completion and academic achievement was higher than that between homework time with academic achievement.

Homework effort was also found to be correlated with academic achievement. Fan et al. (2017) reviewed four primary studies and returned that a medium correlation ( r = 0.31) between homework effort and academic achievement. Two recent investigations showed that this relationship is positively and reciprocally related ( r = 0.41–0.42) ( Xu, 2020 ; Xu et al., 2021 ).

The effect of homework purpose was also correlated with the academic achievement. Fan et al. (2017) summarized four existent primary studies and reported an averaged correlation of 0.11 between them. Later, Rosário et al. (2015) found a similar correlation coefficient of these two variables on a sample of 638 students. Xu’s (2018) investigation revealed that the correlation between purpose and academic achievement was about 0.40. Sun et al. (2021) investigated a larger sample ( N = 1,365), and found that the subscales of homework purpose had different correlation patterns with academic achievement (academic purpose is 0.40, self-regulatory purpose is 0.20, and approval-seeking purpose is 0.10).

Considering the case of homework creativity, there is only one study preliminarily investigated its relationship with academic achievement. Guo (2018) investigated a sample of 1,808 middle school students, and reported a significant correlation between homework creativity and academic achievement ( r = 0.34, p < 0.05).

Previous studies on the relationship between homework behaviors and general creativity

General creativity refers to the psychological attributes which can generate novel and valuable products ( Kaufman and Glăveanu, 2019 ; Sternberg and Karami, 2022 ). These psychological attributes typically included attitude (e.g., willing to take appropriate risk), motivations (e.g., intrinsic motivation, curiosity), abilities (e.g., divergent thinking), and personality (e.g., independence) ( Kaufman and Glăveanu, 2019 ; Long et al., 2022 ). These attributes can be assessed independently, or in the form of grouping ( Plucker et al., 2019 ; Sternberg, 2019 ). For instance, the divergent thinking was measured independently ( Kaufman et al., 2008 ). Also, the willing to take appropriate risk was measured in tools contain other variables ( Williams, 1979 ). There are many studies examined the relationship between learning and general creativity in the past several decades indicating that the correlation between them was around 0.22 (e.g., Gajda et al., 2017 ; Karwowski et al., 2020 ).

Regarding the relationship between homework behaviors and general creativity, there are few studies which presented some contradictory viewpoints. Kaiipob (1951) posited that homework could accelerate development of students’ general creativity disposition, because the tasks in homework provide opportunities to exercise creativity. Cooper et al. (2012) argued that homework can diminish creativity. Furthermore, Zheng (2013) insisted that homework will reduce curiosity and the ability to challenging – the two core components of creativity. The preliminary results of Chang (2019) indicated that the score of HCBS is significantly correlated with scores of a test of general creativity, Williams’ creativity packet ( r = 0.25–0.33, p < 0.05).

Previous studies on the relationship between homework behaviors and homework creativity

In Guo and Fan’s (2018) theoretical work, homework creativity was combined from two independent words, homework and creativity, which was defined as a new attribute of homework process and was considered as a new member of homework behaviors. Up till now, there are two works providing preliminary probe to the relationship between homework behaviors and homework creativity. Guo (2018) investigated a sample of 1808 middle school students, and found that homework creativity was correlated significantly with liking ( r = 0.33), correctness ( r = 0.47), completion ( r = 0.57), and purpose ( r = 0.53). Based on another sample of Chinese students (elementary school students, N = 300; middle school students, N = 518; high school students, N = 386), Chang (2019) showed that the score of homework creativity was correlated significantly with homework time ( r = 0.11), completion ( r = 0.39), correctness ( r = 0.63), effort ( r = 0.73), social interaction ( r = 0.35), quality ( r = 0.69), interpersonal relation purpose ( r = 0.17), and purpose of personal development ( r = 0.41).

Previous studies on grade differences of homework behaviors and general creativity

Grade differences of homework behaviors.

As a useful indicator, homework time was recorded frequently (e.g., Cooper et al., 2006 ; Fan et al., 2017 ). A recent meta-analysis included 172 primary studies (total N = 144,416) published from 2003 to 2019, and demonstrated that time Chinese K-12 students spent on homework increased significantly along with increasing of grades ( Zhai and Fan, 2021 , October).

Regarding homework managing time, some studies reported the grade difference was insignificant. Xu (2006) surveyed 426 middle school students and found that there was no difference between middle school students and high school students. Xu and Corno (2003) reported that urban junior school students ( N = 86) had no grade difference in homework Managing time. Yang and Tu (2020) surveyed 305 Chinese students in grades 7–9, and found that in managing time behavior, the grade differences were insignificant. The rest studies showed that the grade effect is significant. A survey by Xu et al. (2014) based on 1799 Chinese students in grades 10 and 11 showed that the higher level the grade, the lower level of time management.

Grade differences of general creativity

The findings from the previous studies suggested that the scores of general creativity deceases as the grade increases except for some dimensions. Kim (2011) reviewed the Torrance Tests of Creative thinking (TTCT) scores change using five datasets from 1974 to 2008, and reported that three dimensions of creative thinking (i.e., “Fluency,” “Originality,” and “Elaboration”) significantly decreased along with grades increase, while the rest dimension (i.e., “Abstractness of titles”) significantly increased when grades increase. Nie and Zheng (2005) investigated a sample of 3,729 participants from grades 3–12 using the Williams’ Creativity Assessment Packet (WCAP), and reported that the creativity scores decreased from grades 9–12. Said-Metwaly et al. (2021) synthesized 41 primary studies published in the past 60 years, and concluded that the ability of divergent thinking had a whole increase tendency from grades 1 to 12 with a decrease tendency from grades 8 to 11 at the same time.

The purpose and questions of this study

What we have known about homework creativity hitherto is nothing except for its notation and a preliminary version of measurement. To get deeper understanding of homework creativity, this study made an endeavor to examine its relationships with relevant variables based on a confirmation of the reliability and validity of HCBS. Specifically, there are four interrelated research questions, as the following paragraphs (and their corresponding hypotheses) described.

(i) What is the reliability and validity of the HCBS?

Because the earlier version of the HCBS showed a good Cronbach α coefficient of 0.87, and a set of well-fitting indices ( Chang, 2019 ), this study expected that the reliability and validity will also behave well in the current conditions as before. Then, we present the first set of hypotheses as follows:

H1a: The reliability coefficient will equal or greater than 0.80.

H1b: The one-factor model will also fit the current data well; and all indices will reach or over the criteria as the expertise suggested.

(ii) What degree is the score of the HCBS related with academic achievement?

As suggested by the review section, the correlations between homework behaviors and academic achievement ranged from 0.15 and 0.59 (e.g., Fan et al., 2017 ), then we expected that the relationship between homework creativity and academic achievement will fall into this range, because homework creativity is a member of homework behaviors.

The results of the previous studies also demonstrated that the correlation between general creativity and academic achievement changed in a range of 0.19–0.24 with a mean of 0.19 ( Gajda et al., 2017 ). Because it can be treated as a sub-category of general creativity, we predicted that homework creativity will have a similar behavior under the current condition.

Taken aforementioned information together, Hypothesis H2 is presented as follows:

H2: There will be a significant correlation between homework creativity and academic achievement which might fall into the interval of 0.15–0.59.

(iii) What degree is the relationship between HCBS and general creativity?

As discussed in the previous section, there are no inconsistent findings about the relationship between the score of HCBS and general creativity. Some studies postulated that these two variables be positive correlated (e.g., Kaiipob, 1951 ; Chang, 2019 ); other studies argued that this relationship be negative (e.g., Cooper et al., 2012 ; Zheng, 2013 ). Because homework creativity is a sub-category of general creativity, we expected that this relationship would be positive and its value might be equal or less than 0.33. Based on those reasoning, we presented our third hypothesis as follows:

H3: The correlation between homework creativity and general creativity would be equal or less than 0.33.

(iv) What effect does grade have on the HCBS score?

Concerning the grade effect of homework behaviors, the previous findings were contradictory ( Xu et al., 2014 ; Zhai and Fan, 2021 , October). However, the general creativity decreased as the level of grade increases from grade 8 to grade 11 ( Kim, 2011 ; Said-Metwaly et al., 2021 ). Taken these previous findings and the fact that repetitive exercises increase when grades go up ( Zheng, 2013 ), we were inclined to expect that the level of homework creativity is negative correlated with the level of grade. Thus, we presented our fourth hypothesis as follows:

H4: The score of HCBS might decrease as the level of grades goes up.

Materials and methods

Participants.

To get more robust result, this study investigated two convenient samples from six public schools in a medium-sized city in China. Among them, two schools were of high schools (including a key school and a non-key school), and the rest four schools were middle schools (one is key school, and the rest is non-key school). All these schools included here did not have free lunch system and written homework policy. Considering the students were mainly prepared for entrance examination of higher stage, the grades 9 and 12 were excluded in this survey. Consequently, students of grades 7, 8, 10, and 11 were included in our survey. After getting permission of the education bureau of the city investigated, the headmasters administrated the questions in October 2018 (sample 1) and November 2019 (sample 2).

A total of 850 questionnaires were released and the valid number of questionnaires returned is 639 with a valid return rate of 75.18%. Therefore, there were 639 valid participants in sample 1. Among them, there were 273 boys and 366 girls (57.2%); 149 participants from grade 7 (23.31%), 118 from grade 8 (18.47%), 183 from grade 10 (28.64%), and 189 from grade 11 (29.58%); the average age was 15.25 years, with a standard deviation (SD) of 1.73 years. See Table 1 for the information about each grade.

Those participants included received homework assignments every day (see Table 1 for the distribution of homework frequency). During the working days, the averaged homework time was 128.29 minutes with SD = 6.65 minutes. In the weekend, the average homework time was 3.75 hours, with SD = 0.22 hours. The percentage distribution here is similar with that of a national representative sample ( Sun et al., 2020 ), because the values of Chi-squared (χ 2 ) were 7.46 (father) and 8.46 (mother), all p -values were above 0.12 (see Supplementary Table S1 for details).

Another package of 850 questionnaires were released. The valid number of questionnaires returned is 710 with a valid return rate of 83.53%. Among them, there were 366 girls (51.50%); 171 participants from grade 7 (24.23%), 211 from grade 8 (26.06%), 190 from the grade 10 (22.96%), and 216 from grade 11 (26.76%); the average age was 15.06 years, with SD = 1.47 years.

Those participants included received homework assignments almost each day (see Table 1 for details for the distribution of homework frequency). During the working days, the averaged homework time was 123.02 minutes with SD = 6.13 minutes. In weekend, the average homework time was 3.47 hours, with SD = 0.21 hours.

The percentage distribution here is insignificantly different from that of a national representative sample ( Sun et al., 2020 ), because the values of χ 2 were 5.20 (father) and 6.05 (mother), p -values were above 0.30 (see Supplementary Table S1 for details).

Instruments

The homework creativity behavior scale.

The HCBS contains nine items representing students’ creativity behaviors in the process of completing homework (for example, “I do my homework in an innovative way”) ( Chang, 2019 , see Supplementary Table S3 for details). The HCBS employs a 5-point rating scale, where 1 means “completely disagree” and 5 means “completely agree.” The higher the score, the stronger the homework creative behavior students have. The reliability and validity of the HCBS can be found in Section “Reliability and validity of the homework creativity behavior scale” (see Table 2 and Figures 1 , ​ ,2 2 for details).

Results of item discrimination analysis and exploratory factor analysis.

**p < 0.01, two side-tailed. The same for below.

a Correlations for sample 1; b Correlations for sample 2. c Seventh item should be removed away according to the results of CFA (see section “Reliability and validity of the HCBS” for details).

Parallel analysis scree plots of the HCBS data.

The standardized solution for HCBS eight-item model. hcb, homework creativity behavior; it 1∼9, item1 ∼6, 8∼9.

Homework management scale

The HMS contains 22 items describing specific behaviors related to self-management in homework (for example, “I will choose a quiet place to do my homework” or “Tell myself to calm down when encountering difficulties”) ( Xu and Corno, 2003 ; Xu, 2008 ). The HMS employs a 5-point Likert scale, ranging from 1 (completely disagree) to 5 (completely agree). All items can be divided into five dimensions, i.e., arranging environment, managing time, focusing attention, monitoring motivation, and monitoring and controlling emotion. Among them, the monitoring and controlling emotion dimension adopts a method of reverse scoring.

Except for the internal consistency of arranging environment in sample 1, which is 0.63, the internal consistency coefficients of the five dimensions based two samples in this study are all greater than 0.7, ranging from 0.70 to 0.79. The Cronbach’s coefficients of the overall HMS-based two samples are 0.88 and 0.87, respectively. The ω coefficients of the dimensions of HMS ranged from 0.64 to 0.80. The ω coefficients of the HMS total scores were 0.88 and 0.87 for samples 1 and 2, respectively. Those reliability coefficients were acceptable for research purpose ( Clark and Watson, 1995 ; Peterson and Kim, 2013 ).

Williams’ creativity assessment packet

The WCAP including a total of 40 items is a revised version to measure general disposition of creativity (for example, “I like to ask some questions out of other’s expectation” or “I like to imagine something novel, even if it looks useless”) ( Williams, 1979 ; Wang and Lin, 1986 ; Liu et al., 2016 ). The WCAP uses a 3-point Likert scales, in which 1 = disagree, 2 = uncertain, and 3 = agree. The higher WCAP score, the higher is the general creativity level. All items of WCAP can be scattered into four dimensions: adventure, curiosity, imagination, and challenge ( Williams, 1979 ; Wang and Lin, 1986 ; Liu et al., 2016 ). In this study, the Cronbach’s α coefficients of adventure, curiosity, imagination, challenge, and total scale are 0.62, 0.71, 0.78, 0.64, and 0.90, respectively. The ω coefficients were in sequence 0.61, 0.70, 0.77, 0.63, and 0.90 for adventure, curiosity, imagination, challenge, and the total score of WCAP. The correlations between the four dimensions of WCAP are between 0.47 and 0.65. The patterns of reliability coefficients and correlations between dimensions are similar to those results reported by the previous studies ( Williams, 1979 ; Wang and Lin, 1986 ; Liu et al., 2016 ) which stand acceptable reliability and validity ( Clark and Watson, 1995 ; Peterson and Kim, 2013 ).

Homework indicators

Homework time.

The participants were asked to report the time spent on homework in the past week. This technique has been employed widely in many international survey programs, such as PISA from OECD (e.g., Trautwein and Lüdtke, 2007 ). The items are as follows: (1) “Every day, from Monday to Friday, in last week, how many minutes you spent on homework?” The options are as follows: (A) 0–30 min; (B) 31–60 min (C) 61–90 min (D) 91–120 min; (E) 121–180 min; (F) 181 min or more. (2) “In last weekend, how many hours you spent on homework?” The options are as follows: (A) 0–1 h; (B) 1.1–3 h; (C) 3.1–5 h; (D) 5.1–7 h; (E) 7.1 h or more.

Homework completion

The homework completion is a useful indicator demonstrated in the previous studies ( Welch et al., 1986 ; Austin, 1988 ; Swank, 1999 ; Pelletier, 2005 ; Wilson, 2010 ), and had large correlation with achievement, as a meta-analytic results suggested ( Fan et al., 2017 ). In the survey of this study, the participants were also asked to estimate a percent of the completion of homework in the past week and fill in the given blank space. It includes three items which are as follows: “What is the percentage of Chinese/Maths/English homework assignment you completed in the last week?” “Please estimate and write a number from 0 to 100 in the blank space.”

Academic achievement

To record the academic achievement, an item required participants to make a choice based on their real scores of tests, not estimate their tests scores. The item is, “In the last examination, what is the rank of your score in your grade?” (A) The first 2%; (B) The first 3–13%; (C) The first 14–50%; (D) The first 51–84%; (E) The last 16%. The options here correspond to the percentage in the normal distribution, it is convenient to compute a Z -score for each student.

The method employed here is effective to retrieve participants’ test scores. First, the self-report method is more effective than other method under the condition of anonymous investigation. To our knowledge, participants do not have the will to provide their real information in the real name format. Second, this method transforms test scores from different sources into the same space of norm distribution which benefits the comparisons. Third, the validity of this method has been supported by empirical data. Using another sample ( N = 234), we got the academic achievement they reported and real test scores their teacher recorded. The correlation between ranks self-reported and the real scores from Chinese test were r = 0.81, p < 0.001; and the correlation coefficient for mathematics was also large, i.e., r = 0.79, p < 0.001.

Data collection procedure

There are three phases in data collection. The first one is the design stage. At this stage, the corresponding author of this study designed the study content, prepared the survey tools, and got the ethical approve of this project authorized from research ethic committee of school the corresponding author belongs to.

The second stage is to releasing questionnaire prepared. The questionnaire was distributed and retrieved by the head master of those classes involved. Neither the teachers nor the students knew the purpose of this research. During this stage, students can stop answering at any time, or simply withdraw from the survey. None of the teachers and students in this study received payment.

The third stage is the data entry stage. At this stage, the corresponding author of this study recruited five volunteers majored in psychology and education, and explained to them the coding rules, missing value processing methods, identification of invalid questionnaires, and illustrated how to deal with these issues. The volunteers used the same data template for data entry. The corresponding author of this study controlled the data entry quality by selective check randomly.

Data analysis strategies

R packages employed.

The “psych” package in R environment ( R Core Team, 2019 ) was employed to do descriptive statistics, correlation analysis, mean difference comparisons, exploratory factor analysis (EFA), reliability Analysis ( Revelle, 2022 ); and the “lavaan” package was used in confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and measurement invariance test ( Rosseel, 2012 ); and the “semPlot” package was employed to draw the picture of CFA’s outputs ( Epskamp et al., 2022 ).

Analysis strategies of exploratory factor analysis and reliability

Sample 1 was used for item analysis, EFA, reliability analysis. In EFA, factors were extracted using maximum likelihood, and the promax method served as the rotation method. The number of factors were determined according to the combination of the results from screen plot, and the rule of Eigenvalues exceeding 1.0, and parallel analysis ( Luo et al., 2019 ).

The Cronbach’s α and MacDonald’s ω test were employed to test the reliability of the scale. The rigorous criteria that α ≥ 0.70 ( Nunnally and Bernstein, 1994 ) and ω ≥ 0.7 ( Green and Yang, 2015 ) were taken as acceptable level of the reliability of HCBS.

Analysis strategies of confirmatory factor analysis

As suggested by Hu and Bentler (1999) , two absolute goodness-of-fit indices, namely, the root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA) and the standardized root mean square residual (SRMR), and two relative goodness-of-fit indices, namely, comparative fit index (CFI) and Tucker–Lewis Index (TLI) were recruited as fitting indicators. The absolute goodness-of-fit indices are less than 0.08, and the relative goodness-of-fit indices greater than 0.90 are considered as a good fit. The CFA was conducted using the second sample.

Strategies for measurement invariance

Measurement invariance testing included four models, they are Configural invariance (Model 1), which is to test whether the composition of latent variables between different groups is the same; Weak invariance (Factor loading invariance, Model 2), which is to test whether the factor loading is equal among the groups; Intercept invariance (Model 3), that is, whether the intercepts of the observed variables are equal; Strict equivalent (Residual Variance invariance, Model 4), that is, to test whether the error variances between different groups are equal ( Chen, 2007 ; Putnick and Bornstein, 2016 ).

Since the χ 2 test will be affected easily by the sample size, even small differences will result in significant differences as the sample size will increase. Therefore, this study used the changes of model fitting index CFI, RMSEA, and SRMR (ΔCFI, ΔRMSEA, and ΔSRMR) to evaluate the invariance of the measurement. When ΔCFI ≤ 0.010, ΔRMSEA ≤ 0.015, and ΔSRMR ≤ 0.030 (for metric invariance) or 0.015 (for scalar or residual invariance), the invariance model is considered acceptable ( Cheung and Rensvold, 2002 ; Chen, 2007 ; Putnick and Bornstein, 2016 ).

Strategies of controlling common methods biases

The strategy of controlling common methods biases is mainly hided in the directions. Each part of the printed questionnaire had a sub-direction which invites participants answer the printed questions honestly. The answer formats between any two neighboring parts were different from each other which requested participants change their mind in time. For example, on some part, the answering continuum varied from “1 = totally disagreed” to “5 = total agreed,” while the answering continuum on the neighboring part is the from “5 = totally disagreed” to “1 = total agreed.” Additionally, according to the suggestion of the previous studies, the one factor CFA model and the bi-factor model can be used to detect the common methods biases (e.g., Podsakoff et al., 2012 ).

Detection of common method biases

The fitting results of the one-common-factor model using CFA technique were as follows: χ 2 = 15,073, df = 3320, p < 0.001; χ 2 / df = 4.54, CFI = 0.323, TLI = 0.306, RMSEA = 0.071, 90% CI: 0.070–0.072, and SRMR = 0.101. The results of the bi-factor model under CFA framework were presented as follows: χ 2 = 2,225.826, df = 117, p < 0.001; χ 2 / df = 19.024, CFI = 0.650, TLI = 0.543, RMSEA = 0.159, 90% CI: 0.154–0.164, and SRMR = 0.127. These poor indices of the two models suggested that the one-common-factor model failed to fit the data well and that the biases of common method be ignored ( Podsakoff et al., 2012 ).

Reliability and validity of the homework creativity behavior scale

Item analysis.

Based on the sample 1, the correlation coefficients between the items of the HCBS were between 0.34 and 0.64, p -values were below 0.01. The correlations between the items and the total score of HCBS vary from 0.54 to 0.75 ( p -values are below 0.01). On the condition of sample 2, the correlations between the items fluctuate between 0.31 and 0.58, the correlation coefficients between the items and the total score of the HCBS change from 0.63 to 0.75 ( p -values were below 0.01). All correlation coefficients between items and total score are larger than those between items and reached the criterion suggested ( Ferketich, 1991 ; see Table 2 for details).

Results of exploratory factor analysis

The EFA results (based on sample 1) showed that the KMO was 0.89, and the χ 2 of Bartlett’s test = 1,666.07, p < 0.01. The rules combining eigenvalue larger than 1 and the results of parallel analysis (see Figure 1 for details) suggested that one factor should be extracted. The eigenvalue of the factor extracted was 3.63. The average variance extracted was 0.40. This factor accounts 40% variance with factor loadings fluctuating from 0.40 to 0.76 (see Table 2 ).

Results of confirmatory factor analysis

In the CFA situation (based on sample 2) the fitting indices of the nine-item model of the HCBS are acceptable marginally, they are χ 2 = 266.141; df = 27; χ 2 / df = 9.857; CFI = 0.904; TLI = 0.872; RMSEA = 0.112; 90% CI: 0.100–0.124; SRMR = 0.053.

The modification indices of item 7 were too big (MI value = 74.339, p < 0.01), so it is necessary to consider to delete item 7. Considering its content of “I designed a neat, clean and clear homework format by myself,” item 7 is an indicator of strictness which is weakly linked with creativity. Therefore, the item 7 should be deleted.

After removing item 7, the fitting results were, χ 2 = 106.111; df = 20; χ 2 / df = 5.306; CFI = 0.957; TLI = 0.939; RMSEA = 0.078; 90% CI: 0.064–0.093; SRMR = 0.038). The changes of the fitting indices of the two nested models (eight-item vs. nine-item models) are presented as follows: Δχ 2 = 160.03, Δ df = 7, χ 2 (α = 0.01, df = 7) = 18.48, p < 0.05. After deleting item 7, both CFI and TLI indices increased to above 0.93, and RMSEAs decreased below 0.08 which suggested that the factor model on which eight items loaded fitted the data well. The average variance extracted was 0.50 which is adequate according to the criteria suggested by Fornell and Larcker (1981) . The standardized solution for the eight-item model of the HCBS was shown in Figure 2 .

Correlations between the homework creativity behavior scale and similar concepts

The results showed that the score of the HCBS was significantly correlated with the total score and four dimensions of WCAP and their correlation coefficients ranged from 0.20 to 0.29, p -values were below 0.01. Similarly, the correlations between the score of the HCBS and the scores of arranging environment, managing time, motivation management, and controlling emotion, and total score of the HMS ranged from 0.08 to 0.22, p -values were 0.01; at the meanwhile, the correlation between the score of HCBS and the distraction dimension of the HMS was r = –0.14, p -values were 0.01. The HCBS score was also significantly related to homework completion ( r = 0.18, p < 0.01), but insignificantly related to homework time (see Table 3 for details).

Correlation matrix between variables included and the corresponding descriptive statistics.

About correlation between variables, the results of sample 1 and sample 2 were presented in the lower, upper triangle, respectively.

a In analyses, grades 7, 8, 10, and 11 were valued 1, 2, 3, and 4, respectively.

b TWk, the time spent on homework in the weekend; TWw, the time spent on homework from Monday to Friday; HCp, homework completion; HMSt, total score of homework management scale; AE, arrange environment; MT, manage time; MM, monitor motivation; CE, control emotion; FA, focus attention; WCAPt, WCAP total score; AD, adventure; CU, curiosity; IM, imagination; CH, challenging; HCb, homework creativity behavior; AA, academic achievement.

c Since sample 1 did not answer the WCAP, so the corresponding cells in the lower triangle are blank. *p < 0.05, two side-tailed, the same for below.

d Since there is only one item from variable 1 to 4, the α and ω coefficients cannot be computed.

Correlations between the homework creativity behavior scale and distinct concepts

The correlation analysis results demonstrated that both the correlation coefficients between the score of HCBS and the time spent on homework in week days, and time spent on in weekend days were insignificant ( r -values = 0.02, p -values were above 0.05), which indicated a non-overlap between two distinct constructs of homework creativity and time spent on homework.

Reliability analyses

The results revealed that both the Cronbach’s α coefficients of sample 1 and sample 2 were 0.86, which were greater than a 0.70 criteria the previous studies suggest ( Nunnally and Bernstein, 1994 ; Green and Yang, 2015 ).

Effect of homework creativity on academic achievement

The results (see Table 4 ) of hierarchical regression analyses demonstrated that (1) gender and grade explained 0.8% variation of the score of academic achievement. This number means closing to zero because the regression equation failed to pass the significance test; (2) homework time and completion explained 5.4% variation of academic achievement; considering the β coefficients of the time spent on homework is insignificant, this contribution should be attributed to homework completion totally, and (3) the score of the HCBS explained 3.7% variation of the academic achievement independently.

Effect of homework creativity on general creativity

The results showed the following (see Table 4 for details):

(1) Gender and grade explained 1.3% variation of the total score of general creativity (i.e., the total score of WACP); homework time and completion explained 1.3% variation of the total score of general creativity disposition; and the score of the HCBS independently explained 7.0% variation of the total score of general creativity.

(2) Gender and grade explained 1.7% variation of the adventure score, and homework time and completion explained 1.6% variation of the adventure score, and the score of the HCBS independently explained 6.4% variation of the adventure score.

(3) Gender and grade explained 2.4% variation of the curiosity score, and homework time and completion explained 1.1% variation of the curiosity score, and the score of the HCBS independently explained 5.1% variation of the curiosity score.

(4) Gender and grade explained 0.3% variation of the imagination score, homework time completion explained 0.3% variation of the imagination score. The real values of the two “0.3%” are zeros because both the regression equations and coefficients failed to pass the significance tests. Then the score of the HCBS independently explained 4.4% variation of the imagination score.

(5) Gender and grade explained 0.3% variation of the score of the challenge dimension, homework time and completion explained 2.3% variation of the challenge score, and the score of the HCBS independently explained 4.9% variation of the challenge score.

Grade differences of the homework creativity behavior scale

Test of measurement invariance.

The results of measurement invariance test across four grades indicated the following:

(1) The fitting states of the four models (Configural invariance, Factor loading invariance, Intercept invariance, and Residual variance invariance) were marginally acceptable, because values of CFIs (ranged from 0.89 to 0.93), TLIs (varied from 0.91 to 0.93), RMSEAs (fluctuated from 0.084 to 0.095), and SRMRs (changed from 0.043 to 0.074) located the cutoff intervals suggested by methodologists ( Cheung and Rensvold, 2002 ; Chen, 2007 ; Putnick and Bornstein, 2016 ; see Table 5 for fitting indices, and refer to Supplementary Table S2 for the estimation of parameters).

Fitting results of invariance tests across grades.

(2) When setting factor loadings equal across four grades (i.e., grades 7, 8, 10, and 11), the ΔCFA was –0.006, ΔRMSEA was –0.007, and ΔSRMR was 0.016 which indicated that it passed the test of factor loading invariance. After adding the limit of intercepts equal across four groups, the ΔCFA was –0.008, ΔRMSEA was –0.004, and the ΔSRMR was 0.005 which supported that it passed the test of intercept invariance. At the last step, the error variances were also added as equal, the ΔCFA was –0.027, ΔRMSEA was 0.005, and the ΔSRMR was 0.019 which failed to pass the test of residual variance invariance (see Table 5 for changes of fitting indices). Taking into these fitting indices into account, the subsequent comparisons between the means of factors can be conducted because the residuals are not part of the latent factor ( Cheung and Rensvold, 2002 ; Chen, 2007 ; Putnick and Bornstein, 2016 ).

Grade differences in homework creativity and general creativity

The results of ANOVA showed that there were significant differences in the HCBS among the four grades [ F (3,1345) = 27.49, p < 0.001, η 2 = 0.058, see Table 6 for details]. Further post-test tests returned that the scores of middle school students were significantly higher than those of high school students (Cohen’s d values ranged from 0.46 to 0.54; the averaged Cohen’s d = 0.494), and no significant difference occurs between grades 7 and 8, or between grades 10 and 11. See Figure 3 for details.

Grade differences in HCBS.

***p < 0.001.

The mean differences of the HCBS between the groups of grades.

To address the gap in the previous research on homework creativity, this study examined the psychometric proprieties of the HCBS and its relationship with academic achievement and general creativity. The main findings were (1) Hypotheses H1a and H1b were supported that the reliability and validity of the HCBS were acceptable; (2) Hypothesis H2 was supported that the correlation between the score of the HCBS and academic achievement was significant ( r -values = 0.23–0.26 for two samples); (3) Hypothesis H3 received support that the correlation between the scores of HCBS and WCAP was significant ( r -values = 0.20–0.29 for two samples); and (4) the H4 was supported from the current data that the score of high school students’ was lower than that of the middle school students’ (Cohen’s d = 0.49).

The positive correlations among homework creativity, homework completion, and general creativity

The first key finding should be noted is that the positive correlations with between pairs of homework creativity, homework completion, and general creativity. This result is inconsistent with prediction of an argument that homework diminishes creativity ( Cooper et al., 2012 ; Zheng, 2013 ). Specifically, the correlation between homework completion and curiosity was insignificant ( r = 0.08, p > 0.05) which did not support the argument that homework hurts curiosity of creativity ( Zheng, 2013 ). The possible reason may be homework can provide opportunities to foster some components of creativity by independently finding and developing new ways of understanding what students have learned in class, as Kaiipob (1951) argued. It may be the homework creativity that served as the way to practice the components of general creativity. In fact, the content of items of the HCBS are highly related with creative thinking (refer to Table 2 for details).

Possible reasons of the grade effect of the score of the homework creativity behavior scale

The second key finding should be noted is that the score of the HCBS decreased as the level of grades increased from 7 to 11. This is consistent with the basic trend recorded in the previous meta-analyses ( Kim, 2011 ; Said-Metwaly et al., 2021 ). There are three possible explanations leading to this grade effect. The first one is the repetitive exercises in homework. As Zheng (2013) observed, to get higher scores in the highly competitive entrance examination of high school and college, those Chinese students chose to practice a lot of repetitive exercises. The results of some behavior experiments suggested that repetitive activity could reduce the diverse thinking of subjects’ (e.g., Main et al., 2020 ). Furthermore, the repetitive exercises would lead to fast habituation (can be observed by skin conductance records) which hurts the creative thinking of participants ( Martindale et al., 1996 ). The second explanation is that the stress level in Chinese high schools is higher than in middle school because of the college entrance examination. The previous studies (e.g., Beversdorf, 2018 ) indicated that the high level of stress will trigger the increase activity of the noradrenergic system and the hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal (HPA) axis which could debase the individual’s performance of creativity. Another likely explanation is the degree of the certainty of the college entrance examination. The level of certainty highly increases (success or failure) when time comes closer to the deadline of the entrance examination. The increase of degree of certainty will lead to the decrease of activity of the brain areas related to curiosity (e.g., Jepma et al., 2012 ).

The theoretical implications

From the theoretical perspective, there are two points deserving to be emphasized. First, the findings of this study extended the previous work ( Beghetto and Kaufman, 2007 ; Kaufman and Beghetto, 2009 ). This study revealed that homework creativity had two typical characteristics, including the personal meaning of students (as represented by the content of items of the HCBS) and the small size of “creativity” and limited in the scope of exercises (small correlations with general creativity). These characteristics are in line with what Mini-C described by the previous studies ( Beghetto and Kaufman, 2007 ; Kaufman and Beghetto, 2009 ). Second, this study deepened our understanding of the relationship between learning (homework is a part of learning) and creativity which has been discussed more than half a century. One of the main viewpoints is learning and creativity share some fundamental similarities, but no one explained what is the content of these “fundamental similarities” (e.g., Gajda et al., 2017 ). This study identified one similarity between learning and creativity in the context of homework, that is homework creativity. Homework creativity has the characteristics of homework and creativity at the same time which served as an inner factor in which homework promote creativity.

The practical implications

The findings in this study also have several potential practical implications. First, homework creativity should be a valuable goal of learning, because homework creativity may make contributions to academic achievement and general creativity simultaneously. They accounted for a total of 10.7% variance of academic achievement and general creativity which are the main goals of learning. Therefore, it is valuable to imbed homework creativity as a goal of learning, especially in the Chinese society ( Zheng, 2013 ).

Second, the items of the HCBS can be used as a vehicle to help students how to develop about homework creativity. Some studies indicated that the creative performance of students will improve just only under the simple requirement of “to be creative please” ( Niu and Sternberg, 2003 ). Similarly, some simple requirements, like “to do your homework in an innovative way,” “don’t stick to what you learned in class,” “to use a simpler method to do your homework,” “to use your imagination when you do homework,” “to design new problems on the basis what learnt,” “to find your own unique insights into your homework,” and “to find multiple solutions to the problem,” which rewritten from the items of the HCBS, can be used in the process of directing homework of students. In fact, these directions are typical behaviors of creative teaching (e.g., Soh, 2000 ); therefore, they are highly possible to be effective.

Third, the HCBS can be used to measure the degree of homework creativity in ordinary teaching or experimental situations. As demonstrated in the previous sections, the reliability and validity of the HCBS were good enough to play such a role. Based on this tool, the educators can collect the data of homework creativity, and make scientific decisions to improve the performance of people’s teaching or learning.

Strengths, limitations, and issues for further investigation

The main contribution is that this study accumulated some empirical knowledge about the relationship among homework creativity, homework completion, academic achievement, and general creativity, as well as the psychometric quality of the HCBS. However, the findings of this study should be treated with cautions because of the following limitations. First, our study did not collect the test–retest reliability of the HCBS. This makes it difficult for us to judge the HCBS’s stability over time. Second, the academic achievement data in our study were recorded by self-reported methods, and the objectivity may be more accurate. Third, the lower reliability coefficients existed in two dimensions employed, i.e., the arrange environment of the HMS (the α coefficient was 0.63), and the adventure of the WCAP (the α coefficient was 0.61). Fourth, the samples included here was not representative enough if we plan to generalize the finding to the population of middle and high school students in main land of China.

In addition to those questions listed as laminations, there are a number of issues deserve further examinations. (1) Can these findings from this study be generalized into other samples, especially into those from other cultures? For instances, can the reliability and validity of the HCBS be supported by the data from other samples? Or can the grade effect of the score of the HCBS be observed in other societies? Or can the correlation pattern among homework creativity, homework completion, and academic achievement be reproduced in other samples? (2) What is the role of homework creativity in the development of general creativity? Through longitudinal study, we can systematically observe the effect of homework creativity on individual’s general creativity, including creative skills, knowledge, and motivation. The micro-generating method ( Kupers et al., 2018 ) may be used to reveal how the homework creativity occurs in the learning process. (3) What factors affect homework creativity? Specifically, what effects do the individual factors (e.g., gender) and environmental factors (such as teaching styles of teachers) play in the development of homework creativity? (4) What training programs can be designed to improve homework creativity? What should these programs content? How about their effect on the development of homework creativity? What should the teachers do, if they want to promote creativity in their work situation? All those questions call for further explorations.

Homework is a complex thing which might have many aspects. Among them, homework creativity was the latest one being named ( Guo and Fan, 2018 ). Based on the testing of its reliability and validity, this study explored the relationships between homework creativity and academic achievement and general creativity, and its variation among different grade levels. The main findings of this study were (1) the eight-item version of the HCBS has good validity and reliability which can be employed in the further studies; (2) homework creativity had positive correlations with academic achievement and general creativity; (3) compared with homework completion, homework creativity made greater contribution to general creativity, but less to academic achievement; and (4) the score of homework creativity of high school students was lower than that of middle school students. Given that this is the first investigation, to our knowledge, that has systematically tapped into homework creativity, there is a critical need to pursue this line of investigation further.

Data availability statement

Ethics statement.

The studies involving human participants were reviewed and approved by the research ethic committee, School of Educational Science, Bohai University. Written informed consent to participate in this study was provided by the participants’ legal guardian/next of kin.

Author contributions

HF designed the research, collected the data, and interpreted the results. YM and SG analyzed the data and wrote the manuscript. HF, JX, and YM revised the manuscript. YC and HF prepared the HCBS. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Acknowledgments

We thank Dr. Liwei Zhang for his supports in collecting data, and Lu Qiao, Dounan Lu, Xiao Zhang for their helps in the process of inputting data.

This work was supported by the LiaoNing Revitalization Talents Program (grant no. XLYC2007134) and the Funding for Teaching Leader of Bohai University.

Conflict of Interest

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Publisher’s note

All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article, or claim that may be made by its manufacturer, is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

Supplementary material

The Supplementary Material for this article can be found online at: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2022.923882/full#supplementary-material

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The impact of homework on student progress

How important is homework to student performance, how can homework influence the academic performance of students read on to find out….

Sep 05, 2018    By Team YoungWonks *

How effective is homework in helping improve a student's performance?

The answer is a not a simple yes or no. The fact of the matter is that today we hear arguments both for and against homework being assigned to students and hence, this subject deserves a closer examination. The debate between the two opposing camps is not exactly new; on one hand, you have people who say that homework will help the student grow and thus positively impact his / her performance and then there are the others who believe the opposite, that is homework is just extra effort for both students and teachers and that it doesn't translate into any positive results.

The homework proponents

Let's look at the first camp that belongs to the homework proponents; this camp believes that there is great benefit to homework and that it is vital to student success. According to this group, homework that isn't an overload - as in homework that follows the standard "10-minute rule" which recommends a daily maximum of 10 minutes of homework per grade level - can actually help the student with life skills such as organization, time management and independent critical thinking. They are of the view that homework can help the student practice and review what they learnt and that it acts as a reinforcement of sorts.

A research commonly cited by this camp is the comprehensive meta-analysis done by Duke University researchers in the year 2006. They reviewed more than 60 research studies on homework between 1987 and 2003 and concluded that homework does have a positive effect on student achievement. Harris Cooper, a professor of psychology and director of Duke's Program in Education, said the the correlation was stronger for older students - in seventh through 12th grade - than for those in younger grades. His analysis focused on how homework impacts academic achievement - test scores, for example. His report noted that homework is also thought to improve study habits, attitudes toward school, self-discipline, inquisitiveness and independent problem solving skills.

That said, it must be mentioned that Cooper also came across studies that said that homework can fuel negative attitudes about learning and limit leisure time for children. This is why he recommended further study of such potential effects of homework. But all in all, his study concluded that in moderation, homework tends to improve test scores, but not usually at the elementary level. Secondly, he said that teachers should avoid extremes when assigning homework and lastly that instructors will know best about what is best for their students in a given situation, once they have assessed the student's capability.

The homework opponents

This group believes that assigning and grading homework takes up valuable class time. That homework particularly in the lower grades often requires help, so it just encourages these students to hurry and cheat by getting someone else to do it, or simply not turn it in time. They also say that time spent doing homework can be spent reading and that homework can cause stress as it eats into time for family, friends, volunteering, sports, and hobbies.

For example, Alfie Kohn, author of the book The Homework Myth , is a well-known critic of at-home assignments. According to him, homework is frequently the source of frustration, exhaustion and family conflicts. He adds that homework can thus even extinguish a child's curiosity because of its sheer pressure.

What constitutes good, productive homework?

Like in the case of any argument, it's imperative here to look at empirical evidence in the form of research that has been carried out. This, in turn, needs us to look at several concepts that play an important role in helping determine what a good, productive homework assignment is.

Homework in a flipped classroom

To begin with, we need to look at the concept of flipped classroom. Now what is a flipped classroom? It's where the traditional roles of the teacher/ instructor and the student are flipped. In a traditional setting, the teacher delivers the lecture in class and assigns homework to the student. The flipped classroom turns this approach on its head. Here, lectures are typically shared in a video format with the student so he/ she can watch it at home and absorb the lesson; that way, you can pause or rewind the lecture at home and learn it at your own pace. The assignment is then worked upon not at home but in class under the supervision of the teacher. So the classroom time is spent on applying the content rather than direct instruction. At YoungWonks Coding Classes for Kids , the faculty has worked on making videos and animations an essential part of their specially crafted curriculum and students are given access to this material for them to watch it at home.

Homework complemented with assisted practice

A flipped classroom lets the teacher actually assess how much the student has actually grasped from the video lecture at home and the teacher can now assist the student in his/ her assignment. Hence, this method of teaching is called assisted practice as the student gets to practice under the supervision or with the assistance/ aid of the teacher. The teacher has a more hands-on approach here and this approach has shown to yield positive results.

A key element here in this teaching method is for the teacher to not judge the student and put any pressure on him / her. This is why the instructors at YoungWonks acknowledge how each student is different. The idea then is to customise the teaching/ lecture for each student. For instance, there's no point in assigning the homework of solving a quadratic equation to a student who doesn't even know what's a variable, because the student's basics are not yet in place. The instructor here needs to dumb down the concept and facilitate easier learning for the student. Similarly, it is also a waste of time to assign the quadratic equation homework to a student who has already covered this at home or in some other class. This is because the homework, in this case, is adding no value to the student.

Similarly, blended learning is a school of thought that believes in using the right mix of the teacher's strengths - as in the case of traditional learning - and today's technology to provide instruction to students.

Homework in a project-based learning environment  

The whole point of project-based learning is that it makes the lesson interesting as it provides knowledge in the form of a project. So the student has a meaningful purpose he/ she is working towards and that kind of approach always has the kids excited.

Just reading a book or studying a diagram about a circuit can be boring. But if you tell the same kid how he / she can light up an LED with the highest potential in a manner that the current allows maximum light and yet doesn't blow it up, then he / she would be a lot more interested in the lesson. That's when you introduce the Ohm's Law formula and have the kids use them to figure out the solution.

What research says about the new and 'disruptive' teaching and homework concepts

Several thought leaders today believe in ditching the traditional forms of teaching in favor of these methods, i.e. customised learning, project-based learning, assisted practice and flipped classroom. This includes the likes of entrepreneur Elon Musk and Sal Khan of Khan Academy. Shying away from traditional styles of teaching may be described as a disruption of sorts but it has also proven to be highly beneficial to the students. The quality of education imparted in such a setting is way superior to that in a traditional setting and research proves this.

For instance, an online survey of 450 teachers conducted in 2012 by the Flipped Learning Network in conjunction with education startup ClassroomWindow found that teachers associate Flipped Learning with improved student performance and attitudes, and increased job satisfaction. Of the teachers surveyed, 66% reported their students' standardized test scores increased after flipping their classrooms. In the same survey, 80% of teachers perceived an improvement in their students' attitudes towards learning. Nearly nine in ten of the teachers surveyed reported that their job satisfaction also improved, with 46% reporting significant improvement.

Project-based learning too is shown to make classes more engaging for students and thus improve their learning. For example, the Effectiveness of Project Based Learning in Trigonometry was studied at the Department of Mathematics at the Sebelas Maret University in Indonesia and in the semester 2 of the academic year 2016/2017, they found that the mean / average score of students taught under the Project-based learning (PjBL) learning model was 84.5, significantly higher than 76.26, the average score of students taught under the classical learning model.

Implementation is key

It is interesting to note that these unorthodox methods of teaching have met with opposition from parents. Several American schools tried these methods but had to abandon them and revert to the traditional styles. The reason behind this is their flawed implementation. Most of these schools cherry-picked topics/ questions while using the flipped classroom, assisted practice or blended learning approach. And therein lies the problem.

The modern concepts addressed in this blog are designed for the 21st century and hence, require one to make full use of the available technology. So an instructor needs to not just share a few lessons in the video format but instead maintain uniformity by sharing all lessons through videos. And then he or she needs to observe how the student applies knowledge gleaned from each of these lessons in class and share feedback accordingly.

The bottom line is that homework doesn't have to be a negative, dirty word. Assigning homework is fine as long as the instructor knows hows the assigned homework will benefit the concerned student and this can be done only when the homework is in keeping with the learning practices of flipped classroom, assisted practice, self-paced learning, personalised learning, blended learning and project-based learning.

YoungWonks strongly relies on these methods. Each teacher here assesses the student at an individual level and then assigns the homework accordingly. This is what makes YoungWonks distinctively different from other coding classes.

Shared below is a video throwing light on the same subject:

Enhancing Student Progress through Targeted Learning

In the realm of modern education, it's essential to identify resources that not only complement homework but actively enhance student learning and progress. At YoungWonks, we understand this need and offer specialized Coding Classes for Kids designed to introduce them to the world of technology and prepare them for the future. For students keen on exploring specific programming languages, our Python Coding Classes for Kids provide a solid foundation in one of the most popular and versatile languages today. Additionally, for those intrigued by hardware and game development, YoungWonks offers comprehensive Raspberry Pi, Arduino and Game Development Coding Classes , which blend fun and learning in a unique way, encouraging innovation and creativity. These programs aim to supplement traditional homework, offering a hands-on approach to learning that can significantly impact student progress.

*Contributors: Written by Vidya Prabhu; Photo courtesy: Shutterstock

This blog is presented to you by YoungWonks. The leading coding program for kids and teens. YoungWonks offers instructor led one-on-one online classes and in-person classes with 4:1 student teacher ratio. Sign up for a free trial class by filling out the form below: