France to Ban Homework

[Purlina]

I wholeheartedly agree with this, and anyone who disagrees DESERVES to die.

I am no longer a student, but back when I was, homework was the bane of my existence. Schoolwork should be done in class, not forced onto you after school. Homework =/= studying. Some students learn better without having to do repetitious exercises, or studying. Forcing students that don't need the extra repetition to do work that they may not have the time or inclination to do, only limits their potential.

When a student get's A's on every test without any studying, but graduates with a C because they didn't do homework is a failure for the education system.

Failure on the students part for being lazy, not responsible...

[Dristereau]

Although longer days than when I was in school (09.00 - 15.30), I was in five days a week and still got homework. Seem daft to get rid of it, helps teachers find out how much the kids are learning without tests every week. I never had any help from family with Homework, but sill did it regardless, and had plenty of free time. Stupid idea to get rid of homework on a four day week. Also, what about subjects with coursework modules? Or when they get to College and University? Working in your free time then is mandatory, and getting used to it early is good practice.

[Mister K]

In the real world that's hardly so. Each subject in school developed cognitive skills that video games will never come close to.

Never? I would not say that, I am sure in future gaming may be part of the educational systems and play a decently large role. So who knows, 50, 100 or even 500 years ^^

[Reeve]

Failure on the students part for being lazy, not responsible...

I see that argument, but on the other hand, the schools should be giving students motivation to do homework beyond "because we said so." If the homework isn't teaching you something new, you shouldn't be doing it. If the student already understands the subject, asking them to do 50 repetitive math problems of the same type isn't teaching them responsibility so much as it's teaching them that authority figures are dumb for making them do this pointless exercise.

---------- Post added 2012-10-26 at 03:31 PM ----------

Although longer days than when I was in school (09.00 - 15.30), I was in five days a week and still got homework. Seem daft to get rid of it, helps teachers find out how much the kids are learning without tests every week. I never had any help from family with Homework, but sill did it regardless, and had plenty of free time. Stupid idea to get rid of homework on a four day week. Also, what about subjects with coursework modules? Or when they get to College and University? Working in your free time then is mandatory, and getting used to it early is good practice.

I did very little work outside of class at University honestly. Maybe a couple papers in a semester and one or two projects. In addition to that work, I studied maybe a total of 6 hours over the course of a semester, and still got As on all my exams. With such a small amount of work outside the classroom, I still learned quite a bit.

[Purlina]

I see that argument, but on the other hand, the schools should be giving students motivation to do homework beyond "because we said so." If the homework isn't teaching you something new, you shouldn't be doing it. If the student already understands the subject, asking them to do 50 repetitive math problems of the same type isn't teaching them responsibility so much as it's teaching them that authority figures are dumb for making them do this pointless exercise.

How does the teacher know that the student understands the material besides tests and homework?

When you hand in your homework a teacher can find your mistakes and figure out where you need help, before the exam.

[Shiny212]

I can see this working in france, as school there isnt something children hate to go to. It's an all day school pretty much, they get hot food etc, and are home around 4, homework after that is fairly pointless.

[Axi]

Homework is one of the biggest turn-offs for many kids when it comes to education. Having a baseline work ethic imposed on children from a young age is detrimental to not only the least able, but also the top students who are only likely to feel disenfranchised by being set endless mundane assignments that are curriculum-limited far below their level.

At a serious academic university you have far lower workload than you ever do at an average secondary school in Europe, but the emphasis is rightly on quality of work, depth of understanding and strength of analysis. Challenge and critical thought creates scholars.

The United States is some way behind the curve on this, the 'importance' of workload is emphasized deep into higher education in many universities to the expense of scholarly mandate. The ease with which even average students are able maintain a 'maximum' GPA at undergraduate level is outrageous and outlines the failure of the US education system to provide any real challenge to students. Workload without intellectual challenge creates worker-bees.

If this move by France is reinforced by appropriately mature attitudes to education then it is extremely positive.

[Deleted]

I support this. You'd learn more life skills watching an episode of Spongebob Squarepants than having to do some retarded algebra equation that you will NEVER have to deal with in your adult life.

[Reeve]

How does the teacher know that the student understands the material besides tests and homework?

When you hand in your homework a teacher can find your mistakes and figure out where you need help, before the exam.

That's what quizzes are for. They're snapshots designed to tell the teacher how well the students are absorbing the material before the exam.

[namelessone]

I'm all for removing MANDATORY homework, as long as they don't end up relaxing standards. Homework should be something you might want to do to improve your performance, but not something you are forced to do.

[Purlina]

That's what quizzes are for. They're snapshots designed to tell the teacher how well the students are absorbing the material before the exam.

Quizzes by design are very short, and only test a very small portion of the material...

[Deleted]

i never did the homework anyway.. y'know, when i come home from school, i dont want to work anymore, i want to do whatever the hell i want, i so suport this..

[Reeve]

At a serious academic university you have far lower workload than you ever do at an average secondary school in Europe, but the emphasis is rightly on quality of work, depth of understanding and strength of analysis. Challenge and critical thought creates scholars.

This, absolutely this. Homework, if it must exist, should focus on challenging the student and making them think. If homework is just busy work, as so much of my K-12 homework was, it just turns the student off and makes them uninterested in the subject.

[s_bushido]

If the student already understands the subject, asking them to do 50 repetitive math problems of the same type isn't teaching them responsibility so much as it's teaching them that authority figures are dumb for making them do this pointless exercise.

Um... You call it repetitive and a pointless exercise...but isn't repetition the point of practice? The more you do something, the better you'll get at it and the more likely you are to retain that information/skill.

[Reeve]

Quizes by design are very short, and only test a very small portion of the material...

Which is why you do a quick quiz a couple times a week to cover the material you've been doing up until that point, so for every exam, you've done maybe 10 quizzes.

[Deleted]

The future of France can't be very bright with a retard like Holland in charge. If he really wants for some reason to remove homework, there should at least be an obligatory extra hour where you do exercises and stuff at least a few times per week, which would compensate the homework. Both getting rid of homework and reducing the length of day is no way smart. He basically wants to keep everyone at the same level, at a level where everyone is completely shit.

Homework is often very annoying, but you usually learn from it, and here in Finland is really not so obligatory for most teachers. For example in math and chemistry we get some extra bonus points to our coming test when we have done the homework, and not doing the homework doesn't mean that you can't get full points, you can't just get those few extra points. Also, your school has to be really easy and shit if you feel no need for any kind of homework when you get a bit older.

[Deleted]

Good....If only the same applied in the UK

My mother told me (Don't do homework...why use your spare time to study you're doing the teachers job by doing homework!)
And I never did homework again.


And even if you wanted to study a subject you could easily >>>google<<<

[vizzle]

I've read some pretty interesting studies on this topic, actually. Homework's been found not to have any (or very little) positive effect on students.

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/new...-1226311860123

"What the research shows is that, in countries where they spend more time on homework, the achievement results are lower," Dr Walker, from Sydney University's Education Faculty, said.

"The amount of homework is a really critical issue for kids. If they are overloaded they are not going to be happy and not going to enjoy it. There are other things kids want to do that are very valuable things for them to be doing.

http://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/104.../664712800.pdf

[Deleted]

I'm French.

We had class from 8 or 8:30 to at least 4.
We had a bit of homework.

I always had free time anyway.

Scrapping homework won't make a bit of difference because kids never did it anyway; like ever.

Hollande is a moron with bigger things to worry about than kids homework, like coming good with his empty promises.

[Purlina]

Which is why you do a quick quiz a couple times a week to cover the material you've been doing up until that point, so for every exam, you've done maybe 10 quizzes.

I never had a teacher that had more then 1 quiz per week...