Should Homework Be Removed?

Its a visual representation which shows an example of a student struggling to keep up with their work.

Its a visual representation which shows an example of a student struggling to keep up with their work.

By Magdiel Gamez, Staff Writer

Another boring day arrives, and you get back home from school as usual after a day of school or prison as some call it. You suddenly realize that you have something that can make even nerds flinch up their bones, which is homework. The temptation to just act like homework doesn’t exist is unimaginable, but you stress furthermore after realizing the cost of not doing it. 

Stress Givers 

Richard Fonseca, a junior, elaborates, “I feel overwhelmed sometimes when I get too much homework from all of my teachers.”  

    This case of being overwhelmed is more common than you think. Based on a CNN story titled “Is homework making your child sick?”, 56% of the students in their study cited homework as a primary stressor in their lives. 

 Another research study cited in the same article shows how excessive homework is associated with high stress levels.  

 As more homework is given, you feel like you wasted time that could’ve been spent on something else that may have been a turning point in your life. English teacher Ms. Ransom agrees, “Hours and hours of homework is not healthy for the student, they have other activities such as school, clinics, jobs, extra curriculars and more,” she said. As for the student’s case, 11th grader Wilkins Castillo says, “I could be doing other productive things that can teach me about life and how to make money.” 

 

Homework Diversity 

Let’s imagine how each homework is separate and you struggle to decide what homework you should do first.  

Junior Armando Amaya said, “I usually do core class first because they are way more important than an elective class homework”. Junior Christhopher Lopez agrees, “Algebra 2 homework goes first before I focus on other classes,” he said.  

After finishing homework, most students usually feel relief or excitement, but that can easily change after remembering the next assignment. This leads back to the stress caused by the next assignment. As accurately explained by Junior Franciso Renaloza, “Homework can be stressful and even if you finish it, having a bad grade makes your stress worse by your grade dropping a lot from it.” 

 

An Unsurprisingly Result  

Many students don’t do their homework, which can harm the student academic wise. 

 Biology teacher Ms. Guiterrez, or Ms. G elaborates: “60 percent of my students do the homework in her classroom”. Even if the numbers overlap for good reasoning, this includes a core class which is required for graduation, meaning the other 40 percent don’t try. 

 

Opinion Crashes 

Before you dive into the mess of chaos between more or less homework, you must know what homework would mean in your own words. For example, “Homework is schoolwork that the student is supposed to do at home and a way to let your teacher know that you learned something in class,” said junior Gabriela Cespedes. 

The ability to practice something you learned in class as an alternate study guide can be useful, but some may want more than others do such as junior Crystal Jarquin. “I believe with more, it would help to better understand the subject in general,” she said. Having more homework will indeed help a student gain a better understanding of that subject, but it can easily overwhelm you in terms of the amount of homework. 

Sharing an opposing view, junior Luciano Stankov said “I believe homework should be reduced because sometimes they don’t consider that we have other homework from different classes and that creates a problem for students in general.” 

Regardless of if students have more or less homework, does it teach responsibility somehow? Reading Teacher Ms. Garcia doesn’t think so. “Instead, it reinforces whatever the teacher went through in a classroom, but mostly responsibility is learned as you grow up especially by the influence by your parents,” she said. 

 

Possible Solutions 

 Have you ever wondered about how teachers received homework at some point in their lives?  Mr. Strickland, a math teacher says, “Homework affected me for the simple fact that I always did my homework before I left school.” 

 But nowadays, we have technology and subjects outside of homework that get us busy depending on the type of day it is. What’s more, junior Lance Weston explains, “It really depends on what day it is. If it’s a special occasion like spirit week or somewhere near the last week of school, then the students deserve a break,” she said. 

  Just like problem and solution, we see the solution that can stop this problem overall. Junior Javier Ortiz expresses, “To help solve the stress of homework, one way is to minimize the amount students get,” he said. 

Homework Life Hacks 

  1. Make a list for doing your homework

  2. Narrow your stretch on homework by doing it in class

  3. Listen to classical music while working

  4. After you’ve finished, reward yourself

Source: https://ofy.org/blog/homework-hacks-8-tips-get-done-faster/