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I had a professor in grad school who believed that assigning homework was discriminatory. He was right. Not all kids have it like I did when I was growing up. My Dad was a teacher and could help me with just about any question I had. I grew up in a house of books and music and things were okay except for that limit on TV rule.

My kids have it even "better", just don't ask them. Both parents of my kids have graduate degrees so they can get help in a wide variety of subjects and in the hypocrisy of parenting I limit my kids TV and video games and Internet time. Not all of my students have this luxury. Many of them, I believe, come from homes where education is not a high priority. Assigning homework to a class where there is a wide diversity of support awaiting those students at home is a discriminatory act. What am I to do?

Homework is the bridge between lessons. Experienced teachers know that extra practice is good whether it's conjugating verbs, solving math problems or writing computer programs. The reflective processes that happen in even the weakest students I believe are worthwhile and helpful. Homework helps students prepare for tests and while tests and exams etc. are coming and in and out of fashion (mostly out lately) at some point it will be likely that these students will have to take some. Completing homework is a skill that will be useful throughout life.

I always shock kids when I tell them things like " I don't necessarily thing that school is a great idea." Cramming thirty five teenagers into any room for 5 hours at a stretch is a good let alone asking them to pay close attention. Asking a student to pay attention for even one hour may be unrealistic.
Typically a student will leave a classroom without mastery of what just happened. A teacher's best hope is that a student will leave their classroom with only a few gaps in the learning that was intended for the lesson. Well assigned homework will fill in some of these gaps.

Don't think that I'm naive enough to have ever believed that kids come into my classroom for my fantastic lesson and they all leave with that packet of knowledge orderly stored in their minds. Learning that packet of knowledge is much more of a process than a single event. That process at the least should involve the lesson, homework, review, study and evaluation.

Help your kids, check their homework, encourage them to complete it, check with your child's teacher regularly. Do they have a homework web page at your child's school? Use it. Maybe your child was given an agenda to record their homework assignments. Make a habit of checking their agenda. Calling the school should probably be the last option, schools typically have many more computers than telephones proving teachers with better email access than phone access. Teacher's email addresses are usually posted on the school's web page. If all else fails send a note to school with your phone numbers email addresses etc.

Learn more about this author, Bob Riche.
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