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Post by Darknezz on Dec 11, 2008 17:07:21 GMT -5
I think the entire system of homework is flawed. Honestly, I see no reason for it. Now, I've been able to read something and understand it immediately since I got into school, so my perspective might be flawed, but I'm posting anyway.
Homework as a means of getting students to understand the day's lesson is all well and good, but, again, there's no reason for it. If a student doesn't understand the lessons, they need to ask questions, they need to have it explained better, or they just need to go over it a few times. There is no reason that schools should be forcing busy work down our throats other than just that; To keep us busy. Now, while in school, I can why students should be busy; Without such busy work, students would be goofing off, not paying attention, blah de blah. Why, then, do they force us to go through the monotony and tedium of taking the work outside of the school?
For the purposes of my post, I'll take math for my example. It works with any subject, really, but math is the easiest to demonstrate.
So, let's take a simple, linear equation that we all learned in freshman year of highschool (if not before). 2x - 6 = 24. We can all solve this, finding that x is 15. It's not hard, and it wasn't hard when you first learned it. Why, then, must we solve what is essentially the same question 40 times per assignment? Practice. There is no reason for someone who fully comprehends the material to continue trudging through mindless equation after mindless equation ad naseum. The only people benefiting from it are the ones who don't understand it, and even then, they don't get any benefit from doing it wrong 50 times, so really, the only people benefiting from this tedious exercise are the ones who bother to ask about what they don't understand, and then, when they do comprehend what to do, it becomes as pointless and redundant as it is for people who understood it in the first place.
Okay, so a little practice doesn't hurt, but it should be the student's decision if they should practice; Let test scores reflect if they have actually learned something, or hell, give them busy work to do in class, whatever they don't finish, oh well. Then have the teacher look through it, and if people made mistakes, how about explaining the mistakes to the students? At least that way, the people who understand the work can do other stuff, like reading a book, and then the people who need help can get help.
This being the debate forum, I await any responses.
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Post by skyliner12 on Dec 11, 2008 17:23:59 GMT -5
So, let's take a simple, linear equation that we all learned in freshman year of highschool (if not before). 2x - 6 = 24. Not letting you get away with that. I'll edit this post with my debate in a little while. |
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Post by evilplans on Dec 11, 2008 22:29:36 GMT -5
to me its pointless. so i dont do it. but thats me.
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Post by inquisition on Dec 12, 2008 10:06:06 GMT -5
Homework as a means of getting students to understand the day's lesson is all well and good, but, again, there's no reason for it. If a student doesn't understand the lessons, they need to ask questions, they need to have it explained better, or they just need to go over it a few times. There is no reason that schools should be forcing busy work down our throats other than just that; To keep us busy. Now, while in school, I can why students should be busy; Without such busy work, students would be goofing off, not paying attention, blah de blah. Why, then, do they force us to go through the monotony and tedium of taking the work outside of the school? Well, you see, not all kids are willing to tell the teacher that they didn't understand something that was being taught, I never told my maths teacher that I didn't understand some stuff he was teaching, because honestly, I have a life to attend to, I don't care if I don't understand a few things. Homework is a teachers way of checking whether or not the lesson has really stuck in the students mind, sure you can do what you've been taught while in a lesson, but how about when you go home? People often forget by then. I suppose the idea of homework was probably based on one of the most simple models of memory, that model stating that repitition will result in memory moving from the short term memory to the long term memory before it is discarded. After a lesson, the things you have been taught may not have been embedded in your long term memory correctly, therefore it must be reinforced with homework. Remember, teachers don't like giving out homework, it means they have to take it back and mark it, which wastes their time, trust me, one of my parents is a teacher, they're doing it because it does genuinely help. It helps students get what they need to know into their long term memory, it also allows teachers to see who is struggling after looking at the homework they get back. It's not pointless busywork. See above. Also when you get the chance, enrol yourself onto a Psychology course, you'll look back on your schoolwork and say, "Oh, so that's why we did that." It isn't a matter of, "Whoever works hard gets an education." It's a matter of, "The Government is funding us to make sure all of these kids get the best test score they possibly can." If they don't make you "practice" what they teach, and then you go and do really badly, it's not you getting into trouble, it's them. If it really concerns you THAT much, just don't do your homework. When I was in the final year of High School, I very rarely did any of my homework that was set, the worst they usually do is shout at you or threaten expulsion, which they never follow through with. |
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Post by Darknezz on Dec 12, 2008 10:30:19 GMT -5
Homework as a means of getting students to understand the day's lesson is all well and good, but, again, there's no reason for it. If a student doesn't understand the lessons, they need to ask questions, they need to have it explained better, or they just need to go over it a few times. There is no reason that schools should be forcing busy work down our throats other than just that; To keep us busy. Now, while in school, I can why students should be busy; Without such busy work, students would be goofing off, not paying attention, blah de blah. Why, then, do they force us to go through the monotony and tedium of taking the work outside of the school? Well, you see, not all kids are willing to tell the teacher that they didn't understand something that was being taught, I never told my maths teacher that I didn't understand some stuff he was teaching, because honestly, I have a life to attend to, I don't care if I don't understand a few things. Homework is a teachers way of checking whether or not the lesson has really stuck in the students mind, sure you can do what you've been taught while in a lesson, but how about when you go home? People often forget by then. That's exactly my point. The work is there to make sure that you understand the lesson. The thing is that then we get students like you, as you freely admit, that don't understand part of the lesson, and would rather not learn it. So then, the students that do care about learning have about sixty questions that they can do easily, it's just monotonous and time consuming. It's ridiculous to have people like me suffer because of people like you. I suppose the idea of homework was probably based on one of the most simple models of memory, that model stating that repitition will result in memory moving from the short term memory to the long term memory before it is discarded. After a lesson, the things you have been taught may not have been embedded in your long term memory correctly, therefore it must be reinforced with homework. Again, there's no point in having students like you that don't understand the lesson doing it wrong 60 times, and when a student already knows how to do it, there's also no reason to continue doing it ad naseum. Your point about long term memory is noted, but again, my alternative of just having the kids do work in class and not have to bother with a stupid, tedious waste of time and effort. Remember, teachers don't like giving out homework, it means they have to take it back and mark it, which wastes their time, trust me, one of my parents is a teacher, they're doing it because it does genuinely help. It helps students get what they need to know into their long term memory, it also allows teachers to see who is struggling after looking at the homework they get back. It's not pointless busywork. All the teachers I ever had loved making us miserable with extra homework. And again, classwork, not homework. See above. Also when you get the chance, enrol yourself onto a Psychology course, you'll look back on your schoolwork and say, "Oh, so that's why we did that." A psych class gives no insight as to why we do pointless, monotonous crap; Perhaps you could give me a reason that isn't easily discredited? It isn't a matter of, "Whoever works hard gets an education." It's a matter of, "The Government is funding us to make sure all of these kids get the best test score they possibly can." If they don't make you "practice" what they teach, and then you go and do really badly, it's not you getting into trouble, it's them. You just said that the entire education system is worthless. The government pays schools to teach kids things that will be on government-made and run testing, and the only point of the testing is to make sure you learned what was on the test. And for that matter, government testing is worthlessly easy, and I feel sorry for the fact that a large portion of the country doesn't even have a highschool diploma. If it really concerns you THAT much, just don't do your homework. When I was in the final year of High School, I very rarely did any of my homework that was set, the worst they usually do is shout at you or threaten expulsion, which they never follow through with. That's the thing; I'm on an independent study system because of medical problems, and for every class, all I have is tedious worksheet after tedious worksheet, and then a test at the school after the worksheets. I'm saying that the worksheets are worthless, both in regular school and in independent study. If I can pass the tests, why do I need to do the work? |
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Post by inquisition on Dec 12, 2008 10:46:16 GMT -5
That's exactly my point. The work is there to make sure that you understand the lesson. The thing is that then we get students like you, as you freely admit, that don't understand part of the lesson, and would rather not learn it. So then, the students that do care about learning have about sixty questions that they can do easily, it's just monotonous and time consuming. It's ridiculous to have people like me suffer because of people like you. Just ride it out until you get to college. There's no homework in college. Only coursework, and deadlines! MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAH! The thing about doing it in class is that the idea is still fresh in your mind while in class, but by the time you get home, it may not be so fresh, homework is like a reminder, it'll help you remember. Some teachers don't have lives and enjoy making children suffer, I applaud them. A psych class WOULD give insight as to why you do pointless monotonous crap, modern teaching methods are often created using memory models as most popular memory models have been proven to be true, although not in every case. Also you didn't discredit anything, you just said what I said was wrong and acted like you were right, I think you're suffering from trollitis. The entire education system IS worthless, you're only taught what is going to be on the tests and you never really learn anything that isn't going to be on them. However, the sheit ON the tests is usually the sheit you need to know. I agree, I never studied or listened in class, still passed with As in my GCSEs, looking at As in my A-Levels too. |
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Post by skyliner12 on Dec 12, 2008 14:15:46 GMT -5
About time I got back to this. Guh.
The first thing that has to be considered when discussing this is realizing the fact that each child learns at a different pace, through different methods. Just because Child A reads a paragraph and understands it immediately in thirty seconds but Child B reads it in a minute and then takes another thirty seconds to understand it doesn't mean that either subject has done the work correctly.
Sticking to the subject at hand, "System of Homework", I'm going to agree with it most of the time. In any given class of twenty to thirty students, repetition is the highest statistical way of teaching an idea so that students comprehend it. It's the same way of repetitive thought process that we learn everything else in life. Experiment, check, solve or re-evaluate.
We learn these skills as infants. Poke the kitty. Kitty gets mad. Kitty bites. Poke the kitty again. Kitty gets mad. Kitty bites again. Poke the Kitty? I do not want to get bit, therefore, I do not poke the kitty.
However, I do agree with your point (and what I stated at the beginning) that every child learns through different methods. And I would be willing to bet that repetition is not the best method for most children. But in this country the system is set up to educate all students. Sadly education has taken a statistical approach to teaching, using whatever device that is proven to give the highest results to the student body. Cramming down a single idea in a class for an hour, then forcing the idea again on a worksheet while the student is out of the school environment is a safe way for the educational system to say, "We hit all the bases we could."
I know better than most people, we're probably in the same boat Dark. I was on medical leave from school and was either homeschooled or in independent study programs for two years. What you'll find later in life, especially college, is that homework is much less prevalent. I've gotten through quite a couple of my courses (with lovely flying colors) without ever doing homework assignments and simply doing well on tests because I understand the information during the lecture or when I read it.
Anyway. I agree with you. I wish there could be more teacher-student interaction so each student could realize what methods help them learn best early on, and just fucking use them, but the problem is nobody properly funds public schools.
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Post by inquisition on Dec 12, 2008 14:40:32 GMT -5
Most kids who think that they don't need to do homework, are really just tards.
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tenshibo
Full Member
gt: Tenshibo psn: Tenshibo13
Posts: 280
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Post by tenshibo on Dec 12, 2008 16:19:46 GMT -5
ur right, it's pointless as hell. i don't do my homework, ans still found away to get straight A's. that, prove that homework is an unnesicary and pointless system that our school systems behold. and inquistion, that is really ignorant, sometimes, it could b the parents faults, or the teachers faults, or, like me, they have just found ways to still get fantastic grades without doing it.
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BetaMaxx
Full Member
Of Course!
Posts: 241
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Post by BetaMaxx on Dec 12, 2008 16:42:25 GMT -5
I dont have a problem with homework, its just when i get too much of it and i cant partake in other activities.
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Post by SnowOwl96 on Dec 12, 2008 16:45:19 GMT -5
I agree with sky on this subject.
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Post by mypallyowndu on Dec 12, 2008 17:03:25 GMT -5
What sky said.
Also, I think homework helps to instill good work habits in students. I know a lot of you are smart people and you can excel in your high school and even college classes with a minimal amount of effort. But there will come a point where you are surrounded by equally talented people and the ones that rise to the top are those that know how to prepare. If you have no idea how to budget your time, plan a calendar, etc., you will be severely disadvantaged. And I speak as someone that has terrible tie management skills learned through years of skipping homework, thinking it a pointless activity.
Also, before condescending to kids who struggle in high school and fail to get a degree, you should watch season four of "The Wire." It's a bit difficult to worry about algebra when you have to manage the food stamps for your junkie mother, create different routes to school every day to avoid the drug dealers and keep your little brother protected from your abusive father.
Walk a mile in a man's shoes before judging him.
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Post by inquisition on Dec 13, 2008 10:55:43 GMT -5
I dunno, I prefer Monk more, I mean try walking a mile in his shoes.
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Post by thecrazycanuck on Dec 14, 2008 0:41:10 GMT -5
i like to think of it this way...
homework... that is work they intend for you to do at home... on your free time... rather than in the classroom. Teachers get paid to teach us so why should they give us a ton of crap to do on our free time when they just sit behind their desk for the rest of the period after giving the bare bones of a lesson then giving crap answers to our questions when we didn't understand the lesson because they cut half of the stuff we need to know out of it.
also i can't see any practical use homework may have in preparation for a real job because, very very few jobs require you to do work from home after your shift and even then it's probably just verifying that the right patient is in the right hospital bed for example, besides, people get paid extra when they need to do extra work. I'm still wondering where my pay is from all the schoolwork I've done.
anyway there is also one completely retarded thing I'd like to add, "Homework Detentions", when someone chooses not to do homework because they have something better to do and/or they understood lesson perfectly, the next day they'll wind up with a 75 minute after school detention, because they decided to do what they wanted with their free time, not what their teacher wanted,
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Post by Sax on Dec 14, 2008 0:58:53 GMT -5
I find journals one of the most pointless fucking things ever. Especially ones when reading a book where you write one for every few chapters.
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