ASSAMETANKUL 1

Samaphoo Tawan Assametankul

Ms. Orana Meenongwha
English 10/10:04
May 25, 2017

Effect of Homework toward student learning ability

Introduction

Going to school every weekday is one of the hardest tasks for the student. The

student is facing lots of obstacle in one day. In the same way, student mostly struggles with

waking up to school in the morning. According to national sleep foundation (2015), teenager

requirement for sleep periods is between 8-10 hours a day. However, school usually started at

7.30-8.00 am. Which make the student woke up around 5.30am. In fact, the student usually went

to bed around 10.30-12.00 pm., causing the student to earn less sleep than the requirement. One

of the issues that affect the student habits is homework. The student was assigned 3-4

assignment each day. It took the student 1-2 hours each. So, approximately 3 hours as the

minimum will be used as a homework time. If without homework will the ability to understand

the subject will be decreased? However, some country like Finland, it education rank as six

highest world ranking in reading and twelve highest rank on the mathematic standard test and

the school didn't assign much homework, they assign only 3 hours of homework time in a week.

According to the statement above show that homework likely cause more negative toward the

student; stress, less outdoor activities, less social connection and sleeping habits. These lead to

the question that with the less homework or eliminated will be enhanced to the better childhood

for the student. However, the research by Organization for Economic Cooperation (2014) saw an
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unconnected between hours of homework assigned and there scored on the exam. Some country

assigned a lot of homework, however the average standard test was lower than what it should be.

These statements represent that the homework isn't enhanced and improve the student

understand. Homework need lots of change to make the education world to get improve.

Therefore, this research paper aims to provide reliable sources and information which represent

homework isnt much necessary for student to understand the topic and how homework should

be change in the way they assign and its amount.

Background information of Homework

According to What is Homework? | Les devoirs : c'est quoi? (2011) homework

defined as a task which assigned by the school which plans to be work on the non-school hours.

Roberto Nevilis was credited as the first who assigned homework (Walken, N/D). In additional,

the purpose of homework is to enhance the understanding ability and checking whether how well

the students are on task. Furthermore, homework could divide into 4 different categories:

Completion, Practice review, Preparation and Extension/Creation. These 4 different types can

define, the first Completion is the homework which is not able to complete in class. Second,

Practice is a for review new materials which are learned in class. Third, Preparation is for the

preparing understanding for the next day class. Fourth, Extension/Creation is a creative

application that integrates and or expand upon classroom learning. Although the purpose of

homework act as enhancing student learning ability, the students have the negative attitudes

toward homework. According to Ferdowshi and Islam (2014) showed that more than 50% of

their research participants including the student in grade 3, 5 and 12. Children have to do their

homework during night time. In the same way, parents of kindergarten student said that their

kids spend time on the homework too much (Antonia, 2015). As same as, Admin of Teaching

English (2010) students complained that the homework was pointless and boring because of too
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much type of homework they have assigned such as doing workbook exercises, finishing

incomplete classwork, memorizing lists of vocabulary and writing compositions causing student

to lost their interest and brought the negative attitude toward it. Ferdowshi and Islam (2014),

pointed that student who has negative attitude is in the higher grade like grade 10, 11 and 12.

Who faced more homework compare to the younger grader. As a result, most of the high grader

responded to the research that there has too much homework. In contrast, the average score of

the lower grader is better than the higher grader who has a feedback as too much homework.

This result was consistent with another global study reported that the country which student has

high average score such as Japan, Denmark, and the Czech Republic, have teachers who assign

less homework. Compare to countries such as Greece, Thailand, and Iran, reported having

student have the worst average scores because of teachers who assign more homework.

Advantages and Disadvantages of Homework

As reported by Judd (1998), British Psycho- logical Society conference on education

claimed that the homework exposed when school got pressure by the government and the

competition between educations. However, these exposed homework caused the perdition to the

education. In 1883, social and parents campaigned for a reduction toward the homework.

Furthermore, between the1929-1935, the argument of homework lengthen for centuries.

Homework hours had been adding more and eliminated out during this time. Nowadays, as

reported by Australian researchers claimed that the amount of homework could affect the lower

score of the student. According to Walker(2012), an educational psychologist at Sydney

University, the country that spend their time on homework likely to score lower on standardized

test program such as PISA or International assessment. Relating to LeTendre(2005) of

Pennsylvania State University, reported that the cause of assigning homework lowering the

standard test score because of teachers typically give take-home assignments that are unhelpful
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busy work. This type is of homework defined as not covering topics in class. It give students

struggling on the topic, and not an elevation strategy work (work that designed to enhance and

improve the student to excel.) To illustrate the disadvantages of homework, it could be explain

into 4 points. First, homework can lowering the children time. Second, homework can also cause

children to believe only what they had learn in school and homework. Third, homework can be

more confusing for the student. Fourth, the student could lost their confidence. Fifth, homework

diminishes the children time exploring the world, enjoying their kid childhood. Children could

spend their time on sport, practicing their activities skills that make them improve on their

mental and physical abilities. Homework can also cause children to believe what they had learn

in class and on their homework. In addition, the student will lack of curiosity and natural

learning opportunities. Homework could be confused for the student. For example, the student

needs to learn how to solve some math exercises. He needs advisors to explain them to him.

Without a doubt, there is no one to help this at home, so the homework needs to be finished by

himself. He might not be able to comprehend the exercise in the correct way, so he will solve it

in his own way that can be wrong or copying homework which is more worst (A New Look At

The Pros And Cons Of Doing Homework, 2012). A student could lose their self-confidence if

they couldnt do their homework are causing the student to upset toward that subject and later

on. They will hate the subject which they struggling with and leads to the not concentrate during

class (Karimjee, 2008). On the other hand, homework still has benefit for example, homework

teaches students about time management. Homework teaches students how to set priorities.

Homework helps teachers determine how well the lessons and material are being understood by

their students. And homework teaches students how to problem solve (Bishop, n.d.). Although

the homework has advantages and disadvantages, most of the research and statistics showed that

the homework couldnt fully reach its goal to enhance the children learning abilities. So, there
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are some countries that see these loophole. So, they begin to change how they assess students

learning performance.

Alternative ways to improve the education.

Countries like Finland saw this loophole and begin to lessen their homework.

Finland started assigning less homework approximately less than 2 hours per week.

Nevertheless, a result of PISA average score of the International school student was surprised.

Finland ranked in 4th and 5th place in reading and Science field in PISA test (Coughlan, 2016).

In addition, Finland graduation rate is highest among the others Europe countries, 93%

successfully graduated rate compared to Canada 78% and U.S. 75% (Lepi, 2014). So, what

makes Finland's education so successful without providing much homework? It is found that

there are 5 factors have been demonstrated to the successful of Finland's education. First, the

teacher ratio to students per class is 1:12 ratio of teacher to student. The teacher will be able to

take care of student thoroughly compare to others places like Thailand which approximately

1:40, and NYC 1:24 which is twice as much as Finland (Lepi, 2014). Second, Jackson (2016)

reported that Finland has found a better standardized test. Finnish students only get standardize

test at their entire of primary and secondary school, comparing to others country which has

standardized test annually like the US. to track their performance. The researcher claimed that

the constant test doesn't make the student any smarter more than to create a "Teaching to test"

environment of learning. Third, high teaching professional, teaching career in Finland is the

great honor job and a high barrier to enter. Compared to the US., teachers in Finland has less

working hours than the US. Time will be dedicating more on the lesson planning. Furthermore,

Finland teachers slightly earned more salary than the US. and lots more compared to Thailand.
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US and Thailand teacher salary 41,000$ and 12,000 $ respectively. On the other hand,

Finland teachers Funding rate is 45,000$ annually. Fourth, students has more time to play.

According to the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) (2014), 15

years olds student in Finland spent 2.8 hours a week on their Homework. In contrast, American

student spent 6.1 hours per week. These could lead to the mental health and anxiety. American

students get less than half and hours to recess after the school day. Fifth, fewer learning topics

but more depth and covered. Fewer topics will make clear explaining and more understand on

the topic which leads to Inclusive and perspective on the topic (Day, 2015). Therefore,

homework is not the only way to enhance the student learning abilities anymore. There are much

more factors such as more student recessing time, better teachers, amount of student ratio to

teacher.

Conclusion

In conclusion, the purpose of homework is to enhance the student understanding

ability. Homework is demonstrated into 4 types; completion, practice review, preparation and

extension/ creation. However, the most useless homework is the unhelpful busy work. This

type of homework is not covering the topic in class. Which causing the student to increase their

confused toward the learning topic. The statement above lead to the disadvantages of homework.

It Lower the children time to recess, homework cause the children to believe only in what they

had learnt in school, unsuccessful finish homework lead to lost of self-confident. These country;

Thailand, Greece, and Iran are felt into the situation which they have lots of homework to the

student but their education didn't go any further. However, these disputed points were deciphered

by the Finland's education. They began to improve their education into points; first, reducing

quantity of homework to 2.5 hours makes the student have more time to recess. Second,

Increasing instructor's salary, 45,000$ annually. Third, transforming the class environment to
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become the normal classroom instead of test preparation class. Fourth, limiting amount of

standard test. Not exceed too much of test, which causing too much stress on the learning time.

Fifth, lessing the learning topic but more depth and covered. Finland education is in high ranked

and they have the most effective way of teaching. Therefore, research showed that the amount of

homework has the big effect on the education. It could be able to explain into the beneficial term

and not the beneficial term. This term was effect by its quantity. Too much homework causing

lots of disadvantage as the statement above, but the only right amount of homework will be the

most suitable for the student. Which defined to not exceed over 3 hours of homework per week.

In additional, more of factors demonstrated and should be done to help the education step ahead.
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Appendix