Introduction
Critics have emerged questioning the benefits of homework in a students’ daily learning progress. They claim that homework leads to frustration, fatigue, and nervousness in the learners. The critics say that homework is brought about by a lack of appropriate management and monitoring of the students by both teachers and parents.
Main Body
In general, homework can be very beneficial to students in several aspects. Homework gives student’s an opportunity to test their capability of working independently and to conduct a review on what they were taught. The assignments also create an opportunity for teachers and parents to interact. All these benefits are lost if the concerned parties neglect their responsibility of putting appropriate mechanisms in place to ensure the homework helps students to develop their knowledge and skills.
Parents should be responsible for ensuring that their children have a peaceful environment of doing their homework. This is meant to limit distractions that might create errors in the pupil’s work. A good example of this is a case where parents should encourage children to do their homework in a room without television or radios. Parents should also provide the required resources to minimize movement when undertaking the assignment. This can best be achieved by liaising with teachers to learn the nature of the required materials to undertake the assignments.
Parents should also show interest in whatever their children are doing and be ready to give direction when they are stranded. Giving direction should not mean doing the assignment for them, but just giving guidance or correction on the small mistakes. Parents should set aside time for doing the assignment that does not collide with the family chores.
The completed assignment must be checked by the parent before the child is allowed to proceed to other activities. If mistakes are identified, correction must be done immediately before the work is handed over to the teachers. After the assignment has been checked, comments given by the teacher should be addressed before the student can proceed with the next day’s work. In this way, the students will learn from the mistakes they had done the previous day.
For high school and college students, homework can be a big source of stress if not managed efficiently. This is because it leads to confrontation with their tutors. These students need to realize that the first step in proper homework management is to have a notebook.This is used to record all the assignments given in class with all details such as date of submission, reference materials to be used and the mode of presentation.
The second thing that they need is a weekly work plan which they should use to indicate the day and time they will work on each assignment. The plan helps students to prioritize their work depending on the date of submission. This eliminates the last-minute rush that finally makes the students plagiarize on their work. The work plan should also set aside time to review previous assignments.
Teachers on the other hand hold the key to ensuring that homework attains its intended purpose. This is because they decide the nature of the assignment to give to the students. In this case, the teachers must ensure that the given work matches the students’ ability based on what they have coved in class. Teachers should also give clear instructions to avoid ambiguity. The homework must target specific learning aspects of the student. Teachers should give out assignments that prepare students for the next day’s lesson. It should also encourage the students to be responsible and teach them how to adhere to deadlines and manage their time well.
Conclusion
The homework given in school could be a great source of motivation to students if they are properly managed. For this to be achieved, the assignments have to be tailored to encourage creativity and present the students with an opportunity to apply their skills while enhancing their knowledge towards their academic achievement. This must involve the cooperation of the parents, teachers, and the students.