Instructional Principle: Student achievement rises significantly when teachers regularly assign homework and students conscientiously do it.
Instructional Principle: Homework is most useful when teachers carefully prepare the assignment, thoroughly explain it, and give prompt comments and criticism when the work is completed.
Useful assignments that students correctly complete effectively increase the length of the school day. If this additional time is used productively, it increases effective learning time and enhances learning proportionately. Nevertheless, homework is often a waste of time. There is really little value in having students do busywork at home. There is likewise little point in having students encounter major learning problems when there is no one to help them. Homework that students merely copy from other students, that they have their parents do, or that they perceive as unrelated to classroom activities does not provide an effective use of learning time.
There are two types of effective homework.
As students become more mature and self-directed in their learning, of course, they can accomplish much more outside the classroom. Additional information on homework can be found in Walberg, Paschal, and Weinstein (1985). EV- GET COOPER CITATION
Even if students receive ordinary homework assignments (that is, assignments that do not stress the use of the computer), teachers can post the homework assignments online at class web sites. This enables students to keep track of the assignments. In addition, this strategy enables parents to double-check their children's integrity when they claim that they have no homework. An assoicated message board and email system can enable parents to commuicate with teachers about homework and other school-related activities.
If students have access to home computers, one obvious possibility is to assign computer programs for them to run as homework. If the programs are well written, this strategy overcomes the weakness of inadequate structure and makes it likely that the student will benefit from practicing academic activities at home. Often it is possible to let students take home the same disks they would otherwise run in school.
It is also a good idea to encourage students to use the family word processor to prepare written reports on subjects that would otherwise be unrelated to the computer. And since computer time in school is often limited, it is sometimes a good idea to have students do preparatory work at home or in the library and then enter the appropriate information into the computer when they return to school.
Several companies have developed "homework helper" programs. For example, Homeworker (Davidson) (Get a new one!) provides six integrated modules to help students with homework activities. First, its Textwriter is a simple word processor. Second, it provides an Outliner to help prepare papers and rewrite class notes. Next, it provides a Flash Card Maker to help with memorization tasks. The Calendar helps the student keep track of important assignments and other activities. The Grade Keeper helps the student keep track of grades, compute grade point averages, and project final grades. Finally, the Calculator assists the learner with computations of almost any kind. A student who uses such a program is likely to benefit from homework assignments and develop the effective study habits discussed elsewhere in this chapter.
Finally, there are several "homework helper" web sites. One of the most popular is shown in Figure 3.x.
Most of these web sites are simple reference desks designed for young learners instead of for adults. As a matter of fact, one of the most popular is simply a variation of the very popular Refdesk.com. They have many of the characteristics of a good search engine, with additional links that will be of special interest to children. Additional homework helper sites are listed in the online links.
Homework
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