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Mini: No Homework · Why We Do What We Do

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  Speaker 1: You're listening to Why we do what we do. Welcome
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  Speaker 1: to Why we do what we do Mini. I'm your
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  Speaker 1: host Abraham, and I'm your O Shane. We are a
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  Speaker 1: psychology podcast. We talk about the things that humans and
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  Speaker 1: non human animals do, and in many episodes that we
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  Speaker 1: release on Mondays, we do that quickly in a short
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  Speaker 1: format that's only like fifteen minutes or less. Our full
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  Speaker 1: length episodes come out on Wednesdays, so you can check
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  Speaker 1: out those for more in depth conversations, multiparters and all
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: that good stuff.
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  Speaker 2: But let's go ahead and dive into this.
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  Speaker 1: a rating and a review, like a subscribe, tell a friend,
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  Speaker 1: join us on Patreon. I'll talk more about those at
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  Speaker 1: the end of our discussion today. If you are joining
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  Speaker 1: us for the first time and welcome, I hope that
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  Speaker 1: you enjoy what we describe in this discussion and that
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: appeals to you and then you're like, man, I feel
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  Speaker 1: so well informed that I'm just happy, and that's what
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  Speaker 1: we're trying to do. If you're a return to person,
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  Speaker 1: then welcome back. You already had that blissful euphoria and
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  Speaker 1: you're here for more and I applaud you being here.
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  Speaker 1: But either way, this is a mini so we got
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  Speaker 1: to get in there. Is there anything you'd like to
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  Speaker 1: add or that I forgot before we dive into our
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  Speaker 1: topic today?
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  Speaker 3: Nope, not today.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, let's start big around the world and throughout human history.
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  Speaker 2: Is that big enough?
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  Speaker 3: I think that's plenty big.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, perfect In that amount of time, students have
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  Speaker 1: been required to take work home with them from school
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  Speaker 1: for centuries. I mean, we haven't obviously had an education
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  Speaker 1: system for as long as there have been humans, But
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  Speaker 1: since we've had an education system, or at least for
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  Speaker 1: a good chunk of it, students have been required to
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  Speaker 1: take work home with them after their education in some capacity. However,
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  Speaker 1: the emphasis on this practice has also been the subject
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  Speaker 1: of debate for nearly as long and has ebbed and
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  Speaker 1: flowed in the extent to which there are requirements for
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  Speaker 1: things like homework.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, and so a new or we should really say
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  Speaker 3: in the currentside, guys, because we've had this conversation before,
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  Speaker 3: a new quote unquote discussion argues for less or no
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  Speaker 3: homework in school, at least in elementary schools.
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  Speaker 1: And while this does kind of sound like the makings
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  Speaker 1: of a debate. There's actual science here, so we'll just
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  Speaker 1: explore the arguments for and against homework and find out
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  Speaker 1: what is suggested by science and the data that are
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  Speaker 1: out there.
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  Speaker 2: Are you ready, yes, let's do this.
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  Speaker 1: Let's start by defining our terms. Homework is additional academically
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  Speaker 1: oriented tasks assigned to students to complete outside of the
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  Speaker 1: time spent in the classroom. I made up that definition
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  Speaker 1: and look it up. But that seems like that captured
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  Speaker 1: it for the most part. So if you disagree with me,
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  Speaker 1: go ahead and let us know. But anyway, the point
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  Speaker 1: is that you might have, for example, a student that
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  Speaker 1: solves additional math problems after having practiced similar math problems
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  Speaker 1: in class during the day, and they take those home
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  Speaker 1: and there's like a worksheet and they have to complete
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  Speaker 1: that worksheet, and the teachers who assign these things will
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  Speaker 1: enforce their policy of assigning additional work by including the
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  Speaker 1: completion and usually the accuracy of these assignments as a
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  Speaker 1: part of the students overall grade for the class. So
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  Speaker 1: like if they were just assign homework and the student
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  Speaker 1: didn't do it and there was no consequences for not
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  Speaker 1: doing it, then they would never do it, but because
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  Speaker 1: they can lump these things in with the grade for
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  Speaker 1: the class, they get to sort of hold the students
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  Speaker 1: accountable to that expectation by leveraging those contingencies.
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  Speaker 3: Right. However, many have pointed out that there's some problems
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  Speaker 3: with this. There are there are plenty of problems with us,
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  Speaker 3: specifically this emphasis on homework and why it's a problem.
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  Speaker 3: One of the things is it's stressful. Surveys and studies
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  Speaker 3: have found repeatedly that students and families of students that
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  Speaker 3: they cite homework, particularly large amounts of homework exceeding about
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  Speaker 3: an hour to be significant source of stress and fights
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  Speaker 3: at home. Actually it causes quite a few problems there.
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  Speaker 2: Did you have issues with homework with your kids?
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I mean part of it was the
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  Speaker 3: stress of getting it done. Part of it was trying
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  Speaker 3: to teach when my kids didn't want to be taught.
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  Speaker 3: Part of it was that we were working full time
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  Speaker 3: and so it was an additional thing that we had
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  Speaker 3: to do inside of our full time schedule that was
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  Speaker 3: already pretty packed. So yeah, it was. It had been
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  Speaker 3: a historically stressful thing for us, for sure.
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  Speaker 1: Depending on how you slice said this, is like the
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  Speaker 1: number one stressor cited by a lot of students in
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  Speaker 1: a lot of places. So there's a legitimate argument to
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  Speaker 1: be made here that there is undue stress caused by
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  Speaker 1: the burden of homework, particularly as I said, as you said,
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  Speaker 1: at large amounts of homework, And relatedly, there are correlations
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  Speaker 1: between the amount of homework students complete and other adverse
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  Speaker 1: health outcomes, including things like, as you might imagine, sleep
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  Speaker 1: deprivation if they're staying up late to work on work,
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  Speaker 1: or they're getting up early, weight loss, stomach problems, headaches.
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  Speaker 1: In high school, some students reported that they would use
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  Speaker 1: drugs or alcohol to cope with the stress and just
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  Speaker 1: feeling like they have an excessive amount of work that
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  Speaker 1: they're trying to keep up with. They might be doing
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  Speaker 1: those things for other reasons and claiming homeworks for the reason,
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  Speaker 1: but like they also there are people who have legitimately
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  Speaker 1: used drugs or alcohol in high school, at least sometimes
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  Speaker 1: because of homework.
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  Speaker 3: It's also isolating a lot of time spent in homework
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  Speaker 3: means less time spent with friends and family, and the
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  Speaker 3: social isolation can have significant adverse impacts on students. I mean,
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  Speaker 3: I was in ap classes and the amount of homework
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  Speaker 3: that we would often have. Like I played baseball and
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  Speaker 3: I was in AP classes, and I almost never saw
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  Speaker 3: my friends during the week after school because I was
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  Speaker 3: so busy with those activities. I mean, baseball was not isolating,
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  Speaker 3: but coming home and then doing homework and then maybe
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  Speaker 3: even working was not great. So the homework was really
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  Speaker 3: a big slice of that pie.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, no, very much.
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  Speaker 1: And this is actually really pointed out powerfully how significant
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  Speaker 1: of an impact it can have that students are just
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  Speaker 1: not getting like meaningful time with other relationships in their lives.
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  Speaker 1: Particularly as you said, like AP students are like really
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  Speaker 1: at the most risk for this.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: Another thing that happens is when there's a lot of homework,
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  Speaker 1: students are more likely to cheat. Several teachers have reported
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  Speaker 1: discovering that when there are a lot of and lengthiest signs,
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  Speaker 1: students are more likely to plagiarize, copy from each other,
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  Speaker 1: try and find hacks for how they might solve their
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  Speaker 1: like get through the homework or find other ways to
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  Speaker 1: cheat to complete their homework and do so efficiently. And
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  Speaker 1: if they've got more homework than they've got hour, like
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  Speaker 1: more hours of homework than they have time between when
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  Speaker 1: that was assigned and when it was due, then like
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  Speaker 1: they're increasingly prone to find other ways to solve it.
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  Speaker 1: And that's part of where AI I think has become
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  Speaker 1: such a problem is because it's so fast at solving
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  Speaker 1: some of these things. So it's understandable that if there's
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  Speaker 1: a lot of homework that students are more likely to
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  Speaker 1: turn to those systems so that they have more time
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  Speaker 1: that is not spent doing homework.
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  Speaker 3: Right, And it's even worse when there's ads to the
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  Speaker 3: middle of the homework.
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  Speaker 2: So bad.
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  Speaker 3: Okay, so we're back and we're talking about some of
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  Speaker 3: the problems that come up with homework. One of the
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  Speaker 3: things that comes up is that students are less likely
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  Speaker 3: to do the homework at all. Besides the fact that
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  Speaker 3: it's stressful, besides that it's isolating, besides that they're likely
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  Speaker 3: to cheat, they're just not likely to do it. So
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  Speaker 3: if they're defeated by spending hours doing homework, they may
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  Speaker 3: not even get a very good grade for having done
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  Speaker 3: their work. So not only did they spend allless time
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  Speaker 3: extra time doing it, they may not even get a
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  Speaker 3: good grade for it, And then they're less likely to
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  Speaker 3: engage at all. And small, manageable assignments that are well
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  Speaker 3: designed and don't feel like busy work are more likely
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  Speaker 3: to be completed and be helpful than these larger assignments
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  Speaker 3: that they may not do well on.
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  Speaker 1: There's also this issue that we mentioned a couple of times, now,
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  Speaker 1: is just this amount of work that this more is
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  Speaker 1: not always better. Teachers have argued that students are already
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  Speaker 1: spending six to eight hours per day in school doing
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  Speaker 1: academic work, and they pointed out that if you look
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  Speaker 1: at other expert performers, they tend to peak and show
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  Speaker 1: diminishing or even reverse gains after about four hours of work.
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  Speaker 1: These are professionals, experts who are very proficient at what
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  Speaker 1: they do, and after four hours we're starting to see
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  Speaker 1: their performance plateau or even decline, and we're expecting kids
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  Speaker 1: to do double that in some of this some of
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  Speaker 1: these cases, they argue that after six hours of a
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  Speaker 1: school day, there's a little benefit they're likely to gain
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  Speaker 1: from doing even more work afterward.
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  Speaker 3: And then you've also got disparities in inequalities. So many
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  Speaker 3: students from lower income families may have to go straight
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  Speaker 3: to work after school, or go home to take care
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  Speaker 3: of siblings or other family members or do chores. They're
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  Speaker 3: less likely to have time and space to do homework
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  Speaker 3: and less likely to have parents who can help or
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  Speaker 3: who are around or available to help, whereas more affluent
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  Speaker 3: students may have dedicated spaces, plenty of time for help,
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  Speaker 3: and more highly educated parents, or even have dedicated tutors
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  Speaker 3: available to support homework. So I was in ap classes,
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  Speaker 3: I would come home from school, get dressed for work,
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  Speaker 3: ride my bike to work because I didn't have a car. Yeah,
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  Speaker 3: bring my backpack so that when I was on my
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  Speaker 3: break at work, I was doing homework, and then would
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  Speaker 3: come home and finish whatever homework I didn't finish after
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  Speaker 3: working a five hour shift after school and then staying
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  Speaker 3: up all night and then doing it all again the
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  Speaker 3: next day. And that was my work routine. If I
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  Speaker 3: wasn't if I wasn't working my midnight shifts at the
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  Speaker 3: time too, and my parents were around, right, my parents
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  Speaker 3: were around and super supportive and helpful, and I still
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  Speaker 3: had to do that.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, And like there are people with wayless, way less
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  Speaker 1: supportive situation than you had, Like maybe they have to
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  Speaker 1: like do chores and take care of their siblings and
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  Speaker 1: babysit and then they have to go to a job
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  Speaker 1: and they're supposed to do homework. I'm like, it really
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  Speaker 1: does have a disparate impact on people depending on the
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  Speaker 1: resources and the situation they have at home. Right, So
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  Speaker 1: that's some of the arguments there. There's also just like
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  Speaker 1: there's some general sort of research and science to unpack here,
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  Speaker 1: and this first one is not actually science, but there
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  Speaker 1: are some recommendations from professionals. So the National Education Association
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  Speaker 1: and the Natural Parent Teacher Association both recommend a rubric
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  Speaker 1: for thinking about homework that is ten minutes of homework
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  Speaker 1: per day per grade, which means if you're in first grade,
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  Speaker 1: you get ten minutes of homework per day, twenty minutes
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  Speaker 1: per day if you're in second grade, thirty minutes per
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  Speaker 1: day if you're in third grade, and so on. Like
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  Speaker 1: you can see how that scales up up to you
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  Speaker 1: would imagine that about two hours per day if you're
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  Speaker 1: a senior in high school. And while this isn't explicitly
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  Speaker 1: supported by science, the science that does exist that sort
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  Speaker 1: of is looking at what available or what homework guidelines
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  Speaker 1: might be.
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  Speaker 2: It is kind of close to that.
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  Speaker 1: So specifically, what they found is homework and elementary school
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  Speaker 1: has negligible benefits on students understanding of the material and
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  Speaker 1: subsequent performance on academic testing. So ten minutes a day
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  Speaker 1: might even be ten minutes more than is really worth
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  Speaker 1: putting anything into that in elementary school there is just
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  Speaker 1: not particularly those early early grades. There seems to be
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  Speaker 1: very very few, if any, gains to be made by
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  Speaker 1: assigning homework to those grade levels.
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  Speaker 3: Right, but small amounts of homework can have parents more
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  Speaker 3: well informed about what students are doing in school and
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  Speaker 3: provide some opportunities for support that can be valuable.
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  Speaker 1: And like it can be a meaningful bonding experience to
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  Speaker 1: like the parents who work with the kids and that
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  Speaker 1: sort of thing.
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  Speaker 2: So like, there's not not.
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  Speaker 1: Nothing there, right, the quality of the homework is sort
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  Speaker 1: of paramount. They found in research homework that feels like
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  Speaker 1: busy work does not produce meaningful gains in learning, and
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  Speaker 1: researchers actually show that homework should be designed to extend
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  Speaker 1: students thinking about a given subject, rather than simply repeating
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  Speaker 1: the same exercise again that they did while they were
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  Speaker 1: in school. So the architecture behind building these assignments is
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  Speaker 1: going to be one of the really important factors in
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  Speaker 1: determining how effective any assigned homework is going to be
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  Speaker 1: and accomplishing some particular goal.
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  Speaker 3: Sure, Now, even past elementary school, the amount of time
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  Speaker 3: spent has a sweet spot for impact on the students.
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  Speaker 3: So some studies show that by high school, after two
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  Speaker 3: hours of homework there's a minimal impact on performance, and
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  Speaker 3: after three hours of homework, performance metrics actually began to decrease,
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  Speaker 3: although one study found no systematically clear data signal regarding
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  Speaker 3: how much time spent on homework is appropriate at various grades,
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  Speaker 3: So like, the jury's a little bit out on that,
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  Speaker 3: still just a little bit.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, So it's like they tend to find that, like
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  Speaker 1: for really high performing students with really high expectations, up
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  Speaker 1: to two hours you might see some benefits. And there
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  Speaker 1: was like some thing specifically showing that if you spent
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  Speaker 1: up to around an hour on like math, for example,
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  Speaker 1: then they reliably retained that better and better on academic tests.
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  Speaker 1: But again, you do reach a point of diminishing returns.
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  Speaker 1: By the time you're passing two hours, it's starting to
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  Speaker 1: plateau and maybe even decrease the likelihood that they'll show
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  Speaker 1: high levels of performance subsequently to the time spent on homework.
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  Speaker 1: So and even then, like the quality of the homework
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  Speaker 1: is so important that it's more about how what are
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  Speaker 1: they actually getting out of this assignment, not how much
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  Speaker 1: time did they spend on it, although spending too much
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  Speaker 1: time is pretty much always going to have adverse impact
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  Speaker 1: is what the science shows, right, So what do we
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  Speaker 1: think is the verdict here on this whole idea of
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  Speaker 1: homework or no homework?
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  Speaker 3: I mean, it sounds like a little bit might be
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  Speaker 3: fine too much as a problem. It should be well designed.
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  Speaker 3: I mean it sounds like if you account for all
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  Speaker 3: those things and it's very intentional. I think if it's
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  Speaker 3: well designed and it's like and it makes sense for
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  Speaker 3: the student, then I think it should be considered. I
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  Speaker 3: don't think it should be part of a grade because
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  Speaker 3: I think that's unfair for those students to have those disparities.
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  Speaker 3: I mean, that's the way that I would look at it,
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  Speaker 3: just to kind of like balance that playing field a
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  Speaker 3: little bit.
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  Speaker 2: That's totally fair.
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  Speaker 1: And I think, you know, if you consider what is
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: the point of homework, I think there are parents and
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  Speaker 1: administrators who think that the point of homework is to
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: do busy work.
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  Speaker 2: They just want these kids to be busy all the time.
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  Speaker 1: But I think that if you think about the point
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  Speaker 1: of homework is to ensure that they get there was
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  Speaker 1: insufficient practice that was done in the classroom and that
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  Speaker 1: to be able to move at the pace that they
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: need to move, that that requires a little bit of
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  Speaker 1: extra work, and therefore the work that they're given is
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  Speaker 1: designed to bridge that gap.
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  Speaker 2: Then it probably makes sense.
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  Speaker 1: But again it's like, can we also need to create
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  Speaker 1: the system so that everyone has an equal opportunity to
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: have participated in this meaningfully right? And there might have
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: to be either considerations around like some people just don't
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  Speaker 1: have the situation where they can do homework, or else
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  Speaker 1: we just create dedicated time in school. It is like,
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: there's extra practice time now because we know that that
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: way everybody has a relatively even access to this, and
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: there should be enough extra time to bridge whatever gap
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: we couldn't do in the time that we had, right,
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: So that would be my thought on that.
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  Speaker 2: So, yeah, it's not that.
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  Speaker 1: No homework is necessarily like the gospel, we need to
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: go that direction. But I do think that we should
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: be mindful and intentional around the homework and consider to
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: spare that might exist in those systems agreed, perfect, all right.
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: If you have thoughts on homework you would like to
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: tell us, you can email us directly, write us an
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: info at wwdwwdpodcast dot com, or we just on the
• 14:10
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• 14:12
  Speaker 1: from you. If you would like to support us, you
• 14:14
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• 14:16
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• 14:18
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• 14:21
  Speaker 1: and I'll read your name in the list of names
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: of people who support us at the end of our
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: full length discussions which come out on Wednesdays. Thank you
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: so much for recording with me today, Shane.
• 14:30
  Speaker 3: Hey, thanks for having me.
• 14:31
  Speaker 2: Thank you to my team of people.
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: Is there anything else that I missed or that you'd
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: like to add before we sayah goodbyes. Nope, I think
• 14:36
  Speaker 1: I did not also say thank you all for listening,
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: So thank you all for listening. But otherwise, this is
• 14:40
  Speaker 1: Abraham and this is Shane. Why we do what we
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: do Mini is out.
• 14:44
  Speaker 3: Bye.
• 14:46
  Speaker 2: You've been listening to Why We Do what We Do.
• 14:48
  Speaker 3: You can learn more about this and other episodes by
• 14:51
  Speaker 3: going to wwdwwdpodcast dot com thanks for listening, and we
• 14:57
  Speaker 3: hope you have an awesome day.