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Who Invented Homework?

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Re: Who Invented Homework?

#71

Post by apercu »

lordnacho wrote: post #20

My feelings now are that there really shouldn't be any mandatory homework. - If you do it badly, you may as well not do it. Who else remembers flipping through "The Catcher in the Rye" so fast they don't actually remember any other character than Holden Caulfield? - It's an easy way for teachers to not teach, yet gives them an alibi. "Look I'm teaching, they have loads of books to read. Can't help it if they don't."…

"- You end up testing which kids have peaceful homes, and parents who care. Some kids just can't do any homework with the home environment they're given. School should be such that it doesn't matter if your parents are drunks or academics."

Profound.

Re: Who Invented Homework?

#72

Post by xyzzy4 »

kasparsklavins wrote: post #37
xyzzy4 wrote: post #6

Some of my best teachers would give us optional homework.

There still can be pressure from parent-figures to complete this "optional" homework.

True, but being pressured by your parents isn't as bad as having a tarnished academic record from not doing homework.

Re: Who Invented Homework?

#73

Post by ae_keji »

adrusi wrote: post #58
hdctambien wrote: post #28

Math isn't the only class that gives homework. Should Spanish class-time be spent memorizing vocabulary and conjugations, or practicing communicating in the language? Should History class-time be spent reading from the book so you know what happened, or discussing those topics and their implications? Should English class-time be spent doing silent reading, or talking about the books/authors/time periods that you read…

Fwiw, high school language classes are very easy and slowly paced, to the point where I aced the standard curriculum purely by showing up to class and doing no out-of-class work, nor any memorization at all. So either the curriculum should be made more challenging, or homework should be optional for everyone, like it was for me. And something I regret more, but still wouldn't have done differently if given the opport…

I think your problem is avoiding AP classes. They claim to be college prep, but from my experience (no citation, sorry) they're more the level that the entire education system should be working on. I do not remember learning a single thing from my honors/traditional classes (other than ohm's law in Electronic Tech, which is no longer available), however I can confidently say I did learn and still remember what I've learned in my AP and IB classes.

Unfortunately that is due more to excessive memorization and general work required than anything else, but I still find it better than the alternative, which is learn nothing at all.

Re: Who Invented Homework?

#74

Post by jamespo »

nibs wrote: post #30

As an unschooler who went to school and did "homework" or any kind of "schoolwork" for the first time when I was 12, it took me about a month to catch up to my peers in terms of abilities to do the coursework, and about a year to catch up to my peers in resentment and disengagement. Except I got to spend seven years hanging out with my brothers doing fun stuff and my friends had to spend it training to be slaves. The…

What do you do now?

Re: Who Invented Homework?

#75

Post by robto »

fiatjaf wrote: post #61
nibs wrote: post #30

As an unschooler who went to school and did "homework" or any kind of "schoolwork" for the first time when I was 12, it took me about a month to catch up to my peers in terms of abilities to do the coursework, and about a year to catch up to my peers in resentment and disengagement. Except I got to spend seven years hanging out with my brothers doing fun stuff and my friends had to spend it training to be slaves. The…

Do you have more stories about your education like this? A blog or something? I would like to read it.

I would check out the book "Free to Learn" by Peter Gray - he goes into why "unschooling" or democratic schooling can be effective. It really changed my outlook on education. I had previously read "A Mathemetician's Lament"[0], an essay by Paul Lockhart that made me start to question the value of regular schooling.

https://www.maa.org/external_archive/devlin/LockhartsLament....

Re: Who Invented Homework?

#76

Post by bprieto »

coldpie wrote: post #66
fiatjaf wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do you disagree? Please explain and clarify your point.

I need to refute the claim that public schooling is "training to be slaves"? Really?

Yes, you do. Please read this: http://www.sethgodin.com/sg/docs/brainwash.pdf

Maybe "training to be slaves" is hiperbole, but as Seth Godin puts it, training to be "cogs in a machine" is quite right.

Re: Who Invented Homework?

#77

Post by coldpie »

bprieto wrote: post #76
coldpie wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I need to refute the claim that public schooling is "training to be slaves"? Really?

Yes, you do. Please read this: http://www.sethgodin.com/sg/docs/brainwash.pdf Maybe "training to be slaves" is hiperbole, but as Seth Godin puts it, training to be "cogs in a machine" is quite right.

Slaves were, and are, born into poverty, often forcibly removed from their parents, treated and sold like cattle, worked hard at all times for no benefit to themselves, had no rights and no legal protections, and had no prospect of removing themselves from slavery. In no way is this comparable to receiving a relatively high quality education during the formative years of your life.

Teachers work hard for little reward to provide the education they give and it is a slap in their face, the faces of the descendants of real slaves, and the real slaves that continue to exist today, to imply that the good work they do is equivalent to what slave owners and masters did to their victims. The analogy to slavery is disgusting and juvenile and it's ludicrous that I had to explain this to you.

Re: Who Invented Homework?

#78

Post by danielweber »

branchless wrote: post #49
lordnacho wrote: post #20

My feelings now are that there really shouldn't be any mandatory homework. - If you do it badly, you may as well not do it. Who else remembers flipping through "The Catcher in the Rye" so fast they don't actually remember any other character than Holden Caulfield? - It's an easy way for teachers to not teach, yet gives them an alibi. "Look I'm teaching, they have loads of books to read. Can't help it if they don't."…

So sick of my 7 year old getting math work and asking him what he did that day only to hear much of it was little more than coloring in. They are leaving the hard stuff for homework.

As a parent, let me say that your seven year old isn't a reliable narrator.

Re: Who Invented Homework?

#80

Post by fiatjaf »

coldpie wrote: post #77
bprieto wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, you do. Please read this: http://www.sethgodin.com/sg/docs/brainwash.pdf Maybe "training to be slaves" is hiperbole, but as Seth Godin puts it, training to be "cogs in a machine" is quite right.

Slaves were, and are, born into poverty, often forcibly removed from their parents, treated and sold like cattle, worked hard at all times for no benefit to themselves, had no rights and no legal protections, and had no prospect of removing themselves from slavery. In no way is this comparable to receiving a relatively high quality education during the formative years of your life. Teachers work hard for little rewar…

Yes, you are right, school do not train for slavery literally. But that wasn't the point. As you've recognized yourself, it was an analogy.

As an analogy, you can't say it is invalid by stating differences between the analogues, all analogies are pretty much aware of these differences. If not, they would be identities, not analogies.

"Juvenile", "disgusting" and "ludicrous" are not arguments sufficient to invalidate the analogy either.

What you have to do to invalidate the analogy is to refute the similarities between schooling and slavery, some of them:

  - kids are forced to go to school;
  - kids are brainwashed to think that school is the only alternative they have besides starving and ultimately dying after an horrible life;
  - kids are trained to be submissive to teachers and other in liderance positions.
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