So, what, is homework any good or not?

This is mostly a critique of a report but the quotes from the report are interesting. Just apparently not new.

Let’s start by reviewing what we know from earlier investigations.[1] First, no research has ever found a benefit to assigning homework (of any kind or in any amount) in elementary school. In fact, there isn’t even a positive correlation between, on the one hand, having younger children do some homework (vs. none), or more (vs. less), and, on the other hand, any measure of achievement. If we’re making 12-year-olds, much less five-year-olds, do homework, it’s either because we’re misinformed about what the evidence says or because we think kids ought to have to do homework despite what the evidence says.

Homework: An unnecessary evil? … Surprising findings from new research – Valerie Strauss and Alfie Kohn, Washington Post (26 November 2012)

So that’s not new in two ways: it’s a 2012 article commenting on how a then-recent study wasn’t great. But it cites or at least refers to a whole chain of prior reports that all say homework is a shrug, doesn’t help you one way or the other.

I can’t help but map that homework idea to the amount of cramming I do overnight before meetings. I’ll take a couple of evenings off and see what happens.

The things I do for you.

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