Unit 3, Part 1

Pre-school and school education

It is the subject of many a battle between parent and child - homework. The traditional standpoint for most students is that homework is boring and they would rather be doing something else. Parents and teachers think it is essential.

So what is a happy medium?

The State Government last week released its guidelines on homework and asked the parents of 536,000 state students to make sure the students complied.

The guidelines include:

* Year 10 to 12 students to do 90 minutes to three hours a day and up to six hours at weekends.

* Year 5 to 9 to do 45 to 90 minutes of homework.

* Prep to year 4 students to do a maximum of 30 minutes of homework a day.

But many education experts feel it's not the amount of homework that matters, but the type.

Chris Perry, a senior lecturer in education at Deakin University, says society needs to rethink its traditional notion of homework. "The thoughtful teacher can use the kids' diverse experiences to draw out learning that is happening outside the school," she says. "You can ask them about the time management practices they have learnt in their job at McDonald's." Dr Perry says that the type of homework given also needs to be looked at to avoid boring and dreary work.

John Glass, a University lecturer, is doing his PhD on problem-solving techniques. He agrees that there are many ways to do homework to suit students' different approaches to learning. Mr Glass, a former secondary teacher and counsellor, says parents can use the "scaffolding method" to help their children work out answers. "Instead of giving someone the answer, you provide them with a clue," he says. "You can help children to develop, not just to learn."

However, Mr Glass sees value in traditional methods of revising schoolwork. "Research shows that, generally, if you look at your class notes within the first 24 hours, then you tend to remember most of it," he says. "But if you put material away and don't look at it for another few weeks and then come back to it, it's as if you were never in the classroom."

But do students always have to be doing homework? A University of California project, in which 6000 students' homework was surveyed over five years, showed that students who did an extra 30 minutes of maths a night beginning in year 7, would, by year 11, see their achievement soar by two grades.

However, such results have been disputed and, some say, cloud the issue of how much homework should be given. Educationalists say quality, not quantity, is needed.

Yet in a report it was found that some parents were calling for more homework. The report acknowledges that parents have different views of what homework is, or what it should be.

And homework does not always have to be done at home. Many schools now have homework clubs, which have been running for several years. The clubs are usually open to junior and senior students twice a week. A benefit of the homework club is that students get to talk about maths problems with each other. It's not an onerous thing. The students go by choice. It's enjoyable.

Mick Butler, president of the Victorian Welfare Teachers' Association, says the new guidelines should be flexible enough to take into consideration the changing needs of children and their families. An increasing number of students work part-time to supplement family incomes, he says. Other students have "unpaid domestic labours" to perform, such as picking up younger siblings after school or caring for sick parents.

Helen Thomas, co-ordinator of the Teacher Learning Network, a professional development organisation for teachers, is, like a number of educationalists, concerned about the increasing demands on students' time and the increasing presence of homework in their lives - particularly when it prevents them from playing sport at a time when research is showing that more Australian schoolchildren are becoming obese.

What message are we giving our kids? Do we need to give them five hours of homework every night for them to be successful?