Homework is destroying teens lives: a research-based argumentative essay
Schools should not assign homework to students. Schools should get rid of homework assignments that were not completed in class. Homework is an excuse teachers use for giving extra unnecessary work. Students can still learn without homework; homework causes a very high amount of unnecessary stress. Most schools assign homework out of habit, but that is a habit they should break. Does homework even help with the learning process? Is homework helping or hurting? Why do we assign homework in the first place? These are all questions to think about throughout this paper.
Teachers use homework to give the students extra work. Teachers and schools want to control students’ lives as much as possible. When students go home schools assign homework so that the student never really has any free time. Most homework assignments have no purpose aside from extra work. Teachers also use homework as a punishment they will threaten to assign extra homework if a student does not stop talking or stop messing around. This proves that the homework has no real academic value if assigning extra homework can be a punishment. Teachers also use homework as a crutch. When the teacher fails to teach all that they wanted to in a day, they assign the rest of the day’s work as homework even though it was their failure to plan according to the time they had. Teachers should not punish students because they could not plan. It has been proven that “Ultimately, the amount of homework a student has can impact a lot more than his or her grades” (oxfordlearning.com). When the teachers pile on extra homework they destroy the students’ motivation and health.
Students do not require homework to learn; The teacher’s job is to teach the students. Homework is not supposed to teach students. Making students learn off of homework is making students learn themselves. The teacher should be able to explain all the required course material in class. Homework should be an optional extra activity if the student chooses to use it. It is not uncommon for the homework to cause increased confusion to the students. If a student has no idea how to do something and the teacher assigns him homework, he will only be more confused. Then his grade will suffer because the teacher did not do their job. Healthline’s studies show that “when students are pushed to handle a workload that is out of sync with their development level, it can lead to significant stress” (1). Students get no extra learning from homework. Homework never teaches the student. Homework is only extra work.
Homework causes students a very high amount of stress. Students continuously get loaded with tons of unnecessary homework. It is stated that “students should do no more than 10 minutes a night per grade level — from about 10 minutes in first grade up to a maximum of about two hours in high school” (Wier 1). Proving that each class should not assign 3 hours of homework a night. Assigning more homework than this has an excellent chance of causing stress to the student and their family. The number one cause of stress in teens is homework. So school could solve most teen anxiety by merely not assigning homework. Homework is not an essential part of schooling. Homework is like a trap due to the fact that homework can be weighted so heavily that not doing it can significantly decrease a student’s grade, but doing it can cause an increase in the students’ stress. Schools should not force students to choose between good health and good grades.
One may argue doing homework is an excellent way for the student to practice and remember the material outside of school. Teachers designed homework to teach the students outside of school. Extra practice is always favourable. Students need homework to retain the information they just learned. It is said that “Proponents of homework say that it improves student achievement and allows for independent learning of classroom and life skills” (ProCon.org 1). Showing that homework is an essential part of learning. However, this is not the case because homework does more harm than good. If students stay up all night doing homework, then they do not get enough sleep and can not focus during school or a test because of sleep deprivation. Homework does not teach the students anything that the teacher has not already taught them, and forcing them to learn on their own could make the students learn how to do it the wrong way or spend way too much time doing school work. Students also do not try their hardest on homework assignments. If a teacher gave a quiz, students would take it seriously and do their best, but if it is just another homework assignment, students will not try, and the teacher will not know for sure if the student understands the material.
Homework is causing teens to have stress and sleep deprivation, but the school system does not care. This is because the school system does not care about the students all schools care about is getting good test scores. Currently, schools assign homework because that is what schools have always done but that needs to change. Schools need to stop over assigning homework to their students. Schools can stop teen stress if they remove homework. Homework does not help the learning process, and in some cases, it can negatively affect it. Homework is hurting the students’ health and ability to focus. Homework is assigned because teachers think it helps, and it is also assigned to control the students with threats of extra homework. Schools should get rid of mandatory homework.
Works Cited
“Infographic: How Does Homework Actually Affect Students?” Oxford Learning, 4 Oct. 2016, www.oxfordlearning.com/how-does-homework-affect-students/.
Levy, Sandra. “Is Too Much Homework Bad for Kids’ Health?” Healthline, 22 Aug. 2019, www.healthline.com/health-news/children-more-homework-means-more-stress-031114.
ProCon.org. “Is Homework Beneficial? – Top 3 Pros and Cons.” ProConorg Headlines, 28 Apr. 2020, www.procon.org/headline.php?headlineID=005411.
Wier, Kristen. “Is Homework a Necessary Evil?” Monitor on Psychology, American Psychological Association, Mar. 2016, www.apa.org/monitor/2016/03/homework.