What if homework was illegal in the US? Imagine a world where teachers from elementary, middle, and high schools are prohibited from assigning homework to students. That would mean that every day after school, children of all ages can hang out with their friends, engage in sports, and practice gymnastics. Is homework illegal? There is no federal law or any state law that makes it illegal to assign homework.
Who has time for homework when you gotta look fabulous for your Instagram!
Students attend school from seven to eight hours a day, each day. Those are seven to eight hours a day in which kids must continuously exercise their minds with memorization, critical thinking, calculating, and processing information in each class, back-to-back. Their minds are getting the exercise they need every day with this, just as parents do at the same time in their job whether it be construction or in an office. It is work.
Once adults clock out and arrive home to rest, they do not bring their work home with them unless the work is paid. Adults get paid for whatever work they do, even if it’s after hours. Why should kids have to keep working their minds with the same academic work after school hours? What is the benefit or compensation there?
After school, hours should be spent doing the activities they enjoy the most, just like adults do. They are getting their much-needed social time, spending time with friends, playing the sports and games they love, and even practicing a hobby that they too want to put their mind to, maybe an instrument or club activities. The truth is, there is only so much time in the day for all these things: school, chores, family time, and independent time. Adults can agree with this, as managing a well-balanced home and work life has been a physical and mental struggle for so many.
To kids, homework can be a huge obstacle in their life. Some children struggle to complete their homework because of their activities outside of school life: shores, looking after siblings and taking on a parental role for their parents who must work nights and evenings, and other circumstances. We do not know the home life of every child, and that is why school life should be kept separate. Homework does not belong in the home life.
On the other hand, why should homework be illegal when it teaches kids about responsibility from a young age? Responsibility and accountability are a significant portion of growing up and becoming an adult. Though there are many life lessons, a school can contribute by assigning deadlines and due dates. And homework is a daily responsibility with a due date.
A child getting used to doing the work and being responsible for it, it’s a good habit to have. And these habits can be developed through these tasks, like homework or even extra credit.
Arguments can be both made on both sides about homework being illegal or not? Should home life and school life be kept separate or not? There are so many pros and cons to homework, but in the end, maybe an answer can be found somewhere in the middle. Perhaps instead of asking if homework is illegal or not, we could ask how much homework children should be assigned?
Homework should be limited to a certain amount of work and not from all classes at once. For example, a middle school or high school student has approximately 6-7 classes a day. Imagine what it is like for a student when all their classes assign homework. That is a total of 6-7 homework assignments for which each work probably takes at least 20 minutes. That is over two hours of homework. Over two hours of a child’s home life being taken away. This means that it is over 10 hours a day of schoolwork, of academic life in a child’s life.
How is a child supposed to fit in guitar class, family dinner time, chores, and playing and or hanging out with friends after that? It is pressuring kids, causing stress, and putting their mental health at risk in some cases.
Extending deadlines to homework, such as being due a week after instead of the very next day or limiting the number of classes that can assign homework a day, or even the amount of problems and assignments. The amount of homework assigned should be limited for the student’s well-being and balance of their school and home life. Not all classes should be allowed to assign homework at once; not all classes should assign heavy amounts of homework.
A new system for homework should be in place for students to have the opportunity to have a good balance of school and home life. Stress-free.