They Say They Weren't Prepared for High School - 15 Questions

One of the middle school teachers I work with said that high school students came back to visit last week. They do this quite often - you'd never find ME going back to my 7th grade teachers, but our high schoolers do. It must say something about our school, right? Anyway, they said that middle school didn't prepare them for the work they'd have to do in high school.

Homework, that is.

This got our teachers going about how much is too much, how maybe we should be giving them more, about how things have been changing over the past few years, etc.

That next Tuesday night, Zach Rondot was our guest moderator for our #ShiftThis chat - such a great group of thinkers that come on Tuesdays! - and he asked questions about homework. Homework gets people riled up - students, teachers, and parents. No surprise. (Side note: Find all #ShiftThis archives here - on the right - including the homework chat on 10/17/17.)

What tugged at my heart strings was the tweet from friend and cohort Carrie - her daughter cried because her creative writing had a page expectation. And then this, from Michael Shunneson (who I luckily met at #DitchConference2017)...

Oh, this hurts my heart. This was almost 8pm. On a Tuesday.

If you've read Shift This, you've got some ideas for how to make homework more meaningful. If not, try chapter six. Or just go and get yourself a copy of Ditch That Homework, or perhaps The Homework Myth is more your style? And, in case you missed it from my book, here's the philosophy I share with parents. 

But really - we need to keep the conversation going. Even after all the research has been read and shared, many teachers still do what we learned to do - assign homework. Just because something is passed down to us doesn't mean we have to continue it. Whether you grade it or not (that's a whole other chapter) isn't even the issue. It's the homework itself that needs to be discussed.

So going back to my roots of asking questions to get to the heart of the matter, here are 15 I've come up with (from the ideas in last week's chat) so we can discuss this further at our own schools:

• What homework expectations change from elementary to middle to high school? Why?
• How is a student's home life already teaching responsibility?
• Is the volume of homework many of our high school students have really necessary?
• If our students need our help doing their homework, how will we make ourselves accessible? Or - what other resources could we provide for our students if we are not accessible? Do our students know how to access these resources?
• Which students will have an advantage over other students when it comes to homework?  Which will have a disadvantage? (Consider access to tech, home responsibilities, economic status, extra-curricular activities, etc.)
• Is homework given creating resistance to learning or inspiring learning?
• How can students in AP classes do homework that helps them learn the material - not just pass the test?
• How can subject-specific teachers share the amount of homework they're giving with other subject-specific teachers - so they can see the load students carry on a nightly basis?
• How and when can middle and high school administration get together to talk about amount and type of homework that has been given in the past, and that should be given in the future? How can they then convey this to their staff?
• What burning questions can we send home with students instead of worksheets or projects?
• How can we foster curiosity so students are learning on their own when they get home?
• How can we help students prioritize the work they're expected to do at home?
• How can students have choice and voice over what they're learning at home?
• How can we make any homework an authentic, engaging learning opportunity?
• How can we model lifelong learning?

Have the conversations. 

Please let me know other questions (in the comments section) we should be asking!