Homework … as unnatural as taxes

What an idea – no homework. It’s not a new idea of course. Americans have been on about it for ages –which may be the biggest reason to keep homework.

If we don’t have homework my classes and I will never get to listen to wonderfully convoluted and time-consuming stories explaining why James’ homework wasn’t done – he’d been working on his homework, on his computer of course, when a car crashed into a power pole outside his house and the electrics in his house went ‘boom’ and the ‘fizzzzt’ and so did his computer. When I looked doubtful another boy piped up and said ‘it’s true, my bruvva­ was driving the car.’

A girl in a class was very serious when she explained why she’d not done her homework. ‘It was my fate.’ I sensed crystals or horoscopes at play.

Another boy told me he couldn’t do homework this weekend because it was a religious festival all weekend during which time he and his family would talk about all the work they’d be doing in the coming year.

Several centuries ago when I was a kid, I hated homework because it was a chore. I loved homework too though because they hadn’t invented playstation golf and the internet, and television was still only black and white.

It rather depends on the homework of course.

Doing zillions of dopey maths problems is worse than a trip to the dental nurse. Building a car that runs on sunlight or wind… that’s a good homework thing. And planting trees, or going to the beach and rummaging around in the rocks, or damming up a small stream just to see what happens, or learning to cook a roast dinner with gravy…these are all good homework things.

Even better – visiting your grandparents, or someone else’s grandparents, just to say hello and to listen to some stories and make a cup of tea.

She and they who don’t support homework say that children would be better off watching intellectual documentaries on television, or reading magazines or books or sleeping. She also said they should be reading the back of a weet-bix packet. I’d rather read a Peanut Slab wrapper myself (notice the change in allegiance). They ought to be outside breathing raw air and climbing trees and swimming and occasionally breaking ankles.

Of course kids should not be doing homework. It’s as unnatural as taxes. It’s also as inevitable – at least for high school kids, because parents want their kids shut away alone in their bedrooms doing homework and not doing drugs or getting pregnant. And there’s the essence of the homework thing – it’s not about education, it’s about keeping kids busy.

— Peter Giddens