On Homework

Although it is true that homework completion may lead to better understanding of the material and will certainly lead to better marks, and while it is true that all students should be engaged in regular review of concepts, I'd like to remind parents that too much time and energy spent on homework may contribute to DECLINING performance.

For example, if your child is spending 10 hours on a map for Socials that is worth about 15 marks/300 for a term, this is not a sustainable or appropriate use of time. A kid with no learning output issues will take about 1 hour to complete that map for a 13/15 mark. A motivated kid with no learning output issues might spend another hour (neatly colouring in all the coastlines, drawing whales swimming across the seas, finelining all the labels) and get a 15/15. Having your child spend 3 or 4 times longer on the map in order to earn 10/15 because it will end up looking like something that he spent 15 minutes on is not a good use of time.

These kids need to sleep--going to school is exhausting for many of them anyway. They need to expend time and effort learning core concepts and skills--math, science, english and socials--on elements of curriculum that will build on foundations they are laying down now--how to add negative numbers, chemical vs physical change, what motivates Hamlet (or how to figure that out).

We will try--if we know about the issue--to help the student advocate for an altered assignment--to be allowed to verbally prove to the SS teacher that he can point out the Volga River on a map of Europe for instance--or to find out how much time/effort the teacher feels is reasonable for a particular assignment. Sometimes, even with appropriate advocacy and with a clearly stated reason based on a childs' learning profile, we are unable to reach an arrangement with the teacher--but, if it's over something worth .5% of a year's mark, we (parent, student, and GOLD staff) might decide that the battle just isn't worth the trouble.

Related to the danger of exhausting the student, there are concomitant issues that may arise, such as:

• deceit ("it's done, I handed it in")
• school avoidance ("my stomach hurts")
• cheating
• aggression
• anxiety disorders

I am not saying that students shouldn't be working hard. I do believe that many GOLD students will find that they must work longer hours than age-peers to achieve the same results as their age-peers. The GOLD student should be carefully monitored for signs of burnout or frustration, and the energy consumed on any one task should bear some relation to the payoff for that task. 10 hours on a "1 hour map" is too long. 30 hours listening to a novel that will form the basis of 4 weeks instruction in an English class IS a worthy use of time/energy.