By Sara Ballenger

LASD sets policy for districtwide time guidelines for school work at home

The current homework controversy in the Los Altos School District is a passionate one. Some parents feel students have too much homework and some too little. For others, the workload is fine. All sides present valid arguments as the district works to implement its first-ever, districtwide homework policy.

The policy will be formally put in place by June 17, according to the district.

The new policy defines homework as: “Any assigned activity which is primarily accomplished outside of regular classroom time and which has a definite relationship to the student’s educational growth. Homework shall not serve as a replacement for in-depth classroom lessons or teacher-directed instruction.”

The district has had a broad-based homework policy in place since 1982, which allowed each school to have its own homework policy. But the policy proved too vague, allowing schools to interpret it differently.

“Those different policies may not have the same homework expectations across the district at any given grade level,” said Dick Liewer, assistant superintendent in charge of curriculum. “We have gotten a lot of feedback that it’s time the district put together a policy for all the children in the district to have a level playing field when it came to completing homework assignments successfully.”

The district’s administrative council, made up of the principals, Liewer, Superintendent Marge Gratiot, teachers and parents spent five months drafting a model for the new policy.

What it says

The new policy addresses makeup homework; school-site homework plans, the definition of homework and its purpose; schools’, teachers’ and parents’ roles in the homework process; the amount of homework given; and long-term homework projects.

At the center, the model and new policy is a minute guideline that has caused some controversy in the district. A minute guideline is assigned to each grade level in terms of the amount of homework a student should expect each evening.

The district’s board of trustees accepted the minute guideline proposed by the curriculum council at its June 3 meeting. The nightly averages for Monday through Thursday are: 30 minutes, first grade; 40 minutes, second grade; 45 minutes, third grade; 60 minutes, fourth grade; 75 minutes, fifth grade; 95 minutes, sixth grade; and 120 minutes, sixth and seventh grades. The times include 20 minutes for reading. Nightly homework time is listed as “occasional” for kindergarten.

“I am very supportive of having some guidelines for the minutes children spend on homework,” Gratiot said. “The value of the minute guideline is that it provides an opportunity for parents and teachers to look cooperatively at how much homework is assigned and how a child reacts to that homework.”

Although studies show no increased educational benefit from homework in grades K-3, Gratiot said the time with parent and child over homework is “very valuable for kids to know parents care what’s going on in school.”

Reactions

The reaction of students is what has some parents concerned, particularly those who feel their child has too much homework.

“I feel that the homework has increased over the years and has become a very stressful situation for our family,” said parent Vickie Clements who has a daughter in fifth grade and a son in eighth grade in the district. “The amount of homework in middle school is particularly heavy. The kids in middle school attend seven classes every day and are dealing with so much school, social and academic pressure that loading on homework in most subjects every night is just not appropriate.”

The district hopes that the minutes requirement will give teachers guidelines when assigning homework with the state standards.

“The teachers feel so under pressure to fit all of the subject matter that pertains to the state standards, as well as preparing students for the tests required, that a lot of teachers feel if they don’t assign homework, the material might not get covered and the students won’t be prepared to take the tests,” said Laura Bence, a teacher at Bullis-Purissima School and president of the Los Altos Teachers Association. “There is a lot of pressure there. I personally feel there should be a balance between family time, homework and outside activities. Children shouldn’t be penalized by not being able to participate in these activities because they have too much homework.”

That has been a concern for district parents, as well as the students being assigned homework over the weekends and vacation time.

“With regular weekend and vacation homework, my daughter never gets a real break from it. It’s relentless,” said Blach parent Jane Clayton.

She is seeing a light at the end of her daughter’s homework tunnel with the district’s new policy, however. The new policy states, “except for outside reading, homework shall not be assigned on holidays, vacation days, conference days or (teacher work days) which fall within the school calendar year.”

That is a step in the right direction, in Clayton’s mind, towards reducing the amount of homework as well as stress on students.

Time issues

Parents whose child may take twice as long to complete homework, are concerned that an estimated 45-minute assignment might stretch out to two hours for their child.

The new homework policy gives parents avenues of communication with teachers if they feel their child is receiving too much homework. The policy states that if a child is spending a significant amount of time with homework, the teacher or parent may initiate a conference. If the determination is made that less work is needed, the student will receive full credit for the work completed. The policy allows participants to “measure reality against the guidelines,” Gratiot said.

Students with disabilities will have accommodations outlined in their individual education plans. They will receive full credit for work completed. These plans are implemented by their teacher.

“The real strength here is now a parent can say, ‘You have a homework policy that says at the seventh grade my child would do an average of 120 minutes a night.’” Liewer said. “There is a baseline there now, it’s a line in the sand so to speak, where in the past that line has been wavy. Nobody knew how much homework to give a sixth-grader. Now, new teachers know, parents know and everybody is talking from the same basis of discussion.”

In order for the new homework policy to be really effective, communication among the district, students, parents and teachers will be key, Liewer added.

That includes recognizing the different learning styles of each student, which is included in the policy under the heading of a teacher’s role in the homework process.

Some students are auditory learners, or learn by listening; some are visual learners who learn by seeing; and some are tactile learners who learn by doing.

“It’s difficult to come up with time guidelines because of the spread of student abilities, with some students taking a long time and some students getting it done in a snap,” said Springer School parent Amy Mueller. “The only way to solve this is to facilitate communication between parent and teacher so they can deal with the specific child. My experience is that parents seem to avoid communicating directly with the teacher. It’s a two-way street. Parents need to take the initiative to say something to the teacher if there is a problem.”

Homework tips

If parents are aware of their child’s learning style, they can make optimal use of learning time, said Heather Guidice, regional director for Sylvan Learning Centers, tutorial and educational centers.

Guidice offered a tip for each type of learning style. An auditory learner, can tape record class lectures and notes; summarizing and verbalizing is especially helpful.

A visual learner should write things down, take notes and use a highlighter for main ideas and important facts in the notes.

Tactile learners, whenever possible, can use graphic note-taking methods such as mapping, concept trees or timelines and take frequent notes.

“Parents should be willing to supervise their children’s homework. It is not the sole responsibility of the school to educate our children - it is the parents’ responsibility too,” said district parent Nandan Dixit. “If we want our kids to be at par or better than students of other developed and developing nations, we need to make sure that they learn to work hard at a young age. Kids in other nations have to work very hard to remain competitive, and we should make sure that our kids do not fall behind. Otherwise, how will they learn to be competitive when they enter U.S. colleges and universities where students from all over the world come to study?”

For more information on how to obtain a copy of the district’s official homework policy, call the district office at 941-4010.