Brian Sztabnik’s podcast Talks with Teachers, episode 51 “Is Homework Helpful?” is a quick episode for teachers on the go. Taken from an article written on Edutopia, Sztabnik discusses five questions teachers should ask themselves when assigning homework. Sztabnik begins the podcast describing how much time his young nephew spends forty to fifty minutes up to double that amount when distractions and breaks are factored in on assignments. He cites that the National PTA recommends teachers assign 10-20 minutes of homework for first graders and increases that amount by 10 minutes each year. Consequently, by following this recommendation, students will spend at least 137,160 minutes doing homework from 1st to 12th grade. That equals 2,280 hours or 95 straight days of homework. Students in Finland get around a half an hour of homework but still score very high on International tests. …show more content…
Correspondingly, Sztabnik provides teachers with five questions to ask themselves when assigning homework. These five questions are: how long will it take to complete, have all learners been considered, will an assignment encourage future success, will an assignment place material in a context that a classroom cannot, and does the assignment offer support when the teacher is not there? The five questions Brian Sztabnik poses in this podcast heavily relates to culturally responsive teaching. By asking themselves these questions teachers use culturally responsive pedagogy that relates to classroom management. It follows two parts of classroom management from a critical perspective from Culturally Relevant Pedagogy by Gina Oran, specifically, “recognize that we are all cultural beings, with our own beliefs, biases, and assumptions about human behavior”, and
After spending most of their time in school, students are expected to complete even more work, seems almost ridiculous. Homework is taking time away from students other activities. In the book, “The Case Against Homework,” by Sara Bennett and Nancy Kalish, they state how homework, “robs children of their sleep, play and exercise time need for proper physical, emotional, and neurological development.” Homework is no different than a towel placed in water. It soaks up the time from other activities A study done by the Brown Center found an
For the purpose of this paper, I have read three different articles that all talk about the common theme of being culturally responsive in the classroom. They also touch on the issue of social justice oriented classrooms. From these articles I will share what I have learned and how they tie into my life as I enter into my teaching career and become a culturally responsive teacher that makes sure to follow social justice.
Culturally Responsive Teaching is an emerging field that focuses on student cultural backgrounds and experiences in the development of pedagogy. According to Kea (2013) cultural difference is the single largest difference in U.S. schools and also the most neglected. The goal of Culturally Responsive Teaching is to provide an equal opportunity for all students to learn in school, regardless of their gender, social class, ethnic, racial or cultural characteristics (Banks 2005). Ladson-Billings (1994) suggest that the historic failings of educators in educating non-white students is that educators attempt to insert culture into education rather than insert education into the culture. In other words, educators are not providing an equal multi-culturally relevant education by bringing tokens of culture such as food, national flags, or maps from around the world into the classroom alone. Although these actions promote a sense of multiculturalism, an education that is relative to a diversity of cultures is not necessarily being provided. Culturally Responsive Teaching attempts to bring the various experiences of the student’s cultural home life into the classroom. Schmidt (2005) identifies seven characteristics that must be incorporated into curriculum in order to provide culturally responsive instruction. These characteristics are high expectations,
Culturally Responsive Teaching is a pedagogy that recognizes the importance of including students' cultural references in all aspects of learning (Ladson-Billings, 1994). This approach to teaching encompasses how knowledge is both communicated and perceived by the students. The teacher must have a good relationship with the parents, have high expectations, learn about their students culture, have culturally mediated student-centered instruction, willing to reshape the curriculum, and be a facilitator in order to accomplish this method of teaching. These are key points a teacher must be willing to do if they intend to be an effective teacher especially in a highly culturally diverse area like central
When giving homework, teachers should follow the ten minute rule which means that students get 10 minutes of homework per grade. For example, if a student is in third grade then they should get 30 minutes of homework a night. Cooper recommends that teachers follow this rule and do not give more homework than that because it can lead to negative experiences, feelings, and cause students stress. Therefore, it is important to focus on the quality of homework that we are assigning and the subject matter. Parental involvement is encouraged during the younger years but should be gradually reduced as the students get older. Teachers should make sure that their parents have the skills needed in order to teach their students the skills that they may be struggling with at home. If not, students could become confused and parents may put too much pressure on the child. Cooper ends the article by saying that the, “the vast majority of educators have got it right” (Walker). This information will impact my
Hsiao (2015) conducted a quantitative study to create a multidimensional scale known as the Culturally Responsive Teacher Preparedness Scale (CRTPS) based on a teacher’s self-report. By defining the term responsive as expressing appropriate reaction in instructional contexts, the exploratory study measured how prepared preservice teachers are with implementing teaching practices and its concomitant effects on culturally responsive teaching (CRT). To holistically cover the dimensions of education, Hsiao (2015) lists five elements that encompass CRT: diagnosing students’ needs; curriculum content; counseling and guidance; instructional strategies; and performance assessment (p. 241). The study evolves as Hsiao distinguishes the scholarly interpretations
The debate regarding exactly how much homework is too much homework has been an ongoing debate for years. As of right now, there seems to be no end in sight for this debate. Various adults believe that if children do not obtain homework, then they are not learning properly. However, numerous children are obtaining a substantial amount of homework per night, as well as per each class. Once a child exceeds a certain amount of homework, then it is no longer beneficial for the child’s education. An excessive amount of homework can essentially become harmful to the child’s education. As a result, teachers are struggling with finding the right amount of homework to assign to students. The National Education Association as well as the National Parent-Teacher Association endorse the “10-minute rule” for teachers to follow when assigning homework to students. If a child is assigned an excessive amount of homework, then the child might experience more harm than good when attempting to complete the assigned homework.
Even a professor by the name of Harris Cooper at the Duke University found connections between students and spending time on homework. Firstly, he found that elementary school students improve study habits with only a small amount of homework. Secondly, middle school students are willing to do homework within ninety minutes each night, and thirdly, high school students are willing to do homework within ninety minutes and two and a half hours. Anything after those times, they start to think of it as busy work and lose the interest in learning (DeNisco).
After reading Geneva Gay’s article Preparing for Culturally Responsive Teaching I realized my pedagogy is culturally responsive in many ways. For one, I always
2. The Best Practices in Culturally Responsive Teaching: The second part of the study will focus on providing teaching strategies and frameworks that utilize culturally responsive teaching methods. This method includes teaching that integrates students’ backgrounds and experiences into the curriculum and learning experiences that take place in the classrooms. In doing so, teachers must: 1) hold high expectations for all learners, 2) assist students in developing cultural awareness and tolerance, 3) providing room for all students to make meaningful connections to learning
Creating an understanding and sharing of one’s culture should be facilitated by the educators of the students. Teacher’s set the tone of what is acceptable and unacceptable through classroom management, teacher-student relations, and teacher-parent relationships. We must foster a culture of united we stand divided we fall through practices such Responsive Classroom and enhanced by the concept of Cultural Responsive Classroom Management (CRCM). CRCM is classroom management based on methods to formulate a caring, respectful environment that facilitates learning—and discipline out of a sense of personal responsibility (Weinstein,
As an educator it is important to be aware of the various learners in the classroom as well as being able to shift lessons accordingly to adapt to a greater number of students. In addition it is essential that culturally responsive practices is adapted in the classroom in order for all students to have a sense of belonging and are able to participate. For this reason, a teacher must actively use culturally responsive practices to engage students and their families because it helps to develop a relationship and maintain a level of communication. Learning “facts” about different cultures is not enough, it is more important that we make
The first step for me to become a culturally responsive teacher is to learn not to judge others. Working with students from diverse backgrounds requires us to question our reactions to families and students. We need to stop judging different as “abnormal” and embrace what the differences can teach us (Rosenberg, Westling, & McLeskey, 2011). Embracing the differences
When I was first presented this task of interviewing another educator, I was apprehensive because the concepts that are being addressed in the prompts are so important to a teacher’s personal teaching philosophy. These prompts almost appeared to be questions that one might hear at a job interview for a teaching position. I did not at first want to subject a colleague to these questions, as they require so much deeper though and inquiry from the teacher. That is why I first answered the questions myself. I feel that the responses to these questions are the center for a teacher’s approach to culturally responsive teaching.
Students should only spend enough time on homework so that the subject is reinforced and not just a waste of time. The national PTA suggest that from K-3 grades there should be no more than 20 minutes a day, for 4-6 grades there should be 20-40 minutes of homework, and from 7-12 grades time varies do to types of subjects and number of subjects taken(KidSource). Anymore than these recommended amount of times is seen excessive by the national PTA. Surprisingly U.S. students are working as hard as Asians: 24% of eighth graders do more then two hour of homework compared to Japans 28% and Germanys 17%(Brimelow108). Are we working to hard, researchers don't think so, U.S. student grades are improving. As of 1996 one in every sixth grader does more than an hour of