StrategiesTo ImproveHomework

Think About Your Homework• Does it serve a purpose?• Is it relevant to student learning?• Is it used when appropriate rather than routinely. • Myths– Hard work is good for you regardless of the

pointlessness of the task.– Some of my examples– If a teaching/learning experience is too enjoyable it is

somehow academically suspect.

Students (and parents) should have no trouble connecting

homework to classroom learning.

• Identify the purpose for students• Have them state what the goal of the

homework is for them.

Quality Homework task promote ownership when they:

• Allow for choices.• Offer students an opportunity to personalize their

work.• Allow students to share information about

themselves or their lives.• Tap emotions, feeling, or opinions about a subject.• Allow students to create products or presentations.• Cathy Vatterott, page 104 Rethinking Homework

Massed vs. Distributed Practice

• 24 focused practices to achieve 80% competency (Marzano et.al., p. 67)

Massed Practice

Distributed Practice

Massed & Distributed Practice

Week 1 Week 2 Week 3 Week 4 Week 5

Important Assumption:“Learning” implies that students can recall, understand, and use information for the long term.

Definitions

• Same-day content homework is problems similar to what was covered that day.

• Distributed Content can include material from previous lessons (practice content) or content for future reference (preparation content)

• Interspersal is embedding brief problems in longer sets of more challenging problems.

Research Says

• Distributed content homework is more effective than same-day content.

• Distributed content homework was even greater when more time was allowed to pass before the material was tested.

• Students prefer interspersed assignments• Homework accuracy and completion improve

with interspersed assignments

Completion ContractFrom Ken O’Connor page 52

• Missed Work—The following work has not been handed in…

• Original Due Date…• Reason—please indicate why the work is late.• Next steps—What will you now do to get this

work completed?• New Due Date…• Student, parent and teacher signature

Homework Suggestions• Do as many of these problems as you can in 15

minutes. Bring those you were able to complete.• Find out why students’ work is late or incomplete

and assist them.– Is there something that I should know that I don’t

know?• Establish consequences (not penalties) for late

work such as– After school follow up– Documentation

Due Date Considerations

• Work is sometimes part of a sequence and must be submitted before marked work is returned - if this is formative it should not be included in the grade

• Teachers have to have a reasonable workload - the best approach is to record an incomplete

• Due dates are often arbitrary - keep any penalty to a minimum - provide information separately about when work is submitted. “He scored a 95%, but turns in work late”. This provides good information

Choice Board

• Create a Tic-Tack-Toe board with assignments in each box. Students are able to choose which assignments they want to complete to make Tic-Tack-Toe or other variations allowed by the teacher.

• This allows student choice which increases student motivation.

Choice Boards

• Enables students to choose tasks, practice a skill and demonstrate and depth of knowledge.

• Allows for differentiation of instruction related to interest or readiness level.

• Teachers need to carefully design the boards to ensure a good experience regardless of which “path” is chosen.

Collect Teach Draw Judge

Photograph Demonstrate Graph Create

Dramatize Survey Forecast Build

Create Memorize Write Compare

Interdisciplinary Assignment

• Provides students an opportunity to create an assignment to meet requirement in 2 or more classes.

• Form includes– Proposed new assignment– Assignments that are being combined– Signatures of cooperating teachers– New dew date

Choice

• Ask kids, “What can I do to help you complete more homework?”

• Get input and ideas from your students.• Have students create the homework

assignment. “Your mission is to design a homework activity, task, or assignment that will improve your understanding of the concept.”

Other Homework Help

• Older students tutoring younger students• more advanced students tutoring less advanced

students• Internet resources• Worked Out Examples--Research shows that

providing worked examples for actual assigned homework problems is beneficial.– Decrease in “wrong learning” – Instead of “How do I start?” students ask “Why did they

take that step?”

Math Strategies

• Instead of Sudoku do a Ken-Ken.• Instead of 10 problems do a couple and write

an explanation of what was done.

Lotus Chart

• Fill in the squares around – Feedback and Homework– Choice boards