Countries where homework is not assigned. Homework: cancel or leave? Parents play a key role

Psychologist, coach and mother of three children at home schooling Olga Yurkovskaya writes articles and books, conducts webinars, trainings and courses for responsible parents. We publish an excerpt from Olga's book “Education for Life. School curriculum with benefit and without violence. For contemplators and beginners"

Why don't I send my kids to school

I often have to deal with surprise at the fact that I do not send my children to school. I am perplexed why seemingly intelligent, educated city dwellers, who have reached career heights and are financially secure, break their children, innocently imprisoning them for eleven years in this system. I understand that schooling in pre-revolutionary times in the conditions of village life was really
progressive phenomenon. Then the teacher occupied a higher social position, was more developed and financially secure than the parents of peasant children, the teacher enjoyed universal respect. However, noble families did not send their children to zemstvo schools, organizing homeschooling. Let us, modern city dwellers, honestly try to answer the question today: does a child need a school? Or does his parents want her?

I don't think a child needs school at all. I have not yet met schoolchildren who, in the first quarter, after the holidays, would dream of continuing studying proccess.

We recognize that it is very convenient and comfortable for working mothers and fathers to hand over their child to a “luggage office” for the whole day under minimal supervision, consoling themselves with the fact that everyone does this. Of particular perplexity is the position of some non-working mothers with a wealthy husband. Own children are so annoying that they are given even in after-school. One gets the impression that the birth of a child is just a way to provide for oneself financially. It seems that, given the opportunity to send their offspring to a boarding school without losing their reputation, many would have done just that.

As for children… I think that a child almost never needs a school. I have not yet met schoolchildren who, in the first quarter, after the holidays, would dream of continuing the educational process. Children tend to go to school to socialize or play with classmates, but not for the sake of sitting in class. If you provide a child with comfortable communication outside of school, he will not want to go there at all. Shifting the responsibility for the child to the school is a vicious way!

So I don't like modern free school. Why? Yes, if only because I have not met people who are satisfied with the education offered by the state, even among fans schooling. When we were schoolchildren, the program and teaching methods suited everyone more or less. Today there is a flurry of claims against them. But at the same time, it is still very difficult for people to go against the system. "How did you decide on this?" - the first question that new acquaintances ask when they find out that my children are homeschooled.

In a regular school, my daughters would simply be bored: their level of preparation was significantly ahead of school requirements

Probably my experience helped. Now, in hindsight, I understand that I was very lucky, although at that moment there were doubts. Since the third grade, I and several of my friends have been playing chess. We had a good coach. He recruited a group of those who had already shown results. So that we can play chess for more high level, parents were offered to transfer us to study at the Republican School of Olympic Reserve. Most of the parents refused, believing that there could be no study at this school by definition. Mine weren't against it, and from the sixth grade I actually studied according to the system of part-time education. Now in the Republic of Belarus this is called training according to an individual plan. In Russia, the name "individual academic plan"(IUP). optional items we didn’t have: physical education, work, music and drawing were simply absent in the schedule. There were only basic disciplines, but without homework, because everyone had one or two workouts a day, and we constantly participated in training camps or competitions. All my classmates - hundreds and even thousands of children - practically did not attend school. Some came to hand over the studied subjects literally for three days in a quarter. They handed over all the tasks, control ones and again left for competitions or training camps. We were absent from school for more than half of the study time, appearing there to pay off debts, and not to attend current lessons. According to this scheme, I studied from the sixth grade until graduation.

I approached the issue of where and how my children will study very rationally. I had four main choices:
1) the nearest public school;
2) a prestigious gymnasium;
3) paid private school;
4) family education.

In view of the foregoing, the first option was almost immediately discarded. In a regular school, my daughters would simply be bored: their level of preparation was significantly ahead of school requirements. Both of them did not go to the first grade, they passed the exams as an external student and studied with a tutor throughout the elementary school. An hour and a half of classes a week provided them with good marks on the tests.

Less than 10% of children with the first health group after the end of the eleventh grade remain, although at the time of admission there could have been about 50%.

Then the third option was rejected. I did not find such private schools that would not copy the usual gymnasium nearby. What I would have to pay for, I did not understand. Therefore, in fact, I was choosing between a good gymnasium and studying at home. The first criterion is the health of the child
The main damage that the school causes to almost every child is various diseases. Think about when schoolchildren get sick more often: in the summer in the fresh air or during the school year?

Different researchers come to the same conclusion: the school worsens the health of children. And this problem is recognized at the level of the Ministry of Health. The older the students, the less healthy among them. By the end of school, the number of healthy children falls by 3-4 times. Less than 10% of children with the first health group after the end of the eleventh grade remain, although at the time of admission there could have been about 50%. Many graduates complain about various chronic diseases and functional abnormalities: diseases of the musculoskeletal system, visual impairment, gastroenterological, allergic, endocrine and neuropsychiatric pathologies.
I talked with teachers and health workers: every year the situation worsens. The children of my friends almost without exception were diagnosed with gastritis and scoliosis. The problem is visible to the naked eye.

Why is this happening? Children in the classroom sit still, and this is welcome. Not only do they spend several hours a day in a physiologically harmful position, they are also in constant tension, the cause of which may be fear of an answer at the blackboard, conflicts with classmates, noise at recess, malnutrition. School puts them under severe stress on a daily basis, provoked precisely by the totalitarian, oppressive aspect of the system. Often in the classroom there is not joint work, but the struggle between the teacher and the students.

By the end of the quarter, schoolchildren accumulate general fatigue and become apathetic and lethargic.

The school grading system also aims to exacerbate these stresses. Plus, students are given a load of homework. By middle school, the difference between children who spend nine hours a day on schoolwork and homework and those who
who works out at home for two hours. Compare two children (a somewhat hypothetical option, but no less revealing for this):

– homeschooler walks a lot in the fresh air, he does not need to get up early, he gets enough sleep, eats well, does fitness. Study load it corresponds to the maximum concentration of attention.
– Schoolboy gets up at 6:30 in the morning, eats in the school cafeteria, is in tension and noise all day among hundreds of children. AT primary school with an after-school program or circles, his workload lasts from 8:00 to 18:00, and from sports he has only physical education.
Will the second child be healthier? Of course not.

By the end of the quarter, schoolchildren accumulate general fatigue and become apathetic and lethargic. While homeschoolers (for the most part) remain cheerful regardless of holidays and weekends! A homeschooled child follows his physiological rhythms and rests a lot,
alternating load and outdoor games. For example, the “owl” has the opportunity to get up later, which students in the first shift are deprived of. Thus, home schooling saves the child from the harmful effects of stress, fear, static postures and strong nervous tension. In addition, home children eat better. Can parents of schoolchildren be 100% sure that their offspring will spend their pocket money on lunch, and not on chips and soda? Homeschoolers generally don't have such temptations, which means they don't have a chance to develop the habit of healthy eating And they have more lifestyles. Saved from contact with other children during epidemics of influenza and SARS, they get sick less often viral infections. Therefore, their immunity is stronger.

The thought that I would have to get up at 6:30 every day to take the children to the gymnasium on time terrified me.

In our favor is the fact that after the transfer of frequently ill children to home schooling, after a few weeks, a decrease in health problems becomes noticeable. Homeschooling works for the health of the child! The conclusion suggests itself that the most important plus of learning at home is the health of children, both physical and psychological. Choosing between studying at school and at home, parents need to think about what exactly they will receive in exchange for the deterioration in the health of their children. Is it really impossible to get this benefit in safer ways for your own child?
Me the results of comparing school and home schooling on health criterion convinced that the child at home will be much better. This is one point in favor of family education.

The second criterion is knowledge school subjects The gymnasium won here. I had no idea how to get children to study seriously at home without hiring tutors. However, the services of tutors in all subjects are not something that is available to everyone (for one reason or another). And yet I found an acceptable solution, which I will talk about later. In the meantime, let's put a point in favor of school education.

A student spends approximately nine hours a day on lessons and homework.

The third criterion is admission to a university. The certificate for a child in family education will be exactly the same as if he studied at school. Almost all parents hire tutors to prepare for the final test - we will hire them too. If you plan to study at a Russian university, a lyceum or gymnasium at this institution will do. They test children in advance in specialized disciplines, help to choose the direction and faculty for admission. Thus, education is more effective, and when entering a university, the child has some benefits. On the other hand, if you plan to enter foreign university, then a family-schooled child will have more time to prepare for testing that is unusual for us (TOEFL and SAT, for example). So one more point in favor of family education.

The fourth criterion is my workload and peace of mind . The thought that I would have to get up at 6:30 every day to take the children to the gymnasium on time terrified me. I am a self-employed entrepreneur and I plan all my affairs in such a way that I work in the afternoon.
Early rises did not fit into my daily routine at all with the habit of working late at night and even at night, when the children finally calmed down. And if you think about parent meetings with listening to teachers' complaints, about the hassle of unfulfilled homework,
"deuces" in behavior ... No, this is not for me! The safety of my state of mind was possible only in the case of home schooling. Therefore, here I got an extra point in favor of family education.

Homeschooler works out at home for a maximum of two hours: individual training learning school subjects is about ten times faster

The fifth criterion is the effectiveness of training(relative to time costs). A student spends approximately nine hours a day on lessons and homework. Teachers in ordinary schools are guided by weak students: they endlessly repeat and ask the same thing, so time in the classroom is spent inefficiently. Compared to classes with a tutor, the loss of time in the classroom is about 90%, and the time used to study new material does not exceed 10%. In addition, some time is spent on organizational matters in class. In addition, the teacher adapts to the slowest and most slow-witted children.
Based on my experience, I can say that a homeschooler studies at home for a maximum of two hours: with individual training, the study of school subjects is about ten times faster. Remaining free time child spends outdoors. He gets enough sleep, can afford to play sports or read books that are interesting to him. Spends a lot of time on clubs or hobbies.

Often, due to the negative attitude of teachers to passes, problems arise with trips to competitions or contests.

In determining the effectiveness of training for me, an important factor is the possibility of additional classes. For a student, music, dance, drawing or sports are in conflict with the workload of homework. Parents and children quite often have to choose between school work and their favorite hobbies. Even if these are professional dance clubs, music or art schools. And even when the child undoubtedly has talent. Often, due to the negative attitude of teachers to passes, problems arise with trips to competitions or contests. In the family form of education, such problems are absolutely excluded. Therefore - one point in favor of family education.

The sixth criterion - communication with children & For those who prefer not to communicate with the child and not to do joint things with him, but to watch how he listens to the teacher, and then sits for hours at homework, this item can be a minus. For me, this is a plus: I am not ready to give up my authority and give my own children under the influence of outsiders. Moreover, I have questions about the values ​​of modern young teachers, and the level of their self-realization makes me doubt the usefulness of the personal example they set. I like to talk with my children, to explain to them different interesting things. That is why I am engaged in entrepreneurial activities and do not go out to work for hire, although I could receive a decent stable income. I want to spend a lot of time with children. So - one point in favor of family education!

It turned out that the elementary school program is so primitive that with the help of a tutor it can actually be completed in a year. My expenses for the teacher did not exceed the amount of three hundred dollars.

The seventh criterion is cash costs. A good education is a great value for me, and I am always ready to pay for it. I'd rather pay a considerable amount for training or courses than spend on consumer goods. And it’s easier for me to pay a tutor than to do such an unpleasant thing as standing over a child’s soul with homework. Therefore, I was initially ready to give each child 400-500 dollars a month for private school. In reality, it turned out that tutors are much cheaper: one lesson costs 10-20 dollars.
My girls (despite the difference in age) were able to study together. In elementary school, they needed an hour and a half of classes once a week to learn how to properly arrange their work or disassemble difficult questions. The rest of the material was mastered by the children themselves, according to a regular textbook, completing tasks in workbooks.

It turned out that the elementary school program is so primitive that with the help of a tutor it can actually be completed in a year. My expenses for the teacher did not exceed the amount of three hundred dollars. In fact, they turned out to be equal to the amount saved on gasoline for trips to school. In high school, tutors will cost more: you need to study English and mathematics in depth. Later, complex subjects will be added - physics and chemistry. But in any case, it is unlikely that I will be able to exceed the budget of education in a private school.

If you are the parent of a school-age child, you definitely have some feelings about this issue. You can hear different opinions: “Children are asked too much. It's stressful!" or “Homework is very important. They teach kids how to manage time." So who is really right? Well, in a sense, everything.

Homework is not necessary in elementary school

"For kids who are in elementary school, there's really no correlation between homework and achievement," says Denise Pope, Ph.D. and senior lecturer at Stanford high school education. - During the study, we could not find any work confirming for sure that homework teaches kids discipline.

Pope also claims that early age children only need two things: free play and timed reading. “Little schoolchildren learn to cooperate and interact with each other,” she notes. - Homework may not necessarily help with that. Even in the sports section that the child visits after school, the adult tells the student what he should do, as in school. Children should be given the opportunity to choose how to manage their time. This contributes to the development of new processes in the brain. Fighting a child who doesn't want to do homework can be a source of tension. As a result, the child will develop a dislike for learning.

Why won't the school give it up?

The main reason why the tradition of giving homework is still preserved in education is the desire of most parents. They expect the school to teach children how to work independently. In addition, with the help of homework, communication is established between parents and the teacher, home and educational institution. This is a strong system that has been formed over the years, seems indestructible to many families, and that is why it remains so.

A vital necessity

"Homework in kindergarten just terrifying. Nobody agrees with that, says Stephanie Donaldson-Pressman, clinical director of the New England Center for Pediatric Psychology. “But I don't think it's a first, second, or third level problem. By doing homework, children gain time management skills and learn to prioritize.”

Donaldson-Pressman believes in the oft-quoted "ten minute rule" or "10 minutes of class work". She comments as follows: “Children can draw a picture with you or read a book. You can even set a timer to control the time. It is very important for toddlers to learn perseverance over a period of time.”

The task becomes more difficult in middle and high school

“As we move into high school, we begin to see the connection between homework and achievement,” says Pope. - But there is a limit. The correlation disappears after 90 minutes for high school and two hours for the highest. She adds: “Our study showed that classes longer than 3.5 hours begin to negatively affect the health of schoolchildren. Problems mainly arise against the background of constant lack of sleep. Combined with stress, this factor can lead to depression.”

"Homework should improve the retention of topics covered in the classroom," says Lily Eskelsen Garcia, president of the National Education Association. “Ask teachers, and they will tell you that too much study time is spent testing students’ knowledge, so it simply isn’t enough for a full presentation of the material.”

That is, homework assignments are often used to catch up. Although children often start doing work too late, and therefore it takes even longer to check it.

Can a solution be found?

Probably not really. Homework debates are not a new phenomenon.

Both children and their parents need to know about existing problem. Some schools don't want to admit that the need for homework is more relevant than ever, Pope notes.

Here are two tips for preventing home debate and talking to your child's teacher:

• Make a wheel of time. Draw a circle and mark the 24-hour clock on it. Then allocate all existing time to specific tasks. For example, set aside 9 hours for sleep, 3 hours for school, 2 hours for rest, etc. If there is not enough time in the daily routine for homework, then it probably needs to be revised.
• Sign the agreement. Decide when and where homework will be done (for example, at 5:30 at the kitchen table). All who sign the agreement automatically become bound by its rules.

The round table was jointly prepared by the editors of AiF-Chelyabinsk and the online edition of the site. This is the second experience of such joint work (God forbid, not the last!). During the first round table, the topic was discussed

Who is to blame for homework in its current form and volume?

This time it was about homework, the burden of which, according to many parents and students, has become exorbitant. And an interesting fact came to light. Head of Elementary, Basic and Secondary Department general education The Ministry of Education and Science of the Chelyabinsk Region, Mikhail Elagin, said that according to federal law, homework is not required at all. They are within the competence of a particular educational organization and the teacher himself. True, there is, of course, a share of slyness on the part of the Ministry of Education. Another participant of the round table, Mars Vakhidov, chemistry teacher, head of the Chemistry Plus resource center at Lyceum No. 77, recalled that the school is overloaded with examinations and checks: “Look how many examinations and checks are today! But all these exams, NIKO ( national studies of the quality of education - Approx. ed.) and VLOOKUP ( all-Russian verification work ) do not let us work in peace! Last week, all second-graders and fifth-graders wrote VPR in the Russian language. We were reassured that VPR is not an examination. But de facto, both parents and leaders evaluate us according to this CDF. And we can't let either of them down. No one removed the question of the quality of knowledge from us! The conditions are such that we are forced to set lessons. Therefore, our minimum is far beyond the maximum.” So the question to the organizers of education in Russia remains. And the question is huge.

An evening at home is a time for joy, not for homework

Not so long ago, a “cry from the heart” of the mother of one of the schoolgirls appeared on social networks, which collected more than 2,000 reposts and more than 500 comments. "Yes I bad mother! - the woman writes. - I do not want to do homework with the child in the evenings. In the evening we come home tired. With a desire to chat, have dinner and even - what a sin - to watch a movie or read a book. But no, you have to do your homework. Daughter doesn't want to do it. And I can't stand over her head and bark like a country dog ​​at passing cars. Because I work hard. Because I'm tired. Because I don't remember eighth grade math. Because I need to cook buckwheat in the morning and fry cheesecakes. Because I need to pat my husband on the head. Because the evening is a time for joy, not for scandal!

“The fact that the cry of the soul of this woman found such a response from other parents says a lot,” another participant of the round table is sure, Ekaterina Zabacheva, Chairman of the Regional Branch "Parental All-Russian Resistance". - Neither we with you, nor our parents in their school time There were no problems with homework. It means that something went wrong, it means that the education system has failed.”

Many teachers blame this failure on parents, who certainly want to control the implementation of lessons and thereby deprive their child of independence in this matter. “Many adults tell children to wait for them from work to do their homework together,” states the dean of the faculty of teacher training. primary school SUSGPU (ChSPU), candidate pedagogical sciences, Associate Professor Natalia Lukinykh . - But what time do modern parents come home today? Late in the evening. Moreover, at first they will make a bunch of calls, browse social networks, solve a lot of cases, and only then move on to the lessons. Of course, the attitude to the lessons is expressed aloud, the child, who already really wants to sleep, becomes a witness to the controversy between the parents, which does not add positive emotions towards the school. Until that time, the student would have already been able to do the homework himself, perhaps not so successfully, but it would be his success, his achievements!
“Once upon a time, we all studied according to the same system, it was called the traditional education system,” recalls Lukinykh. - We studied quite successfully, received decent certificates with medals, and had time to walk. But everything has changed. Today we have a lot of different educational systems, each one has a book publisher behind it, and this is a serious business. The most interesting thing is that many parents choose specific systems, trying to send their child to this particular system, they are ready to knock on the thresholds of schools that are not registered, stand in lines. It is difficult to say what they are guided by in this case: after all, even we, specialists, do not fully understand some points in different educational systems! This means that they make a conscious choice and, apparently, understand what they doom the child to by sending him to this or that school, to this or that teacher. Where are the complaints coming from then?
One can argue with such a statement. Many parents, including the author of these lines, still give priority to children and homework in the evening at home. However, the problem is not solved. The love of learning through an overly saturated school curriculum (including homework) cannot be instilled in children. And there is no need to talk about obtaining serious knowledge either. Information after passing the next test or control immediately disappears from the student's memory. Schoolchildren are increasingly asking the question: “How will this be useful to me in life?”.
It is worth saying that teachers also begin to call parents to school when the child begins to receive “deuces”. That is, teachers, too, it turns out, are not supporters of independence in the work of students. Or is it a question for a particular teacher? Can he teach the child to work independently?

By the way, here another question arises - is it necessary in modern school ratings, what's the point?

On this occasion Evgeny Bunimovich, Honored Teacher of Russia, said this: "Parents who demand from their child not education, not an attempt to understand what is interesting to him in this life, and what is not interesting, what he will do next, but only marks, make a big mistake."

On practice-oriented Finnish and fundamental Russian education

Irina Ruzaeva, Director of the Chelyabinsk Regional Multidisciplinary Boarding School for Gifted Children, speaking at the round table about the difference between the Russian education system and the Finnish one, noted that the Finns have a practice-oriented system, while Russian school provides fundamental knowledge. And evidence of this is the victory of Russian schoolchildren at the world Olympiads. Mars Vakhidov agrees with her. He also added during the round table a weighty argument about Russia's achievements in space, which the Finns do not even have close.
I would like to object to this that only a few win at world olympiads (as well as fly into space). The significance of these victories for society as a whole is more moral (although, of course, let's not forget that some types of medicines were created precisely in space conditions). Whereas a practice-oriented system, if it exists, applies to EVERYONE who is engaged in such a system. In addition, the achievements of "fundamentality" Russian education can be questioned. Including on the basis of data from the Russian parliament. Here is what Oleg Smolin, the first deputy chairman of the State Duma Committee on Education, noted on this occasion on the pages of the AiF two years ago:

“Developers of school programs should moderate their ardor. They forget the concept of the great teacher and psychologist L. Vygotsky: if the material is too easy - the child does not develop, too complex - he does not even master what he could. It turns out, on the one hand, the children are overloaded, and on the other hand, they do not know the elementary. When the results were considered in the State Duma past USE, I was struck by the example given by Rosobrnadzor. Task: the train left point A at 10 o'clock and arrived at point B at 12 o'clock the next day. How many hours did the train travel? A quarter of graduates (!) of schools could not solve it. When I was studying in school curriculum there were no elements higher mathematics type of probability theory and statistics and other things. But in our class (I emphasize - blind children) there was not a single one who would not solve such a problem. To improve the quality of learning, you need to reduce the complexity.

What should a child do at home

A few years ago, the Ministry of Education of the Chelyabinsk Region developed a special memo for parents regarding the child's pastime after school. It consists of three items:

After the arrival of a child of any age from school, he must have lunch and rest for 1.5-2 hours (not at the computer!);

Starting lessons, you need to determine the sequence of their implementation (first you should complete the most difficult tasks);

After completing the lessons, a walk in the fresh air is required for at least one hour.

On the attitude of the Russian state to education

Just one quotation will suffice here. Vsevolod Lukhovitsky, a board member of the Uchitel interregional trade union of educators, said: “In all countries that come out on top, there are three components. The first component - a good education - is a value, which means that money must be invested in education. Our government is cutting funding for education. It is necessary to transfer power over specific schools to the local community and teachers, and only in our country it is managed by the department of education. And the third point - ask any child or any adult in Singapore what is a teacher? They will immediately stand up, stretch out along the line and say: “Oh, this is the most respected person.” Sorry, we don't have any of that."

How schoolchildren do their homework in other countries

Alfie Cohn, one of the leading critics of education, wrote the book Myths about Homework. He said that for younger students, there is no relationship between the amount of homework and academic achievement. In high school, the connection is so weak that it almost disappears if more accurate measurement methods are used in the study.
However, while homework is retained in most education systems in different countries peace. But the difference is how much time is spent on it. American teenagers devote an average of 6 hours a week to homework. In countries that are members of the OECD (Great Britain, Germany, Spain, Italy, Canada, the USA, etc.), homework takes even less - 4.9 hours a week. Schoolchildren from Korea and Finland spend the least time studying at home - they study about three hours a week. At the same time, Korea and Finland are among the world leaders in terms of the quality of education. Parents of schoolchildren in Romania report that the homework load of schoolchildren is decreasing. Some spend only an hour a week on this, although 3-5 hours would be optimal. In America, somewhere there are no school assignments until the middle of the fifth grade, somewhere they were completely abandoned. French President Francois Hollande spoke out radically: “Homework should be abolished because children from poor families do not have time for this. At home, parents do not always pay due attention to students, while at school a student can always count on the help of a teacher.”

Schoolchildren in Russia do homework for 10 or more hours a week. At the same time, Russia occupies a place in the fourth ten countries in the world rankings of education. In principle, there is no need to talk about the practical orientation of our education system. In one of the publications of Komsomolskaya Pravda, a couple of years ago, it was noted that schoolchildren in Russia work harder than adults! This not normal.

By Labor Code an adult cannot work more than 40 hours a week. At the same time, schoolchildren spend 10 hours or more per week on homework. And now add six lessons (or even seven) to this. Plus electives, tutors, courses, music lessons and sports sections! It turns out that children are loaded up to 52 hours a week or more!

There are countries where the situation is no less difficult. With difficulty doing homework, for example, schoolchildren in Spain. Gets up to 6 hours a day! Moreover, most of the tasks consist in rewriting the textbook. But this can hardly reassure us. We live in Russia. And if anyone does not know, then the solution to the problem was actually proposed more than 60 years ago by our, domestic specialist. Petersburg teacher-researcher Elena Yanovitskaya has developed a technique that allows you to refuse homework.

“Then, in 1953, the main thing that caused a buzz of bewilderment in the hall was the refusal to make homework compulsory. But in this refusal - the first cornerstone principle of our system - to learn the compulsory school curriculum in the classroom (that's 5-6 hours a day!), And the rest of the time - for personally chosen additional education”, she recalls in her book “Great Didactics”.

Alexander Gulin, a teacher of history and social studies at school No. 1828 "Saburovo", on the pages of the KP posed the question point-blank:

“Theoretically, you can take the entire program at school if you increase the number of hours in all subjects. But in practice this is not the case. We would not ask so much if children were not required to achieve high results. Because there is SanPiN, which limits the workload at school to 35 hours a week. The maximum that can be done within this framework is to give two core subjects, and everything else on basic level. Therefore, they load homework to the full in excess of the legal 35 hours. The only question is - do we need high results on the exam or knowledge that does not disappear the next day after passing the exam? Or, more broadly, healthy children?

Homework is not always exactly what students like to do after school. After all, sometimes you have to spend many hours of extracurricular time on this task when you could relax and have fun. I wonder how many hours do students in different countries devote to doing homework?

According to information from the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), in 2012, American teenagers devoted an average of 6 hours a week to homework. This figure is lower for all students from OECD countries (Great Britain, Germany, Spain, Italy, Canada, USA, etc.) - about 4.9 hours per week. Schoolchildren from Korea and Finland spend the least time studying at home - they study about three hours a week. Students from Russia can be commended for their diligence - our children do homework 10 hours a week. And schoolchildren in Shanghai even more - as much as 14 hours.

The OECD also noted that teens from wealthy families tend to spend more time studying at home than their peers from disadvantaged backgrounds. In this regard, the question arose: “Does the very presence of homework contribute to increased stratification between families with different levels of income?” Researchers believe that more attention should be paid to this issue:

Homework is an integral part educational process, while schools and educators must look for new, better effective ways motivation of students from disadvantaged families for self-study at home.

The researchers also tried to find out how important homework assignments are in general for the educational process. As a general rule, students who study hard at home perform better on exams than their less diligent peers. If we turn to the data, which we have already written about, we will see that such a dependence actually exists, but at the same time, the number of hours devoted to homework by schoolchildren does not affect efficiency and productivity. school system generally. Thus, the key to quality education is to a greater extent a well-organized educational process and high qualification of teachers.

Russia . At the same time, according to studies, schoolchildren from Russia do a lot of work on their own and take a responsible approach to doing homework. Is it possible to speak of a direct connection between homework and the effectiveness of education in our country?