Jay Trivedi

Phase 3 Essay Freshman Composition

11/13/20

Cover Letter

The reason why I chose this class as an audience was because they experience my theme, homework, in their everyday lives. Not only do they receive homework in college, but they also have been receiving homework for over ten years from school. Because they have been receiving a substantial amount of homework for such a long period of time, they are a credible group for me to present my argument. I tailored my essay towards my audience by specifically talking about experiences that they have most likely also encountered. As you will be able to see, in my introduction, I try to put them in the shoes of where they have already been countless times. I bring them back to those stressful evenings and sleepless nights to give them a more negative perception of homework in hopes of my classmates accepting my argument. I also ask them various questions to keep them engaged and paint a picture in their heads.

One meaningful insight that I gained is thinking about how much my life has changed over the years. More importantly, I was able to see how changes in education environment and level have impacted me over the years, particularly the direct impacts that homework had on my personal life and mental health. Regarding literacy, I feel like the only way that homework benefited me was in my reading comprehension level. When teachers would assign a certain amount of time to read, I would benefit from this more than any of the other homework assignments. 

In this phase specifically, I feel that purpose, argument, and evidence impacted me the most. When writing the assignment for this phase, I saw purpose emerge as a writing practice that I focused on heavily. Most assignments require the writer’s input to some extent; however, in this phase, this theme was something that I was very passionate about and therefore took this to heart. Relating to purpose, argument was something that I focused on and learned a lot about. It is not enough to only focus on your purpose, but rather argue your claim with your purpose always in mind. It is important to present your argument in an organized fashion, in order for the reader/audience to understand your position. The purpose of your piece is what you intend to do, but do not flat out say, while your argument is usually written directly in the thesis. Additionally, an argument must be supported by evidence, which is what I used in the form of statistics and experts’ input that I was able to research and express in my Research Essay.

I was able to integrate multiple course learning outcomes and be able to showcase these abilities. One course outcome I was able to learn and implement was, “Compose texts that integrate your stance with appropriate sources using strategies such as summary, critical analysis, interpretation, synthesis, and argumentation.” I was able to study this outcome by picking out multiple sources and seeing how these sources would come together and could be used in my argument. I was able to line up my interests with these and present my argument through these sources.

 

Homework: Why it’s killing our kids

It is not common to hear students around the world ask, “Can we not have homework?” Hardly any students actually enjoy doing homework and most kids see it as an overwhelming chore. Now that most of us are in college, we do not receive as much homework, but rather consume more information in class and have a heavier workload geared more towards tests and projects. However, to further understand this feeling, you have to think back to when you were a young child. You most likely felt sad on Mondays especially knowing that you have to go do homework after an eight-hour school day. Homework was assigned to us almost every day, regardless of how much information we consumed in school that day. To make matters even worse, a lot of us could have tests the next day, but instead had to spend time going to school and doing homework, and when we got home this school and homework time took away time from studying for important assessments. Homework should be banned, or at the very least limited because it does not increase productivity, does not allow students to flourish outside of a classroom setting, and challenges students’ mental health.

Lory Hough, a well known author who publishes school and education-related articles for Harvard, argues in her article, “Are you down with or done with homework?” that there is no clear response for whether homework should be banned or not. She supports this idea by first discussing what Stephanie Brant, a principal of an elementary School in Gaithersburg, is implementing in her school, in that she is replacing homework with reading for thirty minutes, then discusses the benefits of cutting down homework or eliminating it as a whole, and finally speaking on the consequences of taking such action. Hough’s purpose is to show the dangers of giving too much and too little homework and explaining how every student functions and reacts differently in certain environments in order to spread awareness to a future change that could possibly end up impacting students negatively. She adopts a neutral, informative tone for her audience, the readers of Harvard Magazine and others interested in the topic of time and stress management for students. 

Hough illustrates this when she writes, “This past September, Stephanie Brant, principal of Gaithersburg Elementary School in Gaithersburg, Md., decided that instead of teachers sending kids home with math worksheets and spelling flash cards, students would instead go home and read. Every day for 30 minutes, more if they had time or the inclination, with parents or on their own. Twenty-first-century learners, especially those in elementary school, need to think critically and understand their own learning — not spend night after night doing rote homework drills.” In introducing this, Hough argues and keeps her ear open for Stephanie Brant’s claim, in that when students do homework based on content they learned at school after coming home from school, this benefits nobody. Relative to my claim, Hough explains that instead of being “robotic” and repeating what students should have learned at school, they should let their mind rest and let themselves “digest” and synthesize the content rather than overflowing. Hough implies that when there is an abundance of homework, this takes away from studying for “rigorous AP exams, midterms, finals, and essays.” Knowing that we are college students, this could not be more true,  where homework has overflowed our brains with content when we have a test in another class the next day.

Suzanne Capek Tingley, a former student and principal who is now a writer specializing in educational policies, addresses the topic of changing the workload of homework in her article “Should Students have Homework?”, published on the WGU website. She argues that lowering the amount of homework can benefit students heavily and can be an overall positive change. She supports this claim by explaining the burdens of homework, then examining the increasing number of schools banning homework, and finally showcases why homework should at least be decreased, if not limited significantly. Tingley’s purpose is to explain why homework needs to be limited in order to enforce change in schools that will benefit students and ultimately society as a whole. She adopts a persuasive, detailing tone for her audience, the readers of the WGU website and others interested in the topic of changing workload of homework or schoolwork in general. 

Similar to Hough, Tingley illustrates all of this when she states, “Child psychologist Kenneth Barish wrote in Psychology Today that battles over homework rarely result in a child’s improvement in school. Children who don’t do their homework are not lazy, he said, but they may be frustrated, discouraged, or anxious. And for kids with learning disabilities, homework is like “running with a sprained ankle. It’s doable, but painful.” The essence of Tingley’s claim is that homework is just simply not worth it in the amount it is currently given. She uses multiple studies to show that homework hardly affects course grades, if having any type of positive impact at all. With these hours of homework come mental health problems including anxiety, stress, and feelings being overwhelmed. Tingley is correct in the sense that assigning too much homework can in fact, decrease productivity because of an overburden and lead to anxiety, stress, and other potentially worse mental health problems.

Courtney B., a student who is writing to President Donald Trump, addresses the topic of the effects of homework on students in her letter, “Homework should be banned,” published in Letters2President. She argues that homework should be banned for students across all schools. She supports this claim by first giving her audience an informative background on the life of the student in an attempt for the audience to better understand her claim, then describing the circumstances of different students and explaining what students experience in their lives. Finally, she adds on to Hough’s idea by describing the direct negative effects that homework has on students and clearly describes in detail the negative consequences. Courtney’s purpose is to show how homework can negatively affect students in hopes of expressing this message clearly enough for homework to be banned in schools across the nation. She adapts a persuasive and logical tone by backing her claim with proven statistics for her audience, the readers of this letter to the president, and the president himself. 

As Courtney details, “ Senior lecturer at the Stanford Graduate School of Education and co-author of a study published in the Journal of Experimental Education, Denise Pope, found that spending too much time on homework meant that students were ‘not meeting their developmental needs or cultivating other critical life skills’ after surveying 4,317 students from 10 different high schools. Students were more likely to drop activities, not see friends or family, and not pursue hobbies they enjoy.” Courtney’s concept about homework taking too much time away from other productive activities can be applied to my reasoning that students should not continue doing homework if research does not support it. It is frustrating as a student to see yourself having to do hours of homework after coming home from a long day at school rather than being able to pursue a hobby or reflect on personal goals or desires. Courtney’s reasoning behind homework taking away too much time from a student’s free life directly relates to my claim that a student cannot flourish without having time to dedicate towards his/her passions outside of school.

Mikel Garmendia, a sixth grade student who gave the Ted Talk presentation, “Homework Overload”, published on Tedx Talks, addresses the topic of the effects of school work on mental health. He argues that having a homework overload from school affects students’ mental health in a negative way. He supports this claim by first speaking about the workload of a student on a general day-to-day basis, then speaks about the negative effects of homework on students by showing what homework will do to a student’s mental thought process, and finally presents a solution whereby homework can be drastically decreased for the better of school. Courtney B and Garmendia share a like minded mindset when relating how homework impacts a student’s mental health and headspace negatively. Garmendia’s purpose is to show how an excess of homework will actually decrease a student’s efficiency and can cause an unhealthy burden of stress in order to contribute to a global change towards giving less homework across all schools for students of all ages. 

Speaking in the Ted Talk, Germandia states that, “results showed that students indicated that homework as somewhat useful and only six percent said that homework is very useful for learning or preparation, but it’s not the homework that’s causing the lack of interest, it’s the amount that students are expected to do. The solution is so simple. Do not give out so much homework! If the school board is going to increase the amount of time of school, then so be it, because that just gives us students more time to practice and understand the concept inside the classroom rather than getting a boatload of homework they have no clue on what it’s asking you to do.” Germandia’s point is relevant to my reasoning that homework is an overkill given that he talks about how homework does not benefit students. Germandia suggests that productivity should be left in a class setting because when students are forced to do homework that they might not fully understand, it does no benefit to anybody. This can relate back to my claim that homework should be decreased because it will lead to stress and anxiety. Let me put it this way: would you rather practice the content that you learned in school when there is a teacher to guide you if you need assistance or at home where you may feel pressured if you do not fully understand something?. 

Now that these sources and their interpretations are presented, we can now better see how homework should be significantly decreased because of the lack of productivity and creativity a student will endure leading to stress, anxiety, and potentially even worse mental health outcomes. The continuation of homework will only add to this already pressure-filled conformist school system. It’s time to put our foot down and help the next generation of students flourish to the best of their ability!

Works Cited

Hough, Lory. “Are You Down With or Done With Homework?” Harvard Graduate School of Education, 2012, www.gse.harvard.edu/news/ed/12/01/are-you-down-or-done-homework. 

Tingley, Suzzane. “Should Students Have Homework?” Hey Teach!, 9 Aug. 2018, www.wgu.edu/heyteach/article/should-students-have-homework1808.html. 

B., Courtney. “Homework Should Be Banned.” Letters to the Next President, 24 Sept. 2016, letters2president.org/letters/739. 

“Homework Overload.” Performance by Mikel Garmendia, Tedx Talks, 2015.