The Dog Ate My Homework: A Qualitative Study of Students' Views of Their Homework Experiences
Students’ voices are underrepresented in the professional literature and public conversations regarding homework; therefore, this study was designed to include students’ voices in future conversations. This study examined the responses of ten high school students enrolled in an eleventh grade English Language and Composition Advanced Placement (AP) class at a rural public school. The findings of this study answer the research questions: 1. What are students’ experiences with homework? 2. In what ways have these experiences shaped students’ views of homework? Over a period of 16 weeks, the researcher gathered qualitative data via students’ responses to essay writing, a questionnaire, open-ended questions, journal writing, focus groups sessions, and social media (Twitter) postings. At the end of the study, the findings revealed that 1. Students worry and stress over trying to divide their time between homework completion and other obligations. 2. Students struggle to complete their homework assignments because they claim they are not academically prepared. 3. Students resist homework assignments they consider unnecessary. 4. Students realize completing homework can be meaningful. The findings of this study indicate that, for different reasons and at different times, the students in this study view homework as: assignment that affect arbitrarily affects their class grades; a way to prepare for tests; assignments not worth doing; something they do not need to know or want to know; assignments they will complete it if they have to; requirements they need to fulfill; opportunities to teach them to be responsible; a way to increase their retention of subject matter; confidence building opportunities. The students in this study also offer the following adjectives to describe homework: cumbersome, stressful, tiring, confusing, difficult, unimportant, pointless, useless, boring, common sense and counterproductive. This study points to the need for education stakeholders (i.e. policy makers and elected officials, school administrators, parents, post-secondary educators, and future employers) to consider students’ perspectives of their homework experiences and include them in future conversations about homework.
student perspectives, nontraditional homework, social networking, social media, purpose of homework, problems with homework
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