To focus on the quantity, or even the quality, of something is to discourage questions about whether it needs to be done at all. (Indeed, recent research casts doubt on its necessity even in high school.) I have heard from many teachers who have eliminated all homework, and they all report fabulous results, with students experiencing less stress and greater interest in learning without sacrificing achievement. You skipped right over asking why we should force kids to work what amounts to a second shift after getting home from a full day of school, particularly when there’s no evidence that any kind of homework is beneficial for younger students. Are we assigning the right amount of homework? Are parents helping their kids too much (or too little) with these assignments? A teacher who simply wonders whether (or when or how) to do x isn’t asking the far more consequential question: Must such matters really be decided unilaterally by the adult and imposed on students?īy the same token, if an administrator mulls what speaker or consultant to hire for a professional-development session, he or she has skipped asking the question, “Shouldn’t the teachers be deciding this?”ģ.

The same is true of solving tricky discipline problems, or deciding how to arrange and decorate the classroom. The latter requires not only relinquishing some control but learning more about students’ interests and how to involve them in figuring out which topics to pursue and how best to do so.

You skipped a big step by assuming we should be doing this for students rather than with them. How can we improve the quality of the curriculum?

And some let their students decide on their own final grade.Ģ. Even when administrators still demand a final course grade, these teachers never put a letter or number on any individual assignment. Fortunately, more teachers are doing just that in order to create classrooms that help students of all backgrounds and ability levels become more focused on (and excited about) the learning itself.

The question, then, isn’t how to grade but how to stop grading.

Classworks student