home assignment subject

Homework Planner

Our free homework planner printable will keep you organized and on top of your homework assignments. We also offer a digital version if you prefer. Both are free.

Homework Planner Template

Our free homework planner printable will keep you organized and on top of your homework assignments. If you prefer a digital version, you can open the PDF homework trackers on an iPad and write on them with a note-taking app and stylus (see digital planner ).

Select any homework planner template from the selection below. Select a format that you think will work best for you.

Homework Calendar

When I was a student, I personally loved using a homework calendar. It helped me see the bigger picture and take all of my obligations into account. You can use the homework calendar template as is or you can edit it to suit your needs. Add your list of assignments below. Add each assignment to the calendar on the due date. This is a blank calendar that you can use for any month.

Word | Editable PDF | Image

The following homework schedule is similar to the one above but it doesn’t have a list of assignments.

Add your list of assignments or homework on the due date. Mark each one once you have completed it.

Daily Homework Planner

This daily homework planner will help you keep track of assignments received and due.

Word | Editable PDF | Image | Excel

Editable PDF | Image

Weekly Homework Planner

This weekly school planner will keep track of the assignments and homework you received all week and when each one is due. There is also a checkbox to mark it when it is complete.

Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday

Thursday and Friday

Homework Checklist

If you select the Excel version, then there is a dropdown list to select the subject, priority, and status. You can edit the list of subjects under the “subjects” tab. Each subject is automatically assigned a color code . All assignments that are due the next day are colored red. Assignments due that week are orange and those that are due that month are yellow.

Word | Editable PDF | Excel | PNG

This homework tracker can track your homework assignments, the subjects, due dates, and the status of each assignment. There is a dropdown list to select the subject and each subject will be marked with a different color. To change the list of subjects, go to the subject tab and list each subject. The priority can be either urgent, high, normal, or low. The status is either “to do” or “done”. You can change the priority or the status in the tabs.

Assignment Tracker

This Excel spreadsheet keeps track of assignments, who is responsible for each, and when each assignment is due. The color of each assignment changes according to the due date. When the assignment is due it will turn yellow. You can also open this spreadsheet on Google Sheets.

What is a homework planner?

This is a planner to track your homework and assignments to ensure that you prepare and submit everything on time. An assignment planner can keep track of all your assignments and is a great tool for priority management. However, if you have other obligations such as tests, social and family gatherings, etc, it might be better to prepare a planner that takes all your obligations into account. If you have a family gathering the day before a test, then you will know you will need to start studying one day earlier than you would have. If you don’t keep track of deadlines and everything you need to do, you might find yourself stressed or too late to get everything done. Planning will take the stress out of school and help you be more productive and organized.

How to use an assignment tracker?

Learning how to manage your time is an essential skill that will be needed later on in life as well. Time management is something that sets efficient people apart from those who do not manage their time well and get little done or even fall apart when stressed. Our job as parents is to give our children the skills and tools to manage their time well and get things done, even when they have a lot on their plate.

Start helping your kids to get organized when they are young. Help them write their assignments in their planner. Help them organize their time and schedule. The younger they are, the less they have on their plate. This is the time to help them acquire the skills they will need when they are older and obligations start to become more overwhelming. Remind your kids to review their planner regularly until it becomes a habit. By the time they are older, in high school or college, they will be able to manage their time efficiently.

It isn’t enough to write assignments and homework in a planner when you receive them. In order for a planner to be efficient, you will need to review it regularly. Start a daily habit where you check your homework calendar daily to see what needs to be done. This should be part of your child’s daily routine. If it isn’t feasible to check daily, then it should happen at least once or twice a week. If that doesn’t work, then try setting reminders on your phone.

How to make a homework planner?

Choose whether you want a weekly assignment planner or a daily or monthly planner. Whatever works for you. Scan the templates on this page and see which one you think will be the most helpful. If you like it as-is then download the PDF version. If you prefer to edit it to meet your specific needs then select the Microsoft Word version and edit as you please. Make it work for you.

If you feel comfortable using a spreadsheet then try the assignment deadline spreadsheet template above.

If you are a college student, then you might want a comprehensive student planner that includes a homework tracker:

• College Student Planner (our free student planner includes a class schedule and all other tools you will need during the school year)
• Best Planners for College Students
• School Calendar Template

2 thoughts on “Homework Planner”

amazing resources for students- thank you.

Thank you for your wonderful collaboration with these material 🙂

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How to Create a Homeschool Schedule (with 10 Sample Schedules & Template)

Jeanne faulconer, m.a..

As a homeschool evaluator in Virginia and a homeschool mom for 20 years, I've worked with hundreds of kids in families who have used all kinds of weekly homeschool schedules.

In this post, I will explain some of the many different types of homeschool schedules that families have successfully implemented, including examples and a template for you to use to create your own.

As you read over the many different ideas below, keep in mind that homeschoolers sometimes find families have to change their approach and their expectations or do things a different way. Adapting to what works best for your family is part of the wonderful flexibility of homeschooling.

Video: Homeschool Schedules Overview with Jeanne

Tips for creating a homeschool schedule, 10 example schedules & template printable, homeschool schedule faqs, the effective homeschool schedule.

Creating an effective weekly schedule can look different for each family. Some families have schedules that look like school schedules, but most families use the flexibility of homeschooling to create a weekly schedule that is customized for them. How do you make a homeschool schedule that works?

Here are some tips that will help you to avoid pitfalls as you create your family's schedule.

• Start with a broad view of your typical weekly and monthly activities. With a firm grasp of those basic commitments and the needs of your family in mind, you can develop a good plan for an effective homeschool schedule.
• Before you start thinking about your typical homeschool schedule for the week, put your weekly and monthly commitments and kids' activities on the calendar so you can take them into consideration. Then focus on a creating a basic homeschooling schedule for your week around the basic commitments and responsibilities.
• Include your household weekly/daily routine in the basic commitments you include on your calendar. You will need the cushion in your schedule for these non-homeschooling responsibilities.
• Evaluate whether consistency in your daily homeschool schedule is important to you. Some of the options result in each daily schedule being different, while others may look the same each day of the week.
• After deciding on the basic schedule that will work best for your family, keep your initial planning and work assignments to a month or less until you see how the schedule is working for you. If you need to switch gears, you haven't wasted time on schedules that will need to be reworked.
• Do not plan to start off in high gear. Doing too much, too fast, and for too long often results in burnout—your kids' and yours. Instead, invest in the process of deschooling before jumping into a new schedule with both feet.
• Consider starting with one academic subject at a time and adding in more over days or weeks. Many experienced homeschoolers even do this when transitioning to each new school year.

Here are some of the different schedules I have seen work to create a productive homeschooling week. I have included pros and cons for each type of homeschool schedule, and we've put together a free printable with sample homeschool schedules since seeing an example of each schedule type can be helpful.

The Traditional Five-Day Week Schedule

Pros: Works well with pre-planned curricula

Cons: Does not take advantage of the flexibility homeschooling offers

Yes, many follow a homeschool schedule that looks similar to a school schedule, doing five or more academic subjects each day for all five week-days. This can feel familiar, and many curricula make the assumption that this is the schedule you'll follow, so if you're big into pre-planning and use a formal curriculum, the five-day school week may be the schedule for you.

The Four-Day Week Schedule

Pros: Leaves a free day for other activities; the homeschool day closely matches the public school day of other neighborhood kids

Cons: May require adjusting pre-made lesson plans

Some families do traditional academics Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday and leave the fifth day free. This often morphs into "Field Trip Fridays," either as families or members of the same homeschool group or co-op plan field trips for the end of the week. Even though some families may not take a field trip every Friday, they leave that day open for errands, appointments, library day, and a head start on weekend trips. Some curricula offer both four- and five-day plans, built right into their materials.

The One-Subject-a-Day Schedule

Pros: Allows more in-depth study and less time refocusing

Cons: May require review due to longer time between covering subject material

Other families divide their learning into traditional school subjects and address one subject each day. For example, they might do math on Mondays, English on Tuesdays, science on Wednesdays, social studies on Thursdays, and electives or "anything else" on Fridays (art, music, foreign language, etc.). The order  might vary from family to family, but the idea is to focus on one subject more thoroughly and in-depth on each day.

The One-Subject-a-Day- Plus Schedule

Pros: Allows more in-depth study and less time refocusing but allows for more repetition where needed

Cons:  May require review on less frequented subjects; some kids resist repetition of more frequented subjects

The parents and/or kids in families using this type of homeschool schedule like delving deeply into one subject per day, but they also want to do some of certain specific subjects every day. The "plus" is commonly math practice, memory work practice, and/or language arts, so they'll spend time  every  homeschooling day doing those added ("plus") things, followed by one other subject.

For example, on Mondays they might do math and spelling, followed by science. On Tuesdays they might do math and grammar, followed by history. On Wednesdays they might do math and writing, followed by geography. And so on.

For a younger child, the language arts portion might be a reading lesson or reading practice each day. For a child who wants to write or who needs practice, it might be writing each day.

Memory work, which is an approach some families might take for learning facts like state names and locations, multiplication tables, geologic time periods, or U.S. presidents, is obviously something that works better when revisited frequently.

In any case, homeschool parents using this kind of weekly homeschool schedule may have several things that are done daily because they are seen as the priority or because they are "practice-oriented," while they designate other subjects for each day to give time for real exploration. If science can take up more time on Tuesday instead of switching from subject to subject every 45 minutes to an hour, then you have time to watch a documentary, read a passage, and do an experiment, all related to the same scientific concept. You will be building a lot of context for that science learning all within the same day, making it easier for a child to make connections rather than shifting gears constantly.

The Co-op-Driven Schedule

Pros:  Helps families be more realistic about the amount of time a co-op commitment takes

Cons:  Can sometimes squeeze out time at home and relaxed learning opportunities

Some families belong to academic homeschool co-ops that meet on a regular schedule, commonly once per week. While some co-ops are self-contained, with the kids doing enrichment learning at co-op with no expected follow-up, other co-ops have the core academic subjects. Students are expected to do assignments at home and study for tests given by co-op teachers.

Parents will arrange their weekly schedules at home to help their children prepare for the coming classes at co-op. In my homeschooling life, I've been involved in Monday co-ops, Wednesday co-ops, and Thursday co-ops, some of which had homework expectations and some which did not, driven by the type of learning situation my kids wanted. If the co-op has the core academic classes a parent or child wants covered, then other academic interests that are independent of the co-op are also worked in around co-op homework, spread throughout the other days of the week.

The University-Model Schedule

Pros:  May cover all subjects with teachers who are experts in their fields

Cons:  Not a good fit for kids who are not traditionally academic or have poor executive function skills

In some states, there are university-model homeschool co-ops where classes meet twice a week, using the same type of scheduling you'd commonly find on college campuses. A student might attend four classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and have Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays to complete homework at home. At other such co-ops, a child might be in the classroom four days a week, with a Monday/Wednesday set of classes and a Tuesday/Thursday set of classes.

Yes, this really does become somewhat more like a private school (and some private schools do operate this way), but in some cases, the kids really aren't there more than several hours per day and don't have access to the kind of comprehensive services that a school offers. Their education continues to be directed by their parents, and there is no official diploma awarded by the co-op.

Obviously, this kind of co-op has a lot of the same kind of scheduling and homework challenges that attending school has. On the other hand, it may give students access to teachers who are more expert in their fields or to a more structured type of learning that they want or that the parent is seeking.

These kinds of co-ops may sound like a dream come true for someone who has recently taken a child out of school in order to homeschool ("They cover all the subjects!"), but don't be fooled; using a co-op as a replacement for school does not always work well, especially immediately following withdrawing from school. Instead, consider deschooling first.

Some families use this kind of block scheduling at home without attending a University-Model school. Implementing this model at home is more flexible for students who are not working on the same grade level in all subjects and for families who like the block scheduling but don't want to (or can't) participate in a co-op.

The Shift-Work Schedule

Pros:  Can tag team homeschooling between parents; kids see more of their employed parent(s)

Cons:  Odd schedules can make sports, activities, and social time more difficult to arrange; hard to homeschool when neighbor kids want to play after their school

Some families have a parent who is working a more unusual shift or schedule, such as a hospital nurse or a firefighter who works three or four days on with three or four days off. Homeschooling can be coordinated to take place while  the parent is working -- if the other parent is an at-home parent doing the homeschooling. This way time off can be maximized with togetherness rather than worries about academics.

Another approach may be scheduling the academics purposely during the off shift. This way, in a two-parent family, both parents can participate in the homeschooling, or in a single-parent family, the homeschooling can take place during time off with child care covering the work hours.

You can definitely create a homeschool schedule that takes your work schedule into account.

The Extracurricular and Class-Driven Schedule

Pros:  Can increase commitment to specific priorities like sports or a special class

Cons:  Easy to over-schedule and leave too little time at home

In a large or busy family, extracurricular activities, sports, volunteering, and classes in the community go on the weekly schedule first. For example, the local science museum may be offering an eight-week class in archaeology on Tuesdays, and all three kids go for piano lessons on Thursdays, followed by library story hour. Fridays may be the day that your family volunteers at the animal shelter or at the food pantry.

Families who make liberal use of these kinds of resources work other academics around these outside activities. I have known many families who have found that their kids took off with Scouts and 4-H projects to the extent that they actually became a large part of their academic learning, so prioritizing them made sense.

Just as a matter of practicality, outside activities aren't going to bend to your personal schedule unless you are the organizer, so putting outside commitments on the calendar first is just a reality, especially as children get older.

Sometimes the "other things" on the calendar really do drive your homeschool schedule, and that's okay!

The What-We-Need-to-Do and What-We-Want-to-Do Schedule

Pros:  May help develop executive function, planning skills, and creativity if parent partners with child or teen

Cons:  May be easy to leave kids on their own without resources they need for their studies and projects

Families who use project-based homeschooling , interest-based homeschooling , unschooling , unit studies, and interdisciplinary homeschooling may not find school subjects or community activities to be the most compelling aspects of their weekly schedule. Instead, their homeschooling may revolve around where the project or interest or study leads . Their days of the week are organized around what they need and want to do to follow up on interests or projects.

That might mean a day at home to research and plan and make lists. This might be followed by a day out to shop for supplies and materials. Then a day at home to build and create the project, along with more list-making and research for another round of resource-gathering. There might need to be a day to visit with a mentor or go to the library for books, or a day to wait for help from Dad or Aunt Janie.

Homeschooling parents using one of these approaches may keep their weekly schedules fluid and ever-changing with each project, or they may have designated days that they know they will "stay home" or "be out," and they tack on what is needed for the week's learning to certain days. That way, material gathering will always be done on Tuesdays -- a designated "out" day, while kids can look forward to help and undisturbed time for working on projects on Wednesday -- a designated "home" day.

The Alternating Home/Out Schedule

Pros:  Balances time at home with time going to classes, sports, co-op, and errands

Cons: Outside activities may not fit your out days; packing so much into "out" days is challenging with babies and young children

In fact, many homeschooling families, especially those with young children, find that a mainstay of organizing their homeschool schedules is that alternating pattern of home- and out-days. A big day of errands, lessons, grocery shopping and volunteering needs to be followed by a slower paced home-based day to give everyone time to recover and have time for reading, playing, exploring, and helping with home maintenance. This may especially be true for people living where there are a lot  of activities available to homeschoolers, so they have to be careful not to over-schedule.

However, it can also be a wise rhythm for families who live in rural areas who have to drive long distances to activities: scheduling firm home days can be a relief from being in the car too much and valuing outside activities over home-based ones.

The home/out alternating schedule also provides relief for both your extroverted children and introverted children -- who can look forward to having time to recharge with the level of interaction that helps them function best.

How do I create a homeschool schedule?

• Put high priority weekly and monthly activities on a weekly schedule worksheet first—things like library days, homeschool co-op, music lessons, sports practices, and grocery day.
• Consider grouping some regular “out-of-the-house” activities on the same day. 
• Look at days without outside activities and the time between commitments.Those days and those blocks of time are the time you can help your child learn at home. 
• If you are using curriculum, space lessons out in the available time, leaving time for meals and breaks. If you are using an interest-led or project-based approach, you’ll want a more fluid schedule that includes time to gather resources or meet with mentors. 
• If shift work and employment are part of your picture, you’ll account for work schedules, so you can homeschool around work commitments. 

We have example schedules in this post for many different scenarios, and our free printable with example homeschool schedules includes blank worksheets you can customize with your activities.

How many hours a day should I spend homeschooling?

There are two factors when deciding how long to homeschool each day: what’s effective and what’s required . 

Most states do not have any required hours while a few states require homeschooling parents to log hours in writing. Homeschoolers in your state can give you tips for meeting requirements. If it’s not required in your state, you do not need to meet a certain number of hours “just in case,” and your homeschool day does not need to look like a school day. 

Remember, you aren’t teaching a large “class” of students, and your children are also learning when you are not actively teaching. You may formally work with a kindergartener or first grader for an hour, spread out during several parts of the day because of short attention spans. 

A six year old may have an attention span as short as eight to ten minutes! But lots of things count: following a recipe while cooking with Mom or Dad, listening to a bedtime story, watching a dinosaur documentary, gathering wild flowers and talking about how they need sun, earth, and rain to grow.

As kids grow older, homeschooling can expand to fill more hours of the day. Remember that insisting on completion of a lesson, chapter, or complete problem set may not be as effective as stopping after a certain amount of understanding or effort. You’re homeschooling—you can meet the needs of your child rather than your curriculum. 

How many days a week should I homeschool?

Homeschool for the number of days each week that creates a positive experience for you and your kids. 

Many curricula assume five days a week or have a second option for four days a week. However, you can spread lessons over more or fewer days depending on what works for your family. This may vary from year to year and even from child to child and subject to subject! 

Some homeschoolers homeschool year round and don’t worry about a certain number of days each week. Some homeschoolers do not separate “homeschooling days” from “non-homeschooling days,” since learning happens all the time. That five-day-a-week “schedule” originates with schools rather than families and may not apply to your family. That’s especially true if you’re using resources rather than a paced curriculum or if you are homeschooling through projects or your child’s interests. 

Check your state law to see if there are requirements for tracking hours or days of homeschooling, and learn how homeschoolers in your area meet the requirement. There is often more flexibility than you expect.

What does a homeschool day look like?

While many families start with a schedule planned to the clock, a flexible approach is to start with a rhythm or routine, often organized around meals, snacks, the baby’s naps, afternoon walks, or other “anchors” to the day you choose. This way, you and the children always know, after breakfast, you gather to read aloud and have “morning time” discussions. Then math. After math, a snack and time to walk the dog. Then a music listening activity or science documentary during lunch, and so on. 

Homeschool days vary so much depending on the ages of children in the family, how many outside activities they are involved in, and whether parents are employed outside the home. One family’s days may involve theater rehearsal twice a week at 1 pm. Another family may do farm chores before breakfast. 

While some parents structure their days so all homeschooling is done in one block, other parents may discover that after 45 minutes of concentration, the kids do better if they play outside for an hour and then resume homeschooling. If you could peek into the homes of a hundred different homeschooling families, you’d see a hundred different homeschool days, most looking not very much like school schedules. You can structure your homeschool day so it works for you and the kids. 

How do I loop a schedule for homeschooling?

To create a loop schedule, list all the homeschool subjects and activities you’re planning to do. Begin with the top item on the list, and then spend time each day working on “what’s next” on the list. 

If you get through three subjects on Monday, then on Tuesday, begin with the fourth subject on the list. Perhaps you get through just two things that day, so on Wednesday, start with the sixth item, and so on. When you get to the end of the list, loop back to the beginning, no matter what day it is.

You can have “repeats” in your list intentionally, so you hit those activities or lessons more often. You can also mix and match looping with one of the other approaches to scheduling. Commonly, parents might do math and language arts every day, but create a list of looped studies or practices for history, science, music, art and interest-led learning.

Looping might be activity-based rather than subject-based, too. Instead of listing English, math, science, history and so on, you might list activities such as read aloud, nature walk, handcraft/art, project time, etc.

You can fit “what’s next” on your looping list into specific hours of the day (which gives you a good stopping time each day), or you can keep your hours open ended so you stay with a project that is engaging the kids, knowing you can pick up on other priorities on a different day. Start with the next thing on your list! 

The truth is, most homeschooling parents have to consider many of these things in creating a strong homeschool schedule for their week.

They may participate in a co-op, have regularly scheduled outside activities, do shift work,  and  use a curriculum alongside interest-based learning and projects. Or, they may be unschoolers whose kids nonetheless participate in a co-op and a lot of community activities, service work, and time with mentors.

Everyone also has to figure in time for grocery shopping, meal preparation , laundry, home maintenance, and appointments, and many have to include part-time or full-time work.

An effective homeschool schedule takes these things into consideration, along with time for the student to do independent work and for the homeschooling parent(s) to take a break and pursue their own interests .

You might find some kind of weekly planner to be a useful tool in scheduling your homeschooling and as something you can post on the fridge to keep your whole family aware of the regularly occurring weekly events (TheHomeSchoolMom has a free homeschool planner here ).

In any case, thinking not only about your homeschool year but also your weekly homeschool schedule can be valuable in preparing for your upcoming season of homeschooling. Rest assured that not everyone follows a school pattern for their homeschool schedule, and you can flex your week to meet your family's needs—and your own.

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Thank you for all this information. I have been a high school certified math teacher for over 20 years. I have also taught K-12 grade in various other subjects. I decided this year not to return to the classroom. I have been asked by a family member if I would consider homeschooling their 3 year old. I am considering this. The idea of homeschooling has always interested me but my hubby was not on board with it when our children were younger. I have learned a lot from your website but I am apprehensive about taking this on.

Do you have information or advice in regards to homeschooling someone else's child. What are some pros and cons?

Homeschooling someone else's child may or may not be legal in your state, so that's the first thing to figure out. And, it may be legal in some states when conducted by a certified teacher like you. This article, Can Somebody Homeschool My Kids? will have more relevant information for you.

Keep in mind that you may be able to "homeschool" a child before compulsory attendance age without any special laws coming into play other than those that may be in place for child care.

Best of luck, Jeanne

Wow! This is incredible. I'm homeschooling my 3rd child - my other two are homeschool graduates now. Even though I've been through this twice before - this is soo helpful! Child #3 has some medical issues so her schooling is a little more challenging. Thank you for sharing! You made my day!

It always helps to see examples of how various families are working out homeschool schedules, doesn't it? So glad you have found this helpful. Yes, even though you've been through it before, you're still revisiting the basic challenges of homeschooling, especially with those added medical issues.

Thanks for letting us know we made your day. That makes our day!

What about a 2 subject a day schedule? Monday to Friday, then Saturday Physical Education? What are the pros and cons? I was planning 2 hours a day, since I work from 1:30pm to 5:30pm so it would be from 6pm to 8pm. My son is 3 years old, he's very physical, easily distracted unless I put his hands on something, then he pay attention, hyper and speech delayed, taking speech/occupational therapy on mornings, I'm a book freak, I prefer planned things, checklists, organization, etc.

-What are the pros and cons of 2 subjects a day schedule? -Can I make it work for my boy needs (Speech delay, kinesthetic learner)? -Will we crash together as a textbooks freak, organized, schedule mom vs kinesthetic learner, hyper, speech delayed kid?

Two subjects a day will work if it works for YOU and for your CHILD. That is the most important aspect of any homeschool schedule.

The "cons" with a 3 year old are mainly related to attention span and developmental stage. I would expect most 3s to pay attention to an adult agenda for about 5 or 6 minutes with a break for 30 minutes to an hour for play. Yes, if you are trying to use textbooks and if you are inflexible about lesson times with a 3 yo, you may find challenges in making that work.

Many 3s are kinesthetic and easily distracted, which is developmentally appropriate for that stage, so it's not just your kiddo. For preschool (and honestly for a lot of kids well beyond that stage), I like to recommend that parents think of using a routine rather than a strict schedule, so that parent and child can have expectations about the ways their days usually progress—but without an inflexible schedule that is unrealistic for such young children.

Remember to claim the "book freak" aspect of yourself as your OWN without feeling it necessary to apply it to your 3 yo, who may or may not grow into the same proclivity you have!

And look for your child's responses to guide you in what is working. A young child who engages is showing you what works. A young child who resists is showing you what doesn't work. The goal of any routine or schedule should be to cultivate those moments of engage them and then "quit while you are ahead," before going on "too long" accidentally creates resistance. That's because with a 3, your primary goal should be helping them begin to love learning. Extra lessons that are taking place without engagement because of a "schedule" will create negative associations with learning.

Watch your child, not the clock!

Looking forward, Jeanne

Great article. Detailed and simplified for first time homeschoolers looking for schedule options to explore for their homeschool.

I'm glad you found the article helpful, Tiffany. There are so many ways to arrange homeschool days and weeks. That said, it seems like specific examples help newer homeschooling parents really comprehend the amount of flexibility they have.

Thanks for commenting! Jeanne

I'm making a few prints of some of the documents from the Master Planner pages. There is a Menu-To Do List-Chore Chart page that has B L D S labels and slots for entries. What's the S?

Hi Theresa - The S is for Snack.

I'm wondering how single/divorced parents work out a homeschool schedule. My children are old enough to be home alone while I work but aren't keeping up with the schedule I planned. The goal was that they'd work independently while I'm at work and I could pick up on more difficult lessons when I get home but that's more of a dream than reality. I don't have any family or friends who could "oversee" them and am having difficulty finding a sitter or tutor who would work 3-4 hrs a day to keep them on task. I'm not sure I can keep up with spending all my time after work and on weekends homeschooling without burning out pretty quickly. Any advice?

Hi Anonymous,

Sounds like your kids are old enough to be home alone, but not ready to be home alone and responsible for school work of the type you are expecting. I hear that your goal of them working at home and then you helping with difficult things at night is not working out.

It's pretty common for homeschooling not to work out the way people hope. Many people find they have to change their homeschooling approach and their expectations or do things a different way.

You don't say what type of homeschooling they are expected to do while you're gone, but it's really not unusual for kids not to be able to work independently, especially if a program is not engaging them.

My suggestions are to try something that is more engaging for them, that they want to work on while you are out. This could be a different approach to homeschooling altogether or a different curriculum.

You might also try flipping the timing - with them doing homeschool work in the evenings when you are home. They may gradually become more independent, partly in an effort to get their evenings more free - or they may really need the assistance to stay on task, which would not be unusual. Many people who work do indeed homeschool at night and on weekends to make things work.

You might also try finding another homeschooling parent who needs to earn extra money, who might be interested in having your kids several days a week and helping them with what they're learning. A university student might also be a good option, if you have a university near you. We have an article called Can Somebody Homeschool My Kids that explains some of the possibilities.

I would also suggest that you find and network with other employed parents who are homeschooling, so you get support and ideas about how they are working things out.

While many employed parents do make homeschooling work well, there are a lot of variables that can make it easier or harder in some families. Some kids are just compliant about doing expected work, or they so strongly desire to learn at home that they are willing to do it while a parent is away. However, many of us don't have those kids, and we have to find other ways to help them learn - a different schedule, a different program, a different setting, etc. Some people find they are able to take kids with them to the office or work part-time from home to make it work. Some check in using Facetime or Skype to help kids keep things on track.

When something isn't working, homeschoolers tweak and change to try out new ideas. Good luck in finding something that will work for your family!

I would say, maybe try giving them incentives to finish their work. Give them a schedule to follow, and as soon as they finish their core subjects, they can have a hour or two of free time (a movie/documentary, video games, or hobbies) and a snack. As soon as they are done they can check in with you (call or text) and you can give the okay for their free time. You can help them with whatever they had issues with when you get home. If they don't fulfill their responsibilities they lose privileges. If they do, then they maintain or gain privileges. If there is anyone who would be willing to give them a call or stop by to check on them, this can be helpful too, to hold them accountable. Maybe the other parent if he or she is still involved. I'm going to say a prayer for you right now. I'm sorry you are going through this difficult situation. I was a single mother of 4 once, so I understand. I pray that you will have a blessed homeschool journey and that you will find the resources and people who will support you along the way.

As I’m sitting here contemplating our 6th year.. can’t believe it’s been 6 years.. I’m considering how to adjust our schedule for the changes that inevitably come with growing kiddos. Your article was a huge relief for me to read. We do not only a 4 day week but have a field trip Friday! Also, I had never considered a subject per day. With the kids getting older the subjects become more in depth. This is my solution subject per day plus! Love it. Thank you so much for writing this article. Even though we have our RE we still stay ahead of the PS curve 🙂

Jen, the "one-subject-per-day-PLUS" is a really workable solution. Many people find they are "almost" doing it, but their brain hasn't quite freed up that idea that they could have Science Mondays, History Tuesdays, Art Wednesdays and so on - but do their math and language arts every day. I love how this option allows for deep dives.

And enjoy those Field Trip Fridays!

Well done! I have only been home schooling my kids for 5 years, but find this info to be on point with what I have observed. We do the 4 day method and reserve the 5th day for a co-op that does the fun, elective type stuff like art and gym. Next fall we are also looking at adding homeschool partnership classes...drums, piano, and swimming lessons. I get overwhelmed wondering how I will pack it all in, but every year can look different...so I know I can change it up if it gets go be too much. Anyway, thanks for the great article! I enjoyed reading it.

Glad you found the info to be on point. You are right that homeschooling changes from year-to-year. That's one reason why we want parents to be aware of the many ways they can schedule their weeks.

There are lots of great options for scheduling, and homeschoolers' schedules don't have to look like school schedules.

Good luck adding in the new activities. You'll find your rhythm!

I really love this article. You explain the different schedules so well. Thank you!

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How to Do Homework: 15 Expert Tips and Tricks

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Everyone struggles with homework sometimes, but if getting your homework done has become a chronic issue for you, then you may need a little extra help. That’s why we’ve written this article all about how to do homework. Once you’re finished reading it, you’ll know how to do homework (and have tons of new ways to motivate yourself to do homework)!

We’ve broken this article down into a few major sections. You’ll find:

• A diagnostic test to help you figure out why you’re struggling with homework
• A discussion of the four major homework problems students face, along with expert tips for addressing them
• A bonus section with tips for how to do homework fast

By the end of this article, you’ll be prepared to tackle whatever homework assignments your teachers throw at you .

So let’s get started!

How to Do Homework: Figure Out Your Struggles 

Sometimes it feels like everything is standing between you and getting your homework done. But the truth is, most people only have one or two major roadblocks that are keeping them from getting their homework done well and on time. 

The best way to figure out how to get motivated to do homework starts with pinpointing the issues that are affecting your ability to get your assignments done. That’s why we’ve developed a short quiz to help you identify the areas where you’re struggling. 

Take the quiz below and record your answers on your phone or on a scrap piece of paper. Keep in mind there are no wrong answers! 

1. You’ve just been assigned an essay in your English class that’s due at the end of the week. What’s the first thing you do?

A. Keep it in mind, even though you won’t start it until the day before it’s due  B. Open up your planner. You’ve got to figure out when you’ll write your paper since you have band practice, a speech tournament, and your little sister’s dance recital this week, too.  C. Groan out loud. Another essay? You could barely get yourself to write the last one!  D. Start thinking about your essay topic, which makes you think about your art project that’s due the same day, which reminds you that your favorite artist might have just posted to Instagram...so you better check your feed right now. 

2. Your mom asked you to pick up your room before she gets home from work. You’ve just gotten home from school. You decide you’ll tackle your chores: 

A. Five minutes before your mom walks through the front door. As long as it gets done, who cares when you start?  B. As soon as you get home from your shift at the local grocery store.  C. After you give yourself a 15-minute pep talk about how you need to get to work.  D. You won’t get it done. Between texts from your friends, trying to watch your favorite Netflix show, and playing with your dog, you just lost track of time! 

3. You’ve signed up to wash dogs at the Humane Society to help earn money for your senior class trip. You: 

A. Show up ten minutes late. You put off leaving your house until the last minute, then got stuck in unexpected traffic on the way to the shelter.  B. Have to call and cancel at the last minute. You forgot you’d already agreed to babysit your cousin and bake cupcakes for tomorrow’s bake sale.  C. Actually arrive fifteen minutes early with extra brushes and bandanas you picked up at the store. You’re passionate about animals, so you’re excited to help out! D. Show up on time, but only get three dogs washed. You couldn’t help it: you just kept getting distracted by how cute they were!

4. You have an hour of downtime, so you decide you’re going to watch an episode of The Great British Baking Show. You: 

A. Scroll through your social media feeds for twenty minutes before hitting play, which means you’re not able to finish the whole episode. Ugh! You really wanted to see who was sent home!  B. Watch fifteen minutes until you remember you’re supposed to pick up your sister from band practice before heading to your part-time job. No GBBO for you!  C. You finish one episode, then decide to watch another even though you’ve got SAT studying to do. It’s just more fun to watch people make scones.  D. Start the episode, but only catch bits and pieces of it because you’re reading Twitter, cleaning out your backpack, and eating a snack at the same time.

5. Your teacher asks you to stay after class because you’ve missed turning in two homework assignments in a row. When she asks you what’s wrong, you say: 

A. You planned to do your assignments during lunch, but you ran out of time. You decided it would be better to turn in nothing at all than submit unfinished work.  B. You really wanted to get the assignments done, but between your extracurriculars, family commitments, and your part-time job, your homework fell through the cracks.  C. You have a hard time psyching yourself to tackle the assignments. You just can’t seem to find the motivation to work on them once you get home.  D. You tried to do them, but you had a hard time focusing. By the time you realized you hadn’t gotten anything done, it was already time to turn them in. 

Like we said earlier, there are no right or wrong answers to this quiz (though your results will be better if you answered as honestly as possible). Here’s how your answers break down: 

• If your answers were mostly As, then your biggest struggle with doing homework is procrastination. 
• If your answers were mostly Bs, then your biggest struggle with doing homework is time management. 
• If your answers were mostly Cs, then your biggest struggle with doing homework is motivation. 
• If your answers were mostly Ds, then your biggest struggle with doing homework is getting distracted. 

Now that you’ve identified why you’re having a hard time getting your homework done, we can help you figure out how to fix it! Scroll down to find your core problem area to learn more about how you can start to address it. 

And one more thing: you’re really struggling with homework, it’s a good idea to read through every section below. You may find some additional tips that will help make homework less intimidating. 

How to Do Homework When You’re a Procrastinator  

Merriam Webster defines “procrastinate” as “to put off intentionally and habitually.” In other words, procrastination is when you choose to do something at the last minute on a regular basis. If you’ve ever found yourself pulling an all-nighter, trying to finish an assignment between periods, or sprinting to turn in a paper minutes before a deadline, you’ve experienced the effects of procrastination. 

If you’re a chronic procrastinator, you’re in good company. In fact, one study found that 70% to 95% of undergraduate students procrastinate when it comes to doing their homework. Unfortunately, procrastination can negatively impact your grades. Researchers have found that procrastination can lower your grade on an assignment by as much as five points ...which might not sound serious until you realize that can mean the difference between a B- and a C+. 

Procrastination can also negatively affect your health by increasing your stress levels , which can lead to other health conditions like insomnia, a weakened immune system, and even heart conditions. Getting a handle on procrastination can not only improve your grades, it can make you feel better, too! 

The big thing to understand about procrastination is that it’s not the result of laziness. Laziness is defined as being “disinclined to activity or exertion.” In other words, being lazy is all about doing nothing. But a s this Psychology Today article explains , procrastinators don’t put things off because they don’t want to work. Instead, procrastinators tend to postpone tasks they don’t want to do in favor of tasks that they perceive as either more important or more fun. Put another way, procrastinators want to do things...as long as it’s not their homework! 

3 Tips f or Conquering Procrastination 

Because putting off doing homework is a common problem, there are lots of good tactics for addressing procrastination. Keep reading for our three expert tips that will get your homework habits back on track in no time. 

#1: Create a Reward System

Like we mentioned earlier, procrastination happens when you prioritize other activities over getting your homework done. Many times, this happens because homework...well, just isn’t enjoyable. But you can add some fun back into the process by rewarding yourself for getting your work done. 

Here’s what we mean: let’s say you decide that every time you get your homework done before the day it’s due, you’ll give yourself a point. For every five points you earn, you’ll treat yourself to your favorite dessert: a chocolate cupcake! Now you have an extra (delicious!) incentive to motivate you to leave procrastination in the dust. 

If you’re not into cupcakes, don’t worry. Your reward can be anything that motivates you . Maybe it’s hanging out with your best friend or an extra ten minutes of video game time. As long as you’re choosing something that makes homework worth doing, you’ll be successful. 

#2: Have a Homework Accountability Partner 

If you’re having trouble getting yourself to start your homework ahead of time, it may be a good idea to call in reinforcements . Find a friend or classmate you can trust and explain to them that you’re trying to change your homework habits. Ask them if they’d be willing to text you to make sure you’re doing your homework and check in with you once a week to see if you’re meeting your anti-procrastination goals. 

Sharing your goals can make them feel more real, and an accountability partner can help hold you responsible for your decisions. For example, let’s say you’re tempted to put off your science lab write-up until the morning before it’s due. But you know that your accountability partner is going to text you about it tomorrow...and you don’t want to fess up that you haven’t started your assignment. A homework accountability partner can give you the extra support and incentive you need to keep your homework habits on track. 

#3: Create Your Own Due Dates 

If you’re a life-long procrastinator, you might find that changing the habit is harder than you expected. In that case, you might try using procrastination to your advantage! If you just can’t seem to stop doing your work at the last minute, try setting your own due dates for assignments that range from a day to a week before the assignment is actually due. 

Here’s what we mean. Let’s say you have a math worksheet that’s been assigned on Tuesday and is due on Friday. In your planner, you can write down the due date as Thursday instead. You may still put off your homework assignment until the last minute...but in this case, the “last minute” is a day before the assignment’s real due date . This little hack can trick your procrastination-addicted brain into planning ahead! 

If you feel like Kevin Hart in this meme, then our tips for doing homework when you're busy are for you. 

How to Do Homework When You’re too Busy

If you’re aiming to go to a top-tier college , you’re going to have a full plate. Because college admissions is getting more competitive, it’s important that you’re maintaining your grades , studying hard for your standardized tests , and participating in extracurriculars so your application stands out. A packed schedule can get even more hectic once you add family obligations or a part-time job to the mix. 

If you feel like you’re being pulled in a million directions at once, you’re not alone. Recent research has found that stress—and more severe stress-related conditions like anxiety and depression— are a major problem for high school students . In fact, one study from the American Psychological Association found that during the school year, students’ stress levels are higher than those of the adults around them. 

For students, homework is a major contributor to their overall stress levels . Many high schoolers have multiple hours of homework every night , and figuring out how to fit it into an already-packed schedule can seem impossible. 

3 Tips for Fitting Homework Into Your Busy Schedule

While it might feel like you have literally no time left in your schedule, there are still ways to make sure you’re able to get your homework done and meet your other commitments. Here are our expert homework tips for even the busiest of students. 

#1: Make a Prioritized To-Do List 

You probably already have a to-do list to keep yourself on track. The next step is to prioritize the items on your to-do list so you can see what items need your attention right away. 

Here’s how it works: at the beginning of each day, sit down and make a list of all the items you need to get done before you go to bed. This includes your homework, but it should also take into account any practices, chores, events, or job shifts you may have. Once you get everything listed out, it’s time to prioritize them using the labels A, B, and C. Here’s what those labels mean:

• A Tasks : tasks that have to get done—like showing up at work or turning in an assignment—get an A. 
• B Tasks : these are tasks that you would like to get done by the end of the day but aren’t as time sensitive. For example, studying for a test you have next week could be a B-level task. It’s still important, but it doesn’t have to be done right away.
• C Tasks: these are tasks that aren’t very important and/or have no real consequences if you don’t get them done immediately. For instance, if you’re hoping to clean out your closet but it’s not an assigned chore from your parents, you could label that to-do item with a C.

Prioritizing your to-do list helps you visualize which items need your immediate attention, and which items you can leave for later. A prioritized to-do list ensures that you’re spending your time efficiently and effectively, which helps you make room in your schedule for homework. So even though you might really want to start making decorations for Homecoming (a B task), you’ll know that finishing your reading log (an A task) is more important. 

#2: Use a Planner With Time Labels

Your planner is probably packed with notes, events, and assignments already. (And if you’re not using a planner, it’s time to start!) But planners can do more for you than just remind you when an assignment is due. If you’re using a planner with time labels, it can help you visualize how you need to spend your day.

A planner with time labels breaks your day down into chunks, and you assign tasks to each chunk of time. For example, you can make a note of your class schedule with assignments, block out time to study, and make sure you know when you need to be at practice. Once you know which tasks take priority, you can add them to any empty spaces in your day. 

Planning out how you spend your time not only helps you use it wisely, it can help you feel less overwhelmed, too . We’re big fans of planners that include a task list ( like this one ) or have room for notes ( like this one ). 

#3: Set Reminders on Your Phone 

If you need a little extra nudge to make sure you’re getting your homework done on time, it’s a good idea to set some reminders on your phone. You don’t need a fancy app, either. You can use your alarm app to have it go off at specific times throughout the day to remind you to do your homework. This works especially well if you have a set homework time scheduled. So if you’ve decided you’re doing homework at 6:00 pm, you can set an alarm to remind you to bust out your books and get to work. 

If you use your phone as your planner, you may have the option to add alerts, emails, or notifications to scheduled events . Many calendar apps, including the one that comes with your phone, have built-in reminders that you can customize to meet your needs. So if you block off time to do your homework from 4:30 to 6:00 pm, you can set a reminder that will pop up on your phone when it’s time to get started. 

This dog isn't judging your lack of motivation...but your teacher might. Keep reading for tips to help you motivate yourself to do your homework.

How to Do Homework When You’re Unmotivated 

At first glance, it may seem like procrastination and being unmotivated are the same thing. After all, both of these issues usually result in you putting off your homework until the very last minute. 

But there’s one key difference: many procrastinators are working, they’re just prioritizing work differently. They know they’re going to start their homework...they’re just going to do it later. 

Conversely, people who are unmotivated to do homework just can’t find the willpower to tackle their assignments. Procrastinators know they’ll at least attempt the homework at the last minute, whereas people who are unmotivated struggle with convincing themselves to do it at a ll. For procrastinators, the stress comes from the inevitable time crunch. For unmotivated people, the stress comes from trying to convince themselves to do something they don’t want to do in the first place. 

Here are some common reasons students are unmotivated in doing homework : 

• Assignments are too easy, too hard, or seemingly pointless 
• Students aren’t interested in (or passionate about) the subject matter
• Students are intimidated by the work and/or feels like they don’t understand the assignment 
• Homework isn’t fun, and students would rather spend their time on things that they enjoy 

To sum it up: people who lack motivation to do their homework are more likely to not do it at all, or to spend more time worrying about doing their homework than...well, actually doing it.

3 Tips for How to Get Motivated to Do Homework

The key to getting homework done when you’re unmotivated is to figure out what does motivate you, then apply those things to homework. It sounds tricky...but it’s pretty simple once you get the hang of it! Here are our three expert tips for motivating yourself to do your homework. 

#1: Use Incremental Incentives

When you’re not motivated, it’s important to give yourself small rewards to stay focused on finishing the task at hand. The trick is to keep the incentives small and to reward yourself often. For example, maybe you’re reading a good book in your free time. For every ten minutes you spend on your homework, you get to read five pages of your book. Like we mentioned earlier, make sure you’re choosing a reward that works for you! 

So why does this technique work? Using small rewards more often allows you to experience small wins for getting your work done. Every time you make it to one of your tiny reward points, you get to celebrate your success, which gives your brain a boost of dopamine . Dopamine helps you stay motivated and also creates a feeling of satisfaction when you complete your homework !  

#2: Form a Homework Group 

If you’re having trouble motivating yourself, it’s okay to turn to others for support. Creating a homework group can help with this. Bring together a group of your friends or classmates, and pick one time a week where you meet and work on homework together. You don’t have to be in the same class, or even taking the same subjects— the goal is to encourage one another to start (and finish!) your assignments. 

Another added benefit of a homework group is that you can help one another if you’re struggling to understand the material covered in your classes. This is especially helpful if your lack of motivation comes from being intimidated by your assignments. Asking your friends for help may feel less scary than talking to your teacher...and once you get a handle on the material, your homework may become less frightening, too. 

#3: Change Up Your Environment 

If you find that you’re totally unmotivated, it may help if you find a new place to do your homework. For example, if you’ve been struggling to get your homework done at home, try spending an extra hour in the library after school instead. The change of scenery can limit your distractions and give you the energy you need to get your work done. 

If you’re stuck doing homework at home, you can still use this tip. For instance, maybe you’ve always done your homework sitting on your bed. Try relocating somewhere else, like your kitchen table, for a few weeks. You may find that setting up a new “homework spot” in your house gives you a motivational lift and helps you get your work done. 

Social media can be a huge problem when it comes to doing homework. We have advice for helping you unplug and regain focus.

How to Do Homework When You’re Easily Distracted

We live in an always-on world, and there are tons of things clamoring for our attention. From friends and family to pop culture and social media, it seems like there’s always something (or someone!) distracting us from the things we need to do.

The 24/7 world we live in has affected our ability to focus on tasks for prolonged periods of time. Research has shown that over the past decade, an average person’s attention span has gone from 12 seconds to eight seconds . And when we do lose focus, i t takes people a long time to get back on task . One study found that it can take as long as 23 minutes to get back to work once we’ve been distracte d. No wonder it can take hours to get your homework done! 

3 Tips to Improve Your Focus

If you have a hard time focusing when you’re doing your homework, it’s a good idea to try and eliminate as many distractions as possible. Here are three expert tips for blocking out the noise so you can focus on getting your homework done. 

#1: Create a Distraction-Free Environment

Pick a place where you’ll do your homework every day, and make it as distraction-free as possible. Try to find a location where there won’t be tons of noise, and limit your access to screens while you’re doing your homework. Put together a focus-oriented playlist (or choose one on your favorite streaming service), and put your headphones on while you work. 

You may find that other people, like your friends and family, are your biggest distraction. If that’s the case, try setting up some homework boundaries. Let them know when you’ll be working on homework every day, and ask them if they’ll help you keep a quiet environment. They’ll be happy to lend a hand! 

#2: Limit Your Access to Technology 

We know, we know...this tip isn’t fun, but it does work. For homework that doesn’t require a computer, like handouts or worksheets, it’s best to put all your technology away . Turn off your television, put your phone and laptop in your backpack, and silence notifications on any wearable tech you may be sporting. If you listen to music while you work, that’s fine...but make sure you have a playlist set up so you’re not shuffling through songs once you get started on your homework. 

If your homework requires your laptop or tablet, it can be harder to limit your access to distractions. But it’s not impossible! T here are apps you can download that will block certain websites while you’re working so that you’re not tempted to scroll through Twitter or check your Facebook feed. Silence notifications and text messages on your computer, and don’t open your email account unless you absolutely have to. And if you don’t need access to the internet to complete your assignments, turn off your WiFi. Cutting out the online chatter is a great way to make sure you’re getting your homework done. 

#3: Set a Timer (the Pomodoro Technique)

Have you ever heard of the Pomodoro technique ? It’s a productivity hack that uses a timer to help you focus!

Here’s how it works: first, set a timer for 25 minutes. This is going to be your work time. During this 25 minutes, all you can do is work on whatever homework assignment you have in front of you. No email, no text messaging, no phone calls—just homework. When that timer goes off, you get to take a 5 minute break. Every time you go through one of these cycles, it’s called a “pomodoro.” For every four pomodoros you complete, you can take a longer break of 15 to 30 minutes.

The pomodoro technique works through a combination of boundary setting and rewards. First, it gives you a finite amount of time to focus, so you know that you only have to work really hard for 25 minutes. Once you’ve done that, you’re rewarded with a short break where you can do whatever you want. Additionally, tracking how many pomodoros you complete can help you see how long you’re really working on your homework. (Once you start using our focus tips, you may find it doesn’t take as long as you thought!)

Two Bonus Tips for How to Do Homework Fast

Even if you’re doing everything right, there will be times when you just need to get your homework done as fast as possible. (Why do teachers always have projects due in the same week? The world may never know.)

The problem with speeding through homework is that it’s easy to make mistakes. While turning in an assignment is always better than not submitting anything at all, you want to make sure that you’re not compromising quality for speed. Simply put, the goal is to get your homework done quickly and still make a good grade on the assignment! 

Here are our two bonus tips for getting a decent grade on your homework assignments , even when you’re in a time crunch. 

#1: Do the Easy Parts First 

This is especially true if you’re working on a handout with multiple questions. Before you start working on the assignment, read through all the questions and problems. As you do, make a mark beside the questions you think are “easy” to answer . 

Once you’ve finished going through the whole assignment, you can answer these questions first. Getting the easy questions out of the way as quickly as possible lets you spend more time on the trickier portions of your homework, which will maximize your assignment grade. 

(Quick note: this is also a good strategy to use on timed assignments and tests, like the SAT and the ACT !) 

#2: Pay Attention in Class 

Homework gets a lot easier when you’re actively learning the material. Teachers aren’t giving you homework because they’re mean or trying to ruin your weekend... it’s because they want you to really understand the course material. Homework is designed to reinforce what you’re already learning in class so you’ll be ready to tackle harder concepts later.

When you pay attention in class, ask questions, and take good notes, you’re absorbing the information you’ll need to succeed on your homework assignments. (You’re stuck in class anyway, so you might as well make the most of it!) Not only will paying attention in class make your homework less confusing, it will also help it go much faster, too.

What’s Next?

If you’re looking to improve your productivity beyond homework, a good place to begin is with time management. After all, we only have so much time in a day...so it’s important to get the most out of it! To get you started, check out this list of the 12 best time management techniques that you can start using today.

You may have read this article because homework struggles have been affecting your GPA. Now that you’re on the path to homework success, it’s time to start being proactive about raising your grades. This article teaches you everything you need to know about raising your GPA so you can

Now you know how to get motivated to do homework...but what about your study habits? Studying is just as critical to getting good grades, and ultimately getting into a good college . We can teach you how to study bette r in high school. (We’ve also got tons of resources to help you study for your ACT and SAT exams , too!)

These recommendations are based solely on our knowledge and experience. If you purchase an item through one of our links, PrepScholar may receive a commission.

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How to Make a Homework Planner

Last Updated: July 27, 2024

This article was co-authored by Jake Adams and by wikiHow staff writer, Danielle Blinka, MA, MPA . Jake Adams is an academic tutor and the owner of Simplifi EDU, a Santa Monica, California based online tutoring business offering learning resources and online tutors for academic subjects K-College, SAT & ACT prep, and college admissions applications. With over 14 years of professional tutoring experience, Jake is dedicated to providing his clients the very best online tutoring experience and access to a network of excellent undergraduate and graduate-level tutors from top colleges all over the nation. Jake holds a BS in International Business and Marketing from Pepperdine University. This article has been viewed 46,446 times.

Keeping track of homework and assignment due dates can be tricky without an organizational strategy. With several classes worth of work to remember, relying on your memory can be a challenge. Put your mind at ease by making a homework planner, and soon you will have all of your assignments at your fingertips.

Crafting Your Own Planner

• You could also use just a calendar with extended areas for writing notes and planning. Also, you can use post-it or sticky notes to add extra notes to your planner.

• Notebook paper offers a quick solution because you probably already have some in your backpack.
• Blank computer paper allows you an unstructured space to plan, which may work really well for people who are creative.
• Using templates makes it easier to get started and stay organized. Since you’ll be printing your own templates, you can choose what best suits your needs. Templates may take more work than notebook paper, but they will make it easier to get started with your planning since the calendar and planning spaces are already created for you.
• Try printed papers for a fun approach to creating your planner. Visit your local craft store for tons of design options. If you use printed paper, keep in mind how you will be using the planner when you pick your designs. For example, don’t choose all dark colors if you want to write directly onto the paper because you won’t be able to see what you wrote.

• Organizing into monthly, weekly, and daily sections will allow you to keep similar planning sheets together. This is a standard format for many planners and will allow you to keep weeks together when the month changes midweek. It also allows you to be flexible with how you use your to-do list sheets.
• If you want to organize by month, take one monthly calendar and pair it with five weekly planning sheets and enough to-do list sheets to accommodate your planning needs.

• You can mark your sections by placing a sheet of colored paper between them.
• You could also use dividers or stick-on divider tabs.
• Another option is to mark the sections with tape. Take a strip of tape and fold it over on itself so that just the edges of the tape touch the paper between two sections, leaving the fold of the tape sticking out of the stack.
• If you have post-it notes, you can use them as section dividers or to highlight important sections.

• If you like to work on the computer, design your cover using your favorite app and then print it out.
• If you want to skip decorating your cover or want something that looks store-bought, use a piece of scrapbook paper from the craft store as your cover. For example, you could buy a piece of zebra print paper and print your planner title on the front.
• If you’re an artist, draw or paint your cover.
• If you don’t like to draw or craft, you could try decorating your planner with stickers that represent something you love, such as your hobby or favorite bands.

• You can also decide if this planner will be for all of your classes or just one of them. This could affect how many sections you decide to make.

• For a cleaner look, cut a two-inch-wide slip of paper and fold it so that it will fit over your staples. Glue the paper in place to make your homemade planner look like a composition book.
• You can also make a notebook using a hole punch and ribbon.

• Use the different colored inks for each class for the best results. [2] X Trustworthy Source Understood Nonprofit organization dedicated to resources and support to people with thinking differences, such as ADHD or dyslexia Go to source If you're using your planner for just one class, you could use different colored inks for different types of assignments. For example, you could use blue for essays, orange for worksheets, red for tests, etc.
• Enter assignments for the whole grading period at once, which will prevent you from overlooking due dates.
• Divide your larger assignments over several days so that you have time to complete the assignment. For example, if you have a science project due at the end of the month, you need to start working on it in advance. Write your project workdays onto your calendar as well.

Using a Standard Notebook

• If you’re artistic, take this as an opportunity to express your talent by sketching or painting your planner cover. Another option is to create a collage using clippings of photos, words, and phrases from a magazine. Simply glue the clippings to the cover of your notebook in your desired arrangement. To protect your work, self-laminate it with clear packing tape.
• If you enjoy crafting, you could glue fabric, paper, or magazine photos to your notebook.
• If you don’t like to draw or craft, you could try decorating your planner with stickers or photos. For example, you could cover your notebook with stickers representing your favorite bands, or you could print out your favorite photos of your friends to glue on the cover.

• Count out the number of sheets for each section. Because it’s your planner, how many sheets of paper you will need per section will depend on you. However, for a standard year-long planner, you would need at least 14 sheets of paper for monthly planning and 54 sheets of paper for weekly planning. Including extra sheets in each section will allow for section labels, do-overs, and section buffers.
• Create your section dividers by either using tape or cutting the edges of the paper. To make your dividers using tape, fold a piece of tape over on itself so that just the ends touch the paper. Leave a flap of tape sticking out from the paper so that you can easily see the divide between sections. You can also divide your planner by cutting the corners of two of your sections. For example, you could cut the top outer corner of the monthly calendars and cut the bottom outer corner of the weekly planning sheets, leaving your third section un-cut. This would allow you to easily find each of those three sections.

• To draw your calendar, you will need a ruler or a straight surface to trace. Using your ruler, draw a large box.
• Lengthwise, trace six evenly-spaced lines to create seven columns for the seven days of the week.
• Then draw four evenly-spaced lines down the width of the box to create the rows of weeks. When you are finished, you will have 35 boxes.
• Write the days of the week above each column.
• Write the name of the month and the correct dates for the first month of your homework planner.

• Draw a line down the center of your paper and then draw three evenly-spaced lines across your paper to create eight boxes.
• Label seven of the boxes with the days of the week, and label the eighth box “Notes.”

Using a Binder

• To avoid adding bulk to your backpack, print out calendars and weekly planning templates and put them in your regular binder. That way you can easily track your assignments without worrying about juggling an extra notebook.

• Open the rings on your binder and first insert your to-do list paper. Place an index divider on top of the stack.
• Add your monthly planning sheets, followed by the index divider for that section.
• Finally, add your calendars, and, if you like, an index divider for that section.
• You may want to also add a special index page or key that explains your organizational strategy.

Homework Planner Template

Expert Q&A

Using a Digital Planner

• If you already have an iPad or similar tablet device, there are a number of notetaking and calendar apps available that make digital planning an easy way to stay organized.
• You can take your notes or design your own custom planner directly through the apps, utilizing the numerous writing tools within them. However, you can also purchase planner templates from the internet to use as a base for your planner.
• New Semester, New Year, New Season. The first phase of maintaining a planner is to enter all known and repeating dates, these are usually established at the beginning of each new school year, semester, or season. The earlier you put these events in your planner, the better. It may take time to set this up, but the benefits are worth it! You’ll always know what’s going on rather than feeling in the dark.
• Sundays. The next anchor point is at the beginning of the week. First, take a look at your week ahead. Do you have any tests coming up? Special events? Appointments? Get familiar with your week at the front end to prevent surprises. Then, coordinate with your family during a Sunday Meeting.
• In Class. As soon as you receive a calendar or syllabus, enter: key dates, large assignments, projects, tests, and final exams in your planner. In class, assignments should be entered in a digital (or paper) planner as soon as they are assigned. Just be careful to not get distracted by other apps and messages.

Reader Videos

• You can customize the sections however you like, so don’t feel like you have to use the suggested sections. Thanks Helpful 1 Not Helpful 1
• Cutting out paper and gluing it into your planner is a great solution for people who hate drawing. Thanks Helpful 1 Not Helpful 1
• Take the time to personalize your homework planner so that you have an incentive to use it. Thanks Helpful 0 Not Helpful 1

• Don’t spend more time working on your planner than you do on your homework. Thanks Helpful 33 Not Helpful 4

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• ↑ Jake Adams. Academic Tutor & Test Prep Specialist. Expert Interview. 24 July 2020.
• ↑ https://www.understood.org/en/school-learning/learning-at-home/homework-study-skills/how-to-help-your-teen-develop-good-study-habits

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5 Keys to Successful Homework Assignments During Remote Learning

While students and their families are coping with so much, teachers should be mindful to assign only homework that’s truly meaningful. 

How can homework be reimagined during remote or hybrid learning? Are students already spending too much time on their screen—why assign more screen time? What is the purpose of the assignment?

As a middle school instructional coach, I often work with teachers who are unsure of how much to give and what to give. They’re also inevitably worried about finding the time to grade it. As a parent, I know how stressful it can be to balance your own work while also helping your own children with homework.

Since remote learning began in March, some schools have banned homework or modified homework policies, but if you’re a teacher who’s allowed to assign homework or an administrator who sets homework policy, the following suggestions may help.

5 Keys to Making Homework More Meaningful

1. Off-screen reading:  Books, books, books. Whether your students are reading books they chose or assigned novels, quiet reading time (or time listening to audiobooks) is a welcome assignment in most homes—I say this as a mom myself. Students can be held accountable for their reading through Harkness discussions in class or on Zoom, journal entries (written or in Flipgrid-style video), or old-fashioned sticky-note annotations in the book itself.

2. Less is more: Unfortunately, math teachers have the reputation of assigning something like “problems 1 through 45” (OK, maybe I’m exaggerating). Do students need to repeat the same skill over and over? Consider how much time you have in class the next day to actually review several problems. Instead, can you choose four or five rich multistep problems that provide practice and application of the skills? Or, alternatively, offer student choice: “Choose five out of these 10 problems.”

In a humanities or science class, can students answer one extended compare-and-contrast question rather than the chapter review in the textbook?

3. Personalized homework: Many students (and adults alike) love to talk about themselves. If students can make the assignment personal to them, they might feel more motivated to complete it. An example might be to compare the protagonist of the assigned reading with themselves in a Venn diagram. In a language class, they can describe a fictitious superhero using descriptive vocabulary in the language they’re studying. Or assign students to make a Flipgrid-style dance or song describing the scientific method (this example was inspired by TikTok).

4. Family involvement: Use this option carefully, especially now when many parents and guardians are stretched thin. Before making family assignments, be sure to get a feel for your students’ family situations to avoid putting anyone at a disadvantage. Give families a heads-up and plenty of time for such assignments.

If you feel it’s appropriate to proceed, ask students to take a video of themselves teaching a new concept to a family member. To practice operations with fractions, students can bring in a favorite family recipe with the measurements adjusted for fewer servings or multiple servings. Assign a riddle or math puzzle for students to discuss with the family, and ask them to write down the various answers they hear.

Whatever you assign, keep it light, low-stakes, and infrequent.

5. Flipped homework: In my experience, students get tired of watching instructional videos, but a few short, well-planned videos can be useful to assign the night before to spark discussion the next day in class. Follow the video with a short Google Form to ask the student to reflect and/or ask initial questions about what they watched. Use flipped learning sparingly to keep it novel and unique.

What about the grading? With shared docs, older students can easily share their work with their peers for review. Take some time to educate students on how to constructively comment on each other’s work. If a student’s assignment is missing, their partner will let them know, which takes some of the burden off of the teacher. This method should not be used for graded summative assessments and should be monitored by the teacher. Peer review can also serve as a differentiation strategy by grouping students by readiness and ability when applicable.

If your school’s homework policies allow, be creative with your assignments. As you create your assignments, consider the following:

• What will a student learn or gain from this work?
• Is it worth their time?
• Is it creating more home stress?

If we reimagine homework, students might actually cheer instead of groan when it’s assigned. OK, that’s wishful thinking, but they should definitely get more out of their assignments. 

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8 Effective techniques on ‘How To Do Home Assignments?’

There are many reasons why students need effective home assignment techniques. “How to do home assignments?” can be a recurring question if you also struggle with doing homework.

Understandably, when your calendar is busy, your time and energy are limited; it takes a while to complete your tasks. But wait!!! Here, we will provide exceptional and practical techniques to help you ace your homework. Most of the time, we rush through our tasks out of obligation rather than genuine interest.

Home assignments help students develop good study habits, which is a fruitful practice in the long run. In addition, students can learn to focus and stay on task by working on assignments at home. This is an important skill to have, both in school and in life. Not just that, it can also help them learn the concepts studied better and gain broader knowledge. When students can complete their assignments with proper and practical techniques, they can take the time to revise the concepts and better understand them. 

Here we’ll discuss some effective home assignment techniques to help you ace your homework. Let’s get started!

What are the effective homework tips for students?

Many effective techniques can help students with their homework:

Tip Number 1: Create a designated space

It is crucial to create a designated space for doing homework. This can be a spot at the kitchen table, a desk in the bedroom, or anywhere else that is quiet and free from distractions. Once a space is designated, it is essential to stick to a routine. 

Tip Number 2: Homework schedule

The next technique is to create a homework schedule. Setting aside a specific time each day for homework and sticking to this schedule as much as possible can help students a lot. If you’re struggling with how to do homework effectively, this technique can help you out. This homework schedule should include time for each subject and breaks.

Tip Number 3: Become familiar with the homework

Don’t be scared to ask queries about what is needed. Make notes in your diary or planner. Asking the teacher a quick question in class or right after that is much simpler than trying to recall anything later that evening.

Review the duration of the particular homework if you’ve got a lot of reading or activities. Allotting time for each part will help you manage and plan your time accordingly.

Tip Number 4: Review your notes from the class

After studying your textbooks, you should revisit your lecture notes that reference your assigned task. In addition, keep lecture notes on the subject you wish to learn if you don’t feel like carrying your books everywhere.

Tip Number 5: Sidestep every distraction and comfort.

Always pick a spot for your study that allows you to focus better. Place your gadgets aside while you study. Having your phone visible might cause distractions. As a result, homework takes longer and interrupts your planning.

Tip Number 6: Commence with the most challenging part.

It’s tempting to get things off the way by starting with simple tasks. But when you first start, you’re most motivated and focused. So focus this mental capacity on the most challenging topics. Once you’re done tackling the tough questions, you may concentrate on the more straightforward topics.

Tip Number 7: Take breaks

Another effective technique is to take breaks during homework. It is essential to stay focused, but taking breaks can help to avoid burnout. Intervals can be used to stretch, get a snack, or take a walk.

Tip Number 8: Online homework help for clarity.

Finally, it is also essential to ask for help when needed. Many students struggle with homework independently, but there are better approaches than this. For example, if a student is stuck on a problem, it is better to get online homework help by asking a teacher, parent, or tutor for help.

Importance of homework tips for students

Homework tips for students are necessary to gain, as they can help them to learn and retain information more effectively. In addition, homework tips can help students stay organized and motivated and improve their grades. By following these fundamental guidelines we have listed above, students can enhance their academic performance.

Each student has specific requirements, and some kids struggle more than others with homework and assignments. Getting online homework help and assignment help might be the solution that enables you to solve your trouble along with a comprehensive understanding of your doubts.

And that’s why we exist. We at Filo assist students with their assignments and provide effective homework tips for students, so they excel in all their homework and assignments!

This blog will be helpful to you if you are a student who struggles daily with how to do homework or how to do home assignments effectively. 

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7 Types of Homework for Students

Chris Drew (PhD)

Dr. Chris Drew is the founder of the Helpful Professor. He holds a PhD in education and has published over 20 articles in scholarly journals. He is the former editor of the Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education. [Image Descriptor: Photo of Chris]

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There are seven types of homework. These are practice, preparation, extension, integration, research, application, and flipped homework.

Each type of homework has its own role for students learning. The important task for teachers is to select homework that will best provide holistic support to a student.

This doesn’t mean just supporting students for the upcoming exams but also ensuring students are not overwhelmed by homework and that they can still live a balanced life outside of school.

Types of Homework

1. practice.

Practice is the most common task students have when they are given homework. It entails attempting to reinforce information learned in school so that students will commit it to long-term memory.

An example of practice homework is math workbooks. Usually, a teacher will complete the math task in class so students know how to do it, then give them a workbook of 20 – 50 tasks to complete overnight to reinforce the task.

The benefit of practice homework is that it can certainly help students commit what they learned in class to memory. This is especially the case if teachers used spaced repetition. This is a strategy whereby the teacher re-introduces things learned in previous weeks and months during homework revision so the information is not lost over time.

The downside of practice homework is that the child is learning on their own during this period. This means that, if the child hasn’t sufficiently learned the content in class, they don’t have anyone to help them during homework time. This can lead to a great deal of frustration and despair for students staring at a piece of paper feeling lost and confused.

Related: Homework Statistics

2. Preparation

Preparation homework is given to students before a lesson so they have the important information at hand before class.

Commonly, this occurs when teachers provide reading materials for students to look over between class. They then come to class having read the materials so they are ready to discuss and debate the topics.

It’s also commonly used in language learning, where it’s called pre-teaching of vocabulary. The teacher provides vocabulary to learn before class so the students can come to class and practice it together.

The benefit of preparation homework is that it bunches a lot of the didactic (non-interactive) parts of learning into the pre-class time so students can spend most of their time in class interacting with the teacher and peers.

The downside of preparation homework is that it rarely works as expected. Teachers often spend the first 10 to 15 minutes of class re-teaching what was supposed to be done for homework either because students found it too hard or they didn’t do the tasks.

3. Extension

Extension homework involves providing students with tasks that are based upon what was learned in class, but goes over and above those tasks.

It is the equivalent of teaching a student to swim then letting them out into the ocean. The students have to apply their knowledge in a new context without the support or ‘ scaffolding ’ of a teacher hovering over their shoulders.

The benefit of extension homework is it can give students a lot of confidence. They can go home and feel as if they’re excelling at their work when they find that they’re doing it without the support of a teacher.

The downside of extension homework is that it can be risky: by definition, students are extending themselves beyond what was learned in class, meaning they will come across new information and new contexts where they might need help that’s not available at the time.

Related: Homework Pros and Cons

4. Integration

Integration homework requires students to bring together, or ‘integrate’, knowledge from various subjects and knowledge areas into one project.

The homework may involve the integration of history lessons with writing lessons to create a book report, or the integration of math with business studies to create a business plan.

Integration is great for students to draw connections between things they have learned in various different classes at school. However, it also involves a lot of complexity that may make students feel confused or overwhelmed.

5. Research

Research homework involves using your time after school and on weekends to gather data that will be discussed in class.

Often, this can involve interviewing family members, taking photos around your community, or looking up information on the internet.

The benefit of research homework is that students often come to class with exciting things to share. They will also come with questions to help stimulate conversation in class.

However, it’s important for teachers to be aware that not all students have access to high-speed internet and other resources to conduct research. In fact, in my homework statistics article, I discussed how a staggering 24% of low-income American teens regularly fail to complete homework due to lack of access to technology.

6. Application

Application homework involves taking knowledge learned in class and applying it to real-world settings.

This is common in immersive language learning settings, for example, when teachers ask students to go out into the streets and practice new vocabulary when ordering a drink or buying food.

The benefit of application homework is that it gives real-world context to what was learned in class. By applying your knowledge, you can more effectively commit it to memory than simply rote learning it at your kitchen table.

Application in a real-world setting provides a context and a story that you can easily pull from your memory in the future, helping you to retain information long-term.

7. Flipped Homework

The flipped learning movement is a movement that involves making students learn at home on their own then come to class to practice it.

For teachers, this means thinking about school as the space for ‘traditional’ homework and home as the space for instruction.

This is increasingly popular with technology and hybrid learning environments. For example, a teacher might assign a YouTube video to watch as homework before class. Then, the class involves dissecting the video and critiquing it.

The benefit of flipped learning is that it maximizes time for constructivist and hands-on active learning in the classroom. The downside is students can get confused during preparation, they may not complete the preparation work, or technology may fail on them.

What are the Functions of Homework?

Homework serves multiple purposes. These include:

• Getting Ahead: Many schools and parents give their children homework (including private tutoring help so their children can have an advantage in life over other children.
• Keeping Up: On a societal level, many governments encourage homework so that students can keep up with other societies in the ‘education race’ of the 21st Century. Some societies, like South Korea, heavily emphasize homework, and others feel they need to keep up.
• Catching Up: Many students are assigned homework to catch up with the rest of their class. If you find a topic very difficult, you may find you need to spend a lot more time on your own working through the information than your peers.
• Retention: Homework helps you to repeat and retain information. With extra practice, you can commit information to memory.
• Excitement: Some well-made homework can get students excited to come to class to discuss what they did.
• Application: Situation-based learning, where you’re applying what you learned in class to real-world situations, can help progress students’ knowledge in ways that you can’t in school.
• Home-School Relationships: Homework also serves the purpose of ensuring parents know what’s going on in school. Many parents like to see what children are learning so they can monitor their children’s progress and keep teachers accountable.

Homework comes in all shapes and sizes. While many teachers stick to the old fashioned repetition homework mode, I’d encourage you to try out a range of other types of homework that can keep students engaged, encourage more discussion and collaboration in class, and ensure that the difficult work where students need the teacher’s help takes place in the classroom. This will provide maximum support for your students, help propel them forward, and prevent arguments for why homework should be banned .

• Chris Drew (PhD) https://helpfulprofessor.com/author/chris-drew-phd-2/ 21 Montessori Homeschool Setups
• Chris Drew (PhD) https://helpfulprofessor.com/author/chris-drew-phd-2/ 101 Hidden Talents Examples
• Chris Drew (PhD) https://helpfulprofessor.com/author/chris-drew-phd-2/ 15 Green Flags in a Relationship
• Chris Drew (PhD) https://helpfulprofessor.com/author/chris-drew-phd-2/ 15 Signs you're Burnt Out, Not Lazy

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Assignment vs. Homework

What's the difference.

Assignment and homework are both tasks given to students by teachers to reinforce learning and assess understanding. However, there are some key differences between the two. Assignments are typically larger projects or tasks that require more time and effort to complete, while homework is usually smaller, daily tasks that can be completed in a shorter amount of time. Assignments often involve more critical thinking and creativity, while homework is more focused on practicing and applying concepts learned in class. Overall, both assignments and homework play an important role in the learning process and help students develop their skills and knowledge.

Further Detail

Assignments and homework are both tasks given to students by teachers to reinforce learning. Assignments are typically more formal and structured tasks that are given to students to complete outside of class. Homework, on the other hand, is a broader term that encompasses any work that students are expected to complete outside of class time.

Assignments are usually given less frequently than homework. They are often larger tasks that require more time and effort to complete. Homework, on the other hand, is typically given on a daily or weekly basis and is meant to be completed in a shorter amount of time.

Assignments tend to cover a broader scope of material than homework. They may require students to demonstrate a deeper understanding of a topic or to apply concepts in a more complex way. Homework, on the other hand, is usually more focused and may involve practicing specific skills or reviewing material covered in class.

Assignments can come in a variety of formats, including essays, research papers, projects, presentations, and more. They often require students to engage in higher-order thinking skills and to demonstrate their understanding in a creative or analytical way. Homework, on the other hand, is typically more straightforward and may involve completing worksheets, answering questions, or reading assigned material.

Assignments are usually graded more rigorously than homework. They may account for a larger portion of a student's overall grade and may be assessed based on specific criteria or rubrics. Homework, on the other hand, is often graded on completion or effort and may not carry as much weight in terms of a student's final grade.

Time Management

Assignments often require more advanced time management skills than homework. Students may need to plan ahead and break down larger tasks into smaller, manageable steps in order to complete assignments on time. Homework, on the other hand, is usually more straightforward and can be completed in a shorter amount of time, making it easier for students to fit into their daily schedules.

The purpose of assignments is to deepen students' understanding of a topic, to encourage critical thinking and problem-solving skills, and to provide opportunities for creativity and self-expression. Homework, on the other hand, is meant to reinforce learning, to practice skills, and to provide feedback to both students and teachers on the progress of learning.

Collaboration

Assignments may involve more opportunities for collaboration than homework. Students may be asked to work in groups or pairs to complete assignments, which can help them develop teamwork and communication skills. Homework, on the other hand, is usually completed independently, although students may seek help from peers or parents if needed.

Assignments often provide more detailed feedback to students than homework. Teachers may offer comments, suggestions, and grades on assignments to help students understand their strengths and areas for improvement. Homework, on the other hand, may be graded quickly and may not always include detailed feedback, although teachers may use homework completion as a way to monitor student progress.

In conclusion, assignments and homework both play important roles in the education system. While assignments tend to be more formal, structured, and in-depth tasks that require advanced skills and knowledge, homework is typically more frequent, focused, and practice-oriented. Both assignments and homework provide valuable opportunities for students to learn, practice, and demonstrate their understanding of course material.

Comparisons may contain inaccurate information about people, places, or facts. Please report any issues.

• Articles / Homework

Smart Homework: How to Manage & Assess It

by MiddleWeb · Published 08/20/2014 · Updated 12/14/2019

In the first installment of our smart homework series from author & teaching consultant Rick Wormeli, he made the case for take-home assignments that matter for learning and engage student interest . In Part 2 , Rick suggested 13 guiding principles to help teachers create homework challenges that spark deeper learning. In this final article, Rick suggests some good ways to assess homework and manage the workload .

These articles are adapted with permission from Rick’s seminal book about teaching in the middle grades, Day One & Beyond: Practical Matters for New Middle Level Teachers (Stenhouse, 2005). Rick continues to offer great advice about homework, differentiation, assessment and many other topics in workshops and presentations across North America.

Fresh approaches to middle grades homework have many benefits, but how does all this play out as we manage homework in our classrooms? How do we assess homework effectively? How do we handle the paperwork? How do we guard against homework becoming just busywork again?

Here are some ideas:

▶ For big projects with multiple weeks of student responses, such as a science learning log or a reader’s response journal, skim every page students have written, but have students select one entry for a letter grade by placing a star on the intended page. The entry should demonstrate outstanding thinking, science protocol, plot analysis, personal response, or whatever you’re emphasizing with the unit. If you’re worried about having a large enough sample, grade two or three entries.

▶ When checking a list of problems, sentences, or answers to questions, have students work in groups of four or five to confirm answers with one another. If someone gets the wrong answer and doesn’t understand why, the rest of the group explains. If the student or group is stuck in understanding how an answer was achieved, they identify that one problem/sentence/question to the teacher when she calls the groups back to the whole class. The teacher reviews only identified problems.

▶ While groups are meeting to review homework, the teacher circulates from group to group, recording evidence of successful collaborations (to be shared later with the whole group), answering questions, correcting misconceptions, facilitating student conversations, and identifying areas to reteach. The great thing about this method is found in the value of conversation, not just the assessment the teacher does. Students who “talk math” (or English, history, science, art, PE, technology, drama, or music) learn those subjects.

▶ Don’t grade everything. Some assignments can be marked with a check or a zero for having done it. Spot-check problems two, nine, and seventeen because they represent different concepts you were worried about students understanding.

▶ Keep the student’s effort in doing the homework from diluting the grade that indicates mastery of content. That is, separate work habits from the letter grade if you can. Even though I know that good work habits usually yield high achievement, as a parent I don’t want my son’s grade to be based on anything but mastery of content and skills. If the grade’s validity reflects good effort but not mastery, then my son isn’t held accountable for learning, I don’t have a valid judgment of his learning, and he doesn’t have the required knowledge.

In the real world, we do not pay a carpet layer for the job until the job is done, regardless of how many hours or days it took, or how hot it was. The degree of his effort is not relevant, just that the job is done well (the standard of excellence was achieved). High-tech-industry workers may work all night long preparing a proposal for a client, but their efforts are irrelevant to the client who accepts and reviews all proposals equally that cross her desk by 10:00 a.m. the next morning.

Revising and Redoing Homework

The teacher is an expert and a coach. Students are not penalized for multiple attempts and revisions, or for not understanding the first time around. The focus is on achieving the standard of excellence. The feedback to the student is clear: If they don’t achieve, they are not given master craftsman status (an A), nor can they set up a practice. They have not yet met the rigorous criteria (standards) for mastery. We can see the revision of important homework tasks in the same way—students do it until they get it right.

Consider the reflections of middle school educator Nancy Long: “We have experimented with dozens of rubric styles over the last few years, and my favorite still is the one that lists all of the content criteria and all of the quality criteria on the left side and has two columns on the right side: YES and NOT YET. Check marks are used in the appropriate column to show which criteria have been met and which still need work.”

Nancy continues: “I try to schedule deadlines for assignments far enough ahead of the end of the grading period so there is time for everyone to get the papers back and do over what was not right before I must assign a grade ‘in concrete.’ . . . (like) in most things in our adult lives, we can mess up and still get another chance to get it right without too large a penalty!”

Another successful educator, Bill Ivey, says this about redoing homework assignments:

“It is exactly what we want our children to do. We had an English teacher who, by taking her sixth-grade class carefully through draft after draft, helped them create poetry that was more powerful than many of the poetry contest winners at our high school, where the poetry program is considered to be quite strong. The principle here can apply to any subject and any learning.”

Punishing Students Who Don’t Do Homework

Homework’s objective is to be instructional, not punitive. It would be wrong to fail a student for not doing homework when he had mastered all I had to teach. It would, however, indicate that I must not be doing my job very well. If my course is too easy for the student, then I need to make it more challenging for him or pursue placing him in a more advanced course.

Some argue against assessing homework in light of out-of-school pressures affecting a student’s ability to do schoolwork. We need to remember that our first task is to teach so that students will learn. Punishing a kid who cannot complete an assignment due to something beyond his control is abusive. We can’t just shrug our shoulders and say that a child has to do the homework and if he doesn’t, that’s just tough, regardless of the child’s situation.

We can work with families to find a satisfactory way in which to complete the work. I had a student who worked approximately four hours after school every day of the week in order to help support his family. Yes, I could have told him and his family that it is illegal to work at his age. Yes, I could have told him and the family that school is his job and it should come first. But food, medicine, and shelter were more basic needs. Completing a worksheet on objective pronouns pales in comparison.

If the student masters the material, then why should I fail him for not doing homework in the midst of such struggles? We should do the most effective thing for students, not the easiest thing for teachers. Many of our students live in harsh realities. Our compassion and alternative structuring of homework assignments will prepare those students for adult success far better than the punishment for not doing a set of 20 math problems ever will.

Is homework a necessary evil?

It’s troubling that many of today’s homework assignments and practices parallel those from the turn of the last century. Today’s middle schools require innovative and developmentally responsive homework based on what we now know about the human brain and young adolescents. One of the pluses of teaching and using these sanity-saving, creative approaches is that we get to experience the inspiring products our students create.

▶ Bonus idea: Homework reprieve

If you’re looking for ways to reward and motivate students and integrate homework into the regular work flow of your classroom, try a “Homework Deadline Extension Certificate.” I used these every quarter in my own classroom. Students really compete for them.

On the day an assignment is due, students can submit the certificate instead of their homework and they are automatically allowed to turn in the assignment one, two, or three days late, according to your comfort level, for full credit. If we reward those who’ve earned these certificates by extending the deadline but not voiding the need to complete the assignment, we haven’t diminished the assignment’s importance. ( Make your own certificate .)

Of course, students learn to be judicious in their use—if the assignment was to study for tomorrow’s test, it won’t help them to use their deadline extension certificate. If they’re working on a complicated project, they’d be wise to have their certificate in reserve.

His books include Meet Me in the Middle ; Day One and Beyond ; Fair Isn’t Always Equal: Assessment and Grading in the Differentiated Classroom ; Differentiation: From Planning to Practice; Metaphors & Analogies: Power Tools for Teaching Any Subject, and Summarization in Any Subject , plus The Collected Writings (So Far) of Rick Wormeli: Crazy Good Stuff I Learned about Teaching Along the Way .

He is currently working on his first young adult fiction novel and a new book on homework practices in the 21 st century.

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• TemplateLab
• Homework Planners

15 Printable Homework Planners (PDF, Word, Excel)

Just because you’re a student, that doesn’t mean that you always have things under control. A lot of times, you might feel that you “don’t have enough time” because you have so many things to accomplish like school work, projects , review, and homework. To make at least one of these aspects easier, creating a homework planner is essential.

Table of Contents

• 1 Homework Planner Templates
• 2 Information to include in your homework planner
• 3 Tips for creating your own homework planner
• 4 Best Homework Planners
• 5 Using a notebook or binder for your homework planner
• 6 Free Homework Planners
• 7 How to use your homework planner?

Homework Planner Templates

Information to include in your homework planner

If you want to improve your time management skills through a homework planner, make sure to use the planner wisely. Avoid any crisis and conflict by including this information:

• Regular times for you to do your homework
• The due dates of your homework assignments
• The dates of your tests
• Any special events you have to attend wherein you won’t have time for homework
• The deadlines of signing up for standardized tests
• The due dates for school-related fees
• The dates of school holidays

Tips for creating your own homework planner

It can be quite tricky to keep track of all the due dates of your homework without using a homework planner, a student planner template or any other kinds of organizational strategy. If you plan to create your own homework planner printable template, here are some tips:

• Think about the types of weekly homework planner sheets to include. If you want to remain organized, you must use different types of planning lists, one of which is the homework planner printable.
• Select the type and color of the paper to use when you print out your student planner template. You may also want to think about the type of template to use to organize all the information you need for school. After choosing and downloading a template, either customize it according to your needs or use it as it is.
• After printing out the sheets of your daily, monthly or weekly homework planner, arrange the sheets in the order you want them to appear in your binder or notebook. Think about how you plan to use the sheets of your planner to find the perfect arrangement.
• Organizing the different sections of your template allows you to keep all of your similar sheets for planning in one place. This is what successful planners to and it’s what allows you to remain flexible as you deal with your daily tasks.
• Create different sections for your homework planner. Mark these sections using sheets of colored paper, stick-on dividers or other types of dividers to make it easier for you to locate the different sections.
• Design the front cover of your planner. Here, you can express yourself using your own ideas and creativity. You can either create a design on your computer or use craft supplies to come up with a lovely design. If you think it will motivate you more, come up with a design that makes you feel inspired.
• Name the sections of your planner. You can use the different subjects in your school as the names of the sections, the months of the year, and more, depending on what you need.
• After marking the sheets and sections clearly, bind the sheets together. The simplest way to do this is with a stapler. Then fold a strip of paper over the entire side of the bound sheets to give your planner a neat look. After this, you can start using your planner!

Best Homework Planners

Using a notebook or binder for your homework planner

Apart from creating your homework planner from scratch, you can also use either a notebook or a binder. Here are some steps to guide you:

Standard notebook

• Select a notebook to use. Although using a homework planner printable is very convenient, decorating a notebook and using it for your planner is an excellent way for you to express yourself.
• Decorate the notebook by starting with the cover. Use paint, stickers, and other craft supplies to do this.
• Divide the notebook into how many sections you need for your planner. Think about how many sections you need then think about how many pages of the notebook you need for each of the sections.
• Label the sections either by hand or using printed labels. You can also decorate the label covers of the notebook as you may see fit.
• Create a calendar for your planner or print out a calendar template and attach it to your notebook in some way. This makes it easier for you to keep track of dates and deadlines.
• Create the daily, weekly or monthly planning sheets. You can organize your plans easily by dividing the sheets or pages into equal sections for you to write your notes . Then you can start using the notebook to plan your homework!
• Select the binder to use for your homework planner. In your selection process, consider the size of the banner. If you need a lot of space for your planning, you may choose a bigger binder. However, a smaller one is a lot easier to carry around. Therefore, considering the size is very important.
• Think about the planning method you’d like to use. You can have daily, weekly or monthly planning or to-do lists . Using a binder is a lot easier, especially in terms of adding new sections when you need them.
• Print out the homework or student planner templates you need after downloading or designing them. You can either use the templates you’ve downloaded or customize them as needed.
• Insert all of the planning sheets and dividers into your binder. As you insert these sheets, separate them using standard dividers to make it easier for you to find the different sections. Using dividers also makes it easier for you to label the different sections for better organization.
• After this, you can start using your homework planner!

Free Homework Planners

How to use your homework planner?

Sometimes it’s hard to think about how you can accomplish all of your homework when your teachers keep piling everything on as if there’s no tomorrow. But as a student, the only thing you can do is to deal with what you’re given. The best way to do this is to remain organized by using a homework planner.

Without the proper organization and time management skills, you might not be able to get the top grades you’re hoping for. Now that you know how to create a daily, monthly or weekly homework planner, here are some tips for using it:

• Select the right type of planner When you’re thinking about the type of planner to use, take your time. Select one which can accommodate all of the information you need but which still fits into your bag. Also, stay away from the store-bought ones with zippers or locks which are a challenge to open.
• Name your planner Small as this detail may be, it’s important to name your planner to remind you to keep using it. When you assign a name to an object, you’re also giving it a strong purpose in your life. Choose whatever name you want, make sure that it stands out!
• Incorporate the planner into your daily routine Make sure to bring the planner along with you at all times, especially when you go to school. Also, make sure to check the information written inside at the start and at the end of each day.
• Jot down the information ASAP As soon as your teachers assign you with homework, jot down the most important details right away. Make this a habit and it soon becomes automatic for you. Write down the assignment on your planner, the due date, and other relevant details.
• Learn how to use backward planning Whenever you write down any due date in your planner, keep going back to that homework to remind yourself that the due date is fast approaching.
• Color-coding systems work wonders Use colored dividers, stickers, papers, highlighters, and more to organize your planner. This makes it easier for you to understand and identify the information written on your planner.
• Make sure to include everything in your homework planner You must write down all the possible information in your planner, even the information about events, holidays, and other times which might take you away from doing your homework. If you don’t include this information, you can’t manage your time effectively.
• Use tabs and flags Using tabs and flags makes it easier for you to indicate due dates, finished homework, end of terms, and more. These serve as an excellent visual tool which constantly reminds you of what you need to accomplish.
• Keep the old pages and sheets in a separate file Since you’ll input everything in your planner, this means that each of the sheets contains important information. Therefore, you must keep the old pages in a separate file in case you need to use them as for reference later on.
• Congratulate yourself for creating an organizational system After creating your homework planner and following all of these tips, congratulate yourself for creating your own organizational system. As long as you stick with the planning, doing your homework becomes a lot easier.

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• BookWidgets Teacher Blog

20+ creative alternative homework ideas for teachers

When giving homework, it must always be based on learning goals your students have to reach, just like in your lessons. But it’s sad to see that lots of teachers are using homework as extra lesson time. Of course, as a teacher, you’re on a clock. But that doesn’t mean your students have to suffer from it and keep working on those boring textbooks and worksheets at home.

Consider goals like attitudes, real-life experiences, and practice, physical exercise, social encounters, creative solutions, and philanthropy as crucial as your lesson goals. These are things students don’t just pick up in your classroom. These are things they pick up in life.

In this blog post, I’ll give you some innovative homework ideas that will engage your students more. These alternatives to traditional homework will thereby also teach your students new things that can’t be taught in the classroom. You will find a variety of homework ideas: online and offline.

I will mention homework alternatives for primary school and high school. Some of these ideas can be changed a little bit, so they are the perfect fit for the right audience.

20 Creative homework ideas

You can divide homework tasks into the following themes or categories:

• Crafts & arts
• Outdoor activities & outings
• Games and activities
• Physical activities
• Digital or computer activities
• Philanthropy & social work

💡 Good to know : all the ready-to-use homework activities are created with BookWidgets . You can easily create activities like these yourself or duplicate an activity below for free, edit it if needed, and share it with your students. You can do so in the examples separately, or you can find all the homework examples in the BookWidgets Blog group folder .

Crafts and arts homework

1. prepare a dish from a recipe book.

2. Make a board game

3. Create a birdhouse

4. Transform a fictional book character into a hand puppet

Outdoor homework activities and outings

5. coupon game.

Students can also go grocery shopping with their parents. Here, they have to read the ingredients of the products and help their parents choose the healthiest products for the best prices, figure out the best deal between the sizes of items, …

6. Visit the zoo

7. Visit the local dumping ground or container park

8. Build a tree house

Games and activities as homework

9. bookwidgets games.

10. Minecraft

11. Play Cards

12. Play Zoo Tycoon or Rollercoaster Tycoon

Physical homework activities

13. rope skipping.

Many rope-skipping songs let your students do different tricks while rope-skipping. This is an excellent opportunity for homework as well. Ask your students to transform a rope skipping song into a song with lesson content. Let them count or spell or even sum up the different states or capitals. To engage their lifestyles even harder, you can additionally give them the assignment to create a TikTok in which they are jumping and singing.

Click here to see how you can get Tiktok more involved in the classroom.

14. Walking quest

If there aren’t any walking quests in the neighborhood, you could ask your students to create a walking quest like this for their fellow students. What a fun day it will be!

15. Obstacle Quiz

In order for students to answer the questions, they have to run and pass a challenging parkour. This is a fun homework exercise, and in the end, it’s a great lesson starter or lesson end.

16. Swimming games

After the activity, they can fill out an Exit Slip:

Digital or computer homework activities

17. create a picture album.

This teaches them to handle the online software, add pictures and write without spelling mistakes. And of course, creating memories is so much fun!

18. Video job application

19. Your life in 10 minutes - video

20. Email pen-pals

Is it still too complicated? Read the messages from your students, before they send them, and provide them with some feedback.

Philanthropy and social homework

21. grow a community garden.

22. Help in a retirement home

23. Help at a homeless shelter

24. Collect litter

Here’s another homework tip: Don’t call homework “homework”. Call it a challenge. Homework has become a negative word for students, and I bet they start rolling their eyes as you even mention the word.

Still looking for more inspiration? Check out the blog on short films and lesson activities that spice up your Google Classroom . Tip: even if you don’t use Google Classroom, there is a lot of inspiration back here.

Above you have read single assignments. But, you also have the option to involve your homework in a project. Find out more here .

So, as I mentioned earlier, there are many fun alternatives to traditional homework. Now it’s up to you to apply this in the classroom as well. In this folder , you will find all the examples you have come across.

Which idea do you or perhaps your students like the most? Let us know on Twitter . Of course, there are many more alternatives. If you have other ideas, you are always welcome to share it with other teachers in our Facebook group .

One more thing: don’t forget to say hi👋 on LikedIn .

Join hundreds of thousands of subscribers, and get the best content on technology in education.

BookWidgets enables teachers to create fun and interactive lessons for tablets, smartphones, and computers.

Does Homework Really Help Students Learn?

A conversation with a Wheelock researcher, a BU student, and a fourth-grade teacher

“Quality homework is engaging and relevant to kids’ lives,” says Wheelock’s Janine Bempechat. “It gives them autonomy and engages them in the community and with their families. In some subjects, like math, worksheets can be very helpful. It has to do with the value of practicing over and over.” Photo by iStock/Glenn Cook Photography

Do your homework.

If only it were that simple.

Educators have debated the merits of homework since the late 19th century. In recent years, amid concerns of some parents and teachers that children are being stressed out by too much homework, things have only gotten more fraught.

“Homework is complicated,” says developmental psychologist Janine Bempechat, a Wheelock College of Education & Human Development clinical professor. The author of the essay “ The Case for (Quality) Homework—Why It Improves Learning and How Parents Can Help ” in the winter 2019 issue of Education Next , Bempechat has studied how the debate about homework is influencing teacher preparation, parent and student beliefs about learning, and school policies.

She worries especially about socioeconomically disadvantaged students from low-performing schools who, according to research by Bempechat and others, get little or no homework.

BU Today  sat down with Bempechat and Erin Bruce (Wheelock’17,’18), a new fourth-grade teacher at a suburban Boston school, and future teacher freshman Emma Ardizzone (Wheelock) to talk about what quality homework looks like, how it can help children learn, and how schools can equip teachers to design it, evaluate it, and facilitate parents’ role in it.

BU Today: Parents and educators who are against homework in elementary school say there is no research definitively linking it to academic performance for kids in the early grades. You’ve said that they’re missing the point.

Bempechat : I think teachers assign homework in elementary school as a way to help kids develop skills they’ll need when they’re older—to begin to instill a sense of responsibility and to learn planning and organizational skills. That’s what I think is the greatest value of homework—in cultivating beliefs about learning and skills associated with academic success. If we greatly reduce or eliminate homework in elementary school, we deprive kids and parents of opportunities to instill these important learning habits and skills.

We do know that beginning in late middle school, and continuing through high school, there is a strong and positive correlation between homework completion and academic success.

That’s what I think is the greatest value of homework—in cultivating beliefs about learning and skills associated with academic success.

You talk about the importance of quality homework. What is that?

Quality homework is engaging and relevant to kids’ lives. It gives them autonomy and engages them in the community and with their families. In some subjects, like math, worksheets can be very helpful. It has to do with the value of practicing over and over.

What are your concerns about homework and low-income children?

The argument that some people make—that homework “punishes the poor” because lower-income parents may not be as well-equipped as affluent parents to help their children with homework—is very troubling to me. There are no parents who don’t care about their children’s learning. Parents don’t actually have to help with homework completion in order for kids to do well. They can help in other ways—by helping children organize a study space, providing snacks, being there as a support, helping children work in groups with siblings or friends.

Isn’t the discussion about getting rid of homework happening mostly in affluent communities?

Yes, and the stories we hear of kids being stressed out from too much homework—four or five hours of homework a night—are real. That’s problematic for physical and mental health and overall well-being. But the research shows that higher-income students get a lot more homework than lower-income kids.

Teachers may not have as high expectations for lower-income children. Schools should bear responsibility for providing supports for kids to be able to get their homework done—after-school clubs, community support, peer group support. It does kids a disservice when our expectations are lower for them.

The conversation around homework is to some extent a social class and social justice issue. If we eliminate homework for all children because affluent children have too much, we’re really doing a disservice to low-income children. They need the challenge, and every student can rise to the challenge with enough supports in place.

What did you learn by studying how education schools are preparing future teachers to handle homework?

My colleague, Margarita Jimenez-Silva, at the University of California, Davis, School of Education, and I interviewed faculty members at education schools, as well as supervising teachers, to find out how students are being prepared. And it seemed that they weren’t. There didn’t seem to be any readings on the research, or conversations on what high-quality homework is and how to design it.

Erin, what kind of training did you get in handling homework?

Bruce : I had phenomenal professors at Wheelock, but homework just didn’t come up. I did lots of student teaching. I’ve been in classrooms where the teachers didn’t assign any homework, and I’ve been in rooms where they assigned hours of homework a night. But I never even considered homework as something that was my decision. I just thought it was something I’d pull out of a book and it’d be done.

I started giving homework on the first night of school this year. My first assignment was to go home and draw a picture of the room where you do your homework. I want to know if it’s at a table and if there are chairs around it and if mom’s cooking dinner while you’re doing homework.

The second night I asked them to talk to a grown-up about how are you going to be able to get your homework done during the week. The kids really enjoyed it. There’s a running joke that I’m teaching life skills.

Friday nights, I read all my kids’ responses to me on their homework from the week and it’s wonderful. They pour their hearts out. It’s like we’re having a conversation on my couch Friday night.

It matters to know that the teacher cares about you and that what you think matters to the teacher. Homework is a vehicle to connect home and school…for parents to know teachers are welcoming to them and their families.

Bempechat : I can’t imagine that most new teachers would have the intuition Erin had in designing homework the way she did.

Ardizzone : Conversations with kids about homework, feeling you’re being listened to—that’s such a big part of wanting to do homework….I grew up in Westchester County. It was a pretty demanding school district. My junior year English teacher—I loved her—she would give us feedback, have meetings with all of us. She’d say, “If you have any questions, if you have anything you want to talk about, you can talk to me, here are my office hours.” It felt like she actually cared.

Bempechat : It matters to know that the teacher cares about you and that what you think matters to the teacher. Homework is a vehicle to connect home and school…for parents to know teachers are welcoming to them and their families.

Ardizzone : But can’t it lead to parents being overbearing and too involved in their children’s lives as students?

Bempechat : There’s good help and there’s bad help. The bad help is what you’re describing—when parents hover inappropriately, when they micromanage, when they see their children confused and struggling and tell them what to do.

Good help is when parents recognize there’s a struggle going on and instead ask informative questions: “Where do you think you went wrong?” They give hints, or pointers, rather than saying, “You missed this,” or “You didn’t read that.”

Bruce : I hope something comes of this. I hope BU or Wheelock can think of some way to make this a more pressing issue. As a first-year teacher, it was not something I even thought about on the first day of school—until a kid raised his hand and said, “Do we have homework?” It would have been wonderful if I’d had a plan from day one.

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Sara Rimer A journalist for more than three decades, Sara Rimer worked at the Miami Herald , Washington Post and, for 26 years, the New York Times , where she was the New England bureau chief, and a national reporter covering education, aging, immigration, and other social justice issues. Her stories on the death penalty’s inequities were nominated for a Pulitzer Prize and cited in the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision outlawing the execution of people with intellectual disabilities. Her journalism honors include Columbia University’s Meyer Berger award for in-depth human interest reporting. She holds a BA degree in American Studies from the University of Michigan. Profile

She can be reached at [email protected] .

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There are 81 comments on Does Homework Really Help Students Learn?

Insightful! The values about homework in elementary schools are well aligned with my intuition as a parent.

when i finish my work i do my homework and i sometimes forget what to do because i did not get enough sleep

same omg it does not help me it is stressful and if I have it in more than one class I hate it.

Same I think my parent wants to help me but, she doesn’t care if I get bad grades so I just try my best and my grades are great.

I think that last question about Good help from parents is not know to all parents, we do as our parents did or how we best think it can be done, so maybe coaching parents or giving them resources on how to help with homework would be very beneficial for the parent on how to help and for the teacher to have consistency and improve homework results, and of course for the child. I do see how homework helps reaffirm the knowledge obtained in the classroom, I also have the ability to see progress and it is a time I share with my kids

The answer to the headline question is a no-brainer – a more pressing problem is why there is a difference in how students from different cultures succeed. Perfect example is the student population at BU – why is there a majority population of Asian students and only about 3% black students at BU? In fact at some universities there are law suits by Asians to stop discrimination and quotas against admitting Asian students because the real truth is that as a group they are demonstrating better qualifications for admittance, while at the same time there are quotas and reduced requirements for black students to boost their portion of the student population because as a group they do more poorly in meeting admissions standards – and it is not about the Benjamins. The real problem is that in our PC society no one has the gazuntas to explore this issue as it may reveal that all people are not created equal after all. Or is it just environmental cultural differences??????

I get you have a concern about the issue but that is not even what the point of this article is about. If you have an issue please take this to the site we have and only post your opinion about the actual topic

This is not at all what the article is talking about.

This literally has nothing to do with the article brought up. You should really take your opinions somewhere else before you speak about something that doesn’t make sense.

we have the same name

so they have the same name what of it?

lol you tell her

totally agree

What does that have to do with homework, that is not what the article talks about AT ALL.

Yes, I think homework plays an important role in the development of student life. Through homework, students have to face challenges on a daily basis and they try to solve them quickly.I am an intense online tutor at 24x7homeworkhelp and I give homework to my students at that level in which they handle it easily.

More than two-thirds of students said they used alcohol and drugs, primarily marijuana, to cope with stress.

You know what’s funny? I got this assignment to write an argument for homework about homework and this article was really helpful and understandable, and I also agree with this article’s point of view.

I also got the same task as you! I was looking for some good resources and I found this! I really found this article useful and easy to understand, just like you! ^^

i think that homework is the best thing that a child can have on the school because it help them with their thinking and memory.

I am a child myself and i think homework is a terrific pass time because i can’t play video games during the week. It also helps me set goals.

Homework is not harmful ,but it will if there is too much

I feel like, from a minors point of view that we shouldn’t get homework. Not only is the homework stressful, but it takes us away from relaxing and being social. For example, me and my friends was supposed to hang at the mall last week but we had to postpone it since we all had some sort of work to do. Our minds shouldn’t be focused on finishing an assignment that in realty, doesn’t matter. I completely understand that we should have homework. I have to write a paper on the unimportance of homework so thanks.

homework isn’t that bad

Are you a student? if not then i don’t really think you know how much and how severe todays homework really is

i am a student and i do not enjoy homework because i practice my sport 4 out of the five days we have school for 4 hours and that’s not even counting the commute time or the fact i still have to shower and eat dinner when i get home. its draining!

i totally agree with you. these people are such boomers

why just why

they do make a really good point, i think that there should be a limit though. hours and hours of homework can be really stressful, and the extra work isn’t making a difference to our learning, but i do believe homework should be optional and extra credit. that would make it for students to not have the leaning stress of a assignment and if you have a low grade you you can catch up.

Studies show that homework improves student achievement in terms of improved grades, test results, and the likelihood to attend college. Research published in the High School Journal indicates that students who spent between 31 and 90 minutes each day on homework “scored about 40 points higher on the SAT-Mathematics subtest than their peers, who reported spending no time on homework each day, on average.” On both standardized tests and grades, students in classes that were assigned homework outperformed 69% of students who didn’t have homework. A majority of studies on homework’s impact – 64% in one meta-study and 72% in another – showed that take home assignments were effective at improving academic achievement. Research by the Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA) concluded that increased homework led to better GPAs and higher probability of college attendance for high school boys. In fact, boys who attended college did more than three hours of additional homework per week in high school.

So how are your measuring student achievement? That’s the real question. The argument that doing homework is simply a tool for teaching responsibility isn’t enough for me. We can teach responsibility in a number of ways. Also the poor argument that parents don’t need to help with homework, and that students can do it on their own, is wishful thinking at best. It completely ignores neurodiverse students. Students in poverty aren’t magically going to find a space to do homework, a friend’s or siblings to help them do it, and snacks to eat. I feel like the author of this piece has never set foot in a classroom of students.

THIS. This article is pathetic coming from a university. So intellectually dishonest, refusing to address the havoc of capitalism and poverty plays on academic success in life. How can they in one sentence use poor kids in an argument and never once address that poor children have access to damn near 0 of the resources affluent kids have? Draw me a picture and let’s talk about feelings lmao what a joke is that gonna put food in their belly so they can have the calories to burn in order to use their brain to study? What about quiet their 7 other siblings that they share a single bedroom with for hours? Is it gonna force the single mom to magically be at home and at work at the same time to cook food while you study and be there to throw an encouraging word?

Also the “parents don’t need to be a parent and be able to guide their kid at all academically they just need to exist in the next room” is wild. Its one thing if a parent straight up is not equipped but to say kids can just figured it out is…. wow coming from an educator What’s next the teacher doesn’t need to teach cause the kid can just follow the packet and figure it out?

Well then get a tutor right? Oh wait you are poor only affluent kids can afford a tutor for their hours of homework a day were they on average have none of the worries a poor child does. Does this address that poor children are more likely to also suffer abuse and mental illness? Like mentioned what about kids that can’t learn or comprehend the forced standardized way? Just let em fail? These children regularly are not in “special education”(some of those are a joke in their own and full of neglect and abuse) programs cause most aren’t even acknowledged as having disabilities or disorders.

But yes all and all those pesky poor kids just aren’t being worked hard enough lol pretty sure poor children’s existence just in childhood is more work, stress, and responsibility alone than an affluent child’s entire life cycle. Love they never once talked about the quality of education in the classroom being so bad between the poor and affluent it can qualify as segregation, just basically blamed poor people for being lazy, good job capitalism for failing us once again!

why the hell?

you should feel bad for saying this, this article can be helpful for people who has to write a essay about it

This is more of a political rant than it is about homework

I know a teacher who has told his students their homework is to find something they are interested in, pursue it and then come share what they learn. The student responses are quite compelling. One girl taught herself German so she could talk to her grandfather. One boy did a research project on Nelson Mandela because the teacher had mentioned him in class. Another boy, a both on the autism spectrum, fixed his family’s computer. The list goes on. This is fourth grade. I think students are highly motivated to learn, when we step aside and encourage them.

The whole point of homework is to give the students a chance to use the material that they have been presented with in class. If they never have the opportunity to use that information, and discover that it is actually useful, it will be in one ear and out the other. As a science teacher, it is critical that the students are challenged to use the material they have been presented with, which gives them the opportunity to actually think about it rather than regurgitate “facts”. Well designed homework forces the student to think conceptually, as opposed to regurgitation, which is never a pretty sight

Wonderful discussion. and yes, homework helps in learning and building skills in students.

not true it just causes kids to stress

Homework can be both beneficial and unuseful, if you will. There are students who are gifted in all subjects in school and ones with disabilities. Why should the students who are gifted get the lucky break, whereas the people who have disabilities suffer? The people who were born with this “gift” go through school with ease whereas people with disabilities struggle with the work given to them. I speak from experience because I am one of those students: the ones with disabilities. Homework doesn’t benefit “us”, it only tears us down and put us in an abyss of confusion and stress and hopelessness because we can’t learn as fast as others. Or we can’t handle the amount of work given whereas the gifted students go through it with ease. It just brings us down and makes us feel lost; because no mater what, it feels like we are destined to fail. It feels like we weren’t “cut out” for success.

homework does help

here is the thing though, if a child is shoved in the face with a whole ton of homework that isn’t really even considered homework it is assignments, it’s not helpful. the teacher should make homework more of a fun learning experience rather than something that is dreaded

This article was wonderful, I am going to ask my teachers about extra, or at all giving homework.

I agree. Especially when you have homework before an exam. Which is distasteful as you’ll need that time to study. It doesn’t make any sense, nor does us doing homework really matters as It’s just facts thrown at us.

Homework is too severe and is just too much for students, schools need to decrease the amount of homework. When teachers assign homework they forget that the students have other classes that give them the same amount of homework each day. Students need to work on social skills and life skills.

I disagree.

Beyond achievement, proponents of homework argue that it can have many other beneficial effects. They claim it can help students develop good study habits so they are ready to grow as their cognitive capacities mature. It can help students recognize that learning can occur at home as well as at school. Homework can foster independent learning and responsible character traits. And it can give parents an opportunity to see what’s going on at school and let them express positive attitudes toward achievement.

Homework is helpful because homework helps us by teaching us how to learn a specific topic.

As a student myself, I can say that I have almost never gotten the full 9 hours of recommended sleep time, because of homework. (Now I’m writing an essay on it in the middle of the night D=)

I am a 10 year old kid doing a report about “Is homework good or bad” for homework before i was going to do homework is bad but the sources from this site changed my mind!

Homeowkr is god for stusenrs

I agree with hunter because homework can be so stressful especially with this whole covid thing no one has time for homework and every one just wants to get back to there normal lives it is especially stressful when you go on a 2 week vaca 3 weeks into the new school year and and then less then a week after you come back from the vaca you are out for over a month because of covid and you have no way to get the assignment done and turned in

As great as homework is said to be in the is article, I feel like the viewpoint of the students was left out. Every where I go on the internet researching about this topic it almost always has interviews from teachers, professors, and the like. However isn’t that a little biased? Of course teachers are going to be for homework, they’re not the ones that have to stay up past midnight completing the homework from not just one class, but all of them. I just feel like this site is one-sided and you should include what the students of today think of spending four hours every night completing 6-8 classes worth of work.

Are we talking about homework or practice? Those are two very different things and can result in different outcomes.

Homework is a graded assignment. I do not know of research showing the benefits of graded assignments going home.

Practice; however, can be extremely beneficial, especially if there is some sort of feedback (not a grade but feedback). That feedback can come from the teacher, another student or even an automated grading program.

As a former band director, I assigned daily practice. I never once thought it would be appropriate for me to require the students to turn in a recording of their practice for me to grade. Instead, I had in-class assignments/assessments that were graded and directly related to the practice assigned.

I would really like to read articles on “homework” that truly distinguish between the two.

oof i feel bad good luck!

thank you guys for the artical because I have to finish an assingment. yes i did cite it but just thanks

thx for the article guys.

Homework is good

I think homework is helpful AND harmful. Sometimes u can’t get sleep bc of homework but it helps u practice for school too so idk.

I agree with this Article. And does anyone know when this was published. I would like to know.

It was published FEb 19, 2019.

Studies have shown that homework improved student achievement in terms of improved grades, test results, and the likelihood to attend college.

i think homework can help kids but at the same time not help kids

This article is so out of touch with majority of homes it would be laughable if it wasn’t so incredibly sad.

There is no value to homework all it does is add stress to already stressed homes. Parents or adults magically having the time or energy to shepherd kids through homework is dome sort of 1950’s fantasy.

What lala land do these teachers live in?

Homework gives noting to the kid

Homework is Bad

homework is bad.

why do kids even have homework?

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Creative Homework Ideas

Learn Bright Lessons include many creative ideas for classroom instruction and student learning. Students are asked to work independently or with their peers, fostering their collaboration skills. Of course, the lessons also include many traditional learning exercises. Such as, multiple-choice questions, matching, fill in the blank responses, and others. Since every school and classroom is different, any lesson used with students can be adapted.

Whether you are assigning homework based on Learn Bright lessons or your own school’s curriculum, the homework you assign is essential for learning. Some schools across the country have banned assigning homework to students while others limit the amount each night. If you do assign homework, there are several creative ideas you can use that will motivate your students to complete the homework you assign.

Creative hands-on learning activities and other similar learning ideas in the classroom are quite effective. They can be just as effective at home as well for a wide variety of subjects and assignments. In every student’s home, there is “stuff” and other resources that can be accessed to help students review a concept taught at school. Here are a few samples for different subjects:

MATH – Multiplication Facts

 Students use the numbers that appear on product labels and multiply them together. Not only do they get multiplication practice, but they may also be introduced to a food label in a new way. It encourages the students to read food and other product labels. In this way, they can relate what they learn in class to the real world. Showing them when they will use these concepts in their everyday lives.

SCIENCE – Solids, Liquids, Gases

Students conduct a home or neighborhood search for items that are solids, liquids, or gases. For example, they can open the refrigerator and list milk, juice, and other beverages as liquids. The containers, butter, veggies, and more as solids. Carbonated drinks can be listed as containing gas. You can ask them later about eggs or Jell-O and other items that may be both solid and liquid. This reinforces their learning by allowing them to explore and use their creativity to complete the assignment.

SOCIAL STUDIES – Older Adult Interviews

 Students may be studying topics in history from the past 50 to 100 years. With this exercise, they interview an older adult who lived through the event that they are studying. They obtain opinions and feelings related to the event. They also confirm (or dispute) facts the students have been taught. Finally, they discuss how the person was affected by the event. This gives them a deeper understanding of that event and shows them the value of primary sources.

LANGUAGE ARTS – Parts of Speech Search

Students practice identifying the seven parts of speech while at home. They do this by listing examples that are used during family conversations or those words found on product labels.

Describing Things

Students use each of the five senses to write descriptive sentences related to things at home or in the neighborhood. The aroma of dinner, the sound of cars passing on the street, the sight of moving tree branches, the feel of a parent’s hug, or the taste of a spicy meal. This allows them to connect the lesson to the real world. It allows them to think about their surroundings in a new and interesting way.

READING – Read and React

Students are asked to read aloud a passage from their favorite story or novel. Next, they ask family members or close neighbors for their reactions and opinions about a character/event from the passage. Students record the information and discuss it with the listener. This illustrates that different people may notice different things while reading. It gives the student a chance to practice discussing literature from a young age.

MUSIC – Favorite Music  

Students will listen to a parent or other family member’s favorite genre of music. Then, list the instruments they hear, share their opinions of the sound, and discuss other artists from a particular era. This encourages them to engage with the music on a level they normally would not.

ART – Art Critic

Nearly all homes include some type of painting, picture, or sculpture on display. Students take a photo of an art piece in their home and share their opinion of the art piece with a family member. They can discuss the age of the work of art, how it adds to the room’s décor, why it’s significant to their family, and more. Students will gain valuable practice analyzing images and thinking about art with this homework assignment.

HEALTH – Food Search

The students conduct a food search, identifying healthy versus unhealthy foods. Next, they list reasons why they may be considered healthy or unhealthy, and reviewing food labels. This teaches students to think about what they eat. Hence giving them a fun and interactive activity to do for homework.

There are many, many more creative homework ideas you can use for at-home assignments for your students. Think outside the box when assigning homework. Practice incorporating interactive elements so that students aren’t just sitting at their desk. Try to create and develop assignments that kids will want to do. Avoid the assignments that kids simply have to do. Think of the real-world applications for your lesson material as inspiration and build your homework assignments around that. Creative homework assignments can be fun and, at the same time, teach and enhance subjects introduced in the classroom.

For more creative homework ideas, be sure to check out our lesson plans and YouTube videos!

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Three predictions for how ai will reshape academia.

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Jozef Gherman is the CEO & Founder of Undetectable AI: StealthGPT .

The current state of artificial intelligence in academia is in constant flux. Each university will inevitably be somewhat defined by its AI policy, but certain trends are bound to sweep academia at large.

With a background in generative AI, I can see the wave of superior chatbots and new technologies coming toward higher education, the universities attempting to protect student learning and the next generation surfing that wave with impeccable competency.

I want to speculate on the near future that builds upon a present where AI tools with large language models like ChatGPT can write essays, AI detectors like Turnitin can spot the watermarks of AI writing and AI tools with natural language processing aim to bypass those detectors by making text more human-like.

As much as the use of AI threatens student development by depriving them of learning outcomes like attaining critical thinking faculties and a sense of real-world consequences, tech developers still want the next generation of students to be fully functional human beings. The three parties—tech, faculty and students—must work together to make a future that benefits everyone using AI technology.

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Here are three predictions for how AI will reshape academia for each of these groups.

More In-Class And Less Take-Home Assignments

If generative AI poses a problem for professors demanding their students’ learning experiences come without any caveats, students should expect in-class assignments to take the place of take-home assignments. These in-class assignments might take the form of long-answer worksheets or full essays asked to be started and finished in class.

While this approach prevents students from using AI to write their essays and ensures they are not engaging in AI plagiarism, it is also important to consider that this forces students to write and think in an environment that might not be conducive to their best work. Deep learning often requires isolation and environmental control by learners. So, the classroom might be the right place to hear a lecture, but unless professors are offering personalized learning experiences for individual students, a whole classroom of students writing the same long-from answers at once might not produce the learning outcomes professors are trying to create.

Some progressive campuses might see a different direction to take their students. Cornell is one such case with a very future-forward approach to embracing AI technology. The university has accepted the use of generative AI in written assignments and the consequences of putting all-out bans on the use of AI. Their AI ethics statement also addresses more political concerns, such as whether students are unwitting contributors to climate change and big data. I expect universities like Cornell to be the first wave of campuses to realize my second prediction.

Augmenting Curriculums For Personalized Learning Using AI

While academia may be facing some challenges in adapting to the new technological era, I believe that AI will ultimately have a positive impact on student learning and overall human intelligence. One of the ways artificial intelligence will likely benefit both students and faculty alike is by augmenting curriculums for personalized learning experiences that are versatile enough to tailor to each class and update according to relevant developments.

The burden on professors to continuously update curriculums is oftentimes too great for them to keep up with the rest of the job’s demands. The amount of personalization employed by a professor may vary, but if they want, artificial intelligence has the power to customize a curriculum down to the individual student, removing any implicit bias that might get in between a student and their learning experience. If a professor is tasked to teach a classroom of international students who are not native-English speakers, the AI can help update the curriculum to make sure no learner is left behind.

AI-powered curriculums can evolve in real time with our changing world and a class’s changing demands. If a student’s personal development as a human being is the highest priority, AI tools can be used by professors to make sure their teaching can keep up with their changing fields so the next generation is prepared for the real world they will be entering.

The Revival Of Oral Testing

A key worry professors have is passing students who have used AI tools to write their papers and then having them leave the classroom without any real-world competency in their field.

There was once a time in academia when elocution and memorization were so valued that to test if individual students knew their class material, they would have to memorize the text and pass an oral test in front of their class. It may seem antiquated, but what is old can become new again.

By requiring students to prove what they know in oral tests, whether just for the professor or in front of the entire class, there is no way they can utilize AI tools to aid them. Oral tests that require memorization don’t care what sort of AI systems are put in place to automate a student’s work. When speaking alone in front of a class, no AI assistant can help you. You can only rely on your own knowledge and the effort you put into acquiring it. Since many professors want students to learn the material without cheating, oral testing is one method of measuring who’s truly learned anything.

How Tech Can Help

With student dependency on AI growing, tech leaders should consider ways AI can build a user’s self-reliance. For some tech leaders, this might include developing AI systems that generate problem-solving processes rather than direct answers or features that allow students to customize their user experience to their education level. Personalization can expand beyond curricula. Imagine what role AI can play in personalizing a student’s campus experience and then their life experience entering an increasingly competitive world.

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Former Dodger Jason Heyward Finds New Home With AL Contenders: Reports

Eva geitheim | aug 27, 2024.

• Los Angeles Dodgers

Former Los Angeles Dodgers outfielder Jason Heyward is reportedly signing with the Houston Astros five days after he was designated for assignment by the Dodgers, per MLB.com's Brian McTaggart.

Source: Astros are close to signing OF Jason Heyward, who was released by the Dodgers. Heyward, 35, slashed .208/.289/.393 with six homers and 28 RBIs in 63 games with L.A. — Brian McTaggart (@brianmctaggart) August 27, 2024

The Dodgers designated Heyward for assignment just two days after he hit a pinch-hit three-run home run to give the Dodgers a win over the Seattle Mariners. He officially cleared waivers on Monday, making him a free agent.

With Chris Taylor ready to return from a groin strain that landed him on the injured list, the Dodgers no longer had room for Heyward on the roster. The Dodgers' lineup has returned to normal for the first time since this spring following the returns of Mookie Betts and Max Muncy from injuries.

Heyward spent two seasons with the Dodgers, originally signing with Los Angeles on a minor league contract in Dec. 2022. He ended up making the Dodgers' Opening Day roster the following March, and appeared in 124 games for the Dodgers during the 2023 campaign, slashing .269/.340/.473 with 15 home runs and 40 RBIs. His efforts landed him the Roy Campanella Award, given to the most inspiring Dodger of the season.

Heyward returned to the Dodgers this season, re-signing with the team on a one-year, $9 million contract in Dec. 2023. He appeared in 63 games for the Dodgers in 2024, slashing .208/.289/.393 with six home runs and 28 RBIs. Heyward did miss some time due to injury this season, including a bone bruise in his knee.

While Heyward did not match the production he showed in 2023 this season, it's unsurprising to see him quickly find a new home after he was designated for assignment by the Dodgers.

In 2024, Heyward showed the ability to fill in for the Dodgers when needed, like he did with his pinch-hit home run last week. Heyward also took over when James Outman struggled this season, his second in the big leagues after finishing third in the National League Rookie of the Year voting in 2023.

Heyward, a 35-year-old veteran, joins an Astros team that currently leads the American League West with a 70-61 record. The Astros have made the playoffs in each of the last seven seasons, and have won the division six of those years.

Houston won the World Series as recently as 2022, and are once again a contender to bring home the trophy this year. Although it's been seven years since the Astros beat the Dodgers in the 2017 World Series, after which they were found to have cheated by illegally stealing the opponents' signs, few rival teams elicit more bad blood among the Dodgers' fan base.

Now, Heyward has a chance to latch on with the Astros for the remainder of this season at the Dodgers' expense. Houston is only responsible for a pro-rated portion of the major league minimum salary, while the Dodgers pay the bulk.

EVA GEITHEIM

Eva graduated from UCLA in 2023 with a bachelor's degree in Communication. She has been covering college and professional sports since 2022.

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Assignment Russia

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Becoming a foreign correspondent in the crucible of the cold war.

A personal journey through some of the darkest moments of the cold war and the early days of television news

Marvin Kalb, the award-winning journalist who has written extensively about the world he reported on during his long career, now turns his eye on the young man who became that journalist. Chosen by legendary broadcaster Edward R. Murrow to become one of what came to be known as the Murrow Boys, Kalb in this newest volume of his memoirs takes readers back to his first days as a journalist, and what also were the first days of broadcast news.

Kalb captures the excitement of being present at the creation of a whole new way of bringing news immediately to the public. And what news. Cold War tensions were high between Eisenhower’s America and Khrushchev’s Soviet Union. Kalb is at the center, occupying a unique spot as a student of Russia tasked with explaining Moscow to Washington and the American public. He joins a cast of legendary figures along the way, from Murrow himself to Eric Severeid, Howard K. Smith, Richard Hottelet, Charles Kuralt, and Daniel Schorr among many others. He finds himself assigned as Moscow correspondent of CBS News just as the U2 incident—the downing of a US spy plane over Russian territory—is unfolding.

As readers of his first volume, The Year I Was Peter the Great , will recall, being the right person, in the right place, at the right time found Kalb face to face with Khrushchev. Assignment Russia sees Kalb once again an eyewitness to history—and a writer and analyst who has helped shape the first draft of that history.

Related Books

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Assignment Russia Book Events

• April 9: Politics & Prose LIVE! Marvin Kalb—Assignment Russia: Becoming a Foreign Corresponding in the Crucible of the Cold War – with Jake Tapper
• April 13: National Press Club Virtual Book Event —Marvin Kalb, Assignment Russia
• April 15: Brookings Event —Assignment Russia: A conversation on journalism and the Cold War
• April 29: Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics, and Public Policy Event —Assignment Russia: Becoming a Foreign Correspondent in the Crucible of the Cold War
• May 25: George Washington University —Assignment Russia: Becoming a Foreign Correspondent in the Crucible of the Cold War

Praise for Assignment Russia

“It is impossible to put this engrossing book down—it illuminates so many dark corners of the Cold War. With a master correspondent’s insight, skepticism, sensitivity, and great clarity, Kalb brings vividly to life all the hopes and fears of the most consequential foe this nation has had.” —Ken Burns, filmmaker

“A fascinating memoir of Marvin Kalb’s Cold War adventures as he sought to penetrate the mysteries of Nikita Khrushchev’s Soviet Russia while building his career as one of broadcast journalism’s legends.” —Jack Matlock, U.S. ambassador to Russia (1987–1991)

“Marvin Kalb’s engaging Assignment Russia is like Hamilton’s ‘The Room Where It Happens.’ It is a delightful narrative of Kalb’s personal encounters with some of the most famous characters of the 1950s and 1960s, like CBS’s legendary Edward R. Murrow, who hired Kalb, or Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev, who nicknamed him ‘Peter the Great.’ It is also an engrossing memoir of a foreign correspondent’s adventures in the enemy camp during the Cold War. I loved it, I learned from it, and, I dare say, had fun reading it.” —Lesley Stahl, co-anchor, CBS’s 60 Minutes

“Marvin Kalb’s great new book Assignment Russia is a rollicking and engaging memoir that takes you to the front lines of the Cold War, to a mic in the early days of broadcast news, and into the mind and career of one of ‘Murrow’s Boys.’ It’s an important book from a legend in journalism, a book you can’t put down.” —Jake Tapper, CNN anchor and chief Washington correspondent

“A nostalgic treat for older readers…a wake-up call for younger ones.” —Edward Kosner, The Wall Street Journal

“Kalb’s fond, generous memoir, which vividly delineates a bygone era of early journalism, will appeal to students of 20th-century American history as well as aspiring broadcast journalists. The author was involved in many significant Cold War moments, and he brings us directly into that world. Hopefully Kalb is back at his desk; readers will be eager for the next volume.” — Kirkus Reviews

“Readers should be forewarned that once they pick up the book, it will be hard to put it down until they reach the end.” —Naseer Ahmad, Pakistan Link

Marvin Kalb is a former senior adviser to the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting, a Harvard Professor emeritus, former network news correspondent at NBC and CBS, senior fellow nonresident at the Brookings Institution, and author of 16 other books, the most recent of which is the first volume of his memoirs, The Year I Was Peter the Great (Brookings).

Media Coverage

Journalist Marvin Kalb on dangers, thrills of reporting from Russia during the Cold War

Why Navalny’s Attempt To Dismantle Putin’s Regime Feels Out Of Reach

An American journalist in Cold War Moscow

The Rise of Marvin Kalb

Veteran journalist Marvin Kalb on covering Cold War Russia

Whine Line, Marvin Kalb

Q&A with Marvin Kalb

M. Kalb, Foreign Affairs Reporter

Wednesday, April 14th: Marvin Kalb

State Circle: April 30, 2021

An earnest young correspondent in Cold War Moscow

‘Assignment Russia’ Review: Murrow’s Man in Moscow

Book Review: Assignment Russia, Marvin Kalb’s Memoir

Assignment Russia: Becoming a Foreign Correspondent in the Crucible of the Cold War

Marvin Kalb in the World

Marvin Kalb at Home and Abroad

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Last updated: August 27, 2024

Education | California gives schools homework assignment:…

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Education | California gives schools homework assignment: Build housing for teachers

In a flurry of recent legislation and initiatives, California officials are pushing school districts to convert their surplus property into housing for teachers, school staff and even students and families.

Some districts have already started, and now the state wants every district to become a landlord.

“I believe that California has enough resources and ingenuity to solve (the housing shortage), and the data shows that California’s schools have the land to make this happen,” state Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond said at a press conference in July. “As school leaders, we can get this done for our communities and restore the California Dream.”

But some superintendents and education analysts are skeptical, saying the idea won’t work everywhere and school districts might be better off focusing on education, not real estate development.

“I’m grateful someone’s paying attention to this, but I feel like educators are being asked to solve so many problems,” said Mendocino County Superintendent Nicole Glentzer. “Student performance, attendance, behavior … and now the housing crisis? It’s too much.”

Last month, Thurmond pledged financial incentives for districts that pass bonds to build staff housing, and the Department of Education is sponsoring a workshop for district officials to learn the ins and outs of real estate development.

His move comes on the heels of a report from the University of California, Berkeley, and the the University of California, Los Angeles, that found school districts in California own 75,000 acres of developable land, enough to build 2.3 million residences — which could wipe out the state’s housing shortage.

It also follows the Teacher Housing Act of 2016, which allows school districts to pursue funding sources for housing projects, including state and federal tax credits. Other pieces of legislation, including a 2022 law that went into effect in January, further streamlined the development and funding process. Other laws allow teachers to live in affordable housing even though their income might exceed the qualifying limits.

If Proposition 2, a $10 billion school facilities bond, passes this fall, schools could use that money to not only repair classrooms and other structures, but build teacher housing.

‘It’s changed my life’

A handful of districts have already embarked on projects.

The Los Angeles Unified School District owns several buildings, including a 90-dwelling building that opened in April and a 26-dwelling building reserved for low-income families. The San Francisco Unified School District plans to open a 135-residence building this fall.

The Santa Clara Unified School District has owned a 70-dwelling complex for more than two decades. In San Mateo County, the Office of Education is working with a public-private housing nonprofit to buy an existing apartment building for local teachers.

In Marin, the county education office joined with the county and state to plan teacher housing on state-owned land near San Quentin prison; the Novato Unified School District is exploring workforce housing at several properties it owns; and the College of Marin has formed a coalition of organizations to promote staff housing.

In San Diego, preschool teacher Carolina Sanchez Garcia said she cried when she learned she won a spot at the 264-apartment Scripps Ranch complex, built through a partnership between the San Diego Unified School District and an affordable housing developer.

Due to the high cost of housing in San Diego, she had been commuting from Tijuana, Mexico, for more than a decade. To get to work on time, she’d get up at 2 a.m., move her five kids into the car where they’d go back to sleep, and make the trek across the border to work. Her kids would brush their teeth and get ready for school at a Starbucks.

Now, her commute is only 15 minutes.

“It’s changed my life,” Garcia said. “My kids are sleeping more. I’m sleeping more. It’s made me a better mother and a better teacher. Now, I start my day feeling positive and energized.”

Garcia pays $1,300 a month for a three-bedroom apartment, roughly half of market rate. The rent is similar to what she paid in Tijuana, but now she has time to cook dinner for her family, prepare for class and help her children with homework. Her kids can participate in after-school activities and spend time with friends. Her gas bill is also lower.

“I am so grateful,” Garcia said. “I think all districts should do this. Teachers need help.”

Kyle Weinberg, a special education teacher who’s head of the San Diego teachers union, said the district’s housing endeavors have been successful because teachers share in the planning process, ensuring that the location, size and rents meet teachers’ needs. The district paid for the Scripps Ranch development through an agreement with a private developer, and plans to pay for the next development with money from Measure U, a $3.2 billion school facilities bond that passed in 2022.

Subsidized housing is necessary, Weinberg said, because of the high cost of living in San Diego. To live in a one-bedroom apartment there, starting teachers, who earn about $60,000, would have to pay roughly 63% of their take-home pay on rent. Teachers have long commutes and suffer from burnout, he said.

The union’s goal is to have 700 dwellings available, serving at least 10% of the teaching staff.

“We have a staffing crisis in our district,” Weinberg said. “We need to explore all possible solutions. Along with salaries and benefits, expanding workforce housing is one of those options.”

Negligible turnover

The model state officials often point to is 705 Serramonte in Daly City. The Jefferson Union High School District opened the 122-apartment complex in 2022, and it now houses a quarter of the district staff. A one-bedroom apartment rents for $1,450 a month, about half the market rate.

The district paid for the $75 million project by passing a $33 million bond specifically for teacher housing, and borrowing the rest. The rents generated by the project cover the bond payments. The district hired a property management company to handle maintenance and other issues.

Daly City is sandwiched between Silicon Valley and San Francisco, which have some of the highest rents in the country. Teachers commute from the East Bay and beyond, and the district grappled with a persistent 25% staff turnover rate annually, said district spokesperson Denise Shreve.

Since 705 Serramonte opened, the district has had near-zero turnover.

“Students now start off the school year with a teacher in their classroom, instead of a long-term substitute,” Shreve said. “You have to look at the long-term benefits. We now have teacher retention and students are better off because of it.”

Lisa Raskin, a social science teacher and instructional coach for the district, said she’s struggled with housing over her 20-year career but never considered leaving. A San Francisco native, she’s committed to staying in the area — which has meant that she’s always had roommates.

When she moved into 705 Serramonte, it was her first time living in her own apartment.

“I can be with community if I want, or I can be alone. I love that,” Raskin said, noting that her neighbors and colleagues often host barbecues, game nights and other gatherings. “We call it ‘adult dorms.’ I feel safe here.”

Overworked superintendents

But not every district can pass a bond for teacher housing. Many can’t even pass bonds to repair school campuses. And some superintendents say they’re already so overworked that undertaking a complicated project like real estate development is a near impossibility. California had a superintendent turnover rate of more than 18% last year, according to research from the Superintendent Lab, in part due to workload.

Glentzer, the Mendocino County superintendent, said housing development would be a challenge for smaller, rural and lower-income districts. Those districts face teacher and housing shortages like their wealthier, urban counterparts, but lack the ability to raise the money and hire the staff to oversee projects.

Besides, the housing shortage affects lots of people in the community — not just teachers. Mendocino County has been scarred by numerous wildfires over the past few years, plus a boom in vacation rentals that have decimated the local housing market, leaving some people to live in trailers or even their cars.

A better solution, she said, would be for housing to be left to regional authorities and for the state to fund school districts sufficiently to pay their teachers more.

Still, she understands the need. She herself lived in a district-owned home when she was superintendent of the Potter Valley Community Unified School district northeast of Ukiah. The  two-bedroom bungalow was next to the football field, and she enjoyed the reduced rent and proximity to work.

“There’s no question we need housing,” Glentzer said. “But when you’re the superintendent and the principal and head of maintenance and you’re teaching Spanish, how are you supposed to find the bandwidth for this? I have a degree in education. I never took a real estate course.”

Marguerite Roza, director of the policy research center Georgetown Edunomics Lab, agreed. School districts might be better off paying teachers more or targeting raises for teachers who are in high demand, such as those who work in special education, math or science.

She also noted that except in those three fields, the teacher shortage is ebbing. With federal coronavirus relief money expiring and student enrollment declining, many districts might be laying off teachers — not hiring, she said. EdJoin, a teacher hiring board, showed nearly 2,000 openings this month for special education teachers in California, for example, but fewer than 100 for third-grade teachers.

“By building housing, districts might be addressing a crisis that no longer exists.” Roza said. “School districts’ expertise and focus is to provide education. To assume school districts could take on the responsibility of being landlords efficiently is concerning.”

Growing interest

To help school districts learn the basics of real estate development, the California School Boards Association has been hosting workshops and providing resources for the past two years. So far, 152 of the state’s 1,000 school districts have signed up to study the idea, and the numbers have been growing, said spokesperson Troy Flint.

He acknowledged that smaller districts might not have the staff to get projects off the ground, but some are working on projects together or collaborating with their local county offices of education, he said.

“Districts see the immense value workforce housing can offer their staff, students, and communities,” Flint said. “There is widespread interest in education workforce housing as an elegant way to address the housing affordability crisis. Workforce housing also brings quality-of-life, community and environmental benefits — and may even help address declining enrollment as district staff can afford to live with their families in the communities they serve.”

The Independent Journal contributed to this report.

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Title: Welcome Home Hoyas

Dear Hoyas,

Welcome home. I know you have heard this before and trust you will always know that we are more than a place of education. Georgetown is our home.

This home is not perfect. We are most certainly a place where the food won’t replace home cooking, the homework assignments may not be turned in on time, and there may even be traffic on your way to the Capitol for an internship. Your Hoya home welcomes your imperfection and cherishes the journey that awaits during your years at Georgetown.

I invite you to think of a few things that are central to our sense of belonging at Georgetown:

We care for one another. Our Jesuit values speak to our purpose as an institution.  Above all things, we cherish the gift that we are to each other and the world you will serve as a Hoya. Make time for the community that surrounds you. I recommend:

• We literally have a 4,418-seat multi-purpose stadium. On campus. In DC. There is a seat for you .
• GWOW is probably one of the coolest acronyms I’ve encountered.
• Selfish plug: hang out with me in VP Advisory . All are welcome. There is food.

Be curious . Scholars are not defined by knowing all the answers, they are defined by their willingness to question ideas and each other. As Hoyas, you are expected, asked, to imagine the possibility of what can be discovered when we take the time to question, engage, and inform our understanding of each other and our world. As a University community we are committed to the free exchange of ideas, as embodied in Georgetown’s Speech and Expression Policy .

My own thoughts and opinions have expanded after experiencing the Laboratory for Global Performance and Politics, the inter religious experience that occurs throughout Georgetown, the empowerment and community found in our restorative circles , and the transformation that occurs during our immersion trips .

Conflict matters ; but only when nurtured by care and curiosity. The Provost has recently launched the Georgetown Dialogues Initiative . I’m thrilled to be teaching an Ignatian Seminar with Rev. Greg Schenden, S.J. this fall on conflict and transformation. In a year that has seen countless elections across the world, GU Politics always proves to keep us engaged.

Now, more than ever, we strive to be people for others in a complex world. These principles are more than chants yelled at rallies, they are central to our identity as Hoyas.

At Georgetown, we seek to go deeper. We seek to critically engage and understand how dignity, justice, curiosity, and care define the depth of how to live in community with each other. Conflict and tension are inherent in that process, shaming and disrespect are not. That dignity and care is fundamental in why we all come to Georgetown as Hoyas.

Use your time as Hoyas to explore what care, conflict, and curiosity mean to all of us. You can learn more about University happenings, campus announcements and ways you can connect with each other in our biweekly newsletter Bulldog Bulletin for undergraduate students and weekly Grad Gazette for graduate students, or sign up for other newsletters here . The opportunities for community are endless.

Welcome home.

Eleanor JB Daugherty, Ed.D. Vice President for Student Affairs