As you try to help them dive into the assignments, it becomes painfully clear that this tortuous nightly ritual is anything but productive.
In today’s episode, I discuss the research on the efficacy of homework (spoiler alert—it’s not necessary) and tips for opting out.
Project Parenthood is hosted by Dr. Nanika Coor. A transcript is available at Simplecast.
Have a parenting question? Email Dr. Coor at parenthood@quickanddirtytips.com or leave a voicemail at 646-926-3243.
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Picture this: it's a typical school night, and you find yourself sitting at the kitchen table with your child, worksheets or textbooks sprawled out, and frustration brewing on both sides. They've got a mountain of homework to conquer, and the clock is ticking. But as you try to help them dive into the assignments, it becomes painfully clear that this tortuous nightly ritual is anything but productive. Stress levels rise, then resistance and conflict flare up between you. Quality family time—or even unstructured downtime—evaporates, all while the joy of learning slips away. You're left wondering, is this really how it’s supposed to be?
Well of course it’s not! So today I’m talking about why the homework grind currently sucks and how it could potentially suck a whole lot less.
Welcome back to Project Parenthood! I'm your host, Dr. Nanika Coor—clinical psychologist and respectful parenting therapist. Each week, I’ll help you repair and deepen your parent-child connection, increase self-compassion and cooperation from your kids, and cultivate joy, peace, and resilience in your relationship with them.
While homework is a widely accepted practice, and you’ve likely been socialized to believe it’s a normal and necessary part of school, its detrimental impact on children is an increasing concern. It's no secret that homework can foster a sense of dread and negativity for all involved, leaving your child with less time for play, increasing frustration with and negative feelings about school, and even turning you into a homework enforcer. This not only breeds bad feelings on all sides but also chips away at your kid’s innate love for learning.
In our capitalist and competitive society, it's normal to worry that your child might fall behind their peers if homework is scaled back. However, research strongly suggests otherwise.
The Human Restoration Project, or HRP, is a non-profit organization that aims to reform the education system by promoting progressive education and restoring humanity to the classroom. They believe that all students and educators are human beings and should be treated with dignity and respect. HRP's goals are to inform educators about the need for progressive education, guide them on how to implement it in their classrooms, and grow the movement through coalition building and advocacy.
HRP has identified twenty educational systems that are dehumanizing and need to be changed in order to produce a human-centric, equitable education system that creates a better future for everyone. One of these systems is homework, which HRP advocates for drastically reducing and replacing with more meaningful and engaging activities that allow students to learn at their own pace and in their own way.
HRP has compiled a database of research—and I’ve dropped the link in the show notes if you’d like to check it out—that suggests that homework isn’t as beneficial as once thought. For instance, even though middle school students in the U.S. are assigned a greater volume of homework compared to middle schoolers in Korea, Japan, and Taiwan, this heightened homework load doesn't actually align with academic performance. When we look at international comparisons, countries like Denmark and the Czech Republic, which assign the least homework, consistently achieve the highest scores on international tests. Conversely, countries like Iran and Thailand, which assign substantial amounts of homework, tend to report lower international test scores. And when it comes to elementary school students, there was no significant correlation between homework and test scores, and any slight correlation that did exist tended to fade away as students moved into middle or high school, especially as the homework demands increased.
The research also suggests that other factors matter more than homework. Effective instruction, motivation, and the selection of appropriate courses do significantly influence academic achievement, while the influence of homework on achievement is negligible. Additionally, considering the substantial time commitment often associated with homework, more than half of families reported that it resulted in stress, hardship, and significant conflicts within the household. And ultimately, when kids are provided with opportunities to independently explore their world and pursue their individual interests, they’re considerably more inclined to cultivate lifelong goals and ambitions.
Given this research, maybe it’s time to face the fact that homework isn’t really beneficial for students. The connection between homework assignments and academic achievement is, at best, minimal (and even then—only for elementary school kids), and those potential benefits aren’t really worth the negative impact it has on children and families.
So if you remove the expectation of doing homework, how else might your child be productive after school and on weekends? Well, some research has looked at other factors connected to a child’s level of achievement. For example, researchers studying how kids 3-12 spend their time and how those activities impact child development found that kids who spend more time reading for pleasure have higher achievement scores. And children who spend more time at meals and sleeping have fewer behavior problems, with eating as a family being the strongest predictor of higher academic achievement and fewer behavior problems for a child.
You could trade being the homework enforcer for being the head chef in the kitchen with your child as the sous chef helping you make the evening meal that you’ll sit down and eat together. Instead of the homework stand-off, you might institute family reading time when the whole family reads for 20 minutes and folks can either read themselves or be read to. Kids not only learn about the world through reading, but they also become more motivated to learn! Spending quality time with family is far more beneficial than homework is to a kid’s success in life.
Kids also need unstructured free time just to recharge, and relax, socialize, play outside, or have new experiences—like a trip to a museum, or checking out a new playground or library. Without homework, they have time to advantage of free resources online and in the community that inspire them to create new things, discover new interests, or develop new skills. They can even use the extra homework-free time to sneak in a nap or get to bed early—kids need 9-12 hours of sleep to be energized and ready to learn!
In some schools, opting out of homework is as easy as sending a note to the teacher saying something like “Dear Teacher, Thanks so much for all the hard work you do for our class! My kiddo thinks you’re the bee's knees! Just wanted to take a moment to discuss our approach to homework for the upcoming school year. It’s important to my child’s development to foster a love for learning while maintaining a healthy balance between academics and personal well-being. To that end, and in alignment with the current research on the impact of homework, I have decided to opt my child out of homework assignments and prioritize our valuable family time. Please let me know what curriculum-related materials or resources I should make available to my child at home. Thanks for your understanding and support!”
It might be that easy, but make sure you’re prepared to face challenges—by opting out of homework, you may face resistance from others. Be ready to explain your reasons and stand by your decision. Keep yourself informed about the latest research on homework and its impact on children, and use this information to support your position.
Also, in the spirit of “nothing about them without them”—always start by sitting down with your child and talking through your concerns about homework and your desire to opt them out of it. How do they feel about this—are they on board? Some kids love doing homework, some hate it, some are neutral about it, and some might simply appreciate having the flexibility to do it if they want to, and not do it if they prefer not to. If your child also wants to opt out of homework, set realistic expectations and make some family agreements about how they’ll spend their free after-school hours.
Once you and your child are on the same page, have a discussion with your child’s teacher. Tell them your concerns and your perspective on homework and brainstorm possible alternatives or workarounds. Read through your school’s homework policies and guidelines—there may be options for flexibility and negotiation you don’t know about. If you're part of a parent-teacher association or a similar kind of group, you can even advocate for changes in homework policies at the school or district level.
Make sure that you have a space at home that is a “homework-free zone” so there’s a clear delineation between family time and schoolwork time. Explore extracurricular activities they could potentially get involved with—which is another way they can learn and build skills outside of school. Intentionally carve out quality family time—even if it’s only 15-30 minutes a day. This can be mealtimes, playing games, reading, or just having technology-free conversations.
As the new school year begins, remember that it’s your relationship with your child that’s the safe haven, the secure base, and the source of resilience for your child during times of transition like these. A strong parent-child relationship is the foundation upon which your child can best thrive. When tensions around homework become heavily entrenched, it comes between you both. It just might be that opting out of homework and prioritizing connection, harmony and your child’s well-being might be the best thing you can do for your child’s education.
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That’s all for today’s episode of Project Parenthood—thanks for listening, and I hope you found this helpful! Be sure to join me live on Instagram @bkparents on Monday, September 18 at 12:45pm when you can “Ask Me Anything…”—about school drop off! You can get your questions answered in real-time!
If you have a question for me about parent-child relationships, respectful parenting tips and/or parental mental health that you’d like me to cover in a future episode, shoot me an email at parenthood@quickanddirtytips.com, leave a message at 646-926-3243 or leave a message on Instagram @bkparents. And you can learn about my private practice working with parents living in New York State at www.brooklynparenttherapy.com.
Catch you next week!
Cooper, H., Robinson, J. C., & Patall, E. A. (2021). The effects of homework on student achievement: A meta-analysis of research. Educational Psychology Review, 33(1), 1-18. doi:10.1007/s10648-020-09525-9
Cooper, H., Robinson, J. C., & Patall, E. A. (2020). The effects of homework on elementary school students' achievement: A meta-analysis of research. Child Development, 91(3), 603-616. doi:10.1111/cdev.13444
Human Restoration Project. (2023, March 8). Why Sheet: Eliminating Homework. Retrieved September 7, 2023, from https://www.humanrestorationproject.org/resources/why-sheet-eliminating-homework
McNutt, C. (2023, January 28). This is why we should stop giving homework. Human Restoration Project. Retrieved from https://medium.com/human-restoration-project/this-is-why-we-should-stop-giving-homework-5f1d0016f586
McNutt, C. (2020, February 9). Review: The End of Homework: How Homework Disrupts Families, Overburdens Children, and Limits Learning. Human Restoration Project. Retrieved from https://medium.com/human-restoration-project/hrp-books-of-the-month-february-the-end-of-homework-how-homework-disrupts-families-overburdens-cdb1c7d89b9c
Swanson, R. (2019, October 7). I’ve opted out of homework for my young children. Here’s why, and how you can, too. The Washington Post. https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/2019/10/07/ive-opted-out-homework-my-young-children-heres-why-how-you-can-too/