I have been following the thread concerning homework on KTM. Rather than comment there, I thought I would add my own comments here.
Homework is an integral part of mathematics. Since the only way to learn mathematics is by practicing, practice must be done at home, after school. Before I give any homework assignment, I do it myself. If it takes me more than 10 minutes (5 minutes for a low level class), it is too long and I shorten it. The homework always is a reflection of what was done in class and the students should have examples to go back to for help. In an advanced class, I try to assign problems with the answers in the back so work can be checked. Although the answers don’ t explain the problems, many times it is possible to work backwards from the answer and figure out the process.
Every homework problem is gone over in class. My room does not have much board space, so I have students (a different one each day) do the assignment on an acetate and then use the overhead to display. If a student cannot do an example it just has to be written down with space left for the solution. The students are supposed to make corrections with a different colored pen. After the assignment is gone over, it is collected. I go through the papers, see which problems were the most difficult and return them the next day. I do not have the time or the ambition to mark each paper and put corrections on them. Besides, years ago when I was young and ambitious, I found my efforts ended up in the trash more times than not.
In my advanced placement calculus class, I don’t check homework every day. It takes too long to collect it and give it back. To compensate, I give “take home quizzes” once a week and mark those. So far, this has been successful.
I don’t know if this is the best way to check homework, but at the moment it is the best I can do.
4 comments:
I can't follow the KTM discussion, but I can follow yours. We do not do the exact same things, but most of the philosophy is in common.
Ironically, homework policies I refined with very weak students I use to great effect with fairly strong students.
One difference is that I do not often collect homework these days, but I usually check it in class.
Also, I do not insist that every problem be reviewed. On an average day we review a bit more than half the homework, usually concentrating on the harder examples.
Finally, and this is very different, I offer two overlapping assignments, and students choose whether to do the longer, more routine one, or the shorter one with a tricky problem or two.
But all kinds of details, like writing down the problem with space, students putting up the homework, assigning odd problems, they make it feel like we have variations on a theme.
I also agonize over penalties and rewards for not doing/doing homework. I don't think kids should get extra credit for doing it. That is part of their job. On the other hand, I usually pass kids with 60 averages if they have done all their homework.
As for penalizing them--If a kid has a 95 average without doing homework, I see no reason to force them to do it.
In my college class I used to have a strict hw policy. It forced me to lower grades of students to the point where they had to retake the course. Now, it is up to them. All my exams come from homework so if they don't do it, they are choosing to fail. At some point, students have to take responsibility for their own actions.
When grading students, homework is counted as 20% of their grade. It's absurd, because it almost creates a "double jeopardy" situation- the kids lose points on his average for not doing homework, and, more likely than not, this affects their test performance. But, for my bottom classes, if I didn't check their hw on a daily basis, they would never do it.
My Regents kids are another story- if I assign a practice set of questions, I must review them in class- generally, I survey them, and if a question is straightforward, I'll just give them the answer- if several kids don't understand a question, I'll break it down for them.
I love jd's idea way of differentiating homework. We usually think of differentiated hw as fewer questions for the lower functioning kids (leading to a great deal of resentment from the more capable)- I'm going to use
his method.
Enjoy the break! (and just keep remembering you're on FU time!)
grading homework in math is tough- mostly because of the sheer volume of it, and also of its necessity, like you said- practice makes perfect. in my classes, we have the students grade their own homework at the beginning of every class. we read out the answers and they mark of correct/incorrect and put their score at the top of the page. its a system based on honor. sometimes it works, sometimes it really doesn't!
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