Best Teaching Practices for Homework & ClassWork
Teaching Solutions & Classroom Techniques for Designing Assignments
Dec 11, 2008
According to best teaching practices, classroom techniques for designing homework and class work should differ. Some of the best formative assessments teachers can get are those made by looking at class work and homework. What are the basic questions teachers should be asking as they plan learning for students? Here's a look at several teaching solutions for designing useful and relevant assignments.
Best Teaching Practices for Creating Class Work
When creating assignments to be used in class, the first question to be asked is, “Why?” If a principal, a parent, or a student asks why this work is being assigned, what will the teacher tell him? There are really three kinds of class work – that which is for learning, that which is for practice, and that which is for review.
Classroom Techniques to Create Class Work for Learning
If a teacher designs class work for learning, then she should ask: What are the goals? How long can the assignment be? Is it OK for students to make mistakes on this assignment? Should it be graded?
It is like taking music lessons. A music teacher will model a new skill then give an assignment. If it is a new skill, the assignments are very short and the teacher monitors the student closely. It is OK for a student not to be perfect at first, but the music teacher will use the performance to form his next instruction.
It’s basically the same when teaching students about multiplication or parts of speech. When the students are learning new content and skills, the assignments are short and the teacher should monitor the students closely so that misconceptions can be corrected and successes can be praised. These assignments are practice and should not be graded.
Teaching Solutions to Create Class Work for Practice
Class work for practice is a different than class work for learning. When a music teacher sees that a student can perform a new skill reasonably well, he will give longer pieces to practice.
A practice assignment will be longer than an assignment for new learning. A teacher does not want students to make mistakes here. She wants them to go slowly and carefully, practicing the skill accurately.
Practice work might be graded if the teacher believes the students have a good understanding of the concept, but she also uses those grades to form instruction.
Classroom Techniques to Create Class Work for Review
Assignments for new learning are short and monitored closely; assignments for practice are longer and designed to reinforce skills. Review work is very different from these two. A banjo teacher might tell a student to play a piece of music as a review. After it is played, he will say something like, “That fingering you do in Old Joe Clark is exactly the same as the one we’re going to use in this new song.” He will use his review work effectively by also building on it for new instruction.
Best Teaching Practices for Homework
So where does homework come in? Teachers ask many of the same questions when designing homework. Should students go home with work that is still very new to them? No. Teachers do not want students to practice something that they don’t yet understand because they are afraid they will learn it incorrectly. It will be difficult teaching it the right way after that. The only class work that should go home is review work and practice that students can complete accurately.
Homework has the distinct ability to be very different from class work. Students could complete more practice and review work at home or expand their experiences in authentic ways. If students are studying moon phases during the school hours, homework might be to draw tonight’s moon and identify the phase.
Students can look for current events, classify leaves, identify food groups, and a host of other authentic curricular activities at home more easily than at school. Grading homework is difficult because teachers have no real way of knowing just how much of the work is the student’s. Some students do their work entirely on their own and some parents help their children. Use homework to teach time management and organization, to broaden experiences, and reinforce classroom skills.
Class work that is designed for new learning is short, focused, and monitored closely. Class work that is designed for practice is longer, focused, and checked for accuracy. Class work designed for review can be a foundation for new learning. Homework is not designed to teach new skills, and it has the special ability to not look like class work.
