Essential Learning Activities Should Be The Ultimate Goal

I caught the statement below from Lyn Hilt in the comment section of Scott McLeod's post on whether or not parents should be allowed to have their children opt out of the use of technology in 1:1 settings. 

"Here’s an idea, engage kids in essential learning activities at school, infuse the technology meaningfully, and let kids be kids and enjoy their lives outside of school by not assigning loads of homework. (And elementary kids? Zero homework.) If kids are so inclined, with their devices they can extend their thinking at home on their own time, but don’t make it mandatory... "

I've written several posts on homework in the past and I can't help wondering what students would use their time for if they had the opportunity to "extend their thinking" on topics that they found most interesting.  How much longer will we continue to ignore the research of Alfie Kohn surrounding homework? It has been nearly a decade since Kohn came to the following conclusions:

"For younger students, in fact, there isn’t even a correlation between whether children do homework (or how much they do) and any meaningful measure of achievement.  At the high school level, the correlation is weak and tends to disappear when more sophisticated statistical measures are applied.  Meanwhile, no study has ever substantiated the belief that homework builds character or teaches good study habits."

I grow continually frustrated as I see my own students spending their time on so many low-level, rote tasks that really serve no essential purpose in preparing them for what they will face when it is time to prove that they have marketable skills that would be an asset to some organization. When they do find time to spend on some of the things that they are most interested in, I am amazed at some of the self-directed learning that they do in spite of the very traditional education they have had.  I can only imagine what the possibilities would be if my kids spent six hours a day in learning environments that focused on the self-directed and collaborative skills that they need (and long for). 

We need to change this cycle...

Related articles

• 12 education guidelines from Alfie Kohn (dangerouslyirrelevant.org)

Amanda Ripley's Intriguing Talk On Education Reform

I came across the video above from Amanda Ripley's talk at Pop Tech 2012 on Scott McLeod's Blog.  It really is something that I would recommend for anyone who is concerned about the state of our schools.

Ripley who is well known for her first book, The Unthinkable: Who Survives When Disaster Strikes — and Why, is working on a book due out this summer titled The Smartest Kids In The World. In writing this book, Ripley took a unique path to investigating how the countries ranked ahead of the United States on the PISA test educate their students. She interviewed some top American students who spent time as exchange students in some of these countries and asked them to compare their experiences abroad with their experiences back here stateside in American classrooms.

The video concludes with the following three takeaways from these conversations:

1. In the top performing countries in the world school is harder.  
2. No country is like the US with its obsession of playing sports. 
3. Kids (in schools in these other countries) believe there's something in it for them. 
4. Kids believe that what they are doing in school impacts their futures.

Ripley ends with these words , "If we want to know how to raise resilient kids, there are lots of ways to find out. One of the ways to do this is to ask kids because kids can tell you things that no one else can."

I am excited for the book! In the meantime, I've added Amanda's blog to my RSS feed.