Summer: the time of the year every student looks forward to. After a long school year, the time of relaxation, vacations, and no worries is just what every kid needs.
Then there are the summer assignments. Students in the secondary levels of school become burdened with having homework during their break. No longer can summer vacation be just that: a vacation. With the school year just winding up, the question lingers: Are summer assignments a valid way of learning?
For starters, a student’s mind needs a break. During the ten months of school, the mind gets an extensive intellectual and emotional workout based solely around homework. In fact, more than 50% of students claim that homework is their main source of stress, according to USA Today.
Sara Bennett, the founder of StopHomework.com, also weighs in on the subject: “Kids don’t have enough downtime during the school year.” So, why carry the pressure of school into the break from school?
Some parents even disdain the work their children are given, since they hate having to remind their kids to do their work which can lead to increases in tension in the family life. It can also upset the parent if their child easily becomes stressed over their “vacation work.”
Another major point on the “anti-summer work” side is the quality of work and how much of a benefit the work has on the student. According to GreatSchools.org and Doassignmenthelp.com, self-learning could do more harm than good. Students could have a shortage of guidance and instruction when learning at home, which may lead to little to no comprehension of the material given.
Is this to say that there are no pros in regards to summer assignments? Of course not. In fact, according to teachers and some experts, work over the break is beneficial to the students. Some claim that the work keeps the brain from “melting” by having the students flexing their mental muscles.
According to Harris Cooper, chairman of the department of psychology and neuroscience at Duke University and America’s leading homework scholar, although there is no data, “We would make the assumption that if students are continuing to flex their mental muscles over the summer, this would have a positive effect on how much material they retain when they return [to school.] Others believe that the assignments help kids maintain a schedule and keep them cognitively engaged.
It goes without saying that most, if not all students strongly dislike having to do work over their summer break. As one of those students, I can attest to the fact that the work brings more bad than good, at least for me. It feeds into a procrastination mindset, and I’ve caught myself thinking, “I’ll do it later,” until there is no later. I also know that the work given brings more eye rolls and head shakes rather than nods of understanding and contentment to work.
Nevertheless, summer homework has just become a fact of being a high schooler and something that has to be done. However, it should not go unnoticed that the work given isn’t necessarily as beneficial as most educators think.