text: Sorry, parents, your child probably doesn't have too much homework | Commentary | Dallas News
  2014 File Photo/The New York Times
  Second-grade teacher Brandy Young became a viral heroine this week when she slew the most hated Grendel in the reptilian cohort of childhood antagonists: homework.
  Young teaches in the Godley school district west of Fort Worth. With the start of the school year, she handed out a notice telling parents that she will not assign work to be completed outside class.
  "Research has been unable to prove that homework improves student performance," she wrote. "I ask that you spend your evenings doing things that are proven to correlate with student success. Eat dinner as a family, read together, play outside, and get your child to bed early."
  This sounds like an excellent prescription for all families. But I have to wonder: Does homework really make all those things impossible?
  Yes, say some parents, some of them people I know. They complain of teachers who load kids down with mindless busywork that wastes precious time in households already stressed by parents' jobs and kids' extracurricular activities.
  So, how bad is this problem? Judging by the headlines that surge in surprisingly predictable recurrent cycles, it's the chief torment of modern existence: "We're destroying our kids" with homework; "Too much homework leads to 'parents' bill of rights'; "How homework overload stresses out families."
  Parent blogs and internet sites abound with horror stories about a "homework arms race" that grows heavier each year.
  Some individual accounts describe a regimen that sounds more appropriate for a Dickensian workhouse than a 21st century American school. A parent in Illinois describes a fifth-grader who is "required to attend school from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.," arrives home at 6 p.m., then stays up until midnight doing homework — every night. Another parent describes a child who is required to "read 10 books daily at home" by a teacher.
  Golly. Ten books a day? Sleep-deprived fifth-graders toiling for six hours every night?
  Yes, the anecdotes are pretty dreadful. And nearly all of these parents cite research that "proves" homework is worthless and even harmful for young children.
  Those claims center on a 2006 analysis that indicated homework in primary grades does not affect academic performance and that it's beneficial for older students only in reasonable doses, and in a Michigan study that found a trend toward heavier homework loads for younger students.
  Yet a close reading shows that most researchers believe that homework in small doses for younger students helps form good study habits, responsible behavior and direct involvement by parents in their children's education. Aren't those good things?
  These same studies also suggest that the "heavier homework loads" for primary children are a jump from none at all to a little bit — usually 10 to 20 minutes a day for the youngest students.
  A quick random sampling of online homework examples from area school districts shows that parents of primary-grade kids are asked to spend a little time each day helping reinforce the basics by practicing counting, reading aloud and recognizing simple words. I have to ask: If you're not already doing this with your children, why not?
  People are not making this up. They are stressed; they're overburdened. By the time everybody gets home from work and school and sports practice and other activities, the family is exhausted. Homework, they say, is one burden too many.
  A January essay in The Washington Post explained why one mom refused to participate in a voluntary homework project offered by her son's kindergarten.
  "More often than not, we face fights, tantrums, whining, messes, potty talk, insolence, jealousy and ingratitude," she wrote. "We are challenged to get everyone to sit down at the table at the same time to eat the same things, to put on PJs without drama, to go to bed on time, and anything else that requires unanimous collaboration from three free-spirited and stubborn children."
  Apart from the fact that this does not paint the most appealing portrait of family life, I have to ask: Does every household activity demand "unanimous collaboration"? Call me insensitive and perhaps crazy, but aren't there cases where adults just, well, tell children to "eat your dinner" or "time for bed"?
  It's hard to draw definitive conclusions about this, because so much of the evidence is anecdotal. In fact, there's actual data suggesting that the scope of the problem is overblown, in no small part because the media loves headlines about the "crushing homework burden."
  A highly detailed report released in 2014 by the Brookings Institution concluded that the homework burden has remained generally stable over the last three decades. The sole exception was the same one identified in other studies: a modest increase for the youngest students from no homework to a little.
  "The homework horror stories need to be read in a proper perspective. They seem to originate from the very personal discontents of a small group of parents," the study's authors concluded. "Complaints about homework have existed for more than a century, and they show no signs of going away."
  According to the written policy for Dallas ISD, there are limits for homework assignments. Middle school students should receive no more than seven hours weekly; high school students, no more than 10. The only exception is for students taking Advanced Placement classes, where the load may be as great as 20 hours per week for students enrolled in several AP subjects.
  Yes, that's a lot. But consider other studies that demonstrate over and over that American children spend far more time than that watching television, playing video games and using social media. A CNN study last year found some eighth-graders who check their social media accounts "upwards of 100 times per day." A 2014 Nielsen report showed that children ages 2 to 11 watch 24 hours and 16 minutes of television every week.
  This suggests that households struggling to find more quality time might have sources of distraction beyond homework.
  Still, there are clearly a lot of unhappy parents out there. So tell me: Does your child have an unreasonable homework burden?
  I want to know. But I also believe that before we call it an "epidemic," maybe we ought to take a hard look at our own priorities.