9486 in the collection
My Son's Back to Doing Homework — and I'm the One Complaining
Hey if Corporations have personhood, why not Homework? The positive thing here is this parent is speaking out. I tried to make a comment at the Redbook site, to take readers to a higher level. Yes, I wanted to tell them about my book What Happened to Recess?, a book that tells them they aren't alone, a book that documents the assault on family life.
And I wanted to give them tools for resistance, tell them to read Simply Too Much Homework! What Can We Do? by Vera Goodman and The Case Against Homework: How Homework Is Hurting Children and What Parents Can Do About It by Sara Bennett and Nancy Kalish.
Alas, I kept gettig rejected by the site.
Teachers could do a great service toward saving childhood--and fostering the needed revolution-- by informing parents about these books.
by Alice Bradley
Dear readers: I sent out the email below this morning. I received a reply back almost immediately. Here is the conversation that followed.
To: Homework
From: Alice Bradley
Hi, Homework. Welcome back. We've just returned from a lovely week away from school, and I hope you had a nice break as well, doing...whatever it is you do. Listen, Homework, I know this is going to sound rude — and believe me, homework, I hate being rude — but the thing is, much of the reason that we so enjoyed last week is that you weren't in it.
Homework, it's time for me to come out and say it: I don't like you.
I didn't always dislike you. Frankly, Homework, last year — the year you made your appearance — I thought you were kind of cute. In first grade, you were with us for maybe thirty minutes a night, and while you weren't the highlight of the evening, you were innocuous enough. My son liked having you — you were a signal that he was becoming a Big Kid. He told all his relatives about you, Homework. And in return, you gave him gold stars and smiley faces. You were okay by us.
But this year, Homework — this year you morphed into a bloated, time-sucking monster, at one moment boring Henry to tears with your mindless repetition and in the next confusing him to the point of tears. You stay for far too long every night, cutting into the little family time we get to have after dinner. You exhaust all of us. We are done with you.
Alice
--
To: Alice Bradley
From: Homework
Hi Alice!
Thanks for your letter! Wow, those were a lot of words! In your next letter, please list each sight word you used, five times each, in alphabetical order! Now use them in a sentence! Now list the sentences in alphabetical order! DON'T FORGET TO STAY IN THE LINES!
So, you liked me in first grade, but not in second grade? Huh! If Sally was in second grade and she had 57 minutes of homework, but her friend Betty was in first grade and had 47 minutes of homework, how many more minutes does Sally have? Draw each "minute" carefully, using a different colored crayon for every odd "minute." What does a minute look like, you ask? I don't have the answers! I'm HOMEWORK!
I know that I can be a challenge! Did you know that the Lenape Indians faced hardships, too? Find 23 things in your home that remind you of the many challenges the Lenape Indians faced, then create physical representations of your feelings using the corn husks you gathered during your dinner which I hope included corn! Show your work! If you get any tears on your work, make sure your work is dry and tidy when it's time to hand it in!
See you tomorrow and every day after that for the next fourteen years!
Love,
HOMEWORK!
--
To: Homework
From: Alice Bradley
Listen up. I've had a week away from you, and my tolerance is at an all-time low. You start making sense, and you start making sense now, or else we're going to ignore you. We'll ignore you every night, Homework. We'll tell my son's teachers that you're not making any sense, and we'd rather spend an evening enjoying each other's company than engaging in mindless drills of information he is supposed to be learning in school.
You know what, Homework? I don't think you're necessary. At all. I think you exist to make schools feel better about how hard they're trying to raise test scores. I don't think you work. I think we could ignore you, and my son would be just fine.
Love,
Alice
--
To: Alice Bradley
From: Homework
OH ALICE!
Not true! Not true! I am very important. List all the ways in which I am very important! Fill in ovals completely! Repeat! Show your work! Use numbered cubes to indicate markers of what you learned in worksheet folders of SOCIAL STUDIES MATH WORD PROBLEMS 101000010000011111010101111001110
--
My attempts at replying all bounced back. I'd like to think I've finally killed Homework, but I have a feeling that it will live on, and continue to ruin our weekdays.
How do you deal with homework? Please share. Before I lose what's left of my sanity.
— Alice Bradley
Redbook
2011-01-03
http://tinyurl.com/24ynf2g
INDEX OF OUTRAGES
Pages: 380
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