Everyday, teachers assign their students homework based on the current lesson taught that class period. A majority, if not all teachers, decide to give out homework almost every class and have it due the next time the students are in that class (usually two days later). Whether it be just one homework sheet or sometimes a more timely assignment, assigning too much for one teenager to handle is  not helpful.

Many teachers defend their excess amount of outside work to “prepare students for college” or even “preparing for the challenging world after high school.” This seems very inaccurate when most college students have very few classes a day, providing larger amounts of time to study and work on assignments. Having an eight hour long school day and then coming home to work on things due the next day does not provide enough time for students to fully put their best effort into whatever it is they are working on. At this point, students are only trying to finish what they have due so they will receive a good grade, not trying to grasp the concepts they have previously learned. Overall, homework and school in general has become very scripted for students to only focus on having the best grades and not actually applying or understand what they have learned.

Too much homework can be both mentally and physically harmful for students. Kids who need to use big textbooks for homework usually carry these books in their backpacks. The weight can actually be dangerous as kids’ bones are still growing and developing at this age. This can have long lasting effects such as back and neck pain starting at a young age and only progressively getting worse with age. Most young kids enjoy being on a sports team, in a club, in the musical/play, etc. throughout their middle school or high school years and have those meetings almost everyday after school for a few hours, which means by the time they get home they get very little time to do homework, eat dinner, shower, and anything else they need to do before bed. This can cause them to stay up unreasonably late. Remember, these kids already have to wake up very early for school, so staying up too late is very unhealthy. Being very sleepy at school will make it even harder to learn anything because you won’t be able to focus. It has also been proven that getting little sleep can eventually lead to worse conditions such as obesity, heart disease and high blood pressure.

Homework can also take away from time that a kid could be spending with their family. Rather than spending time bonding with family, parents and children argue over homework because sometimes parents don’t always understand the amount of stuff actually going on at school. Time is taken away from important elements of a young student’s everyday life. Time can already be limited in some families and taking that away isn’t fair to the kid or parents. This time could be spent going out to dinner as a family, or doing other things that most families are not able to do because the student can’t take a break from their school and homework schedule.

Overall, students are given way more homework than what is necessary. Teachers need to realize that their students have multiple classes and get many assignments every night, which can have very negative effects. The use of homework is effective when it is actually needed and necessary.  Overwhelming kids with loads of homework can cause stress, which can already be hard to deal with at this age. Homework takes away from the small amount of time kids get to spend with their families, cause mental and physical harm and overall just be useless at times. Schools  need to see this issue and put in effort to help their students be successful in more than just their grades and GPA.