Homework Blues

Last week the last lingering afterglow of Winter Break sank deep into the bowels of the Pacific Ocean.  Kids began to slack off.  They stopped doing their homework with any amount of care and attention.  On Thursday, the day we have Music, and now, now that I think they’re old enough and mature enough to follow directions, Computer Lab, 14 out of 17 did a less-than-half-ass job on their homework.  (Did I mention we’re down to 17?  Esteban left for another school district on the last day before vacation.)

They did this less than stellar job even though I had canceled Computer Lab the week before because of lackluster classwork, and I’d warned them that I’d cancel it again if similar behavior repeated.  Nevertheless, 14 out of 17 decided they didn’t really have to pay attention to what they were doing at home.  It wasn’t as if the work was new or strange to them; it was subject-verb agreement which we’ve been doing since Week 1 of school, and then write a paragraph on an animal that camouflages, which we’ve been practicing for a month now.   (Homework, in my room, is always a repetition or slight extension of what has already been done in class, preferably on the same day.)

Most kids did the fill-in-the-blank subject-verb agreement just fine.  Then came the ‘paragraph’.   No indenting.  One sentence.  And the subjects and verbs didn’t even agree!  (We won’t even talk about spelling.)

The rattlesnack camouflage with the sand.

The green anole blend with the leafs.

The snowy ole change colr to mach the sno.

Come on.  Seriously.

I’m gonna rattlesnack you!

Who are they kidding?  These are the same kids who have been doing in-class timed paragraph writing on camouflage: a 3-5 sentence paragraph in twelve minutes.  No problem.  I have about 80 index cards filled with their paragraphs to prove it.  I know they can do it.

Is 12 minutes too much to spare for homework that’s your ticket to the laptop lab?

I guess it clearly is.

I’ve got to figure out what they’re thinking when they leave the structure of the room.  Somehow, it all falls apart. I think this is a common problem in inner city schools.  Teachers do as much as they can in the six or seven hours they’re with the kids, but then the kids go home, and it’s a different world.  Reformers are big on saying we need a longer school day.  That’s not going to change the divide.  It’s just going to widen it by keeping kids longer on one side.  There’s the working structure of school.  Then there’s the–whatever there is–at home.  Somehow, we have to bridge that divide, not just reapportion the time on each side.  It’s not just balancing the equation; it’s creating an equal sign in the first place.

And would you believe, even after Music and Computer Lab were canceled, the next day, Evan and Randy didn’t bring their homework again?