Homework - American Education

Assigned academic work that students are expected to complete at home or during nonclass hours and return to the teacher within a specified time. Although always required by American private schools, homework has traditionally proved difficult to introduce in public schools, whose students are more apt to hold after-school jobs on which they and their families may depend economically and which leave the students too tired for homework when they return home. The advent of the computer has had little statistical impact on homework performance. In the 20 years from 1984 to 2004, the number of students who do no homework each night stayed constant at 22% to 24% among 13-year-olds (eighth graders) and increased among 17-yearolds (high school seniors) from 22% to 26%. In 1984, reading scores of both 13-year-olds and 17-year-olds who did more than one hour of homework each night were about 2% higher than those of students who did less than one hour; 20 years later, the differential edged upward only slightly to nearly 3%, despite access to the Internet in nearly 100% of American schools and the use of home computers by nearly 70% of all elementary and secondary school students.