2019 E2

The debate around the utility of homework in elementary school has been an ongoing issue for more than 100 years. Many claims that rely on poorly interpreted research suggest that homework in elementary school has no effect. Yet, to date all the (very few) experimental studies that tried to investigate the extent of which variations of the amount of homework can improve academic performance of elementary school students were methodologically flawed. Given that elementary school teachers face an increasing workload that places constraints on the availability of instructional time allocated for practice in the classroom, understanding the role of homework in elementary school becomes increasingly important. This presentation aims to show for the first time the results of a very recent experiment that investigated the utility of homework among elementary school students. In this study that was completed in April 2019 (but not published yet), 460 elementary school students were randomly distributed in 3 groups. Each group had assigned a different (standardized) amount of homework for math and for writing for 20 days (for instance, the students who received more homework in math, received less homework in writing). Their math skills (multiplication fluency) and writing skills (spelling and punctuation) were assessed before the intervention, immediately after the intervention and 3 months later. The results and the implications of the findings will be discussed. At the end of the presentation, the participants will have a better understanding of the impact and the limitations of practicing the newly learned skills.