define homework principal

Creating a Homework Policy With Meaning and Purpose

• Tips & Strategies
• An Introduction to Teaching
• Policies & Discipline
• Community Involvement
• School Administration
• Technology in the Classroom
• Teaching Adult Learners
• Issues In Education
• Teaching Resources
• Becoming A Teacher
• Assessments & Tests
• Elementary Education
• Secondary Education
• Special Education
• Homeschooling
• M.Ed., Educational Administration, Northeastern State University
• B.Ed., Elementary Education, Oklahoma State University

We have all had time-consuming, monotonous, meaningless homework assigned to us at some point in our life. These assignments often lead to frustration and boredom and students learn virtually nothing from them. Teachers and schools must reevaluate how and why they assign homework to their students. Any assigned homework should have a purpose.

Assigning homework with a purpose means that through completing the assignment, the student will be able to obtain new knowledge, a new skill, or have a new experience that they may not otherwise have. Homework should not consist of a rudimentary task that is being assigned simply for the sake of assigning something. Homework should be meaningful. It should be viewed as an opportunity to allow students to make real-life connections to the content that they are learning in the classroom. It should be given only as an opportunity to help increase their content knowledge in an area.

Differentiate Learning for All Students

Furthermore, teachers can utilize homework as an opportunity to differentiate learning for all students. Homework should rarely be given with a blanket "one size fits all" approach. Homework provides teachers with a significant opportunity to meet each student where they are and truly extend learning. A teacher can give their higher-level students more challenging assignments while also filling gaps for those students who may have fallen behind. Teachers who use homework as an opportunity to differentiate we not only see increased growth in their students, but they will also find they have more time in class to dedicate to whole group instruction .

See Student Participation Increase

Creating authentic and differentiated homework assignments can take more time for teachers to put together. As often is the case, extra effort is rewarded. Teachers who assign meaningful, differentiated, connected homework assignments not only see student participation increase, they also see an increase in student engagement. These rewards are worth the extra investment in time needed to construct these types of assignments.

Schools must recognize the value in this approach. They should provide their teachers with professional development that gives them the tools to be successful in transitioning to assign homework that is differentiated with meaning and purpose. A school's homework policy should reflect this philosophy; ultimately guiding teachers to give their students reasonable, meaningful, purposeful homework assignments.

Sample School Homework Policy

Homework is defined as the time students spend outside the classroom in assigned learning activities. Anywhere Schools believes the purpose of homework should be to practice, reinforce, or apply acquired skills and knowledge. We also believe as research supports that moderate assignments completed and done well are more effective than lengthy or difficult ones done poorly.

Homework serves to develop regular study skills and the ability to complete assignments independently. Anywhere Schools further believes completing homework is the responsibility of the student, and as students mature they are more able to work independently. Therefore, parents play a supportive role in monitoring completion of assignments, encouraging students’ efforts and providing a conducive environment for learning.

Individualized Instruction

Homework is an opportunity for teachers to provide individualized instruction geared specifically to an individual student. Anywhere Schools embraces the idea that each student is different and as such, each student has their own individual needs. We see homework as an opportunity to tailor lessons specifically for an individual student meeting them where they are and bringing them to where we want them to be. 

Homework contributes toward building responsibility, self-discipline, and lifelong learning habits. It is the intention of the Anywhere School staff to assign relevant, challenging, meaningful, and purposeful homework assignments that reinforce classroom learning objectives. Homework should provide students with the opportunity to apply and extend the information they have learned complete unfinished class assignments, and develop independence.

The actual time required to complete assignments will vary with each student’s study habits, academic skills, and selected course load. If your child is spending an inordinate amount of time doing homework, you should contact your child’s teachers.

• Teacher Housekeeping Tasks
• Collecting Homework in the Classroom
• Dealing With Trips to the Bathroom During Class
• Classroom Procedures
• Planning Classroom Instruction
• 10 Strategies to Boost Reading Comprehension
• The Many Purposes of Education
• Creating a Great Lesson to Maximize Student Learning
• Classroom Rules for High School Students
• Methods for Presenting Subject Matter
• Pros and Cons to Flexible Grouping in Middle and High School
• The Pros and Cons of Block Schedules
• Stop Classroom Clutter
• Assignment Biography: Student Criteria and Rubric for Writing
• Wait Time in Education
• Why Students Cheat and How to Stop Them

Does Homework Really Help Students Learn?

A conversation with a Wheelock researcher, a BU student, and a fourth-grade teacher

“Quality homework is engaging and relevant to kids’ lives,” says Wheelock’s Janine Bempechat. “It gives them autonomy and engages them in the community and with their families. In some subjects, like math, worksheets can be very helpful. It has to do with the value of practicing over and over.” Photo by iStock/Glenn Cook Photography

Do your homework.

If only it were that simple.

Educators have debated the merits of homework since the late 19th century. In recent years, amid concerns of some parents and teachers that children are being stressed out by too much homework, things have only gotten more fraught.

“Homework is complicated,” says developmental psychologist Janine Bempechat, a Wheelock College of Education & Human Development clinical professor. The author of the essay “ The Case for (Quality) Homework—Why It Improves Learning and How Parents Can Help ” in the winter 2019 issue of Education Next , Bempechat has studied how the debate about homework is influencing teacher preparation, parent and student beliefs about learning, and school policies.

She worries especially about socioeconomically disadvantaged students from low-performing schools who, according to research by Bempechat and others, get little or no homework.

BU Today  sat down with Bempechat and Erin Bruce (Wheelock’17,’18), a new fourth-grade teacher at a suburban Boston school, and future teacher freshman Emma Ardizzone (Wheelock) to talk about what quality homework looks like, how it can help children learn, and how schools can equip teachers to design it, evaluate it, and facilitate parents’ role in it.

BU Today: Parents and educators who are against homework in elementary school say there is no research definitively linking it to academic performance for kids in the early grades. You’ve said that they’re missing the point.

Bempechat : I think teachers assign homework in elementary school as a way to help kids develop skills they’ll need when they’re older—to begin to instill a sense of responsibility and to learn planning and organizational skills. That’s what I think is the greatest value of homework—in cultivating beliefs about learning and skills associated with academic success. If we greatly reduce or eliminate homework in elementary school, we deprive kids and parents of opportunities to instill these important learning habits and skills.

We do know that beginning in late middle school, and continuing through high school, there is a strong and positive correlation between homework completion and academic success.

That’s what I think is the greatest value of homework—in cultivating beliefs about learning and skills associated with academic success.

You talk about the importance of quality homework. What is that?

Quality homework is engaging and relevant to kids’ lives. It gives them autonomy and engages them in the community and with their families. In some subjects, like math, worksheets can be very helpful. It has to do with the value of practicing over and over.

What are your concerns about homework and low-income children?

The argument that some people make—that homework “punishes the poor” because lower-income parents may not be as well-equipped as affluent parents to help their children with homework—is very troubling to me. There are no parents who don’t care about their children’s learning. Parents don’t actually have to help with homework completion in order for kids to do well. They can help in other ways—by helping children organize a study space, providing snacks, being there as a support, helping children work in groups with siblings or friends.

Isn’t the discussion about getting rid of homework happening mostly in affluent communities?

Yes, and the stories we hear of kids being stressed out from too much homework—four or five hours of homework a night—are real. That’s problematic for physical and mental health and overall well-being. But the research shows that higher-income students get a lot more homework than lower-income kids.

Teachers may not have as high expectations for lower-income children. Schools should bear responsibility for providing supports for kids to be able to get their homework done—after-school clubs, community support, peer group support. It does kids a disservice when our expectations are lower for them.

The conversation around homework is to some extent a social class and social justice issue. If we eliminate homework for all children because affluent children have too much, we’re really doing a disservice to low-income children. They need the challenge, and every student can rise to the challenge with enough supports in place.

What did you learn by studying how education schools are preparing future teachers to handle homework?

My colleague, Margarita Jimenez-Silva, at the University of California, Davis, School of Education, and I interviewed faculty members at education schools, as well as supervising teachers, to find out how students are being prepared. And it seemed that they weren’t. There didn’t seem to be any readings on the research, or conversations on what high-quality homework is and how to design it.

Erin, what kind of training did you get in handling homework?

Bruce : I had phenomenal professors at Wheelock, but homework just didn’t come up. I did lots of student teaching. I’ve been in classrooms where the teachers didn’t assign any homework, and I’ve been in rooms where they assigned hours of homework a night. But I never even considered homework as something that was my decision. I just thought it was something I’d pull out of a book and it’d be done.

I started giving homework on the first night of school this year. My first assignment was to go home and draw a picture of the room where you do your homework. I want to know if it’s at a table and if there are chairs around it and if mom’s cooking dinner while you’re doing homework.

The second night I asked them to talk to a grown-up about how are you going to be able to get your homework done during the week. The kids really enjoyed it. There’s a running joke that I’m teaching life skills.

Friday nights, I read all my kids’ responses to me on their homework from the week and it’s wonderful. They pour their hearts out. It’s like we’re having a conversation on my couch Friday night.

It matters to know that the teacher cares about you and that what you think matters to the teacher. Homework is a vehicle to connect home and school…for parents to know teachers are welcoming to them and their families.

Bempechat : I can’t imagine that most new teachers would have the intuition Erin had in designing homework the way she did.

Ardizzone : Conversations with kids about homework, feeling you’re being listened to—that’s such a big part of wanting to do homework….I grew up in Westchester County. It was a pretty demanding school district. My junior year English teacher—I loved her—she would give us feedback, have meetings with all of us. She’d say, “If you have any questions, if you have anything you want to talk about, you can talk to me, here are my office hours.” It felt like she actually cared.

Bempechat : It matters to know that the teacher cares about you and that what you think matters to the teacher. Homework is a vehicle to connect home and school…for parents to know teachers are welcoming to them and their families.

Ardizzone : But can’t it lead to parents being overbearing and too involved in their children’s lives as students?

Bempechat : There’s good help and there’s bad help. The bad help is what you’re describing—when parents hover inappropriately, when they micromanage, when they see their children confused and struggling and tell them what to do.

Good help is when parents recognize there’s a struggle going on and instead ask informative questions: “Where do you think you went wrong?” They give hints, or pointers, rather than saying, “You missed this,” or “You didn’t read that.”

Bruce : I hope something comes of this. I hope BU or Wheelock can think of some way to make this a more pressing issue. As a first-year teacher, it was not something I even thought about on the first day of school—until a kid raised his hand and said, “Do we have homework?” It would have been wonderful if I’d had a plan from day one.

Explore Related Topics:

• Share this story

Senior Contributing Editor

Sara Rimer A journalist for more than three decades, Sara Rimer worked at the Miami Herald , Washington Post and, for 26 years, the New York Times , where she was the New England bureau chief, and a national reporter covering education, aging, immigration, and other social justice issues. Her stories on the death penalty’s inequities were nominated for a Pulitzer Prize and cited in the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision outlawing the execution of people with intellectual disabilities. Her journalism honors include Columbia University’s Meyer Berger award for in-depth human interest reporting. She holds a BA degree in American Studies from the University of Michigan. Profile

She can be reached at [email protected] .

Comments & Discussion

Boston University moderates comments to facilitate an informed, substantive, civil conversation. Abusive, profane, self-promotional, misleading, incoherent or off-topic comments will be rejected. Moderators are staffed during regular business hours (EST) and can only accept comments written in English. Statistics or facts must include a citation or a link to the citation.

There are 81 comments on Does Homework Really Help Students Learn?

Insightful! The values about homework in elementary schools are well aligned with my intuition as a parent.

when i finish my work i do my homework and i sometimes forget what to do because i did not get enough sleep

same omg it does not help me it is stressful and if I have it in more than one class I hate it.

Same I think my parent wants to help me but, she doesn’t care if I get bad grades so I just try my best and my grades are great.

I think that last question about Good help from parents is not know to all parents, we do as our parents did or how we best think it can be done, so maybe coaching parents or giving them resources on how to help with homework would be very beneficial for the parent on how to help and for the teacher to have consistency and improve homework results, and of course for the child. I do see how homework helps reaffirm the knowledge obtained in the classroom, I also have the ability to see progress and it is a time I share with my kids

The answer to the headline question is a no-brainer – a more pressing problem is why there is a difference in how students from different cultures succeed. Perfect example is the student population at BU – why is there a majority population of Asian students and only about 3% black students at BU? In fact at some universities there are law suits by Asians to stop discrimination and quotas against admitting Asian students because the real truth is that as a group they are demonstrating better qualifications for admittance, while at the same time there are quotas and reduced requirements for black students to boost their portion of the student population because as a group they do more poorly in meeting admissions standards – and it is not about the Benjamins. The real problem is that in our PC society no one has the gazuntas to explore this issue as it may reveal that all people are not created equal after all. Or is it just environmental cultural differences??????

I get you have a concern about the issue but that is not even what the point of this article is about. If you have an issue please take this to the site we have and only post your opinion about the actual topic

This is not at all what the article is talking about.

This literally has nothing to do with the article brought up. You should really take your opinions somewhere else before you speak about something that doesn’t make sense.

we have the same name

so they have the same name what of it?

lol you tell her

totally agree

What does that have to do with homework, that is not what the article talks about AT ALL.

Yes, I think homework plays an important role in the development of student life. Through homework, students have to face challenges on a daily basis and they try to solve them quickly.I am an intense online tutor at 24x7homeworkhelp and I give homework to my students at that level in which they handle it easily.

More than two-thirds of students said they used alcohol and drugs, primarily marijuana, to cope with stress.

You know what’s funny? I got this assignment to write an argument for homework about homework and this article was really helpful and understandable, and I also agree with this article’s point of view.

I also got the same task as you! I was looking for some good resources and I found this! I really found this article useful and easy to understand, just like you! ^^

i think that homework is the best thing that a child can have on the school because it help them with their thinking and memory.

I am a child myself and i think homework is a terrific pass time because i can’t play video games during the week. It also helps me set goals.

Homework is not harmful ,but it will if there is too much

I feel like, from a minors point of view that we shouldn’t get homework. Not only is the homework stressful, but it takes us away from relaxing and being social. For example, me and my friends was supposed to hang at the mall last week but we had to postpone it since we all had some sort of work to do. Our minds shouldn’t be focused on finishing an assignment that in realty, doesn’t matter. I completely understand that we should have homework. I have to write a paper on the unimportance of homework so thanks.

homework isn’t that bad

Are you a student? if not then i don’t really think you know how much and how severe todays homework really is

i am a student and i do not enjoy homework because i practice my sport 4 out of the five days we have school for 4 hours and that’s not even counting the commute time or the fact i still have to shower and eat dinner when i get home. its draining!

i totally agree with you. these people are such boomers

why just why

they do make a really good point, i think that there should be a limit though. hours and hours of homework can be really stressful, and the extra work isn’t making a difference to our learning, but i do believe homework should be optional and extra credit. that would make it for students to not have the leaning stress of a assignment and if you have a low grade you you can catch up.

Studies show that homework improves student achievement in terms of improved grades, test results, and the likelihood to attend college. Research published in the High School Journal indicates that students who spent between 31 and 90 minutes each day on homework “scored about 40 points higher on the SAT-Mathematics subtest than their peers, who reported spending no time on homework each day, on average.” On both standardized tests and grades, students in classes that were assigned homework outperformed 69% of students who didn’t have homework. A majority of studies on homework’s impact – 64% in one meta-study and 72% in another – showed that take home assignments were effective at improving academic achievement. Research by the Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA) concluded that increased homework led to better GPAs and higher probability of college attendance for high school boys. In fact, boys who attended college did more than three hours of additional homework per week in high school.

So how are your measuring student achievement? That’s the real question. The argument that doing homework is simply a tool for teaching responsibility isn’t enough for me. We can teach responsibility in a number of ways. Also the poor argument that parents don’t need to help with homework, and that students can do it on their own, is wishful thinking at best. It completely ignores neurodiverse students. Students in poverty aren’t magically going to find a space to do homework, a friend’s or siblings to help them do it, and snacks to eat. I feel like the author of this piece has never set foot in a classroom of students.

THIS. This article is pathetic coming from a university. So intellectually dishonest, refusing to address the havoc of capitalism and poverty plays on academic success in life. How can they in one sentence use poor kids in an argument and never once address that poor children have access to damn near 0 of the resources affluent kids have? Draw me a picture and let’s talk about feelings lmao what a joke is that gonna put food in their belly so they can have the calories to burn in order to use their brain to study? What about quiet their 7 other siblings that they share a single bedroom with for hours? Is it gonna force the single mom to magically be at home and at work at the same time to cook food while you study and be there to throw an encouraging word?

Also the “parents don’t need to be a parent and be able to guide their kid at all academically they just need to exist in the next room” is wild. Its one thing if a parent straight up is not equipped but to say kids can just figured it out is…. wow coming from an educator What’s next the teacher doesn’t need to teach cause the kid can just follow the packet and figure it out?

Well then get a tutor right? Oh wait you are poor only affluent kids can afford a tutor for their hours of homework a day were they on average have none of the worries a poor child does. Does this address that poor children are more likely to also suffer abuse and mental illness? Like mentioned what about kids that can’t learn or comprehend the forced standardized way? Just let em fail? These children regularly are not in “special education”(some of those are a joke in their own and full of neglect and abuse) programs cause most aren’t even acknowledged as having disabilities or disorders.

But yes all and all those pesky poor kids just aren’t being worked hard enough lol pretty sure poor children’s existence just in childhood is more work, stress, and responsibility alone than an affluent child’s entire life cycle. Love they never once talked about the quality of education in the classroom being so bad between the poor and affluent it can qualify as segregation, just basically blamed poor people for being lazy, good job capitalism for failing us once again!

why the hell?

you should feel bad for saying this, this article can be helpful for people who has to write a essay about it

This is more of a political rant than it is about homework

I know a teacher who has told his students their homework is to find something they are interested in, pursue it and then come share what they learn. The student responses are quite compelling. One girl taught herself German so she could talk to her grandfather. One boy did a research project on Nelson Mandela because the teacher had mentioned him in class. Another boy, a both on the autism spectrum, fixed his family’s computer. The list goes on. This is fourth grade. I think students are highly motivated to learn, when we step aside and encourage them.

The whole point of homework is to give the students a chance to use the material that they have been presented with in class. If they never have the opportunity to use that information, and discover that it is actually useful, it will be in one ear and out the other. As a science teacher, it is critical that the students are challenged to use the material they have been presented with, which gives them the opportunity to actually think about it rather than regurgitate “facts”. Well designed homework forces the student to think conceptually, as opposed to regurgitation, which is never a pretty sight

Wonderful discussion. and yes, homework helps in learning and building skills in students.

not true it just causes kids to stress

Homework can be both beneficial and unuseful, if you will. There are students who are gifted in all subjects in school and ones with disabilities. Why should the students who are gifted get the lucky break, whereas the people who have disabilities suffer? The people who were born with this “gift” go through school with ease whereas people with disabilities struggle with the work given to them. I speak from experience because I am one of those students: the ones with disabilities. Homework doesn’t benefit “us”, it only tears us down and put us in an abyss of confusion and stress and hopelessness because we can’t learn as fast as others. Or we can’t handle the amount of work given whereas the gifted students go through it with ease. It just brings us down and makes us feel lost; because no mater what, it feels like we are destined to fail. It feels like we weren’t “cut out” for success.

homework does help

here is the thing though, if a child is shoved in the face with a whole ton of homework that isn’t really even considered homework it is assignments, it’s not helpful. the teacher should make homework more of a fun learning experience rather than something that is dreaded

This article was wonderful, I am going to ask my teachers about extra, or at all giving homework.

I agree. Especially when you have homework before an exam. Which is distasteful as you’ll need that time to study. It doesn’t make any sense, nor does us doing homework really matters as It’s just facts thrown at us.

Homework is too severe and is just too much for students, schools need to decrease the amount of homework. When teachers assign homework they forget that the students have other classes that give them the same amount of homework each day. Students need to work on social skills and life skills.

I disagree.

Beyond achievement, proponents of homework argue that it can have many other beneficial effects. They claim it can help students develop good study habits so they are ready to grow as their cognitive capacities mature. It can help students recognize that learning can occur at home as well as at school. Homework can foster independent learning and responsible character traits. And it can give parents an opportunity to see what’s going on at school and let them express positive attitudes toward achievement.

Homework is helpful because homework helps us by teaching us how to learn a specific topic.

As a student myself, I can say that I have almost never gotten the full 9 hours of recommended sleep time, because of homework. (Now I’m writing an essay on it in the middle of the night D=)

I am a 10 year old kid doing a report about “Is homework good or bad” for homework before i was going to do homework is bad but the sources from this site changed my mind!

Homeowkr is god for stusenrs

I agree with hunter because homework can be so stressful especially with this whole covid thing no one has time for homework and every one just wants to get back to there normal lives it is especially stressful when you go on a 2 week vaca 3 weeks into the new school year and and then less then a week after you come back from the vaca you are out for over a month because of covid and you have no way to get the assignment done and turned in

As great as homework is said to be in the is article, I feel like the viewpoint of the students was left out. Every where I go on the internet researching about this topic it almost always has interviews from teachers, professors, and the like. However isn’t that a little biased? Of course teachers are going to be for homework, they’re not the ones that have to stay up past midnight completing the homework from not just one class, but all of them. I just feel like this site is one-sided and you should include what the students of today think of spending four hours every night completing 6-8 classes worth of work.

Are we talking about homework or practice? Those are two very different things and can result in different outcomes.

Homework is a graded assignment. I do not know of research showing the benefits of graded assignments going home.

Practice; however, can be extremely beneficial, especially if there is some sort of feedback (not a grade but feedback). That feedback can come from the teacher, another student or even an automated grading program.

As a former band director, I assigned daily practice. I never once thought it would be appropriate for me to require the students to turn in a recording of their practice for me to grade. Instead, I had in-class assignments/assessments that were graded and directly related to the practice assigned.

I would really like to read articles on “homework” that truly distinguish between the two.

oof i feel bad good luck!

thank you guys for the artical because I have to finish an assingment. yes i did cite it but just thanks

thx for the article guys.

Homework is good

I think homework is helpful AND harmful. Sometimes u can’t get sleep bc of homework but it helps u practice for school too so idk.

I agree with this Article. And does anyone know when this was published. I would like to know.

It was published FEb 19, 2019.

Studies have shown that homework improved student achievement in terms of improved grades, test results, and the likelihood to attend college.

i think homework can help kids but at the same time not help kids

This article is so out of touch with majority of homes it would be laughable if it wasn’t so incredibly sad.

There is no value to homework all it does is add stress to already stressed homes. Parents or adults magically having the time or energy to shepherd kids through homework is dome sort of 1950’s fantasy.

What lala land do these teachers live in?

Homework gives noting to the kid

Homework is Bad

homework is bad.

why do kids even have homework?

Comments are closed.

Latest from Bostonia

Bu alum chompon boonnak runs mahaniyom, one of greater boston’s hottest thai restaurants, champion of indie films, china scholar merle goldman dies, cfa alum jonathan knight is head of games for the new york times, is our democracy at risk americans think so. bu experts talk about why—and the way forward, a commitment to early childhood education, reading list: alum bonnie hammer publishes 15 lies women are told at work —plus fiction, poetry, and short stories, one good deed: jason hurdich (cas’97) is uniting the deaf community, one cup at a time, space force general b. chance saltzman is a bu alum, using glamour for good: alum’s nonprofit organization brings clothes and beauty products to those in need, gallery: shea justice (cfa’93), oscar-nominated actor hong chau (com’01) stars in new action-comedy the instigators, alum’s new book recounts the battle for inclusion in boy scouts, feedback: readers weigh in on a bu superager, the passing of otto lerbinger, and alum’s book fat church, law alum steven m. wise, who fought for animal rights, dies, pups wearing custom-designed veterinary collars get star treatment in alum’s new coffee-table book, opening doors: ellice patterson (questrom’17), an alum’s new memoir recounts six decades of beatlemania, bu alum in paris keeping olympians’ minds sharp and healthy, erika jordan departs bu alumni engagement office to return to california.

What’s the Purpose of Homework?

• Homework teaches students responsibility.
• Homework gives students an opportunity to practice and refine their skills.
• We give homework because our parents demand it.
• Our community equates homework with rigor.
• Homework is a rite of passage.
• design quality homework tasks;
• differentiate homework tasks;
• move from grading to checking;
• decriminalize the grading of homework;
• use completion strategies; and
• establish homework support programs.
• Always ask, “What learning will result from this homework assignment?” The goal of your instruction should be to design homework that results in meaningful learning.
• Assign homework to help students deepen their understanding of content, practice skills in order to become faster or more proficient, or learn new content on a surface level.
• Check that students are able to perform required skills and tasks independently before asking them to complete homework assignments.
• When students return home, is there a safe and quite place for them to do their homework? I have talked to teachers who tell me they know for certain the home environments of their students are chaotic at best. Is it likely a student will be able to complete homework in such an environment? Is it possible for students to go to an after school program, possibly at the YMCA or a Boys and Girls Club. Assigning homework to students when you know the likelihood of them being able to complete the assignment through little fault of their own doesn’t seem fair to the learner.
• Consider parents and guardians to be your allies when it comes to homework. Understand their constraints, and, when home circumstances present challenges, consider alternative approaches to support students as they complete homework assignments (e.g., before-or after-school programs, additional parent outreach).

Howard Pitler is a dynamic facilitator, speaker, and instructional coach with a proven record of success spanning four decades. With an extensive background in professional development, he works with schools and districts internationally and is a regular speaker at national, state, and district conferences and workshops.

Pitler is currently Associate Professor at Emporia State University in Kansas. Prior to that, he served for 19 years as an elementary and middle school principal in an urban setting. During his tenure, his elementary school was selected as an Apple Distinguished Program and named "One of the Top 100 Schools in America" by Redbook Magazine. His middle school was selected as "One of the Top 100 Wired Schools in America" by PC Magazine. He also served for 12 years as a senior director and chief program officer for McREL International, and he is currently serving on the Board of Colorado ASCD. He is an Apple Distinguished Educator, Apple Teacher, National Distinguished Principal, and Smithsonian Laureate.

He is a published book author and has written numerous magazine articles for  Educational Leadership ® magazine,  EdCircuit , and  Connected Educator , among others.

ASCD is dedicated to professional growth and well-being.

Let's put your vision into action., related blogs.

Want Students to Love Science? Let Them Compete!

Rethinking Our Definition of STEM

How to Grow Strong and Passionate Writers

A Common Math Curriculum Adds Up to Better Learning

“Diverse” Curriculum Still Isn’t Getting It Right, Study Finds

• More from M-W
• To save this word, you'll need to log in. Log In

Definition of homework

Examples of homework in a sentence.

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'homework.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Word History

1662, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Dictionary Entries Near homework

Cite this entry.

“Homework.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary , Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/homework. Accessed 2 Sep. 2024.

Kids Definition

Kids definition of homework, more from merriam-webster on homework.

Thesaurus: All synonyms and antonyms for homework

Nglish: Translation of homework for Spanish Speakers

Britannica English: Translation of homework for Arabic Speakers

Britannica.com: Encyclopedia article about homework

Subscribe to America's largest dictionary and get thousands more definitions and advanced search—ad free!

Can you solve 4 words at once?

Word of the day, incandescent.

See Definitions and Examples »

Get Word of the Day daily email!

Popular in Grammar & Usage

Plural and possessive names: a guide, 31 useful rhetorical devices, more commonly misspelled words, why does english have so many silent letters, your vs. you're: how to use them correctly, popular in wordplay, 8 words for lesser-known musical instruments, it's a scorcher words for the summer heat, 7 shakespearean insults to make life more interesting, birds say the darndest things, 10 words from taylor swift songs (merriam's version), games & quizzes.

What’s the point of homework?

Deputy Dean, School of Education, Western Sydney University

Disclosure statement

Katina Zammit does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

Western Sydney University provides funding as a member of The Conversation AU.

View all partners

Homework hasn’t changed much in the past few decades. Most children are still sent home with about an hour’s worth of homework each day, mostly practising what they were taught in class.

If we look internationally, homework is assigned in every country that participated in the OECD’s Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) in 2012.

Across the participating countries, 15-year-old students reported spending almost five hours per week doing homework in 2012. Australian students spent six hours per week on average on homework. Students in Singapore spent seven hours on homework, and in Shanghai, China they did homework for about 14 hours per week on average.

Read more: Aussie students are a year behind students 10 years ago in science, maths and reading

Shanghai and Singapore routinely score higher than Australia in the PISA maths, science and reading tests. But homework could just be one of the factors leading to higher results. In Finland, which also scores higher than Australia, students spent less than three hours on homework per week.

So, what’s the purpose of homework and what does the evidence say about whether it fulfils its purpose?

Why do teachers set homework?

Each school in Australia has its own homework policy developed in consultation with teachers and parents or caregivers, under the guiding principles of state or regional education departments.

For instance, according to the New South Wales homework policy “… tasks should be assigned by teachers with a specific, explicit learning purpose”.

Homework in NSW should also be “purposeful and designed to meet specific learning goals”, and “built on knowledge, skills and understanding developed in class”. But there is limited, if any, guidance on how often homework should be set.

Research based on teacher interviews shows they set homework for a range of reasons. These include to:

establish and improve communication between parents and children about learning

help children be more responsible, confident and disciplined

practise or review material from class

determine children’s understanding of the lesson and/or skills

introduce new material to be presented in class

provide students with opportunities to apply and integrate skills to new situations or interest areas

get students to use their own skills to create work.

So, does homework achieve what teachers intend it to?

Do we know if it ‘works’?

Studies on homework are frequently quite general, and don’t consider specific types of homework tasks. So it isn’t easy to measure how effective homework could be, or to compare studies.

But there are several things we can say.

First, it’s better if every student gets the kind of homework task that benefits them personally, such as one that helps them answer questions they had, or understand a problem they couldn’t quite grasp in class. This promotes students’ confidence and control of their own learning.

Read more: Learning from home is testing students' online search skills. Here are 3 ways to improve them

Giving students repetitive tasks may not have much value . For instance, calculating the answer to 120 similar algorithms, such as adding two different numbers 120 times may make the student think maths is irrelevant and boring. In this case, children are not being encouraged to find solutions but simply applying a formula they learnt in school.

In primary schools, homework that aims to improve children’s confidence and learning discipline can be beneficial. For example, children can be asked to practise giving a presentation on a topic of their interest. This could help build their competence in speaking in front of a class.

Homework can also highlight equity issues. It can be particularly burdensome for socioeconomically disadvantaged students who may not have a space, the resources or as much time due to family and work commitments. Their parents may also not feel capable of supporting them or have their own work commitments.

According to the PISA studies mentioned earlier, socioeconomically disadvantaged 15 year olds spend nearly three hours less on homework each week than their advantaged peers.

Read more: 'I was astonished at how quickly they made gains': online tutoring helps struggling students catch up

What kind of homework is best?

Homework can be engaging and contribute to learning if it is more than just a sheet of maths or list of spelling words not linked to class learning. From summarising various studies’ findings, “good” homework should be:

personalised to each child rather than the same for all students in the class. This is more likely to make a difference to a child’s learning and performance

achievable, so the child can complete it independently, building skills in managing their time and behaviour

aligned to the learning in the classroom.

If you aren’t happy with the homework your child is given then approach the school. If your child is having difficulty with doing the homework, the teacher needs to know. It shouldn’t be burdensome for you or your children.

• Disadvantaged students

Director of STEM

Community member - Training Delivery and Development Committee (Volunteer part-time)

Chief Executive Officer

Finance Business Partner

Head of Evidence to Action

• Cambridge Dictionary +Plus

Meaning of homework in English

Your browser doesn't support HTML5 audio

• The kids are busy with their homework.
• My science teacher always sets a lot of homework.
• "Have you got any homework tonight ?" "No."
• I got A minus for my English homework.
• For homework I want you to write a paper on an endangered species .
• academic year
• access course
• Advanced Placement
• asynchronous
• foundation course
• grade retention
• immersion course
• on a course
• open admissions
• the national curriculum
• work placement

homework | Intermediate English

Homework | business english, examples of homework, translations of homework.

Get a quick, free translation!

Word of the Day

to do something in order to be allowed more time

It’s not really my thing (How to say you don’t like something)

Learn more with +Plus

• Recent and Recommended {{#preferredDictionaries}} {{name}} {{/preferredDictionaries}}
• Definitions Clear explanations of natural written and spoken English English Learner’s Dictionary Essential British English Essential American English
• Grammar and thesaurus Usage explanations of natural written and spoken English Grammar Thesaurus
• Pronunciation British and American pronunciations with audio English Pronunciation
• English–Chinese (Simplified) Chinese (Simplified)–English
• English–Chinese (Traditional) Chinese (Traditional)–English
• English–Dutch Dutch–English
• English–French French–English
• English–German German–English
• English–Indonesian Indonesian–English
• English–Italian Italian–English
• English–Japanese Japanese–English
• English–Norwegian Norwegian–English
• English–Polish Polish–English
• English–Portuguese Portuguese–English
• English–Spanish Spanish–English
• English–Swedish Swedish–English
• Dictionary +Plus Word Lists
• English    Noun
• Intermediate    Noun
• do your homework
• Translations
• All translations

To add homework to a word list please sign up or log in.

Add homework to one of your lists below, or create a new one.

{{message}}

Something went wrong.

There was a problem sending your report.

• Dictionaries home
• American English
• Collocations
• German-English
• Grammar home
• Practical English Usage
• Learn & Practise Grammar (Beta)
• Word Lists home
• My Word Lists
• Recent additions
• Resources home
• Text Checker

Definition of homework noun from the Oxford Advanced American Dictionary

• acquire/get/lack experience/training/(an) education
• receive/provide somebody with training
• develop/design/plan a curriculum/course/program/syllabus
• give/go to/attend a class/lesson/lecture/seminar
• hold/run/conduct a class/seminar/workshop
• moderate/lead/facilitate a discussion
• sign up for/take a course/classes/lessons
• go to/start preschool/kindergarten/nursery school
• be in the first, second, etc. grade (at school)
• study/take/drop history/chemistry/German, etc.
• finish/drop out of/quit school
• graduate from high school/college
• be the victim/target of bullying/teasing
• skip/cut/ ( informal ) ditch class/school
• cheat on an exam/a test
• get/be given a detention (for doing something)
• be expelled from/be suspended from school
• do your homework/a project on something
• work on/write/do/submit an essay/a dissertation/a thesis/an assignment/a paper
• finish/complete your dissertation/thesis/studies
• hand in/turn in your homework/essay/assignment/paper
• study/prepare/review/ ( informal ) cram for a test/an exam
• take/ ( formal ) sit for a test/an exam
• grade homework/a test
• do well on/ ( informal ) ace a test/an exam
• pass/fail/ ( informal ) flunk a test/an exam/a class/a course/a subject
• apply to/get into/go to/start college
• leave/graduate from college (with a degree in computer science)/law school
• study for/work towards a law degree/a degree in physics
• major/minor in biology/philosophy
• earn/receive/be awarded/get/have/hold a master's degree/a bachelor's degree/a Ph.D. in economics

Take your English to the next level

The Oxford Learner’s Thesaurus explains the difference between groups of similar words. Try it for free as part of the Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary app

The Premack principle states that more probable behaviors will reinforce less probable behaviors. Behavior in itself can reinforce behavior, and the presence of a high-probability behavior can make a low-probability behavior more likely.

For example, an unstudious young child may be incentivized to do their homework (a normally low-probability behavior) if their parent tells them that they can go to the park afterward (something that the child is likely to want to do on their own).

Conversely, the C predicts that the presence of a high-frequency behavior above baseline will discourage the low-frequency behavior. For example, to use the homework example, a child allowed to go to the park excessively is less likely to do their homework (Knapp, 1974).

Prior to the Premack principle, behaviorists believed that reinforcers had a so-called trans-situational nature, and something that is a reinforcer in one context will always be a reinforcer. For example, a pigeon conditioned to seek pellets will always see pellets as a reinforcer, regardless of their abundance.

In contrast, Premack’s view establishes that animals prefer ordering responses, and stronger responses will reinforce weaker responses (Knapp, 1974).

Premack’s research into the Premack principle emerged from his 1959 research on the “rate-differential” or “probability-differential” effect.

The probability-differential effect states that “any response A will reinforce any response B, if and only if the independent rate of A is greater than that of B.”

That is to say, a response that happens at a high rate can reinforce a response that happens at a low rate. For example, according to this probability-differential effect, a rat will continue to run in a wheel where they are rewarded with water if and only if the probability of the rat drinking water is greater than that of the wheel running (Premack, 1961).

The probability-differential effect has found applications such as making the probability that those with developmental disabilities will engage in exercise greater by making access to games (a high-rate response) contingent upon exercising (Allen and Iwata, 1980).

Premack (1965), following his original research into the probability-differential effect, found that another accompanied this: when opportunities to engage in a high-probability behavior reinforced low-probability behavior, the rate of high-probability behavior in itself reduced (because of the barrier of the low-probability activity), and thus incentivized the opportunity to engage in the high-probability behavior.

This is called response reduction. Any response A can reinforce a response B if the rate of A is suppressed below its baseline, regardless of which response happens more often (Mazur, 1975; Timberlake and Allison, 1974).

For instance, in one experiment by Eisenberger et al., people tasked with turning a wheel were more likely to press a bar if the rate of the wheel turning was suppressed below baseline, regardless of how much more frequent wheel-turning was than bar-pushing (1967).

This idea of response suppression then evolved into response deprivation (Timberlake and Allison, 1974), which has found a number of applications in changing human behavior.

For example, Dougher (1983) found that the response deprivation of drinking a preferred beverage could increase socially appropriate behavior in adults diagnosed with schizophrenia when access to drinking depended on this appropriate social behavior (Klatt and Morris, 2001).

Language Training in Chimpanzees

David Premack asked the question in his seminal 1971 article, Language in Chimpanzees , of whether apes could be taught language. Premack believed this to be an important question not just biologically but for the fundamental question of what language is.

Premack approaches this question in two parallel ways: through a list of examples and through creating a corresponding list of instructions for training organisms so that they can be taught these examples.

Premack (1971) defined exemplars as aspects of words, sentences, questions, and using language to teach language; concepts of class described through language such as color, shape, and size; the copula, which in linguistics is the word or phrase that links subjects to subject complements (such as is in “The cat is fluffy”); and the logical connector if-then.

Premack attempted to teach Cebus chimpanzees language through pieces of metal-backed plastic adhering to magnetized slates.

Trainers fed the chimpanzees and introduced the language system pieces gradually until the chimps placed the plastic piece on a “language board.”

The trainers gave the chimpanzees different types of fruits depending on the part of speech the word represented. Premack then attempted to test whether or not the chimpanzees had formed an association between the plastic objects and the parts of speech that they represented through two different tests.

The researchers found that the chimpanzee was aware of which word went with each fruit. The researchers changed the fruit donors such that each change in donor was associated with a change in the second language element given to the chimpanzee.

For example, to receive an apple with Mary present, the chimpanzee would have to signal “Mary apple,” and in order to receive an apple with Randy present, the chimpanzee had to signal “Randy apple” and not “Mary apple” or “apple Randy.”

Eventually, the chimpanzee in Premack’s 1971 paper was able to construct the sentence, “Mary give apple Sarah” (which would result in the chimpanzee getting the apple) and “Mary give apple Gussie” (resulting in another chimpanzee getting the apple).

Premack (1971) then used his study of the chimpanzee to test the hypothesis that the acquisition of language is the mapping of existing knowledge. The researchers placed two-ups in front of the chimpanzee and attempted to teach them the difference between the words “same” and “different.”

Again, the chimpanzee was largely able to differentiate between objects that were the same and different. The researchers then asked the chimp yes-no questions such as, “Is X different from X?: to which the chimpanzee was conditioned to answer no.

Additionally, Premack (1971) was able to introduce such concepts as color, shape, size, and so on through this reinforcement.

Premack’s 1971 paper reinforced the Premack Principle in that the researchers used a high-probability behavior (a chimpanzee wanting to eat various types of fruit) to reinforce a low-probability one (the chimpanzee learning the fundamentals of language).

Weight Loss

Researchers have tested the Premack Principle in a number of clinical applications.

In one such study, Horan and Johnson (1971) recruited 96 female undergraduate volunteers and assigned them randomly to one of four treatment groups: a control and three experimental groups with three half-hour counseling interviews where participants were asked to identify a specific highly probable behavior (such as “sitting down on a particular chair”) and think about a specific negative-positive pair of associations associated with being overweight (such as “a shortened life span” and “clothes fitting better”).

The researchers found that those asked to use the Premack Principle lost significantly more weight than the control or those asked to simply think of the negative-positive association pair throughout the day (Horan and Johnson, 1971).

Supporting Research

Premack’s early rat studies.

In an earlier study, Premack (1963) controlled rats’ baseline rates of drinking (how often they lick a drinkometer) and running (number of wheel rotations).

Premack found that longer periods of time spent drinking reinforced longer periods of time spent running and vice-versa. Premack used three different concentrations of sugar in the drinking solution (64%, 32%, and 16%) and two different levels of difficulty in running in the activity wheel (weighted either with an 18 or 80-gram weight).

In his observation of rats in a “free-choice” situation, he observed the following preference ordering (Allison, 2019): 16% drink > 32% drink > run with 18 gram weight > 64% drink > run with 80g weight.

In all, Premack ran an experiment using five groups of rats where one of the previous responses was a reinforcer for lever pressing.

In line with the Premack principle, the results revealed that the average number of lever responses per 10-minute session by the rats depended on which response was used as a reinforcer.

As the second response increased in preference, the performance of a learned response also did. While those given a brief run in the heavily weighted wheel pressed the lever about 20 times per session, those given a drink of 16% sucrose pressed the lever about 37 times per session (Allison, 2019).

This theory also applies to punishment. Premack claims that punishment involves a situation where a more preferred response is followed by the requirement that someone engage in a less preferred response.

For example, a rat drinking the 16% sucrose solution would be punished if they were then forced to run on a heavily weighted wheel. Premack established in other studies that a punishment system decreases the amount of time that the animal makes a preferred response. Thus, any response can reinforce a weaker response but punish a stronger one (Allison, 2019).

However, researchers have since criticized Prremack’s methodology. For example, the experimental design either measured whether the running response was evoked independently from drinking, if this was an effect of the other behavior, or if there were related responses, such as approaching the drinkometer.

This leads to a recurring issue with Premack’s studies where, while deprivation seems to be necessary for the less-likely behavior to happen, this effect is often unmeasured (Klatt and Morris, 2001).

Premack’s study of first-graders

Premack observed first-grade students in a situation where they had to choose between candy-dispensing machines and pinball machines.

The researchers established each of the children’s preferences, and they were subsequently identified as players or eaters.

The researchers then separated the children into four groups, which established a contingency between the candy-dispensing machine and the pinball response in an attempt to determine whether the children’s behavior could be modified.

The researchers predicted, in-line with the Premack principle, that eating should be a reinforcer for the eaters and playing a reinforcer for the players but not vice-versa (Allison, 2019).

Aligning these predictions of the Premack principle with the, researchers found that there was a congruency effect where the learning success in the two types of children differed.

Only those in groups 1a and 2b were more likely to engage in their non-preferred behavior than they were before, while the other two groups exhibited the same amount of responding on the first machine as they had during the pre-learning session (Allison, 2019).

Critical Evaluation

Although the Premack Principle has had wide appeal in fields such as education (Allison, 2019), academics have supplanted it with alternate theories because of several apparently inconsistent predictions.

Often, the Premack Principle can predict learning in a way that contradicts experimental data. For example, Timberlake and Allison (1974) have noted that weaker responses can occasionally seem to reinforce stronger responses and that stronger responses will occasionally not reinforce a weaker response.

Additionally, there can be additional features of the situation not covered by the Premack principle, where the type of learning that occurs depends on the relative rate at which each response must be performed in order to be able to do the other.

Lastly, some events that do not qualify as responses per se can also moderate the behaviors that follow. For example, shocks can punish behavior, but they are not instrumental responses that animals engage in (Staddon and Ettinger, 1989).

Response Deprivation Theory

In response to these objections, Timberlake and Allison (1974) developed the response deprivation hypothesis. Response deprivation is an element of establishing operations.

According to the response deprivation hypothesis, a weak response can become a reinforcer of a stronger response through deprivation, and many of the studies of instrumental learning conducted by Premack had an element of deprivation.

For example, in the experiment with the pinball and candy-dispensing machines, players who preferred to eat candy in one group were deprived of eating by having to play first.

To consider another example of the response deprivation hypothesis, researchers can deprive a rat of the ability to run. Even if running is not the rat’s preferred response, the rat will then increase its rate of running above baseline when it is able to run again.

Modifying the Premack principle, the response deprivation hypothesis generalizes that an animal will perform a non-deprived or less-deprived activity in order to be able to do a more-deprived activity.

The idea of Allison and Timberlake’s (1974) approach is that animals in a free-choice situation are in a state of equilibrium, able to engage in activities at the preferred levels, what scholars call bliss points.

Being above or below a bliss point can trigger either appetitive or aversive responses. In one of Allison and Timberlake’s rat experiments, rats gravitated toward drinking the sweet solution 60% of the time and the dry solution 40% of the time when in a free-choice situation.

However, when the researchers put the rats in a situation where they had to drink the sweet solution at ten times the rate of the dry solution, they effectively forced the rats into a level below its bliss point, giving the rats motivation to do things that would allow it to drink more dry solution, even if this is not preferred in a free-choice situation (Allison, 2019)

Allen, L. D., & Iwata, B. A. (1980). Reinforcing exercise maintenance: Using existing high-rate activities. Behavior Modification, 4 (3), 337-354.

Allison, J. (2019). The nature of reinforcement. Contemporary learning theories, 13-40.

Cooper, J. O., Heron, T. E., & Heward, W. L. (2007). Applied behavior analysis.

Dougher, M. J. (1983). Clinical effects of response deprivation and response satiation procedures. Behavior Therapy, 14 (2), 286-298.

Eisenberger, R., Karpman, M., & Trattner, J. (1967). What is the necessary and sufficient condition for reinforcement in the contingency situation? Journal of Experimental Psychology, 74 (3), 342.

Horan, J. J., & Johnson, R. G. (1971). Coverant conditioning through a self-management application of the Premack principle: Its effect on weight reduction. Journal of Behavior Therapy and Experimental Psychiatry, 2 (4), 243-249.

Klatt, K. P., & Morris, E. K. (2001). The Premack principle, response deprivation, and establishing operations. The Behavior Analyst, 24 (2), 173-180.

Knapp, T. J. (1976). The Premack principle in human experimental and applied settings. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 14 (2), 133-147.

Mazur, J. E. (1975). The matching law and quantifications related to Premack’s principle. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal Behavior Processes, 1 (4), 374.

Premack, D. (1959). Toward empirical behavior laws: I. Positive reinforcement. Psychological review, 66( 4), 219.

Premack, D. (1961). Predicting instrumental performance from the independent rate of the contingent response. Journal of Experimental Psychology, 61 (2), 163.

Premack, D. (1965). Reinforcement theory. Paper presented at the Nebraska symposium on motivation.

Premack, D. (1971). Language in chimpanzee? Science, 172 (3985), 808-822.

Staddon, J. E., & Ettinger, R. H. (1989). Learning: An introduction to the principles of adaptive behavior: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich.

Timberlake, W., & Allison, J. (1974). Response deprivation: An empirical approach to instrumental performance.

Further Information

• Geiger, B. (1996). A time to learn, a time to play: Premack’s principle applied in the classroom. American Secondary Education, 25 (2), 2-6.
• Premack, D. (1959). Toward empirical behavior laws: I. Positive reinforcement. Psychological review, 66 (4), 219.

• by teachmint@wp

What is Homework?

The homework definition refers to the work given to students after class. It is intended to make students capable of doing things on their own and to recollect what they have learned in class. It is based on the teaching provided to them in class. This can be in written form or they might be asked to memorize a lesson.

Homework is part of a traditional classroom teaching technique where the teacher moderates the information provided to the students in class and checks their retention rate based on their performance. The method of teaching is usually lecture-based and does not involve dialogue between teacher and students. 

Homework has to be done separately from the regular classwork. It also enables the student to revise what they learned in class. This is necessary as it allows the students to properly understand the work being done in schools. 

It also helps develop the study skills and good work habits while also helping them learn to work under deadlines, usually without a teacher’s help. It also allows the parents to be in the loop of what is going on in the school.

In order to maintain the effectiveness of the same, teachers can ensure that the work is purposeful and does not take a lot of time. This will ensure that the students do not feel burdened by the homework.

Types of Homework

Now that you know what does homework mean, let’s understand the different types of homework that a teacher can give to students.

Worksheets: These are printable or online homework in which students are required to answer questions or complete activities related to the topic that is being taught. This type of homework can include multiple-choice questions, fill-in-the-blank exercises, short answer questions, or problem-solving tasks.

Projects or Experiments- Such types of homework are given in subjects like science in which there is knowledge to gain via experiments and practical work. For such homework, the students are required to conduct research, do analysis, collect data, and then finally based on all collected information a report is made. 

Group Assignments- As its name suggests group homework definition is that it is the type of homework that is given by the teachers to students to be done in groups. In such homework, students are divided into groups for n numbers of members who will conduct research, and bring ideas to create the final report.

Creative Assessments- These are types of homework that teachers assign to do creative work, such as drawing, model making, performances, and skits to teach students in a unique way.  Teachmint is a one-stop solution for educational institutions of all sizes. Our learning management system is a game changer in the field of education. To know more about our offerings like academic planner , visit our website.

Learn more about  Teachmint plans  here.

Digitize your school in minutes with Teachmint’s integrated platform

" * " indicates required fields

Words and phrases

Personal account.

• Access or purchase personal subscriptions
• Get our newsletter
• Save searches
• Set display preferences

Institutional access

Sign in with library card

Sign in with username / password

Recommend to your librarian

Institutional account management

Sign in as administrator on Oxford Academic

homework noun

• Hide all quotations

What does the noun homework mean?

There are three meanings listed in OED's entry for the noun homework . See ‘Meaning & use’ for definitions, usage, and quotation evidence.

How common is the noun homework ?

How is the noun homework pronounced?

British english, u.s. english, where does the noun homework come from.

Earliest known use

The earliest known use of the noun homework is in the mid 1600s.

OED's earliest evidence for homework is from 1653, in the writing of Edmund Chillenden, parliamentarian army officer and General Baptist leader.

homework is formed within English, by compounding.

Etymons: home n. 1 , work n.

Nearby entries

• homeward-bounder, n. 1837–
• homeward-bound pennant, n. 1853–
• homewardly, adv. 1797–
• homewards, adv. & adj. Old English–
• homeware, n. 1782–
• home waters, n. 1838–
• home wear, n. 1836–
• home-whining, n. a1657
• home wind, n. 1732–
• home-woe, n. 1838–
• homework, n. 1653–
• homework club, n. 1900–
• homework diary, n. 1973–
• homeworker, n. 1843–
• homeworking, n. 1844–
• home-working, adj. 1850–
• home worship, n. 1849–
• homewort, n. Old English–
• home-wreck, n. 1845–
• home-wrecker, n. 1878–
• home-wrecking, n. 1878–

Thank you for visiting Oxford English Dictionary

To continue reading, please sign in below or purchase a subscription. After purchasing, please sign in below to access the content.

Meaning & use

Pronunciation, compounds & derived words, entry history for homework, n..

homework, n. was revised in September 2011.

homework, n. was last modified in July 2023.

oed.com is a living text, updated every three months. Modifications may include:

• further revisions to definitions, pronunciation, etymology, headwords, variant spellings, quotations, and dates;
• new senses, phrases, and quotations.

Revisions and additions of this kind were last incorporated into homework, n. in July 2023.

Earlier versions of this entry were published in:

A Supplement to the New English Dictionary (1933)

• Find out more

OED Second Edition (1989)

• View homework in OED Second Edition

Please submit your feedback for homework, n.

Please include your email address if you are happy to be contacted about your feedback. OUP will not use this email address for any other purpose.

Citation details

Factsheet for homework, n., browse entry.