Should schools do away with homework?

Life is hard for an eight-year-old school-going child in Dubai. Take Indian national Aarav Krishna's example. A resident of Sharjah, he is a student of Kindergarten Starters in Dubai. According to his mother Reshmi Nair, Aarav has to wake up at 5.30am every morning and catch his bus to school by 6.15am.
"After a hectic day in school, filled with classes and activities, he comes back from school by 2.45pm. after which he has dance, karate and other extra-curricular lessons," said Reshmi. The fourth grader, after finishing all this, then has to finish homework in Math, English, Arabic, Science, and study his daily lessons as well. While doing all this, his mother has to see to that he has had enough sleep and has eaten his meals well.
There are several such parents in the UAE who face the challenge of having to sit down and complete homework with their children. She added: "I don't even know how to teach them Arabic. I need to pay additionally to send him to an Arabic coaching centre."
"Children spend so much time in the school and sometimes students are assigned to homework that they cannot do entirely on their own. Once, my daughter was asking to build a model of an Arab wind tower. She's in Grade 3. There was no way that she could do it alone," said another Dubai-based parent Pooja Sudheer. This issue is spread across curriculums and schools and government education authorities are working hard to change the trend.
Changing landscapes
However, in the soon-to-open Arcadia Preparatory School in Jumeirah Village Triangle, the system of traditional homework or assignment writing habits are being done away with.
School authorities said that the learning programme is developed with extra-curricular activities such as coding and robotics, animation, music and photography.
For this purpose, school has developed a unique Enrichment Learning Programme (ELP), which is a forward-thinking and all-inclusive programme delivered to the students as part of the extended school day. The ELP programme will be provided at no additional cost to parents of children in Years 1 to 6 and will also include in-school homework support sessions run by the school's teachers.
"Youngsters should have the chance to try out the broadest spectrum of activities possible, whether that's gymnastics, chess, cricket or cookery, Mandarin Chinese or outdoor survival skills," said Navin Valrani, CEO of the school.
He added: "Parents will be all too familiar with the scenario of having to juggle endless tasks once children arrive home from school, including preparing the evening meal and completing chores alongside dealing with children's homework queries - all on top of trying to find a moment in which to relax, unwind and enjoy quality time together as a family."
Valrani said that by offering students the option of attending teacher-led homework clubs as part of the ELP we aim to alleviate some of the hectic after-school rushing around. The School is set to open in August, 2016, in Dubai's Jumeirah Village Triangle and will offer the National Curriculum for England to pupils studying from Foundation Stage One to Key Stage Two.
dhanusha@khaleejtimes.com

Dhanusha Gokulan

• dhanusha@khaleejtimes.com