Teaching during lockdown has presented a vast range of challenges within education but, when we eventually move into the post-Covid world, there could be some opportunities, too. It is unlikely that many teachers are thinking about “building back better” just now, as they try to keep their heads above the water. But one area that could eventually present opportunities for recovery and improvement is homework.

One of the biggest challenges faced by teachers has been trying to provide coherent learning opportunities that support positive and productive engagement. Parents and carers have undoubtedly found this difficult, with the phrase “that’s not how I did it when I was at school” being heard at kitchen tables around the country. Of course, home learning is not new: in Scotland, official figures pre-pandemic suggested that only around 0.1 per cent of school-age pupils were home educated, although the reality may have been higher.

A far more commonplace example of out-of-school education is homework. Obviously, the lockdown experience has involved far more than typical homework activities, such as practising spelling and times tables, or completing a consolidation worksheet. As a result, parents and carers will be more acutely aware than ever of what it is like to be a teacher - and this might be a good thing.

Homework vs homeschooling

The evidence for the value of traditional homework is mixed. The Education Endowment Foundation research summary suggests minimal evidence for effectiveness of homework in primary and slightly stronger justification for use in the secondary sector.

There is a variety of factors relating to students, teachers, parents and the task itself, making homework a complex area of study. It has been suggested that homework can be used effectively, especially in older age groups, for consolidation of learning and for developing traits such as autonomy and self-regulation. At its worst, homework is allocated simply because of long-established expectations or tradition: “It is what we did in school, so you can do it, too.”

It can also affect the home environment, which is especially pertinent during Covid-19, with demands on students and parents exacerbated by financial pressures and a reported increase in mental health issues. These pressures will not end with the return of students to school buildings.

The evidence for the value of homework with young children isn’t great. In fact, a review of the homework literature shows little - if any - influence of homework on academic achievement at primary level. And it is not even clear, on balance, that homework is a positive influence on primary-age students. The challenges that parents, teachers and students face with homework have also been problems for home learning. Notably, many parents and carers - even those who are teachers - will have found it difficult to get the youngest learners to focus. This might not be an issue with the learners themselves but, with our perception of what homework has always been, there is a lack of shared understanding about the very purpose of the activity.

Self-regulation

Advocates of homework often stress its importance in developing self-regulatory skills. This may differ from the experience of many teachers who have to relentlessly chase homework or receive homework that is incomplete, rushed or copied.

The Sutton Trust reported that only 51 per cent of teachers in the most advantaged state schools were getting at least three-quarters of work back during home learning, with just 20 per cent in the most deprived schools.

Unfortunately, the reality is that homework does not necessarily teach learners to be independent; it often has the opposite effect, depending on the nature of the task. It may even kill a love of learning.

But it doesn’t have to be that way. During Covid-19, teachers have had to innovate and experiment with various techniques, tools and apps to keep learners engaged and focused on learning, and averted from the myriad distractions and lures of the internet.

In fact, home learning is a great opportunity to make links between what children learn in school and experience at home. Students can apply what they learn at home and report this back to their teacher, giving unique opportunities for teachers to assess student understanding.

Instead of focusing on independence as a self-regulatory skill, home learning could demonstrate the usefulness and benefits of what they learn in school, transforming homework from an oppressive task that must be completed to an empowering educational tool.

The role of technology

Covid-19 has put a spotlight on the inequalities that exist in society and in education. Learners from low-income backgrounds have suffered most, with many not having the full access needed for home learning. The impact of a learner’s background is not new or surprising, and homework research has long shown inequalities relating to a range of variables, including parental income and educational history. Although undoubtedly a challenge, homework could be used more effectively to close rather than extend educational gaps. Perhaps the holy grail here is to transform the way we view education as a society, into a process rather than the pursuit of an end product.

Homework can be used to extend learning beyond the classroom but, without the correct support, it may end up cementing misunderstandings or aggravating learner anxieties or frustrations towards learning. Battles with parents and carers over task completion can end up being counterproductive and kill the joy of learning.

Technology may be able to help: adaptive learning software, such as that used within the Khan Academy, is a promising way of supporting learners at their level and could be used to revolutionise homework, although all students would need access.

The big tech firms, including the ubiquitous Microsoft and Google, meanwhile, have the resources and expertise to develop user-focused solutions: with the right educational and pedagogical input, they could create fantastic resources to bridge school and home learning. The possibilities to enhance additional support needs provision, especially relating to accessibility, are also an exciting prospect.

We could, too, look at what was already working well before lockdown. Some schools had developed approaches such as “takeaway homework” - whereby pupils choose from a “menu” of different homework options - that proved popular with teachers and learners alike.

At classroom level, some teachers have successfully involved learners in the development of weekly homework planning, co-constructing activities that consolidate the previous week’s learning. This has been well received, with high engagement, but it requires considerable dedicated teaching time and so lends itself more to the primary sector.

As teachers, we are constantly looking for ways to best support our learners. By pushing back against the status quo and reassessing how homework is used, we can transform the value of homework for teachers, learners and parents alike.

Reinventing home learning

Many teachers are sceptical about traditional approaches to homework, whereas others have simply gone along with it because “’twas ever thus”. We need to move away from homework being a tick-box burden and reinvent home learning with activities that nurture students’ interests and reduce learning disparities, rather than the contrary.

Technology has changed the way we live, learn and experience the world, yet homework practices often reflect more traditional methods, such as rote learning or pen-and-paper activities.

So, where do we start? Research from New Zealand during Covid-19 suggests that there are three pedagogical characteristics that influence learners’ experiences of online learning: personalisation, authenticity and collaboration. These could be the guiding principles to transform homework practice.

Starting with personalisation - and building on our new post-Covid understanding of technology - provides a unique opportunity to link learning to students’ life experiences, making it more personalised and authentic.

Homework is rarely collaborative, yet numerous apps, software and platforms give learners the opportunity to share and give each other feedback. Such collaboration helps to develop social-emotional skills, which have suffered during lockdown; it’s also relevant in the modern-day working environments that learners may experience once they leave education. We also, of course, need to provide teachers and learners with the resources to access this effectively.

When learning at home, an adult is not always around to help to engage or motivate the learner, and we cannot expect them to always do this themselves. But by redesigning home-learning activities, making the task more meaningful and engaging, students can get more out of homework.

Likewise, teachers can find homework more rewarding when it is informative and eases rather than adds to their workload. With the advancement of education software, teachers can assess understanding, collect data and give feedback. Such software can also help promote the home-school link and inform parents how to support their child. Where parental support is not available - a problem sometimes overlooked when setting homework - education software can help to scaffold students while they are working independently.

Home learning during the pandemic has provided us with many challenges but, more importantly, it has given us the experience with which to reinvent homework and transform learning in the future. Crucial to this are the relationships between learners, parents or carers, and the teachers, because - as we have found last year - they may not always be on the same educational page.

What should we do next?

Post-lockdown, it is likely that many learners and their parents or carers will, understandably, want a break from home learning. In contrast, some school leaders and politicians may be keen to ramp up homework in a desperate scramble to close attainment gaps.

Perhaps, though, there is another way. Given the skills teachers have learned, especially using technology, and the experiences of parents and carers during home learning, there may now be a better understanding of each other than ever before. Teachers and school leaders could build on this by using the post-lockdown period to pause homework and develop something new, from the ground up. Aims and objectives could be agreed between schools and families, limitations with technology could be considered, and parents and carers could be given support from teachers to help young people learn better and more independently.

To do this, school leaders and teachers might want to go back to the drawing board. Existing homework policies should be abandoned with learners, teachers, parents and carers collaborating to find a better way forward that suits everyone. The label “homework” could even be replaced by something less task focused.

Once implemented, policies and practices should be reviewed on a regular basis by everyone involved. If they aren’t working, then further refinement should be welcomed.

The experiences of home learning have undoubtedly been challenging, but they present an opportunity to reinforce the idea that learning is a lifelong process, something that goes well beyond the confines of school and classroom - whether or not we refer to it as “homework” anymore.

Rick Grammatica is a primary school teacher in Bangkok. Richard Holme is a lecturer in education at the University of Dundee. He blogs at richardholme.wordpress.com and tweets @richardjholme

This article originally appeared in the 30 April 2021 issue