Homework has been a topic of considerable controversy in 20th century American education, largely because it is a linchpin in the relationship between home and school. This essay examines parent opinions on homework between 1900 and 1960 in order to integrate parents’ elusive voices into the history of American education, and to shed new light on modern-day controversies regarding the school-family interface. The underlying question we explore is whether, in educational policymaking, the family ought to march to the beat of the school, or the school ought to march to the beat of the family? We conclude that if parents want homework, and if homework keeps parents in touch with the program of the school, then it is the abolition of homework -not its presence - that most threatens parents’ interests.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
Annual Report. (1899-1900). Los Angeles.
2.
Annual Report of the School Committee, 1899–1900. (1900). Lynn, MA: Board of Education.
3.
Annual Report, 1898–1899. (1900). San Jose, CA: City Superintendent of Schools, San Jose.
4.
Annual Report, 1931–32. (1932). Madison, WI: Board of Education.
5.
AriesP. (1962). Centuries of childhood: A social history of family life (R. Baldick, Trans.) New York: Vintage.
6.
Balding v. State. (1887). 4 S.W. Reporter (p. 579): Texas Court of Appeals.
7.
BardH. (1958). Homework: A guide for secondary school teachers.New York: Rinehart.
8.
BassettA. E. (1934). Conservation of the school children. Literary Digest, 118, 24–25.
9.
BempechatJ. (2000). Getting our kids back on track: Educating children for the future.San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
10.
Board of Education, District of Columbia. (1916). Supervised study versus home study.Washington, DC: Author.
11.
BokE. (1900, January). A national crime at the feet of American parents. The Ladies’ Home Journal, 17, 16.
12.
BokE. W. (1913, January). The first step to change the public schools. The Ladies’ Home Journal, 30, 3–4.
13.
BoutwellW. D. (1960, October). What's happening in education. National Parent Teacher, 55, 14.
14.
BrooksE. C. (1916). The value of home study under parental supervision. Elementary School Journal, 17, 187–194.
15.
BurnhamW. H. (1905). The hygiene of home study. Pedagogical Seminary, 12, 213–230.
16.
BurnhamW. H. (1912). Hygiene of home study. In MonroeP. (Ed.), A cyclopedia of education (Vol. 3, pp. 305–306). New York: Macmillan.
17.
CallahanR. (1962). Education and the cult of efficiency.Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
18.
CarverR. W. (1937). Directed study and promotion of elementary school pupils. North Carolina Education, 4, 58–59, 70–71.
19.
ChaikaG. (2000). Help! Homework is wrecking my home life!Education World. Retrieved August 8, 2000, from www.education-world.com
20.
CliffordG. (1978). Home and school in 19th century America: Some personal-history reports from the United States. History of Education Quarterly, 18, 3–34.
CooperH. (1989). Synthesis of research on homework. Educational Leadership, 47(3), 85–91.
23.
CooperH. (2001). The battle over homework: An administrator's guide to setting sound and effective policies (2nd ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin.
24.
CreminL. (1961). The transformation of the school.New York: Knopf.
25.
CrundenR. M. (1982). Ministers of reform: The progressives’ achievement in American civilization.New York: Basic Books.
26.
CutlerW. W. (2000). Parents and schools: The 150-year struggle for control in American education.Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
27.
DavenportD. (2002, June 13). A beastly burden: It's time to get heavy weight off our children's lives. Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.
28.
Dedicated to the American parent. (1902, January). The Ladies’ Home Journal, 19, 18.
29.
DemosJ. (1986). Past, present, and personal: The family and the life course in American history.New York: Oxford University Press.
30.
DennyD. (2000, October 29). Homework headaches. Sunday Herald-Times.
31.
Do you believe in homework? Replies for and against. (1936). Parents’ Magazine, 11, 14–15, 58–61.
32.
DownesM. G. (1960). Homework: To help or not to help. Clearing House, 34(5), 283–285.
33.
DrostW. H. (1967). David Snedden and education for social efficiency.Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.
34.
FishlowA. (1966). Levels of nineteenth-century investment in education. Journal of Economic History, 26, 418–436.
35.
GavelD. (2000, September 28). Homework wars provoke debate: Experts face off over importance of after-school assignments. Harvard University Gazette.
36.
GillB. P., & SchlossmanS. L. (1996). A sin against childhood: Progressive education and the crusade to abolish homework, 1897–1941. American Journal of Education, 105, 27–66.
37.
GillB. P., & SchlossmanS. L. (2000). The lost cause of homework reform. American Journal of Education, 109, 27–62.
38.
GordonL. (1988). Heroes of their own lives: The politics and history of family violence: Boston 1880–1960.New York: Penguin Books.
39.
GrantJ. (1998). Raising baby by the book: The education of American mothers.New Haven: Yale University Press.
40.
HaberS. (1964). Efficiency and uplift.Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
41.
Hall-QuestA. L. (1916). Supervised study: A discussion of the study lesson in high school.New York: Macmillan.
42.
Hobbs v. Germany. (1909). 49 So. Reporter (pp. 515–518): Mississippi.
43.
HollowayL. (2000, November 7). Challenging homework stumps parents too. New York Times.
44.
HolmesW. H. (1929, Oct). Home work is school work out of place. American Childhood, 15, 5–7, 55–56.
45.
HuiT. K. (2000, December 4). Too much of a good thing. The News and Observer.
46.
In the Sacred Name of Education. (1933). Progressive Education, 10, 321–325.
47.
KaestleC. F. (1978). Social change, discipline, and the common school in early nineteenth-century America. Journal of Interdisciplinary History, 9, 1–17.
48.
KralovecE., & BuellJ. (2000). The end of homework: How homework disrupts families, overburdens children, and limits learning.Boston: Beacon Press.
49.
LandesW., & SolmonL. (1972). Compulsory schooling legislation: An economic analysis of law and social change in the nineteenth century. Journal of Economic History, 32, 54–91.
50.
LangdonG., & StoutI. W. (1957). What parents think about homework. NEA Journal, 46, 370–372.
51.
LaschC. (1977). Haven in a heartless world: The family besieged.New York: Basic Books.
52.
Literary Digest. (1937, February 13). Home work ho: Chicago schools revamp study plan. Literary Digest, 123, 31–32.
53.
LukasiakM. (2000, November 25). Homework faces new scrutiny. Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.
54.
LyonG. W. (1935). The bugbear of home study. Journal of Education, 118(10), 269–267.
55.
McNiffA. L., & SweetM. A. (1957). Homework. National Education Association Journal, 46, 365–366.
56.
MintzS., & KelloggS. (1988). Domestic revolutions: A social history of American family life.New York: Free Press.
57.
MontgomeryC. F. (1940). For and against home assignments. West Virginia School Journal, 68, 14–15.
58.
Moreno Valley Unified School District. (n.d.). High expectations for success: A school-home partnership.Riverside, CA: Moreno Valley Unified School District.
59.
MyersG. C. (1934). How much home study?Journal of Education, 117, 452–454.
60.
National Congress of Parents and Teachers. (1934). Parent education, the fourth yearbook.Washington, D.C: Author.
61.
NatrielloG. (1997). Hoist on the petard of homework. Teachers College Record, 98(3), 572–575.
62.
New York Times. (1926, September 19). Health and home work. New York Times.
63.
New York Times. (1929, April 21). Questionnaire shows teachers, parents, and children approve of homework, report of teachers union auxiliary. New York Times.
64.
Newark Central High School Experimenting with Plan to do Away with Homework by Dividing Periods so that First Half will be Devoted to New Studies and Second Half to Teacher Supervised Home Study. (1912, June 22). New York Times.
65.
OdemM. E. (1995). Delinquent daughters: Protecting and policing adolescent female sexuality in the United States, 1885–1920.Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press.
66.
OsborneE. G. (1935). New duties of parents and schools. Progressive Education, 12, 270–274.
67.
OwenM. G. (1930). From the other side of the fence. The Grade Teacher, 45, 266, 307, 389.
68.
Pittsburgh Schools. (1950, September-October). Survey of home work assignments. Pittsburgh Schools, 25, 5–45.
69.
Political Code of the State of California. (1901). (Chapter CCXXXVIII, section 1665). Sacramento: State of California.
70.
Question of Homework for Children. (1913). In EagleB. D. (Ed.), Making my mind mind me (Vol. 28, pp. 34–45). New York: Brooklyn Daily Eagle.
71.
RavitchD. (2001). Left back: A century of failed school reforms.New York: Simon and Schuster.
72.
ReeseW. J. (1986). Power and the promise of school reform: Grass-roots movements during the progressive era.Boston: Routledge and Kegan Paul.
73.
Report of Board of Education, 1900–01. (1902). Washington, DC: Board of Education.
74.
RiceJ. M. (1897). The futility of the spelling grind. The Forum, 23, 163–172.
75.
RodgersD. (1998). Atlantic crossings: Social politics in a progressive age.Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
76.
RothmanD. J. (1980). Conscience and convenience: The asylum and its alternatives in progressive America.Boston: Little, Brown and Company.
77.
Sacramento Board of Education. (1961). Homework in the elementary school.Sacramento, CA: Author.
78.
San Diego City Schools. (1936). Home study practices and opinions.San Diego, CA: Research Department.
79.
SchevitzT. (1999, March 16). Parents stressed by homework. San Francisco Chronicle.
80.
SchlossmanS. (1973). G. Stanley Hall and the boys’ club: Conservative applications of recapitulation theory. Journal of the History of the Behavioral Sciences, 9, 140–147.
81.
SchlossmanS. L. (1976). Before home start: Notes toward a history of parent education in America, 1897–1929. Harvard Educational Review, 61, 436–467.
82.
SchlossmanS. L. (1977). Love and the American delinquent: The theory and practice of “progressive” juvenile justice, 1825–1920.Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
83.
SchlossmanS. L. (1981). Philanthropy and the gospel of child development. History of Education Quarterly, 21, 275–299.
84.
SchlossmanS. L. (1983). The formative era in parent education: Overview and interpretation. In HaskinsR., & AdamsD. (Eds.), Parent education and public policy (pp. 7–38). Norwood, NJ: Ablex.
85.
SchorlingR. (1934). Should parents help with homework?Parents’ Magazine, 9, 29, 44–47.
86.
SeligmanK. (1999, December 19). Parents: Too much homework. San Francisco Examiner.
87.
SmithP. D. (1929). Parent cooperation in the secondary school. Progressive Education, 6, 157–160.
88.
SmithW. R. (1933). Home study practices in the elementary schools of certain school districts in western Pennsylvania. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh.
89.
StraussV. (2000, February 8). Who needs homework? Parents and professionals disagree on the purpose of after-hours lessons. The Washington Post.
90.
TyackD. (1976). Ways of seeing: An essay on the history of compulsory schooling. Harvard Educational Review, 46, 355–389.
91.
WiebeR. (1967). The search for order, 1877–1920.New York: Hill and Wang.
92.
WienerW. (1912). Home-study reform. School Review, 20, 526–531.
93.
WineripM. (1999, January 3). Homework bound. New York Times.
94.
WollonsR. (1990). Women educating women: The Child Study Association of America as women's culture. In AntlerJ., & BiklenS. K. (Eds.), Changing education: Women as radicals and conservators.Albany: State University of New York Press.
95.
ZelizerV. (1985). Pricing the priceless child: The changing social value of children.New York: Basic Books.
96.
ZernikeK. (2000, October 10). As homework load grows, one district says “enough”. New York Times.
