Parents with an immigrant background were more positive about homework than the general parent average. Other parents said the opposite: the lack of homework made pupil motivation and performance worse. Some parents reported in their comments that pupils became more motivated about school and performed better during the homework-free period. The majority of parents (79 per cent) and teachers (89 per cent) believed that giving pupils homework is primarily dictated by tradition in Norwegian schools. A whopping 83.8 per cent of the pupils who took part in the trial project responded that they get bored with school because of homework.įewer than half the teachers believed that homework helps make pupils more interested in their schoolwork. But I also think that the school hours should be extended if the no-homework policy continues next year." Does homework promote or inhibit motivation?Ī lot of students are tired of homework. The parent of a child in a homework-free school with no timetable changes said: “There was less arguing about homework and when it had to be done. They also found that the level of conflict at home was less, as did more than half of the parents. Homework-free option reduced family conflictsĩ0 per cent of the children in schools with no homework experienced having more time to spend with family and friends.
Pupils in 5th through 7th grade participated. Four control schools that gave traditional homework assignments as well as homework help at school were also involved in the trial project. In the 2019/2020 school year, Flatåsen and Stabbursmoen schools were homework-free with two extra school hours a week, while Byåsen and Romulslia schools were homework-free with no change in the timetable.Īll four schools were in Trondheim municipality. The purpose of the project was to improve the knowledge base about attitudes towards, and experiences with homework in primary school – and about the effects of homework.Īlthough the homework-free project had to be scaled back and eventually discontinued due to the COVID pandemic, the researchers made several interesting discoveries.
NTNU’s Department of Education and Lifelong Learning was asked to evaluate the experiment. The city council in Trondheim wanted to try out a homework-free project in some of the city’s elementary schools in order to gain experience with a different way of working in schools. (Photo: Elin Iversen / NTNU) Need more knowledge Per Egil Mjaavatn is a researcher and associate professor affiliated with NTNU.
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