UF Study: Kids Excel When Homework Is A Family Affair

January 3, 2001

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — Children gain more from homework if it’s a family affair like going to a picnic or sporting event, says a University of Florida researcher who found that involvement from parents and family members leads to greater success in school.

In a study of 250 sixth- and eighth-graders in Baltimore public schools, Frances Landis Van Voorhis found that students who involved their families in science homework received higher grades than those who did it alone.

“When parents talk at home about their children’s homework, it sends a message to kids that education is important to their family,” said Van Voorhis, a former UF developmental psychology student who did the research for her doctoral dissertation. “And giving children a chance to explain what they learn in the classroom helps to reinforce the concepts.”

Studies have shown that students who complete more homework and those who spend more time on it tend to earn higher grades than other students, especially in middle school and high school, said Van Voorhis, who works at the Center on School, Family and Community Partnerships at Johns Hopkins University. At the same time, parents complain their children have to spend an inordinate amount of time on homework, she said.

“Homework in the public school system is constantly under fire,” she said. “A news article is written every day in some cities about homework and how much time students should spend on it.”

Although most parents want their children to succeed in school, many are too tired at the end of the day, especially in families with two working parents, to spend much time helping with their homework, Van Voorhis said. Or at the opposite extreme, some parents may end up doing assignments for their children in an effort just to get it done, she said.

Van Voorhis believes too much emphasis is being placed on quantity of homework and not enough on quality. “It needs to be clear and understandable, which you don’t hear very much about in the media,” she said. “And teachers should pay attention to what’s going home. Often homework is an afterthought — sent home without any instruction — a photocopy of a page in a textbook that may not even be read and checked for errors.”

If more thought and attention were given to homework so it was better designed and didn’t take quite as much time, some of the current problems would be resolved, she said. In Van Voorhis’ study, half the students participated in the Teachers Involve Parents in Schoolwork, or TIPS, program, which requires children to talk with their parents and other family members about their homework assignments and to share their ideas for getting it done. In lessons on genetics, for example, children may be asked to start family discussions on cloning and which humans, if any, should be cloned.

Many of the assignments in the TIPS program, which was developed at Johns Hopkins University and is available to school districts around the country, are hands-on interactive projects. Students learn about salinity, for example, by working with a family partner in an at-home experiment involving altering levels of salt in a glass of water to make an egg float.

Those students in the study who involved family members on a regular basis on homework assignments earned higher science grades, even after controlling for differences in students’ abilities, Van Voorhis said. Much of it may have had to do with students benefitting from additional communication about what happens in the classroom, she said.

“There’s a big push for parent involvement, and we often hear of schools wanting parents to come into the schools,” she said. “Not all parents can do that. We need to recognize involvement in the home. It’s time parents are often willing to give to their children and it’s just as important.”