Tumbleweeds Newspaper, Spring 2003, pg. 24

Putting Home Back Into Homework

Editor's Note: The mother-daughter writing and teaching team of Dawn Wink and Joan Wink, Ph.D., contribute a section from their book, Teaching to Learn, Learning to Teach: Passionate Pedagogy, to be published this fall by Allyn & Bacon. Dawn Wink of Eldorado has 12 years experience in education. Joan Wink is a professor of education at California State University / Stanislaus.

Joan reflects: As a teacher, I assigned homework and I dreaded it. I spent hours and days collecting homework, reading homework, recording homework and helping students look for lost homework.

Slowly, I realized that homework privileged a particular type of student: those who are safe, well-fed and surrounded by supportive families. Knowing the difference these factors make, and the implications of family investments (or the lack of such investments) in children's learning, made me appreciate the importance of the factors over which I do have control in my students' lives, and try to assign homework accordingly.

I embrace the concept of funwork, proposed by educators and authors D. Scott Enright and Mary Lou McCloskey. The term "funwork," as opposed to homework, captures the notion that learning together within family units can be fun, interesting and pedagogically sound.

Alma Flor Ada extends this idea to say that homework should not be additional schoolwork, but rather that it is homework because it requires the interaction of students with their families.

Dawn suggests: Here are five ideas for putting home back into homework:

• Interview a family member and write a short biography. Generate questions in class to begin the interview process. Schedule class time for students to read their written biographies of family members.

  Ideas to stimulate interview questions:
  "Tell me about the funniest thing I did as a baby."
  "Tell me about the funniest thing that ever happened to you."
  "Tell me about my grandparents."
  "Tell me about where you grew up."
  "Tell me about what you did as a child."
  "Tell me about your favorite memory."
  "Tell me about how you and Dad/Mom met."
  "Tell me about your job."
  "Tell me about how our family came to Santa Fe."
  "Tell me about your favorite book and why it is your favorite."
• Students choose books from the classroom, the school library, the public library or home, to read with family members. This stimulates discussion between adult and child about books, ideas and life experiences. Arrange time in class for students to talk about their reading experiences at home.
• Students write about projects or experiences they have with their families in the evenings. Students create a book that captures the spirit of their families. In school, arrange time for students to share their individual books.
• Students list all of the contexts of literacy in their life, for example: comic books, magazines, how-to books used at home, grocery lists, computer activities, reading mail at home, etc. Arrange time in class to chart the home reading activities of all students.
• Students, with family members at home, write letters to extended family living outside of the home.