BENTONVILLE – The Bentonville School District is reintroducing some parents to the homework equation.

Parents of elementary- and middle-school-age children can expect more paper homework in line with the math and literacy curricula, according to the district.

In June, the school board unanimously approved routines aimed at strengthening educational cooperation between parents and educators.

“That’s why we’ve made this transition back to homework, because it has to be a partnership process,” Superintendent Debbie Jones said at the time. “It can’t just be the school that takes over the education of the children.”

There had been an effort over the years to try to remove parents from the homework process, Jones said. “We’re in a time where that hasn’t been very wise,” she said.

The LEARNS Act is one factor in the change, Jones said. LEARNS is Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders’ signature legislation that overhauled the state’s education system and became law in 2023.

Parental empowerment is an integral part of LEARNS, said Kimberly Mundell, Arkansas Department of Education communications director.

“Parents have a right to know what their children are learning in school, and transparency in the curriculum is key to being informed,” Mundell said.

Jones said she has seen parents comment that they want to see paper homework, to know more about what their children are doing in school.

“That’s why we’ve made this transition back to homework, because it has to be a partner process,” Jones said. “It can’t just be the school that takes over the education of the children.”

When board member Joel Dunning heard that, he clapped.

“To me, hearing a police chief say this makes my heart go ‘wow,'” Dunning said.

Extending the learning day can improve education, Dunning said.

“We think it’s very important that, No. 1, parents read with their kids, that they’re involved in that process,” Jones said. “No. 2, that parents are aware of what their children are studying in school.”

Jones said the district can’t overwhelm students with homework, noting that play is just as important at home. Schools are working to be consistent in assigning homework, Jones said.

There is no time recommendation for completing homework, Jones said. Instead, good judgment is key, with work guided by the curriculum and consistent with what students are learning in class, she said.

Teachers and parents have shown optimism about the plan, said district communications director Leslee Wright, adding that the district has been tracking the homework situation for a couple of years.

The policy change will primarily affect K-12 students and their families, Wright said Friday. Elementary schools are kindergarten through fourth grade in Bentonville. It had been a district with no homework at the elementary level for some time, Wright said.

High school students have always had homework and will continue to do so, she said.

Homework is an extension of the regular school day and should complement, supplement, reinforce and relate to mastery of a subject, according to policy information from the district.

‘BUILD RESPONSIBILITY’

The policies of the Fayetteville, Rogers and Springdale districts include similar language that homework is an extension of what is learned in the classroom and is used in conjunction with well-defined learning objectives.

Fayetteville has made no changes to its policy and none specific to LEARNS, according to Alan Wilbourn, the district’s executive director of communications.

“That said, with the district’s administration being relatively new, we are currently evaluating a variety of instructional practices and engaging staff in conversations around our practices,” Wilbourn said. “Curriculum, technology, grading and homework are all instructional components that we are examining or will examine within our district.”

Fayetteville Superintendent John Mulford assumed the post in July 2023.

In Rogers, there are no plans to change that district’s homework policy at this time, said Jason Ivester, communications director.

Leah Padilla, principal at Janie Darr Elementary School in Rogers, said weekly homework encourages practicing skills. The skills students practice at home focus on essential standards for the grade level and the individual student, she said.

“Students are working on strengthening these foundational skills and building responsibility,” she said.

Padilla said research shows a few keys to student success: eating dinner as a family, reading together, playing outside and going to bed early.

“Our goal is to let kids have enough time to just be kids,” she said.

There is no plan to change the homework policy in Springdale, said Trent Jones, the district’s director of communications. District teachers always encourage students to read independently and with family at home, he said.

Homework can vary by grade level, subject and goals, Jones said. It allows students to practice and reinforce what they learn and can give teachers insight into how students understand concepts and can help measure student progress.

COVID CONNECTION

The Covid-19 pandemic helped bridge the gap between teachers and parents, according to Joyce Epstein, a professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Education and co-director of the university’s Center on School, Family, and Community Partnerships.

With schools closed, schools and districts were told that teachers had to work with parents, Epstein said in a January story on the Johns Hopkins Hub website.

Teachers still taught, but when a student was learning at home, parents had a better idea of ​​what their child was doing in school, she said.

Amid the pandemic, teachers reported developing an improved understanding of students’ families, according to Epstein.

“We collected wonderfully creative examples of activities from members of the National Network of Partnership Schools,” Epstein said in the story. “I’m thinking of an art activity where each child talked to a parent about something that made their family unique. Then they drew what they found on a snowflake and returned it to share in class. In math, students talked to a parent about something the family liked so much so that they could represent it 100 times.Talking about school work at home was the point.

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(Fayetteville:)