Homework

New Mills School is committed to setting students homework that will allow them to make the most use of their time in lessons and make the best possible educational progress.

Throughout Years 7-11, students’ homework assignments are not set in line with a rigid homework timetable as much educational research indicates that this leads to tasks being set to meet the needs of the rota rather than the needs of the student.

 Therefore, teachers will set homework when it is most relevant and effective in advancing your child’s learning. Teachers will aim to set homework once a week, unless at a particular point in the curriculum where they might set more, or occasionally less. The guideline to teachers is not to set work with next day deadlines to avoid creating bottlenecks for students. However, if a homework task is short (10 minutes), it may be given with an overnight deadline. Obviously the type and amount of homework set will vary depending on the point your child has reached in their school career.

To support students and their parents in gaining a clear insight into what homework has been set, the school has invested in CLASSCHARTS. This is an online platform where all your child's homework will be detailed, including task instructions, deadline dates and links to the relevant resources. It may direct your child to another web-based site, such as DODDLE or EDUCAKE, where faculties feel that these sites are particularly appropriate for their subject.

Nonetheless students should also write a reminder of homework assignments in their planner and clearly record the day it is due to be handed in. Carers are then able to support their children in managing their workload and meeting deadlines.

Parents/Carers can also access CLASS CHARTS and become familiar with the work your child needs to be completing at home. Please support students to complete or at least make their best attempt at a homework task. If your child is struggling with a task, please encourage them to be resourceful in solving the problem. Have they re-read their class notes? Can they speak to a friend who can trouble shoot for them? Have they looked on the internet for reminders or definitions to kick-start their memories? There is a wealth of material out there to support them. If a child makes no attempt at a homework task at all, their teacher has no information to draw inferences about what they don’t understand and what is blocking their progress.

If a student fails to complete a homework set, their teacher will record that on the school system. They may issue a short detention or alternatively take the most appropriate action to resolve the issue. If non-completion of homework tasks becomes a repeated issue, a greater sanction may be applied.

If a student misses a homework because of absence, it is their own responsibility to catch up with not only class work, but the homework set.

Should there be concerns about the amount of work set, either too much or too little, carers can raise their worries by contacting the student’s form tutor by writing a note in the planner. Meanwhile, you can always help your child by ‘quizzing them’ on their knowledge and encouraging them to memorise and revisit material they have learnt previously.

Homework can take many forms. It might be a research homework that supports work to be done in the future or a consolidation task that allows students to apply the knowledge they have recently learnt at school. Homework might be a thinking or reasoning task, a written task, a reading task or a revision/learning task. In some subjects homework might be part of a longer term project which is spread over a half-term or longer.

Thank you for your support in helping the school make homework a meaningful learning experience for your child.