Homework as the Job of Childhood

Author(s): Lyn Corno and Jianzhong Xu

Source: Theory into Practice, Vol. 43, No. 3, Homework (Summer, 2004), pp. 227-233
Published by: Taylor & Francis, Ltd.
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Lyn Corno
JianzhongXu
Homework as the Job
The authors undertook a series of empirical stud-
ies to examine how students experience homework
at various grade levels. The research casts a dif-
ferent light on the century-old practice of doing
homework, suggesting it is the quintessential job
of childhood. Homework creates a situation where
the child must complete assigned tasks under min-
imal supervision and after little initial training.
Doing well on that job gets one further along in
school. As in the workplace, when children move
from beginners to experts with homework, they
demonstrate responsibility and become skilled at
managing tasks. These positive outcomes enhance
the intended deepening of students' subject matter
knowledge. However, the authors assert that an-
other virtue of homework is that it can prepare
children for jobs they will have one day; it may
develop an aptitude for gainful employment.
ARELY, IT SEEMS, do teachers speak of an in-
terest in how their students experience home-
work. Just as productive output matters most to an
employer, teachers seem to value the outcomes of
homework more than its processes. One conclusion
Lyn Cornois an adjunctprofessorat TeachersCollege,
ColumbiaUniversity;JianzhongXu is an associatepro-
fessor of curriculumand instructionat MississippiState
University.
THEORY
INTOPRACTICE, Volume 43, Number 3, Summer 2004
Copyright? 2004 College of Education,The Ohio State University
of Childhood
from research on how employees actually experi-
ence work is that some people are remarkablygood
at infusing even the most mundane jobs with per-
sonal meaning, and supervisors are advised to ex-
amine their techniques (Csikszentmihalyi, 1997).
In our research we have asked how students expe-
rience homework; we found that homework and
job situations have much in common.
A series of empirical studies began with vid-
eotapes of third graders doing homework. Our goal
was to capture the full range of emotions, distrac-
tions, and issues that arise in the homework ex-
perience at this young age. We then conducted
interviews with these children and their parents
while they watched the videotapes, giving inter-
pretations for the record in conjunction with our
own. A second study surveyed students in urban
and rural middle schools to understand their con-
cerns about homework and how they manage it.
Finally, we talked with high school students to in-
crease our knowledge about relatively more ma-
ture perceptions of homework, including the extent
that older students use homework management
strategies deemed effective by research.
In this article we focus on the practical con-
clusions and implications of our research. We con-
ceive of homework at the level of a job-that is,
how students experience it in relation to other forms
of work. We discuss homework as the quintessen-
tial job of childhood. Our research suggests that
THEORYINTO PRACTICE/ Summer 2004
Homework
features of homework sufficiently overlap with job-
related activities to conclude that viewing home-
work as a job has important benefits.
Comparing Homework to a Job
How they are alike
To begin with, homework is work, not play.
In contrastto what some might hope, students rarely
finish their homework exclaiming that they had
great fun. Nor is homework an activity that stu-
dents elect to undertake. It is assigned by a teacher
for students to complete on the teacher's schedule,
with the teacher's requirementsin mind. So it helps
to have the right attitude. Homework means busi-
ness and the student should expect to buckle down.
As in the workplace, careless efforts and a laissez-
faire attitude are likely to make the wrong impres-
sion.
Second, teachers assign homework for a va-
riety of purposes (Warton, 2001). In some cases,
teachers seek to review and solidify material being
covered in class; homework is also designed to
extend student learning beyond class lessons (Coo-
per, 1989). As students mature, teachers often as-
sign homework nightly in several subjects.
Homework is also used to prepare students to han-
dle new work, as in the case of summer reading.
Increasingly, school reforms call for homework to
take the form of course projects or a culminating
term experience, thus increasing its connection to
"authentic" job-related activity (Epstein & Van
Voorhis, 2001).
Homework is multifaceted, benefiting from
planning and preparation. As with tasks in the
workplace, homework should be broken down into
parts, and students should tackle some of the more
difficult aspects of their homework while they are
fresh. They can then use easier tasks to break up
the load, interspersing quickly handled elements
with those requiring more time, and multitasking
when possible.
Like jobs, homework can be engaging when
its resources are well managed. Resources include
sources of information-textbooks, of course, and
increasingly, the Internet-but they also include a
quiet space to work, materials and equipment such
as calculators, paper or a computer, and others who
cohabit the homework environment. The external
228
resources needed for homework can be viewed as
a kind of home office for the child with features
like those needed in the workplace.
As with other aspects of schooling, home-
work is, in part, an exchange of performance for
grades (Becker, Geer, & Hughes, 1968). Good
grades lead to advancement in school in much the
same way that a job offers an exchange of perfor-
mance for financial compensation and career pro-
motion. Thus, through homework, the idea of a
performance exchange becomes appropriated by
and cultivated in children at a young age; in doing
homework, children begin to practice working for
external rewards. In this case, we use practice to
mean the extra diligence and vigilance that comes
with self-observation, as opposed to conditioned
reinforcement of less mindful responses. The mind-
ful practicing of homework ensures follow-through
just as mindfulness does on the job.
In the early years, teachers use homework to
develop good work habits and self-control. By mid-
dle school, students begin to assume more person-
al responsibility for homework, writing down
assignments and checking them off when done.
Experience with keeping a personal calendar is
another aspect of job preparation. Viewing home-
work as the job of childhood suggests that good
work habits ought to be an explicit goal for the
homework assigned in elementary school. Teach-
ers and parents should work together to provide a
supportive environment with opportunities for adult
modeling and guidance.
Finally, as children move from the elementa-
ry years through middle school and high school,
homework plays an increasingly important role in
supporting their academic achievement (Cooper &
Valentine, 2001). Doing homework gets the child
further along in school just as success on the job
accomplishes career goals. And just as corpora-
tions judge branch offices by their business profit-
ability, education administratorsand policy makers
use homeworkcompletion as one importantindicator
of successful schools (Epstein& Van Voorhis, 2001).
How they are different
Employers assign tasks to employees to ac-
crue many of these same benefits; however, there
are some differences. An employer seeking to run

an efficient and profitable workplace expects em-
ployees to be diligent and productive in their ef-
forts. Employees should also bring a positive
mental state to their work. Perhaps foremost, they
are expected to earntheircompensation.Beyond these
expectations for individuals, employers have a vest-
ed interest in moving the collective forward; if ev-
eryone works together,each on his or her own portion
of a job, then the business environmentthrives.
Likewise, when everyone in a class fulfills
the obligation to complete their homework, indi-
vidual students contribute both to the spirit and
the progress of the whole group. The teacher is
able to build knowledge, covering new content on
schedule and according to standards,just as an em-
ployer strategically moves coworkers from one task
to another in the workplace. A sense of communi-
ty becomes a probable outcome when individuals
work for others as well as themselves.
While employers supervise their charges close-
ly, homework tends to be loosely supervisedby adults.
It moves life in the classroom, where the teacher
deliberately arranges the learning environment to
monitor the child's activities, into life in the home.
The earliest experience of homeworkis often the first
time a child is asked by an authorityfigure outside
the home to engage in serious work on a regular
basis, with personal discretion concerning when and
how each assignment should be completed.
In the best circumstances, homework furthers
learning ability. The progress made from beginner
to expert with homework translates into increased
acceptance of responsibility for managing person-
al tasks and studying--skills that broaden and deep-
en a student's knowledge of subject matter.
Employers, of course, assume that employees have
these skills for learning to learn, and that they will
recognize and seize learning opportunitiesthat arise
in the workplace. The expression, "You did your
homework," connotes initiative and independence
in the context of a job.
In short, a real virtue of homework, when it
works, is that it helps prepare children for jobs
that someone will employ them for one day, what-
ever those employment situations turn out to be.
Our research data provides interesting con-
crete examples to support the benefits of viewing
homework as the job of childhood.
Corno and Xu
Homework as the Job of Childhood
What Our Research Says
Early homework experience sets
the stage for work later on
First, we find that parents are fully aware of
the serious side of homework, and they emphasize
this with their children. In our study of third grad-
ers, one mother noted:
This [doing homework]is part of the deal of being
in school.... I am trying to get him [her son] to see
that he will grow up, and he'll have a job, and his
boss will say you have to do X, Y, and Z; and you
will have to do X, Y, and Z. (Xu & Corno, 1998, p.
413)
Children quickly come to see the difference be-
tween homework, which they are required to do,
and the other things they would prefer to do after
school. We observed students jump up and shout
when they finished nightly homework, "Good! Now
I can play," and "Done with this homework! Done
with this homework!" (Xu & Corno, 1998, p. 426).
One father explained that homework was not some-
thing his daughter enjoyed. Instead, it was "some-
thing she accepts" and something "she understands
has to be done" (p. 415).
We have said that viewing homework as the
job of childhood suggests the possibility that home-
work can help develop good work habits and im-
portant job management skills. Both are highly
valued in the workplace, as is being able to plan
ahead, budget time, and deal with environmental
and mental distractions. Our research reveals that
everyday experiences with homework, as mediated
by parents, provide clear opportunities for chil-
dren to develop important work habits and man-
agement strategies (Xu & Corno, 1998). For
example, third graders learned the importance of
starting homework assignments and completing
them even when they would rather do other things.
Students told us they understood that there are a
lot of things in life one may not want to do, "but
you have to work at them" (p. 421). They also
discussed the need for pacing; if they had a week-
ly homework package or a long-term project, they
did a certain amount each day.
The elementary students in our studies also
learned how to arrange their workspace so they
could be productive. We found children moving
away from noise, reminding themselves not to be
229
THEORYINTO PRACTICE/ Summer 2004
Homework
distracted by things going on around them, and
stopping others from interfering with their work
(e.g., telling siblings to be quiet because they have
a test coming up). Other students were sufficiently
self-disciplined to avoid things that would distract
them from their homework, such as watching a
favorite TV program or playing outside. They dis-
played a willingness to delay gratification, in some
cases being able to do what they wanted later on.
One family allowed their child to videotape a tele-
vision program and watch it after the homework
was done. This family adopted a role not unlike a
manager's in the workplace, emphasizing the need
to see a job through to the end while concurrently
providing a reward.
We observed other important work habits in
children as young as the third grade, such as ad-
justing attentiveness to the demands of the specif-
ic assignment and self-instructing. This kind of
self-discipline-expected in the workplace-seems
to have some roots in homework. The result was
that gradually the work got done.
In addition, third graders in our study began
to monitor their own motivational states in ways
that insured follow-through on their homework.
Students reassured themselves (e.g., "That should
do it." and "Next time, I'll do better.") (Xu &
Corno, 1998, p. 426). Or they tried to make their
work more interesting. When faced with doing
"boring" homework or when they simply did not
want to do it, one student imagined he was playing
a game and pretended that other people in the room
were watching it. Studies of workplace motivation
report that employees use similar techniques to in-
ject an element of play into tedious tasks (Csik-
szentmihalyi, 1997).
Children we observed also dealt with the ups
and downs of work. Some used positive self-talk
to calm themselves when they became frustrated
or disappointed. Instead of thinking, "This is not
going to work because this is too hard," one girl
said she instructed herself not to worry about her
previous mistakes, but to "look on the bright side"
to cheer herself up and move her attention to what
could and had to be done (Xu & Corno, 1998, p.
429). This seems a rather sophisticated way of
thinking for a child but is commonplace in the
work setting.
230
Sophistication with homework
grows in middle school
As children move from elementary to middle
school, our data show students explicitly begin to
see homework as a part of their jobs as students.
For example, one seventh-grade student said: "I'm
not very excited about it.... It is not that I like to
do homework, it's just that I'm used to it" (Xu &
Yuan, 2003, p. 35). One eighth grader noted that
among all the things she did during after-school
hours, she would put homework in the middle of
the list: "I wouldn't put it in the end because it's
important and I wouldn't put it at the top because
I really don't like that much homework. But I know
I'm going to learn something from it" (Xu & Yuan,
2003, p. 35).
Middle school students were more clearly
aware than the third graders that homework can
help develop good work habits, improve study
skills, and make them more responsible and inde-
pendent (Xu & Yuan, 2003). Consider this exam-
ple of how one middle school student went about
completing a long-term project:
I write down a list and see what I need and where I
need to go, like the library.I write down my sched-
ule in my calendar,so I know when I can go to the
libraryand do my workthere.Then I look over what
else see I need to do.... Little by little, I get all my
things done. (p. 33)
During middle school, students become increas-
ingly skilled at managing homework tasks and more
perceptive in understanding their embedded val-
ues. For example, one student actually described
homework as work and said it was really about
concentrating: "If you don't concentrate, you real-
ly don't get what you're doing." In addition to
trying hard to concentrate on her homework, this
student occasionally even offered what she called
an "on-the-job training workshop" for her younger
siblings, explaining the importance of concentra-
tion on homework in age-appropriate language:
One time I tried to teach them a lesson with their
homework.I startedmaking noise and then I said,
"That'show I feel if you make noise when I'm do-
ing my homework."They were like, "OK, we'll
stop."And they really stopped.Sometimesthey can
[still] be a little annoying,but I'm like, "Remember,
when you have homework,I'll make noise!" Then
they'll stop.

Doing homework has long been considered
an important vehicle for furthering performance in
school. In fact, teachers, students, and parents all
consider homework as something much bigger than
just "tasks assigned to students by schoolteachers
that are meant to be carried out during non-school
hours" (Cooper, 1989, p. 7). These groups collec-
tively view homework as one of the major indic-
tors of whether students are doing well in school
(Xu & Yuan, 2003). In our research, all three par-
ties shared a consensus that serious or good stu-
dents were those who were paying attention in
class, doing all their homework, and contributing
to the best of their ability in class.
Viewing homework as the job of childhood
further suggests that the importance of homework
lies not just in terms of its benefits for the individ-
ual learner, but for the entire group. Teachers clear-
ly see the value of every child in the classroom
doing their part of the job at home and being re-
sponsible for the welfare of the group's learning.
One teacher explained:
If they are readingan articleon the coastal areas [in
Peru],when they come backto class, they know they
have to contribute.They are going to sit down, have
a discussion; and they will have to have something
to say, ratherthan,"Oh,I don't know anythingabout
the article. I'm just going to sit there and wait for
you to tell me something."(Xu & Corno, 1998, p.
413)
Another middle school teacher similarly ob-
served that "in order for homework to be success-
ful, you have to have 85% of the kids do it. Then,
when they come back [to class], you can discuss
it." In addition, this teacher saw its value in pro-
moting group learning, even before homework was
brought back to the classroom:
One person will rememberone thing, and another
person will remembersomething else in the notes,
since they have it writtena little differently.Two or
moretogethercan be muchmoreproductivein terms
of everyoneunderstandingthe homework,thanwhen
a studentgets stuck at home and doesn't talk to any-
one.
As in the workplace, collaborations among
coworkers provide benefits for individuals as well as
the group. These excerpts from our data show how
some of the anticipated benefits of homework come
to be realized as children grow in their experiences.
Corno and Xu
Homework as the Job of Childhood
Nevertheless, some issues arise when homework is
viewed as the job of childhood, and these bear
consideration.
Homework as the Job of Childhood:
Issues to Consider
Activity interests versus content interests
Younger children vary in readiness for the
developmental challenge of work-like activity af-
ter school. During our research some parents asked,
"When does my child get to play?" To address this
concern, some elementary school teachers follow
the Montessori lead and try to embed their home-
work assignments with elements of play. Alterna-
tively, teachers will ask their students what things
they consider interesting and engaging in their daily
lives, and then tailor assignments toward these par-
ticular interests.
But children also engage in a variety of pro-
ductive activities of their own choosing outside of
school. Some activities are organized as part of an
after-school youth program or private lessons, but
others are chosen by children themselves. To re-
turn to our metaphor, another way to address the
question of readiness would be for teachers to de-
sign homework around the range of productive ac-
tivities, jobs, or tasks students enjoy engaging in
outside of school. Here we make a distinction be-
tween homework assignments made around pro-
ductive activities in children's lives (e.g., practicing
with a basketball, babysitting, troubleshooting com-
puters, or drawing pictures for a sick friend) ver-
sus those that attempt to use their content interests
(in animals, television stars, cars and trucks, etc.).
We believe there is value to be gained if teachers
design homework assignments that address chil-
dren's activity interests in addition to or, in some
cases, instead of content interests.
Analogous to the employee's immersion in
productive work, there is an intrinsic appeal to a
homework assignment that is part of productive
everyday activity (Csikszentmihalyi, 1997). Al-
though this type of activity is not play, many of
the activities young children engage in everyday-
from baking to gardening to feeding pets-provide
opportunities for the introduction of elements of
play (e.g., licking the spoon, getting sprayed with
a garden hose, or doing tricks with the dog). These
231
THEORYINTO PRACTICE/ Summer 2004
Homework
elements of play help to sustain engagement. The
appeal also capitalizes on the child's positive atti-
tude for the familiar while allowing the bar to be
ever so gradually raised. These positive personal
experiences can be brought back into school with
great profit, thus capitalizing on the likelihood that
class members share at least some of their activity
interests.
At the same time that academic skills get re-
fined in the context of everyday activities (e.g.,
taking precise measurements when baking, calcu-
lating the projected distance of a pitched ball), chil-
dren who engage in this kind of homework also
hone their understandingof the need to plan ahead.
This is because productive activities-those that
have a desired purpose or outcome-require the
development of self-regulatory habits and the in-
ternalization of work-related values. Students learn
how to follow through and begin to meet external-
ly imposed deadlines similar to those they will
someday face as employees and coworkers.
Supervision can aid or abet the
quality of the experience
Another issue that comes out of our research
is that homework could be better supervised than
it often is. We discovered that homework is most
often supervised either loosely or too authorita-
tively by adults, and these adults are not well-in-
formed about how to help children with homework.
In some homes, children receive little assistance
from adults; in others, parents not only offer to
help, they actually do much of the work for the
child. And yet, our evidence emphasizes the im-
portance of good homework supervision. Indeed,
our studies suggest that not just elementary school,
but also middle school and even some high school
students benefit when supervision (a) clarifies the
teacher's expectations, (b) models and encourages
effective work habits, and (c) responds promptly
and pointedly when the child needs help (Corno,
1996, 2000; Xu & Corno, 1998, 2003).
Not incidentally, our results also suggest that
adults who assist with homework do not need high-
er education to help adolescents develop desirable
study habits. It is training in effective homework
guidance ratherthan a college education that makes
for success. Unfortunately, however, parents and
232
other adults who are available tend to receive little
to no guidance from schools on how to supervise
the job of homework effectively. The evidence to
support this statement comes from a survey of 560
elementary and middle school parents. More than
half of the sample reported that they were con-
cerned about how to help their children establish
effective study habits; about one third were con-
cerned with how to assist their children with the
academic content of their homework (Reetz, 1991).
Research suggests that parents should receive guid-
ance from schools at all grade levels-elementary,
middle school, and high school--about how to pro-
vide better support and supervision during home-
work.
The combination of support and supervision
we refer to is a kind of investment in the process
of homework that produces rewards for both the
parent and the child, not unlike those experienced
by supervisors and employees who deliver profits
for their companies. This is a form of supervision
quite different from authoritarian, overly control-
ling directives that parents may too often adopt.
As Csikszentmihalyi (1997) said, when the invest-
ment is in terms of "psychic energy" (i.e., special
attention to those aspects of the assignment that
the child is into or taking particular pride in), then
the goals of parent and child are harmonious and
the homework may actually be enjoyable (p. 112).
Finally, viewing homework as the job of
childhood has implications for children's level of
stress and burnout. Educators should be mindful
that homework is not stress-free for children any
more than jobs are without stress for adults. Re-
peated negative experiences can turn children off,
or even prematurelyburn them out. Our third-grade
study is notable for its illustrations of ways that
homework becomes an emotionally charged event
in families. We observed situations ranging from
children upset with repeated mistakes to those
where children became so frustrated with the as-
signment, themselves, and their parents that they
had to take a long break or stop working entirely
for the night (Xu & Corno, 1998). This occurred
when children felt they did not understand assign-
ments or the assignments were confusing, hard, or
overly long. It also occurred when parent and child
reached frustration levels and emotional displays

won out. Therefore, we again emphasize the possi-
bilities inherent in assignments designed around
children's regular productive activities and events.
We also hope teachers will help their students learn
how to use coping mechanisms and other proce-
dures for managing stress during difficult home-
work assignments. In short, coordinated efforts by
parents, teachers, and others seem to offer the op-
timum conditions for supporting children's perfor-
mance on homework. Helping them to become more
responsible and skilled at managing homework
tasks gradually and steadily is not unlike how good
employers manage worker productivity on the job.
Conclusion
We framed our article using the metaphor of
homework as the job of childhood. Our discussion
suggests that viewing homework in this way casts
new light on its potential to help develop a work
ethic and important job management skills that are
highly valued in the workplace.
Our view also emphasizes homework's po-
tential to further children's school advancement
both individually and as part of the collective when
the experience is positive. Children as well as adult
workers must manage their space, time, attention,
and motivational resources. They must cope with
common difficulties such as distractions, confu-
sion, disinterest, and fatigue in their learning of all
subject matter or tasks. To maximize these poten-
tials, educators need to be mindful of several is-
sues that arise when homework is seen as the job
of childhood, including the nature of homework
tip
Corno and Xu
Homework as the Job of Childhood
assignments, the quality of parental supervision,
and the need for effective collaboration between
teachers and parents.
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