Students’ and Parents’ Perceptions about Homework

Abstract

This descriptive study aimed to identify students’ and parents’ perceptions about homework and whether their perceptions differed and was conducted with 147 students attending grades 2 through 5 and their parents (father or mother). A questionnaire was developed by the researcher and piloted for its reliability. Some items were either eliminated or reworded so that they could be well understood. The participants were asked to show on a dichotomous ‘yes-no’ scale whether they agreed with the given statements about their homework assignments. The frequencies and percentages of the responses were calculated, and Pearson chi square was used as the statistical procedure to test if students’ and parents’ perceptions differed. It was found that students and parents do not find homework very beneficial and do not think that the efforts that students put on homework pay off. In addition, the participants believe that teachers cannot meet the expectations related to monitoring homework assignments and provision of correctives and feedback. On the other hand, it was identified that students and parents think differently about homework assignments in various aspects