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Longmeadow Elementary Schools Homework Guiding Principles 2017-2018
The fundamental goal of our guiding principles is to promote a consistent and meaningful district-wide approach to homework that is guided by professional literature, current research, teachers’ input and family input. Importantly, the guiding principles reflect what we, as a community of learners, value to be most beneficial to our students as growing learners and citizens. All homework will deepen understanding and encourage a love of and curiosity for learning.
Longmeadow elementary school educators value strong partnerships with our families. We encourage familyinvolvement and school connectedness. Our guiding principles strive to balance the needs of parents, families, and our students.
We acknowledge the importance of play and free time for a child’s growth and development, and while homework is important, it should not prevent children from taking part in a wide range of out-of-school experiences and sharing critical time with family and friends.
Reading
Reading at home is prioritized as a way to instill and develop a love of literature; and to grow our students into lifelong readers. The amount of free reading accomplished outside of school has consistently been found to relate to growth in vocabulary, reading comprehension, verbal fluency, and general information.
Teacher Responsibilities are:
● To prioritize reading at home on a nightly basis.
● To foster a love of reading in their students by allowing them to choose whatever materials or genres they enjoy.
● To develop ways for students to share their reading with their learning community.
● To recommend a certain number of minutes for nightly reading, but additional time on reading is encouraged and applauded.
● To model and share their own love of reading with students.
Student Responsibilities are:
● To read at home daily.
● To choose a variety of reading texts that you enjoy throughout the school year.
● To share your reading with classroom community and family as guided by the teacher.
● To read the number of minutes recommended by your teacher, but reading beyond is encouraged and applauded.
Family Responsibilities are:
● To become familiar with the guiding principles.
● To ensure your children have time each day to devote to reading in a comfortable, quiet space.
● To encourage your children to share their reading daily with family members through discussion, book choice, shared reading, or read alouds.
● To model and share your own love of reading with your children.
Fluency Practice
Sometimes students need to do the same kind of work repeatedly to develop automaticity. This is true when it comes to fluency with math facts and sight words.
Teacher Responsibilities are:
● To assess and assign fluency practice as needed.
● To teach and provide strategies to practice fluency task.
● To help students understand the need to practice repeatedly and in short periods to reach proficiency.
Student Responsibilities are:
● To practice tasks as assigned by teacher.
● To strive for proficiency with task(s).
Family Responsibilities are:
● To ensure your children have time each day to practice assigned task.
● To practice tasks with your children using resources available from teachers and interventionists.
● To inform teacher of any concerns/challenges with tasks.
● To check for fluency practice and information through classroom communication.
Review/Study
Students need to review/study for assessments as they move up in grades.
Teacher Responsibilities are:
● To ensure that review/study can be completed independently by student(s).
● To teach and provide strategies to review/study for assessments.
● To schedule assessments in a manner that does not overwhelm students.
Student Responsibilities are:
● To review/study for assessments.
Family Responsibilities are:
● To ensure your children have time to review/study for an upcoming assessment.
● To review/study with your children as needed.
● To inform teacher of any concerns/challenges with tasks.
● To check for upcoming assessments and information through classroom communication.
Creative Endeavors
Projects relating to curriculum are occasionally assigned.
Teacher Responsibilities are:
● To prioritize goals of creativity, curriculum extension, independence and time management.
● To provide the guidelines for the project when the project is assigned.
● To develop established checkpoints for long term assignments.
● To be mindful that project assignments and due dates not infringe on school vacations and weekends.
● To be mindful that students should have only one project assigned at any given time.
Student Responsibilities are:
● To follow the guidelines for the project when the project is assigned.
● To follow established checkpoints for long term assignments.
● To complete the project independently with minimal help from family members, seeking clarification from teacher as needed.
Family Responsibilities are:
● To facilitate project completion and time management rather than help with project content.
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