It is my understanding that not many kids like homework. After school, you just want to go home, sit down and turn your brain off.
It feels like teachers do not understand that we have our own lives after school; we need to go to soccer practice or music lessons. It is stressful having to juggle homework, chores and after-school activities. Not only is homework a problem when it comes to after-school itineraries, but sometimes we end up with work on the weekend, too.
Writing papers and answering questions on our free time is tiring. We feel like we are losing the only time we get to have fun and forget, for just two days. When there is work to be done on holidays, well, that is a whole other story.
School is the last thing we think about while on vacation or during spring break. Most of us spend time with our families, travelling or maybe just sitting at home watching movies. We just do not feel like doing homework; we just want to relax and have fun.
Now, most of the time there are free classes to catch up on our schoolwork, but there are times when there is just too much. If we do not do our homework, we fall behind, which piles on more and more work. We get in trouble for falling behind, our grades slip, we lose control and home does not feel relaxing anymore.
Laying in bed at night, we go over all of the projects due the next day; the very projects we have not had time to even look at. We leave everything until the last minute, waking up early and trying our best to do all the work.
Everything seems to be due on the same day; it is a never-ending cycle. We pray there will not be as much work to do next week and try to finish everything on a weekend, but our brains just overload.
All students are not at the same speed and we do not all think the same. Some of us do not work well with loads of work and short deadlines. Some of us cannot focus at home.
We need to communicate with our teachers and help them understand our limits. Of course, it is good to test limits, but not all at once, or else everything will come crashing down.
We need to find a balance. We should be able to work stress-free. That is when we will get things done.
Macy How is a grade nine student at École Côte-du-Soleil.
