Why Homework Should Be Banned

When I was your age I was responsible, had good grades and a job. I wasn’t a lazy teenager like you. On a daily, these are the kind of things that teenagers hear. Many adults believe that teens complain too much about school and assume that we are all just lazy. The truth is, school, especially high school, causes a lot of stress to a point where it is just unhealthy. We are sleep deprived, stressed and we are also losing our minds.

The purpose of my speech is to convince you all that homework is the leading role in stress in teens and that it should be banned.

In today’s society, it is very hard being a teenager and in high school. Trust me, I should know. I’m currently 17 and in high school. On top of that I take college courses and extra veterinary courses. Yes I understand that I chose to put myself in this situation but the classes themselves are not what stress me out.

What does stress me and my fellow peers out is the amount of homework that we have to do for these classes. Coming home from school and having to do many other things is already irritating enough.

But adding more than 4 hours of homework every night is just insane and unhealthy. The American Psychological Association stated that, “In fact, the studies find that anxiety has increased so much that typical schoolchildren during the 1980’s reported more anxiety than child psychiatric patients did during the 1950’s.

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” It was then predicted that the number would keep increasing and it has. Already alone without homework, teenagers are dealing with stress and anxiety. Many parents such as my own do not believe their children that school is stressful and say that it is all in our heads. They do not understand everything we have to go through and just assume that everything is the same and as easy as it was for them when they were in school.

Many teens go through very difficult times and sometimes their parents make it even worse. They see their child’s behavior as laziness rather than clinical signs of depression or anxiety.

The Bachelor’s Degree Online stated that, “Because so many dismiss the symptoms of depression as mere adolescent adjustments, a disconcerting number of these teens go without the treatment.” If these teens do not get the treatment that they need, it can lead to serious health issues. Depression and anxiety are real and are not a joke. In an interview with a longtime friend, she told me about her anxiety and how her parents were no help whatsoever.

What she said to me was, “They finally took me to the doctor. I was told that I had severe anxiety problems and I could have serious anxiety attacks that could lead to seizures if I didn’t take care of myself. But all my parents said was that it was all fake and that I was making it up. How could I be making this up if the doctor told me this in front of them?” From then on, she said that she would cry uncontrollably in school when teachers would begin to hand out homework. She cannot even talk to her parents about her issues and this is causing her even more stress and pain than it should.

This is not normal behavior but it has been frequently happening. Over 50% of students reported feeling stressed, 25% reported that homework was their biggest source of stress, and on average teens are spending one-third of their study time feeling stressed, anxious, or stuck (n.d).

According to NBC News, “They say that the pressures of schoolwork, social life, sports or other activities — combined with a relentless media culture — mean that young people may be more tense than ever before.” This helps to further support my claim because, teenagers today have a lot more going on in their lives than people used to 10 or 20 years ago.

Times have changed, requirements have changed, and life is just more difficult to succeed in. Dave Forrester on NBC News stated, “You have to be able to perform at a much higher level than in the past, when I was in high school.” Adults need to understand that school has just become more difficult from when they were in school. It is basically all about who has the best grades and highest GPA. Since you enter high school, you are already in what seems to be a competition for who can get into a good college or university. The stress ends up getting to me and sometimes all I want to do is skip school and stay in bed all day because I am overly stressed and sleep deprived. Coming home from school, I can’t even take a little nap without being called lazy. The reason as to why so many teenagers take naps, or at least try to, when they come home from school is because they stayed up very late the night before trying to finish their homework.

They go to sleep very late and have to wake up early the next morning hence creating a cycle that just keeps on going. They say that your teenage years are the ones you will enjoy the most but, how can the teenagers today enjoy their lives if they are always locked up in their rooms doing an abundant amount of homework?

A student on Debate.org stated, “How is a student supposed to do 3 to 4 hours of homework, study for a plethora of tests and quizzes, play sports, get involved in the community, eat food with nutritional value, and get an adequate amount of sleep, all in one day? That’s not possible.” The schedule of a high school student is so hectic that is has become “normal” to everyone. It is not normal for someone to be going to sleep at 2 in the morning and waking up at 6am to get ready to go to school. In an interview with a fellow classmate who will remain unnamed, she stated “After school I rush home and get ready to go to work. After work, I come home around 10pm and still have to do a lot of homework. It is too much that I don’t even care at this point.” Many high school students have jobs or have certain family responsibilities that take up most of their time after school.

With their crazy schedules, they sometimes do not have enough time to finish their projects or other work so they begin give up on doing homework. Either they give up entirely or just cheat off of one another. Homework is basically just students copying each other’s work and they are learning more efficient ways to cheat so they won’t get caught. No one is learning anything anymore from their homework because they are only trying to get it done and over with as fast as they can. Having too much homework to do cuts in on valuable time that students could be using for something else like studying for an upcoming test.

There has been so many instances where some of my friends and I just have so much homework for different classes due on the same day that we also forget to study for any tests or quizzes that are also on the same day that all of our homework is due. Even if a student was to skip one day of doing homework to catch up on sleep, everything starts to fall apart. They are struggling more the next day to try and finish it and find themselves even more panicked and stressed.

Because of all the pressure and responsibilities that we have, many children have stopped being children. Kids are growing up too fast now and it has a lot to do with the pressure in school and what parents expect from them. There is less time for them to play sports, relax and hang out with friends because they spend all of their, what is supposed to be “free time”, doing their homework. I personally, cannot even go out most weekends with my family due to me having so much homework to do. The weekends are supposed to be the time when students get a break from school but that is not the case anymore. Many teens do not have any hobbies but how can they? They don’t have any time to get one. A cousin of mine told me that she tried to get a hobby so she joined her school’s dance team. “I thought it would be fun and ease my mind off of all the pressure and homework but man was I wrong. It only made things more difficult for me because my homework took longer to do and I would always be exhausted the next day.” Nowadays, it is very difficult to be involved in other things besides homework. Teens spend all of their time working on homework rather than working on creating themselves and living their lives.

As I come to a conclusion, I hope that you all came to understand that children and teens need to have the opportunities to be kids. Yes education and school are important but that should remain at school only. It should not have to be continued for 3 or more hours at home. This generation is not lazy. We are hard and busy workers and we deserve a break. Today’s world has put too much pressure on the younger generations and we cannot take it anymore. It is not just that we hate homework but it is not healthy for the mind. Homework will soon be the reason why many teens have serious health conditions but we can put a stop to this if we ban homework.

Works Cited

1. (2000, December 14). Retrieved April 16, 2018, from http://www.apa.org/news/press/releases/2000/12/anxiety.aspx
2. 15 Serious Facts About High School Stress. (2014, February 20). Retrieved April 15, 2018, from http://www.bachelorsdegreeonline.com/blog/2011/15-serious-facts-about-high-school-stress/
3. Borba, M. (2012, February 21). What’s Happening in Character? Retrieved April 15, 2018, from http://info.character.org/blog/bid/130748/15-serious-facts-about-high-school-stress
4. T. (n.d.). High School Workloads, Student Stress, and How Parents Can Help. Retrieved April 21, 2018, from https://www.princetonreview.com/college-advice/homework-wars
5. Neighmond, P. (2013, December 02). School Stress Takes A Toll On Health, Teens And Parents Say. Retrieved April 14, 2018, from https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2013/12/02/246599742/school-stress-takes-a-toll-on-health-teens-and-parents-say
6. People Should Know Why Homework Should Be Banned Facts and Opinions. (2017, August 21). Retrieved April 18, 2018, from https://myhomeworkhelp.com/people-should-know-why-homework-should-be-banned-facts-and-opinions/
7. Roberts, H. L. (2017, June 13). The Effects of Too Much Homework on Teenagers. Retrieved April 16, 2018, from https://www.livestrong.com/article/561036-the-effects-of-too-much-homework-on-teenagers/
8. Schnurmacher, T. (2012, May 30). All Homework Should Be Banned. Retrieved April 15, 2018, from https://www.huffingtonpost.com/tommy-schnurmacher/why-to-ban-homework_b_1391419.html
9. Should homework be banned? (n.d.). Retrieved April 18, 2018, from http://www.debate.org/opinions/should-homework-be-banned
10. Teens More Stressed-Out Than Adults, Survey Shows. (2014, February 11). Retrieved April 14, 2018, from https://www.nbcnews.com/health/kids-health/teens-more-stressed-out-adults-survey-shows-n26921