Poland made a decision to ban homework for primary school children, but ours do not envy them

As soon as the school doors are closed, elementary school children in Poland can relax, because homework cannot be assigned to them.

“Students in the first three primary grades should not be given written homework, except for some exercises that help to develop newspaper writing,” said Katarzyna Lubnauer, Poland’s deputy education minister.

“Fourth-eighth grades are allowed to do written homework, but students do not receive grades for it. Of course, as always, students will be asked to memorize poems, prepare for tests, etc., K. Lubnauer said.

The new procedure came into effect right after the students’ Easter vacation, and it seemed to confuse the teachers.

“Why April?” Why is such a huge change being introduced in the middle of the school year? We, the teachers, plan our work for the whole academic year, and the new rules come into force in the middle of the second semester. It destroys our plans,” said Danuta Kozakiewicz, a teacher at an elementary school in Warsaw.

Polish teachers are pessimistic. It is said that the new order will only cause chaos.

“There are families that put a lot of emphasis on their children’s education, and where homework is optional, but it will still be done.” In other families, homework will now be completely ignored,” thought D. Kozakiewicz.

However, the everyday life of schoolchildren in Lithuania, even with homework in their backpacks, does not seem gloomy.

“I asked our fourth graders, I say, ‘kids, come and ask me, what do I have to say, do you need homework?’ And they say: “both necessary and unnecessary.” If we don’t need to, we won’t learn anything. Homework is needed. Only we would not want them to ask questions on Fridays”, said Jūratė Mikulskienė, director of Vilnius P. Mašiotos Primary School.

At this school in the capital, even the youngest return home with assignments. True, they are much simpler than those of older students.

“Pack your things and bring them to school. This is the main thing we teach. The child, not the parents, should carry the backpack. It looks so elementary, but it is the child’s first homework at school,” said J. Mikulskienė.

The Ministry of Education assures that schools are left with a lot of freedom regarding homework, so there is no need for drastic solutions here.

“To make some kind of centralized decisions regarding regulation, whether it would be possible or not, to assign homework, today we have neither such proposals nor such ideas raised for consideration,” said Jolanta Navickaitė, director of the Ministry’s Education Department.

Of course, if there were complaints about the excessive load on children after school, the ministry promises to look for solutions. However, education specialists emphasize that complete denial of homework is impossible in Lithuania. This would be hindered by the updated general education program.

“At the moment, their volume has also increased in some cases. So, is there a basis for thinking that we can give up homework? Can we act like this if our content is increased, but we don’t have more contact lessons?”, said educational specialist Rasa Saldukė.

So far, it is common for teachers not to assign homework to first-graders, but from the second grade on, the student’s workload increases, and they have to work after school as well.