Homework is immoral on a deep level.

Round 1
Nate: "Hey Harlan,

I apologize for being unable to post on the first debate. I've been swamped with school and homework lately and just haven't had time. I am very interested in this topic and I look forward to debating it with you. My opening topic is in response to your original opening statement. Feel free just to repost your original opening statement and add a response to mine. I was once in your shoes Harlan. I completely hated homework. It was trivial to me. I would get the same grades in a class whether or not I did the homework. I hated the fact that I went to school for 8 hours a day just to come home and do another 2-3 hours of homework every night. I disagreed so much with homework that I even called in to a local AM radio show when they were on the topic of homework to voice my opinion. Then came high school and college. My whole opinion of the system reversed. For once in my life I realized what the point of homework was and how beneficial it was to understanding and reinforcing the material that was learned in class. The average high school class is 45 minutes long. In that time you take 5 minutes to organize the class and the rest teaching. In that 40 minutes of teaching it is impossible to reinforce the topics introduced enough to embed them in the minds of the students. That is where homework comes in. Homework reinforces the work that was taught in class and allows the child to fully absorb the information that was presented to them. In college, homework is essential. Without it most of the student population would be lost in translation. Sitting in a lecture hall of 400 students listening to an a professor talk in a monotonic voice doesn't allow anyone to learn anything, it mearly provides a guideline of what needs to be studied and what homework needs to be done to learn the material. Is homework immoral in some cases? Yes. Homework is immoral when it is assigned just to give a student homework and not to reinforce material that was presented earlier in the day. In this case homework interferes with a childs outside of school development as well as time spent socializing and interacting with peers and family members."

Harlan: "Thank you for taking the trouble to reinstating this debate,

I will hear post my original opening argument simply for reference: "I am aware that most will dismiss arguments such as this (especially those without children) as the complaining of a child, but please take my arguments seriously.  School is difficult enough already (especially, for me, currently taking college credit classes in the eighth grade); It is the constant source of everyday stress for a child. Eight hours a day, 5 days a week, 9 months a year it is very demanding. From an idealistic standpoint (though I have particular distaste for idealism), it educates the population whether they like it or not. I can see the necessity for school  Homework, however, is disgusting. In my opinion, when a child returns home, they should genuinely return home, they should have the ability to dissatatch from the stresses of the world that is school. They can't though. It looms over them all day. There are things to be learned from having a personal life outside of school. It makes it difficult for them to do things as a family." I will now respond to your new opening argument:  I understand that there is not enough time in school and thus propose that we are taught in school, for about 2 more hours. We can be released at 5:00 and then not have any homework, and life would be so much easier. I would honestly prefer this.  I can understand that on the college level it may be necessary. But today, they are giving homework to first graders. WHY?! Why should anyone at that age be compelled to use his free time doing silly, pointless assignments?  And now, ALAS!, they are giving students homework over THE SUMMER! We do not have ANY breaks, not ever until we are out of college. Do you no how many 800-word essays I had to write over the summer?! 5! 5 long essays in the short three month period that is supposed to be my summer "break" whatever that means.  Here, I debate you, and thus learn many things. I am learning much more, right now, than I almost ever would do on one of those silly assignments. But Alas!, I am right now writing out this debate, and taking away time that I could be doing homework. TO WHAT END?"

Round 2
Nate: "Hey Harlan,

You brought up some interesting points in your opening market that are going to be fun to address. You first point offered up the suggestion that we stay in school an extra two hours every day to eliminate homework. While that is a good suggestion in principle you must realize that it is unrealistic. If you look at the overall homework structure in middle school and high school you realize the that bulk of the homework comes from four classes: Math, Science, History, and English. Other classes such as PE, art, and other "elective" classes have very little homework. By spending an extra two hours in school everyday we would be extending the schedule of every class not just the ones where homework is an issue. This would actually increase the time spent in school and on homework because we would still have the same amount of work from all classes but an increased time spent classes where extra time is not needed. Now to tackle your second point. You mention that homework is being assigned to first graders and that their homework is silly and pointless. If you refer to my opening statement you will see that I have already agreed with you on this point. "Is homework immoral in some cases? Yes. Homework is immoral when it is assigned just to give a student homework and not to reinforce material that was presented earlier in the day. In this case homework interferes with a child's outside of school development as well as time spent socializing and interacting with peers and family members." Pointless and silly homework is useless and does interrupt the developmental process of young children. From the way we have structured our arguments, however, I think we can both agree that our argument lies in middle school and high school and not in the lower graders (3rd grade and below). Summer homework, how I remember the days. I had to do homework over the summer for a few years and it was because I was taking advanced placement classes. I had elected to take the responsibility of completing these assignments because I was interested in taking these advanced placement classes. Never for any "regular" class did I have summer homework. May I ask what class you have summer homework for? Is it because you are taking an AP/Honors class or perhaps because you are at a private school that requires summer work? While I do feel your pain of having to write five 800 word essays over the summer I fail to see how someone of your intelligence has difficulty completing these in under 2-3 hours. You are in the 8th grade, taking college level and high school level courses. Based on this evidence I should easily be able to assume that you write at the level of a high school junior or senior. Each round of the debate we are writing right now easily approaches 500 words. This particular round should almost approach 800 words and it has taken me only 30 minutes in the middle of my Econ 370 class to write. Most people will always learn more on their own than they will in school but, it is the content of the education that matters. School is a structured environment in which a student learns the basic skills and knowledge of life. The skills learned in school and through homework help to make a student an educated and productive member of society. Homework, while it may seem over demanding and pointless is teaching you more than you think. -Nate P.S. sorry for any typos if there are any. I did not have a chance to edit this..."

Harlan: Harlan forfeited this round.