How do you know what homework your students are getting in other subjects? Will they realistically have time to complete your homework to the best of their ability? How do you know that homework has been written down in student planners ready for when parents ask? How do you know when parents say ‘my child got no homework’ that this is true? Show My Homework (SMHW) has the ability to eliminate all of this doubt and to assist students, parents and staff with planning, organising and co-ordinating home-learning.
Homework can be a burden, especially when it’s difficult to get students consistently handing in their homework and when repeat offenders continually use the usual homework excuses. These factors can create barriers to building relationships with your students. The most common excuse students give for not completing the work set is ‘I forgot’, despite them being the only people responsible for completing work within the deadline.
A reason that SMHW is good for students is because it has an app, which means students have no excuse for not remembering to complete work by the set deadline as they will receive push notifications on their smartphones when homework is set or due in. Students can also see how many days they have left before they need to submit certain work for different teachers, therefore assisting them with their organisation.
Additionally, the beauty of SMHW is that if a student has forgotten what they need to do, they can check online to see the task and any resources they need to complete it. Even if students are off sick, they know the homework that has been set and exactly how to complete it. Schools that have embedded SMHW throughout their academic programme have seen a 90% increase in the engagement of students.I know many teachers feel that student planners are a good way for students to manage themselves and that this software does have the potential to allow students to lack responsibility, as students can be informed by parents of what their homework is, or they can check the app later. On the flip side, it´s the 21st century and everyone is technology orientated, so why not embrace it? Save money on paper-diary buying and look after the environment by investing in SMHW
As a teacher, you could be thinking ‘it will take ages to get my head around another program’, ‘I don’t have time between lessons’, ‘students won´t use it so why bother?’ but this software literally takes two minutes to understand and I think that´s what makes it so easy to integrate across the school.
Teachers have access to SMHW from the app or website and can set a variety of tasks catered to differing abilities. Homework can be set in the form of quizzes, differentiated tasks, spelling tests, class tests and regular assignments and you can include links and attachments. Quizzes and Spelling Tests are automatically marked, teachers can also mark and give feedback to students on other tasks through the Gradebook which both parents and students can see instantly. On top of this, teachers can re-use any homework tasks previously set again and again. Teachers also have the option to use a homework tasks another member of staff has previously created. We are all in the profession together to achieve the same goal of student success and attainment and I think that this is a great feature for reducing teacher workload and increasing staff wellbeing!
Parents also receive a log in to SMHW, allowing them to see what homework is set on each day, an explanation of the task, how long it should take and any resources. This allows for parents to be well informed of the homework their children should be completing each evening, as well as being able to assist them if necessary. This creates a positive relationship between parents and teachers, where both can identify gaps and aid understanding. This eradicates the surprise parents feel when students receive sanctions for not having met homework deadlines. An added bonus to this software is that homework can be translated into more than 50 different languages eliminating any language barriers that may exist.
The software also allows Heads of School or Departments to monitor the quantity of homework that they are issuing as well as what other teachers are setting for certain groups or individuals. This ensures that students do not then feel overwhelmed or stressed about the homework they have to complete and staff can assign longer periods of time to complete work if necessary. Teachers also have the very useful ability to set homework in advance for it to be released to students and parents at a later date. This allows staff to plan in advance and also be aware of the work they will have coming in from students at various times.
At the end of the day, SMHW is a software that is simple for even the least tech-savvy parents and staff. The dashboard is straight-forward and very user friendly for all. SMHW integrates with other platforms such as SIMS, Office 365, Google and many more in order to make sure set-up is simple and works for the school. As a result of SMHW, less time is wasted setting and collecting homework during lesson time so more time can be spent teaching. Personally, the best thing about using this is that there are no ´forgotten password´ nightmares and you don’t hear about any dogs eating the homework!
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