I enjoy teaching my students to work on fun projects in class. A project is considered as a special assignment which is different from regular/daily homework. I know some teachers out there like to assign projects for students to complete at home but I don’t! The fact is there is no shortage of enthusiastic parents who would help their child complete the project. Personally, it is great to see how involved those parents are in their child’s school work. However, as a teacher, it is very difficult to assess a child’s accomplishment if the project were done with help at home. When Johnny brings the beautiful castle he has built at home to school, does that castle truly reflect what Johnny can do on his own or how he has applied his knowledge and problem solving skills? I often tell my students, “If the project was done perfectly with help from your mom and dad, should I give your parents an A, or should I give you an A?”
How about those children who don’t get sufficient parent support at home? We have plenty of parents who work so hard all day, sometimes with two jobs, just to support the family. I know for a fact that it is very difficult for these parents to provide any guidance to help their children with the basic homework. It would be too much to ask them if I have assigned something that the child has to construct at home. Many children already have the disadvantage of no home support. Do I just give up on those children’s potentials? I can’t let those children down.
As I was growing up, my parents never had time to help us with our homework. They had enough on their plate already. How could I expect them to help me with my work? Of course, I resented it as a child because I didn’t know better. Now, I can totally understand the struggle some families are going through. Anyway, I always have this simple principle regarding my class projects - I don’t assign any project for home, NOT AT ALL. Every single class project should be and would be done at school. The only project that I would assign to students would be something like the preparation for a formal speech presentation or newspaper report. I would usually teach the students how to do it in class and then they have to practise for their own presentation at home. Parents’ help is not necessary but they could simply be their child’s best audiences at home to cheer them on.
All the projects that I usually assign to my students would be completed in class. Weeks before each project, I would remind the class to bring materials to school. I encourage them to collect, reuse and recycle materials that could be used again for our project. Of course, I usually store these materials in my classroom before any project started, which has earned me a very negative title as the “packed rat” or "Marcos de Education" (Note 1). However, I could careless about what the other people call me. If my students could use the recycled materials to do wonderful things, then so be it! I would be very proud of that.
