Pondering class structure and homework

Hello everyone.

Last week in the classroom, the seniors started their unit on business letters. They will be required to write two business letters during this unit; one will be written with a group and one will be an individual assignment. I think that writing a business letter as a group is an odd assignment; I do not know if group writing assignments are beneficial, but I guess I will see when they get to their individual letters. My teacher is using two different social arrangements for this assignment, which is said to be good according to our Bomer text, so maybe group work will help students who need to interact with classmates in order to fully understand an assignment.

I have not seen how my teacher lectures very much so far; she seems to favor projects mostly. I am interested to see how she presents lessons later on when we actually start getting into the literature section of the course. I wonder if focusing on projects more than lessons is what students prefer because the students have not complained during class about her assignments yet, and everyone has turned in each assignment so far.

I have a question that has been floating through my brain for the past year. I have observed, during my past placements and co-op placement last year, that students are not being given homework on a regular basis anymore. I realize that students have busy lives after school, but that has always been the case, so I do not understand why they are not receiving homework anymore. It might be for the fact that students do not turn in homework when it is assigned, but not giving out homework for that reason only is not good for students because they will never learn to be responsible for doing their homework if they are not given any. I am worried that students will get to college and not know how to manage the homework load that they receive each semester. I am not saying that students should be given a colossal amount of homework each week, but they should be able to handle a few assignments a week.

The class that I am a part of somewhat reminds me of the IB class that I was in two semesters ago. Both teachers give a short introduction lesson before they are given an assignment and then they work on the assignment for a few days and then it happens all over again with the next assignment. When I look at the way the class is structure from this perspective, it is a good thing because the students do not rely on their teacher to walk them though each little step of each assignment. Maybe making the students be productive on their own in class compensates for not assigning them homework because they are responsible for getting their work done in class, using their time wisely, and making sure that they speak up and ask questions during class if they have them.

These are just a few of the things that have been running through my mind when I have been watching students work in class this past week. I am sure that many more questions and thoughts will arise this week while I am in the classroom.