Homework ban in Turkey: Teachers ordered to leave the kids alone

All work and no play make children dull, National Education Minister Nabi Avcı asserted. Avcı instructed all schools under the supervision of his ministry not to assign homework to students during the 15-day mid-term break, which started last week.

The ban apparently proved rather awkward for teachers accustomed to handing out hefty homework assignments to students every break. Avcı witnessed this first-hand. He was having dinner with colleagues at a restaurant on Wednesday when he noticed a bunch of children with pencils and notebooks in the restaurant's playroom. As he chatted with them, he found out the children, instead of playing, were doing homework, despite his strict instructions to schools in all of Turkey's 81 provinces in a first in the country where education has long been synonymous with the heavy burden of homework and rote memorization of passages from textbooks. The ministry is now investigating the case of the children at the restaurant and will inspect the school violating the regulation.

"I kindly request you not give any homework to our students during the semester break in order for them to spend it in a productive way, to start a new semester in a healthy way and rested as well as to allocate enough time to their fields of interest," Avcı said in an announcement to teachers four days before the start of the mid-term break for some 18 million students.

The landmark move to spare children from strenuous homework may be added to a list of Turkey's planned education reforms. As the country plans to gradually roll out a new education program based on the overall academic performance of students rather than grades tied to exam scores, jockeying for year-round success at school may go down in the problematic history of education system.

Experts, however, are divided on whether the ban on homework is helpful for students. Associate Professor Nüket İşiten from Üsküdar University believes life should include homework to boost a sense of responsibility in children "so their self-confidence can improve. Responsibility, doing tasks assigned to oneself by others, is an essential part of healthy identity development," she said. She added that although homework is required for such development, children should not be overburdened. "Teachers shouldn't burden children with doing the work they are supposed to be taught at school and force parents to act as teachers for children instead of simply parenting them," she said. She cited two cases of pros and cons of assigning homework. "In some cases, when children aren't assigned homework, they spend their time at home consumed with watching TV, playing mobile games and engaging in other non-educational activities. Indulging in an unreal environment, children suffer from the lack of empathy, far from real social rules and norms," she said. In other cases, children overburdened with a large amount of homework may face problems at home or develop conflicts with parents. She also cautions that students with learning disabilities, such as dyslexia, need extracurricular support. "Homework certainly improves personality development but it should be tailored for each student's needs," she said.

Mehmet Teber, a psychology pedagogy expert and head of the Pedagogy Association, agrees with the homework ban. "Children are forced to focus too much on education. As a result, their free time and play time has gradually declined. Schools work full-time and children also have to attend weekend classes [to prepare for exams]. Thus, keeping them away from classes and homework, at least during the mid-term break, should help their mental health. It will be better if they were instructed to read books instead of doing homework," he said. He also stressed that students' free time should be guided properly. "If you give them free time and they spend the entire day in front of the TV, it won't be good either. Families should create plans for mid-term breaks for their children so the children aren't confined to sitting in front of the TV and playing computer games. They should take them out sightseeing or organize indoor activities for them," he advised.