Dead-end Weekend

“Therefore, no homework/assignments shall be given during the weekends for students to

enjoy their childhood, and spend quality time with their parents without being burdened by the
thought of doing lots of homework,”

It’s been a long week of school, you’re tired, and all the motivation you have left is to go home
and sleep for a good eight hours. You also look forward to hanging out with friends and relaxing
on the weekend until having to return to misery known as school the following Monday and
repeat another tiring week. In the midst of your happiness, you are informed of having
homework to do during the weekend. The happiness slowly fades to sadness as the reality of
having to complete a minimum of two hours of homework starts to kick in. Before you know it,
the weekend is filled with athletics, family and homework; and there’s no time for yourself. The
statement of the then-DepEd Secretary Bro. Armin Luistro gave us relief as he Issued on Sept.
16, 2010 the DepEd Memorandum No. 392 which ordered teachers to limit the giving of
assignments and any form of school works during weekends and further approved by the new
DepEd Secretary Leonor M. Briones. Six years. Six distressing years had already passed but we,
students, could still not sense that the memorandum was held effective on schools nationwide.
Did the memorandum take effect at all? Or was just hypothesized as a temporary disguise to
our mediocre educational system?

As a student, I don’t mind doing homework since it is part of my duties. What really gets on my
nerves though is getting assigned homework over the weekend. With this, I strongly agree with
the idea of Bro. Armin Luistro, hence, actions shall be taken for it to be held effectively in
schools all-over the nation. First and foremost, family time is more important during the
weekends. Personally, as a student living away from my family, weekend is the only opportunity
I could spend time with them and most of times, I am deprived of that opportunity due to tons
of schoolwork that needs to be done. Assigning less homework makes it easier for families to
have time together. A recently concluded study of the University of the Philippines show that
family time is extremely important to achievement and behavior. Studies on family meals,
suggest that students who have dinner with their family have better academic scores and
behavioral outcomes. Perhaps this is only a correlation, but family time is undeniably important
to student development. In addition, weekend is the only time parents could expect their
children to help them on household chores and assignments given on weekend makes it as
their focus instead. Students spent most of their days at school while parents are at work.
When all is said and done, the things you remember most about the weekends aren’t the
assignments you took home, but the time you spent with your family and friends. After all, it’s
just a matter of two days compared to the five days we spend at school, would it be a great loss
to the course of our lessons?

Second, more homework doesn’t necessarily equate to higher achievement. A 1989 Duke
University study that reviewed 120 studies found a weak link between achievement and
homework at the elementary level and only a moderate benefit at the middle school level. In a
similar recent review of 60 studies, researchers at Duke University found homework was
beneficial, but assigning excessive amounts of homework was counterproductive. On the same
manner, it should be considered that students also need rest. Everyone needs a mental
breather and the weekends are the best time for relaxation, for longer hours of sleep or for
anything you want to do other than your school tasks. Students then, should get less homework
on weekends because too much can cause great stress which in turn causes lack of sleep,
slipping grades, fatigue, unhealthy eating habits, depression and other many factors. According
to a 2006 poll, 80% of teens don’t get the recommended amount of sleep which is one factor of
low performance in class.

Lastly, students might learn more from observing the real world and weekend assignments
deprive them from this opportunity. Learning isn’t just about paper and pen activities. Teachers
should also inspire students to seek ways to learn from real-world experiences. They might be
enlightened to learn more about the real-world and different jobs they might pursue in the
future other than just sitting on a desk all day just to complete all the assigned task.
Extracurricular activities and personal hobbies are important in helping to develop one's
character, and especially in these crucial years it seems an important thing to define ourselves.
However, these important times are just being taken up by more and more work. As student
and as a teen, we should have more time to be able to flourish creatively and to have fun, not
to sit on a desk and study all the time.

The bottom line of this is we want only what’s best for our students. We don’t train robots, we
train humans. We don’t only fill the brains of our students; we should be able to fill their hearts.
Let’s make learning easy and enjoyable. Let us not take times in which children and teens could
not do something great with their family and treasure the memory for the rest of their lives. Let
us not make learning a horrible experience for our students. Hence, the new administration
under the supervision of DepEd Secretary Leonor M. Briones should take immediate actions for
the DepEd Memorandum No. 392 to take effect and be felt by its benefactors. The government,
the community, the teachers and most especially the parents should do their part to be able to
develop a child into an intelligent, responsible and loving human being that could do something
to promote intelligence to the following generations. Weekends are the perfect time to get a
couple days without having to worry about completing homework, and if all teachers were not
to give homework, then there would probably be an improvement in student’s attitude towards
actually doing homework during the week, thus counteracting their journey to the dead-end
weekend.

Jude L. Sanchez
ABM-1
English for Academic and Professional Purposes; 8:30-9:30 AM