5 Ways to Boost Homework Return Rates: Innovative Strategies for Teachers 

Homework is a veritable endangered species – less spotted in the classroom than a snow leopard in the Sahara. It’s a sensation you know too well as another assignment spirals into the black hole of “I forgot.”

Well, buckle up, teacher friend. You’re not alone in this no man’s land of crumpled papers and vanishing deadlines.

You’ve got permission to groan, maybe even drop a tear or two – because this gig can be a roller coaster. But hold on tight because we’re about to make a U-turn.

Completing regular homework builds good habits. Employers look for regular habits in their employees. Doing homework regularly and keeping track of it creates work and life skills.

We’re venturing into five transformative strategies to reel back your students.

Let’s dive in.

Set procedures, expectations, and systems early

It’s the first week of school. You’re getting to know your students. You’ve talked with them about classroom rules. Maybe you had them set regulations with you. There are tons of new procedures your students will learn.

You will assign work to your students no matter what grade you teach. Students must still do it, whether you call it class work, homework, or practice.

Your students practice sports and instruments but also need to practice schoolwork. When we know why something is necessary, we work harder. Discuss with your students why homework is essential.

Establish procedures for turning in work. (See the blog post, “How to Collect and Organize Student Work Without Losing Your Mind.”) Make the procedures clear and easy to follow.

Have systems to turn in, grade, and hand back work. Students will turn in work more often when it’s returned quickly. When work is submitted, you can have a trusted student check names off a list to know who has not turned their work in immediately.

Pink Slips

If you’ve ever been fired, you know what pink slips are. I use them with my students, but instead of being fired from a job, I use pink slips to communicate late work with parents. If a student misses homework, they get a pink slip.

Use a simple form that you create that has basic information filled out by you and the student:

• Name
• Date
• Assignment
• Reason for not doing the work
• Student signature
• Parent signature

I have my middle students write in the information. They take the pink slip home and have it signed by their parents. I also explained that not only do they get the pink slip and have to take it home for a signature, but I still expect the homework to be completed and turned in with the pink slip.

Several possibilities exist if they don’t turn in the pink slip the next day. I may have the student call home and explain to their parents that they must complete the work with or without a grade. I may take 10% off their grade. They might stay in for recess and complete the job.

Student planners: teaching good habits

How often have you distributed student planners and shown kids how to use them? Schools usually spend thousands of dollars on student planners. Sometimes, schools include the cost of student fees and other times, families buy them on “orientation days.”

Don’t give up on planners. There are many benefits for students when they use planners, according to the Professional Learning Board:

• Improved Organization
• Track Achievement
• Enhance Student Responsibility
• Promotes Communication

 

Model how to use a planner at the beginning of the school year. Teaching students how and why to use a planner is very important, and reminding older students is just as important.

Offering incentives for consistent planner use may work for you and your students. A few ideas include:

• Allowing students to choose their seats for the day or week.
• Giving the whole class an extra recess or no homework day for 90% compliance.
• Making positive phone calls home, emails, or notes in their planner to their parents.

Consistent planner use builds excellent habits.

Grade sheets: accountability check

Just like using planners regularly, keeping track of grades builds good habits and keeps students accountable. A grade sheet allows students to track their grades, know how well they are doing, and whether or not they are failing.

The teacher can pre-make and copy a grade sheet, then hand it out at the beginning of each marking period. A simple grid created on Google Docs or Microsoft Word works well. You can add a fourth column for “date turned in.” Consistently using a grade sheet helps students know if the work was late.

 

Assignment	Date given	Grade
1.
2…

 

Students write down the assignment, the date, and their grades. Work must be graded and quickly returned so students can stay on top of their grades.

Students can glue or staple grade sheets into their student planners to prevent them from getting lost. Students can also affix them to the notebook for each class.

Using grade sheets eliminates worry for students who often ask whether they are passing. It allows students to be accountable for themselves since they track their grades.

It is important to model how to use a grade sheet. I keep a grade sheet on Google Docs and project it each time work is handed back. Students see the assignment name and date assigned and write in their grade.

Check off sheets on display.

At one school where I worked, the assistant principal told me that doing this next tip was shaming, and I had to stop using this technique. I asked my students how they felt about it, and they were fine.

The technique is a homework check-off sheet. I posted a class list on the board for each class I taught. I listed each assignment at the top with dates. When students handed in work, I checked the box by their name corresponding to the assignment.

Students could see at a glance if they had turned in work. They liked the visuals. It helped them stay accountable and saved me from pulling out my grade books whenever they wanted to know if they had turned in assignments.

I set up the expectations very early. I was the only one who could check off work and used different-colored pens. If a student was caught checking off work they did not turn in, the grade changed to zero, and a note was sent home. I considered that cheating and let the kids and parents know.

Now What?

Have these techniques worked? They did.

I used these five techniques in a large urban inner-city school, where homework was rarely given because teachers “knew” it would not be done and was often not even attempted. These techniques boosted homework submission rates on average from 25% to over 85%.

Students don’t just need accountability; they like it, even if they complain. A lot of the burden was on them. No one was telling them what to do. (I was, but they didn’t see it that way). Keeping track of their grades, turning in work on time, and seeing missing assignments was empowering for them.

With some explaining, time, modeling, and patience, you can train your students to turn work in on time and enjoy doing it.

Homework is a good word when procedures and expectations are in place.