UAE government has been actively promoting digital transformation initiatives
Parent activism around the subject is being boosted by social media, so that parents in the US are eyeing what parents in Spain and beyond are doing. That's a significant change from when she was a school principal in the 1980s, she says, when parents just did what they were told. Not anymore. "There is a real willingness to challenge teachers, and school policy," she says.
While she says the school listened and lessened loads, levels are still so high that instead of going to the park most days after school, the family instead goes home to complete exercises that can take up to 1.5 hours. Velasco also hired a tutor. "Something is not working, and it's not the children," she says.
Cognizant of being characterised a "hippie" teacher, a teacher gathered parents at the start of the year to share her philosophy, citing studies that have shown that too much homework - generally no more than 10 minutes per grade level can be counterproductive, not to mention wreak havoc on family lives and sleep schedules.
The typical 9-to-5 job in Spain is actually an "intensive workday" that employees have to lobby for. Here, a normal day is 9am to 7pm, including a two-hour, unpaid break for lunch. Children tend to fill their afternoons with extracurriculars. Dinner is eaten late. "They end up doing homework way past bedtime," says L'Ecuyer. Sleep deprivation has a clear negative impact on learning, and homework is then given to increase class efficiency, turning into a "vicious circle," she says.
Zurine de la Horra says this is unfair, and is the education system's problem to solve: just as professional work should be kept at the office, so should lessons stay at school. She admits her partner, a lawyer, doesn't agree with her. "He thinks children have to be constant, and continuously reinforcing what they are learning."
UAE government has been actively promoting digital transformation initiatives
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