See what a high band reads like.

P1It is sometimes proposed that homework should be abolished altogether for children in primary school. I largely agree with this view, since the evidence that homework benefits very young learners is remarkably thin, while the costs to their wellbeing and their appetite for learning are tangible.

P2The most compelling reason concerns effectiveness. Research into early education consistently indicates that homework does little to lift the attainment of young children, whose development hinges far more on play, sleep and rich interaction with adults than on worksheets laboriously completed at the kitchen table. The hours a seven-year-old spends grinding through repetitive exercises after a full school day could instead be devoted to reading for pleasure, pursuing a hobby or simply resting, all of which arguably contribute more to long-term growth.

P3Homework can, moreover, be actively detrimental at this age. It routinely becomes a flashpoint between exhausted children and anxious parents, souring the atmosphere at home and, more insidiously, forging an early association between learning and drudgery that may endure for years. It is also profoundly inequitable: a child blessed with educated, available parents and a quiet desk enjoys an enormous advantage over one in a cramped, chaotic household, so homework can entrench social inequality before formal schooling has barely begun.