By  Sammie Jones-

Spanish Children, like spoilt brats, have long complained about school homework instead of appreciating the benefits that accompany learning. The strike targets weekend homework for primary and high school students.

Jose Luis Pazos, president of the CEAPA, recently told reporters that he had launched the unprecedented initiative due to “the absolute certainty that homework is detrimental” to children, damaging their extra-curricular development.

The claim is ludicrous and unreasonable when viewed against the fact that Spanish children get less than 7 hours homework a week- this equating under an hour a day. The strike is very irresponsible of those  parents -the CEAPA alliance is behaving irresponsibly.

A 2012 PISA education report by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development,put Spain fifth nation in terms of the most homework after Russia, Italy, Ireland and Poland out of 38 countries studied, with 6.5 hours a week compared to an average of 4.9.The one problem is that the report also claimed that Spanish children get low scores in Maths, Reading, and Science.Homework is supposed to help children develop learn by forcing them to answer questions given, either by searching the answers or by consultation with their parents.

However, the PISA report highlighted Finland and South Korea as two of the countries with best student performances despite the average time spent on homework every week being less than three hours.The reason for this may be because more quality time is spent on teaching and practise in the classrooms in Finland and South Korea, than in Spain. The children and parents in those countries may also have a more serious and focused approach to education than their unserious counterparts in Spain.The idea of striking is so irresponsible, it is shocking!

CEAPA president, Pazos, takes an irresponsible approach in the way he  berates the way of learning in Spain, in a failed attempt to justify an irresponsible strike that can be of no help to children.

He says education in Spain is still very reliant on the traditional method of rote-learning, that is memorising work.  So what? This cannot justify an irresponsible strike. Whilst memorising may not be the most effective way of learning,some children understand what they are memorising even if after they have memorised it.  Pazos said that “what we have to teach children isn’t to memorise everything, but how to manage information, to be critical, to select what is worth it and what isn’t.”

“Society has changed deeply, but the environment in the classroom hasn’t.”

Pazos would do better making his suggestion to schools and even demonstrating its efficacy, instead of leading a rebellious strike that signals the wrong messages to children. The irresponsible strike includes both primary and secondary schools, and will only make things worse for the quality of Spanish education.