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A Stanford education researcher found that too much homework can negatively affect kids, especially their lives away from school, where family, friends and activities matter. "Our findings on the effects of homework challenge the traditional assumption that homework is inherently good," wrote Denise Pope , a senior lecturer at the Stanford Graduate School of Education and a co-author of a study published in the Journal of Experimental Education . The researchers used survey data to examine perceptions about homework, student well-being and behavioral engagement in a sample of 4,317 students from 10 high-performing high schools in upper-middle-class California communities. Along with the survey data, Pope and her colleagues used open-ended answers to explore the students' views on homework. Median household income exceeded $90,000 in these communities, and 93 percent of the students went on to college, either two-year or four-year. Students in these schools average about 3.1 hours of homework each night. "The findings address how current homework practices in privileged, high-performing schools sustain students' advantage in competitive climates yet hinder learning, full engagement and well-being," Pope wrote. Pope and her colleagues found that too much homework can diminish its effectiveness and even be counterproductive. They cite prior research indicating that homework benefits plateau at about two hours per night, and that 90 minutes to two and a half hours is optimal for high school. Their study found that too much homework is associated with: • Greater stress : 56 percent of the students considered homework a primary source of stress, according to the survey data. Forty-three percent viewed tests as a primary stressor, while 33 percent put the pressure to get good grades in that category. Less than 1 percent of the students said homework was not a stressor. • Reductions in health : In their open-ended answers, many students said their homework load led to sleep deprivation and other health problems. The researchers asked students whether they experienced health issues such as headaches, exhaustion, sleep deprivation, weight loss and stomach problems. • Less time for friends, family and extracurricular pursuits : Both the survey data and student responses indicate that spending too much time on homework meant that students were "not meeting their developmental needs or cultivating other critical life skills," according to the researchers. Students were more likely to drop activities, not see friends or family, and not pursue hobbies they enjoy. A balancing act The results offer empirical evidence that many students struggle to find balance between homework, extracurricular activities and social time, the researchers said. Many students felt forced or obligated to choose homework over developing other talents or skills. Also, there was no relationship between the time spent on homework and how much the student enjoyed it. The research quoted students as saying they often do homework they see as "pointless" or "mindless" in order to keep their grades up. "This kind of busy work, by its very nature, discourages learning and instead promotes doing homework simply to get points," said Pope, who is also a co-founder of Challenge Success , a nonprofit organization affiliated with the GSE that conducts research and works with schools and parents to improve students' educational experiences.. Pope said the research calls into question the value of assigning large amounts of homework in high-performing schools. Homework should not be simply assigned as a routine practice, she said. "Rather, any homework assigned should have a purpose and benefit, and it should be designed to cultivate learning and development," wrote Pope. High-performing paradox In places where students attend high-performing schools, too much homework can reduce their time to foster skills in the area of personal responsibility, the researchers concluded. "Young people are spending more time alone," they wrote, "which means less time for family and fewer opportunities to engage in their communities." Student perspectives The researchers say that while their open-ended or "self-reporting" methodology to gauge student concerns about homework may have limitations – some might regard it as an opportunity for "typical adolescent complaining" – it was important to learn firsthand what the students believe. The paper was co-authored by Mollie Galloway from Lewis and Clark College and Jerusha Conner from Villanova University.

Clifton B. Parker is a writer at the Stanford News Service .

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Is homework robbing your family of joy? You're not alone

Children are not the only ones who dread their homework these days. In a 2019 survey of 1,049 parents with children in elementary, middle, or high school, Office Depot found that parents spend an average of 21 minutes a day helping their children with their homework. Those 21 minutes are often apparently very unpleasant.

Parents reported their children struggle to complete homework. One in five believed their children "always or often feel overwhelmed by homework," and half of them reported their children had cried over homework stress.

Parents are struggling to help. Four out of five parents reported that they have had difficulty understanding their children's homework.

This probably comes as no surprise to any parent who has come up against a third grade math homework sheet with the word "array" printed on it. If you have not yet had the pleasure, for the purposes of Common Core math, an array is defined as a set of objects arranged in rows and columns and used to help kids learn about multiplication. For their parents, though, it's defined as a "What? Come again? Huh?"

It's just as hard on the students. "My high school junior says homework is the most stressful part of high school...maybe that’s why he never does any," said Mandy Burkhart, of Lake Mary, Florida, who is a mother of five children ranging in age from college to preschool.

In fact, Florida high school teacher and mother of three Katie Tomlinson no longer assigns homework in her classroom. "Being a parent absolutely changed the way I assign homework to my students," she told TODAY Parents .

"Excessive homework can quickly change a student’s mind about a subject they previously enjoyed," she noted. "While I agree a check and balance is necessary for students to understand their own ability prior to a test, I believe it can be done in 10 questions versus 30."

But homework is a necessary evil for most students, so what is a parent to do to ensure everyone in the house survives? Parents and professionals weigh in on the essentials:

Understand the true purpose of homework

"Unless otherwise specified, homework is designed to be done by the child independently, and it's most often being used as a form of formative assessment by the teacher to gauge how the kids are applying — independently — what they are learning in class," said Oona Hanson , a Los Angeles-area educator and parent coach.

"If an adult at home is doing the heavy lifting, then the teacher never knows that the child isn't ready to do this work alone, and the cycle continues because the teacher charges ahead thinking they did a great job the day before!" Hanson said. "It's essential that teachers know when their students are struggling for whatever reason."

Hanson noted the anxiety both parents and children have about academic achievement, and she understands the parental impulse to jump in and help, but she suggested resisting that urge. "We can help our kids more in the long run if we can let them know it's OK to struggle a little bit and that they can be honest with their teacher about what they don't understand," she said.

Never miss a parenting story with the TODAY Parenting newsletter! Sign up here.

Help kids develop time management skills

Some children like to finish their homework the minute they get home. Others need time to eat a snack and decompress. Either is a valid approach, but no matter when students decide to tackle their homework, they might need some guidance from parents about how to manage their time .

One tip: "Set the oven timer for age appropriate intervals of work, and then let them take a break for a few minutes," Maura Olvey, an elementary school math specialist in Central Florida, told TODAY Parents. "The oven timer is visible to them — they know when a break is coming — and they are visible to you, so you can encourage focus and perseverance." The stopwatch function on a smartphone would work for this method as well.

But one size does not fit all when it comes to managing homework, said Cleveland, Ohio, clinical psychologist Dr. Sarah Cain Spannagel . "If their child has accommodations as a learner, parents know they need them at home as well as at school: quiet space, extended time, audio books, etcetera," she said. "Think through long assignments, and put those in planners in advance so the kid knows it is expected to take some time."

Know when to walk away

"I always want my parents to know when to call it a night," said Amanda Feroglia, a central Florida elementary teacher and mother of two. "The children's day at school is so rigorous; some nights it’s not going to all get done, and that’s OK! It’s not worth the meltdown or the fight if they are tired or you are frustrated...or both!"

Parents also need to accept their own limits. Don't be afraid to find support from YouTube videos, websites like Khan Academy, or even tutors. And in the end, said Spannagel, "If you find yourself yelling or frustrated, just walk away!" It's fine just to let a teacher know your child attempted but did not understand the homework and leave it at that.

Ideally, teachers will understand when parents don't know how to help with Common Core math, and they will assign an appropriate amount of homework that will not leave both children and their parents at wits' ends. If worst comes to worst, a few parents offered an alternative tip for their fellow homework warriors.

"If Brittany leaves Boston for New York at 3:00 pm traveling by train at 80 MPH, and Taylor leaves Boston for New York at 1:00 pm traveling by car at 65 MPH, and Brittany makes two half hour stops, and Taylor makes one that is ten minutes longer, how many glasses of wine does mommy need?" quipped one mom of two.

Also recommended: "Chocolate, in copious amounts."

Allison Slater Tate is a freelance writer and editor in Florida specializing in parenting and college admissions. She is a proud Gen Xer, ENFP, Leo, Diet Coke enthusiast, and champion of the Oxford Comma. She mortifies her four children by knowing all the trending songs on TikTok. Follow her on Twitter and Instagram .

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The Truth About Homework Stress: What Parents & Students Need to Know

Fact Checked

Written by:

published on:

December 21, 2023

Updated on:

June 12, 2024

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Homework is generally given out to ensure that students take time to review and remember the days lessons. It can help improve on a student’s general performance and enhance traits like self-discipline and independent problem solving.

Parents are able to see what their children are doing in school, while also helping teachers determine how well the lesson material is being learned. Homework is quite beneficial when used the right way and can improve student performance.

This well intentioned practice can turn sour if it’s not handled the right way. Studies show that if a student is inundated with too much homework, not only do they get lower scores, but they are more likely to get stressed.

The age at which homework stress is affecting students is getting lower, some even as low as kindergarten. Makes you wonder what could a five year old possibly need to review as homework?

One of the speculated reasons for this stress is that the complexity of what a student is expected to learn is increasing, while the breaks for working out excess energy are reduced. Students are getting significantly more homework than recommended by the education leaders, some even nearly three times more.

To make matters worse, teachers may give homework that is both time consuming and will keep students busy while being totally non-productive.

Remedial work like telling students to copy notes word for word from their text books will do nothing to improve their grades or help them progress. It just adds unnecessary stress.

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Effects of homework stress at home

Both parents and students tend to get stressed out at the beginning of a new school year due to the impending arrival of homework.

Nightly battles centered on finishing assignments are a household routine in houses with students.

Research has found that too much homework can negatively affect children. In creating a lack of balance between play time and time spent doing homework, a child can get headaches, sleep deprivation or even ulcers.

And homework stress doesn’t just impact grade schoolers. College students are also affected, and the stress is affecting their academic performance.

Even the parent’s confidence in their abilities to help their children with homework suffers due increasing stress levels in the household.

Fights and conflict over homework are more likely in families where parents do not have at least a college degree. When the child needs assistance, they have to turn to their older siblings who might already be bombarded with their own homework.

Parents who have a college degree feel more confident in approaching the school and discussing the appropriate amount of school work.

“It seems that homework being assigned discriminates against parents who don’t have college degree, parents who have English as their second language and against parents who are poor.” Said Stephanie Donaldson Pressman, the contributing editor of the study and clinical director of the New England Center for Pediatric Psychology.

With all the stress associated with homework, it’s not surprising that some parents have opted not to let their children do homework. Parents that have instituted a no-homework policy have stated that it has taken a lot of the stress out of their evenings.

The recommended amount homework

The standard endorsed by the National Education Association is called the “10 minute rule”; 10 minutes per grade level per night. This recommendation was made after a number of studies were done on the effects of too much homework on families.

The 10 minute rule basically means 10 minutes of homework in the first grade, 20 minute for the second grade all the way up to 120 minutes for senior year in high school. Note that no homework is endorsed in classes under the first grade.

Parents reported first graders were spending around half an hour on homework each night, and kindergarteners spent 25 minutes a night on assignments according to a study carried out by Brown University.

Making a five year old sit still for half an hour is very difficult as they are at the age where they just want to move around and play.

A child who is exposed to 4-5 hours of homework after school is less likely to find the time to go out and play with their friends, which leads to accumulation of stress energy in the body.

Their social life also suffers because between the time spent at school and doing homework, a child will hardly have the time to pursue hobbies. They may also develop a negative attitude towards learning.

The research highlighted that 56% of students consider homework a primary source of stress.

And if you’re curious how the U.S stacks up against other countries in regards to how much time children spend on homework, it’s pretty high on the list .

Signs to look out for on a student that has homework stress

Since not every student is affected by homework stress in the same way, it’s important to be aware of some of the signs your child might be mentally drained from too much homework.

Here are some common signs of homework stress:

Sleep disturbances
Frequent stomachaches and headaches
Decreased appetite or changed eating habits
New or recurring fears
Not able to relax
Regressing to behavior they had when younger
Bursts of anger crying or whining
Becoming withdrawn while others may become clingy
Drastic changes in academic performance
Having trouble concentrating or completing homework
Constantly complains about their ability to do homework

If you’re a parent and notice any of these signs in your child, step in to find out what’s going on and if homework is the source of their stress.

If you’re a student, pay attention if you start experiencing any of these symptoms as a result of your homework load. Don’t be afraid to ask your teacher or parents for help if the stress of homework becomes too much for you.

What parents do wrong when it comes to homework stress

Most parents push their children to do more and be more, without considering the damage being done by this kind of pressure.

Some think that homework brought home is always something the children can deal with on their own. If the child cannot handle their homework then these parents get angry and make the child feel stupid.

This may lead to more arguing and increased dislike of homework in the household. Ultimately the child develops an even worse attitude towards homework.

Another common mistake parents make is never questioning the amount of homework their children get, or how much time they spend on it. It’s easy to just assume whatever the teacher assigned is adequate, but as we mentioned earlier, that’s not always the case.

Be proactive and involved with your child’s homework. If you notice they’re spending hours every night on homework, ask them about it. Just because they don’t complain doesn’t mean there isn’t a problem.

How can parents help?

While every parent wants their child to become successful and achieve the very best, it’s important to pull back on the mounting pressure and remember that they’re still just kids. They need time out to release their stress and connect with other children.
Many children may be afraid to admit that they’re overwhelmed by homework because they might be misconstrued as failures. The best thing a parent can do is make home a safe place for children to express themselves freely. You can do this by lending a listening ear and not judging your kids.
Parents can also take the initiative to let the school know that they’re unhappy with the amount of homework being given. Even if you don’t feel comfortable complaining, you can approach the school through the parent-teacher association available and request your representative to plead your case.
It may not be all the subjects that are causing your child to get stressed. Parents should find out if there is a specific subject of homework that is causing stress. You could also consult with other parents to see what they can do to fix the situation. It may be the amount or the content that causes stress, so the first step is identifying the problem.
Work with your child to create a schedule for getting homework done on time. You can set a specific period of time for homework, and schedule time for other activities too. Strike a balance between work and play.
Understanding that your child is stressed about homework doesn’t mean you have to allow them not to try. Let them sit down and work on it as much as they’re able to, and recruit help from the older siblings or a neighbor if possible.
Check out these resources to help your child with their homework .

The main idea here is to not abolish homework completely, but to review the amount and quality of homework being given out. Stress, depression and lower grades are the last things parents want for their children.

The schools and parents need to work together to find a solution to this obvious problem.

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About the author

The New York Times

Motherlode | homework’s emotional toll on students and families, homework’s emotional toll on students and families.

When your children arrive home from school this evening, what will be your first point of conflict? How’s this for an educated guess? Homework.

Do they have any? How much? When are they going to do it? Can they get it done before practice/rehearsal/dinner? After? When is it due? When did they start it? Even parents who are wholly hands off about the homework itself still need information about how much, when and how long if there are any family plans in the offing — because, especially for high school students in high-performing schools, homework has become the single dominating force in their nonschool lives.

Researchers asked 4,317 students from 10 high-performing high schools in upper-middle-class California communities to describe the impact of homework on their lives, and the results offer a bleak picture that many of us can see reflected around our dining room tables. The students reported averaging 3.1 hours of homework nightly, and they added comments like: “There’s never a break. Never.”

It “takes me away from everything I used to do,” says one.

Lack of sleep and lack of time were a theme, said the researcher Denise Clark Pope, a senior lecturer at the Stanford Graduate School of Education and a co-author of the study, which will be published in The Journal of Experimental Education. While the students didn’t report grieving for the children they were just a few months or years ago, they should have. There is something about that phrase — “everything I used to do” — that makes a parent take notice.

It’s not just the hours, Ms. Pope said. Students describe stress and sleep deprivation. “They feel out of control,” she said. “They often have no idea when a teacher will assign what. They can’t plan around Grandma’s birthday dinner, and it’s really not their fault.”

My students aren’t even in high school yet (my oldest is a seventh grader), and I’m not looking forward to the change. I don’t want them to give up “everything they used to do.” Already, homework struggles dominate many of our evenings. For some children at some ages (it has varied with mine), just getting them to sit down takes more time than the worksheets in their backpacks. For others, homework becomes an excellent place to enact a nightly dramatic rendition of “I Can’t Do It” (whether they can or not). The stress homework places on families starts early.

There are parenting strategies available to deal with those struggles, certainly — but when, and why, did our evenings at home become so dedicated to that particular interaction? I’m perpetually dismayed by how much of our evenings is consumed by schoolwork, and at the end of a particularly fraught night — for example, one when my two second graders each have a report on a South American animal due, and are fighting not just over the homework, but also over their share of my coveted attention and my unique ability to download and print images — I find myself wondering how our family life would be different without the flash point that homework so often becomes.

For the older students who participated in the research, homework was a family flash point of a different kind. Ms. Pope and her colleagues intentionally designed their research and wrote their paper to focus on the voices of the students and on their perspective about homework, arguing that it is the students’ experience that “influences how they do their homework, and consequently, how homework affects them.”

Much of the pressure they described feeling came from their parents, Ms. Pope said, and a sense that if they didn’t do the homework, they wouldn’t get the grades and they wouldn’t succeed. For those students (no matter what their parents might say about the same interactions), homework is affecting their relationship with their parents and how they feel about their family and their place in it.

To take my relationship with my children out from under homework’s shadow, I have pulled back (way back) on any involvement, and we have made an active choice as parents to let the work and any consequences for not doing it fall to their schools, not to us. That doesn’t work for all families. It also doesn’t help when the sheer number of hours a child is expected to spend at his books is destructive to family relationships because there is little or no time left to spend together, particularly once a sport or other activity enters the mix.

Ms. Pope suggests asking teachers and schools to provide homework packets that a student can spread out over a week, rather than springing large assignments due tomorrow that can derail family plans. Schools and teachers can also help by building in time for students to get started on homework and ask any questions they might have.

Looking at the larger picture, she said, things are changing. “These students are already averaging an hour more than what’s thought to be useful,” she said, and teachers, schools and parents are beginning to think harder about what kinds of homework, and how much of it, enhance learning and motivation without becoming all-consuming.

It might be easier than you think to start the conversation at your student’s school. “Load doesn’t equal rigor,” Ms. Pope said. “There are other developmental things students need to be doing after school, and other things they need to be learning.”

And if you are at the point where some of the pressure over homework might just be coming from you? “Don’t fall into the trap of parent peer pressure,” said Ms. Pope, a mother of three. “Nothing is permanent, and it’s up to you to remind your children that. We live in a country where you can drop out of high school and later community college and still ultimately get a Ph.D. from Stanford. At a certain point, it’s O.K. to get some sleep instead of studying for that test.”

And it’s really O.K. to go out to dinner for Grandma’s birthday. When do they assign the homework that teaches students that while work matters, family matters more?

Follow KJ Dell’Antonia on Twitter at @KJDellAntonia or find her on Facebook and Google+ .

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Education scholar Denise Pope has found that too much homework has negative effects on student well-being and behavioral engagement. (Image credit: L.A. Cicero)

A Stanford researcher found that too much homework can negatively affect kids, especially their lives away from school, where family, friends and activities matter.

“Our findings on the effects of homework challenge the traditional assumption that homework is inherently good,” wrote Denise Pope , a senior lecturer at the Stanford Graduate School of Education and a co-author of a study published in the Journal of Experimental Education .

The researchers used survey data to examine perceptions about homework, student well-being and behavioral engagement in a sample of 4,317 students from 10 high-performing high schools in upper-middle-class California communities. Along with the survey data, Pope and her colleagues used open-ended answers to explore the students’ views on homework.

Median household income exceeded $90,000 in these communities, and 93 percent of the students went on to college, either two-year or four-year.

Students in these schools average about 3.1 hours of homework each night.

“The findings address how current homework practices in privileged, high-performing schools sustain students’ advantage in competitive climates yet hinder learning, full engagement and well-being,” Pope wrote.

Pope and her colleagues found that too much homework can diminish its effectiveness and even be counterproductive. They cite prior research indicating that homework benefits plateau at about two hours per night, and that 90 minutes to two and a half hours is optimal for high school.

Their study found that too much homework is associated with:

* Greater stress: 56 percent of the students considered homework a primary source of stress, according to the survey data. Forty-three percent viewed tests as a primary stressor, while 33 percent put the pressure to get good grades in that category. Less than 1 percent of the students said homework was not a stressor.

* Reductions in health: In their open-ended answers, many students said their homework load led to sleep deprivation and other health problems. The researchers asked students whether they experienced health issues such as headaches, exhaustion, sleep deprivation, weight loss and stomach problems.

* Less time for friends, family and extracurricular pursuits: Both the survey data and student responses indicate that spending too much time on homework meant that students were “not meeting their developmental needs or cultivating other critical life skills,” according to the researchers. Students were more likely to drop activities, not see friends or family, and not pursue hobbies they enjoy.

A balancing act

The results offer empirical evidence that many students struggle to find balance between homework, extracurricular activities and social time, the researchers said. Many students felt forced or obligated to choose homework over developing other talents or skills.

Also, there was no relationship between the time spent on homework and how much the student enjoyed it. The research quoted students as saying they often do homework they see as “pointless” or “mindless” in order to keep their grades up.

“This kind of busy work, by its very nature, discourages learning and instead promotes doing homework simply to get points,” Pope said.

She said the research calls into question the value of assigning large amounts of homework in high-performing schools. Homework should not be simply assigned as a routine practice, she said.

“Rather, any homework assigned should have a purpose and benefit, and it should be designed to cultivate learning and development,” wrote Pope.

High-performing paradox

In places where students attend high-performing schools, too much homework can reduce their time to foster skills in the area of personal responsibility, the researchers concluded. “Young people are spending more time alone,” they wrote, “which means less time for family and fewer opportunities to engage in their communities.”

Student perspectives

The researchers say that while their open-ended or “self-reporting” methodology to gauge student concerns about homework may have limitations – some might regard it as an opportunity for “typical adolescent complaining” – it was important to learn firsthand what the students believe.

The paper was co-authored by Mollie Galloway from Lewis and Clark College and Jerusha Conner from Villanova University.

Media Contacts

Denise Pope, Stanford Graduate School of Education: (650) 725-7412, [email protected] Clifton B. Parker, Stanford News Service: (650) 725-0224, [email protected]

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School Stress Takes A Toll On Health, Teens And Parents Say

Patti Neighmond

Colleen Frainey, 16, of Tualatin, Ore., cut back on advanced placement classes in her junior year because the stress was making her physically ill. Toni Greaves for NPR hide caption

Colleen Frainey, 16, of Tualatin, Ore., cut back on advanced placement classes in her junior year because the stress was making her physically ill.

When high school junior Nora Huynh got her report card, she was devastated to see that she didn't get a perfect 4.0.

Nora "had a total meltdown, cried for hours," her mother, Jennie Huynh of Alameda, Calif., says. "I couldn't believe her reaction."

Nora is doing college-level work, her mother says, but many of her friends are taking enough advanced classes to boost their grade-point averages above 4.0. "It breaks my heart to see her upset when she's doing so awesome and going above and beyond."

And the pressure is taking a physical toll, too. At age 16, Nora is tired, is increasingly irritated with her siblings and often suffers headaches, her mother says.

Teens Talk Stress

When NPR asked on Facebook if stress is an issue for teenagers, they spoke loud and clear:

"Academic stress has been a part of my life ever since I can remember," wrote Bretta McCall, 16, of Seattle. "This year I spend about 12 hours a day on schoolwork. I'm home right now because I was feeling so sick from stress I couldn't be at school. So as you can tell, it's a big part of my life!"
"At the time of writing this, my weekend assignments include two papers, a PowerPoint to go with a 10-minute presentation, studying for a test and two quizzes, and an entire chapter (approximately 40 pages) of notes in a college textbook," wrote Connor West of New Jersey.
"It's a problem that's basically brushed off by most people," wrote Kelly Farrell in Delaware. "There's this mentality of, 'You're doing well, so why are you complaining?' " She says she started experiencing symptoms of stress in middle school, and was diagnosed with panic disorder and generalized anxiety disorder in high school.
"Parents are the worst about all of this," writes Colin Hughes of Illinois. "All I hear is, 'Work harder, you're a smart kid, I know you have it in you, and if you want to go to college you need to work harder.' It's a pain."

Parents are right to be worried about stress and their children's health, says Mary Alvord , a clinical psychologist in Maryland and public education coordinator for the American Psychological Association.

"A little stress is a good thing," Alvord says. "It can motivate students to be organized. But too much stress can backfire."

Almost 40 percent of parents say their high-schooler is experiencing a lot of stress from school, according to a new NPR poll conducted with the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Harvard School of Public Health. In most cases, that stress is from academics, not social issues or bullying, the poll found. (See the full results here .)

Homework was a leading cause of stress, with 24 percent of parents saying it's an issue.

Teenagers say they're suffering, too. A survey by the American Psychological Association found that nearly half of all teens — 45 percent — said they were stressed by school pressures.

Chronic stress can cause a sense of panic and paralysis, Alvord says. The child feels stuck, which only adds to the feeling of stress.

Parents can help put the child's distress in perspective, particularly when they get into what Alvord calls catastrophic "what if" thinking: "What if I get a bad grade, then what if that means I fail the course, then I'll never get into college."

Then move beyond talking and do something about it.

Colleen pets her horse, Bishop. They had been missing out on rides together because of homework. Toni Greaves for NPR hide caption

Colleen pets her horse, Bishop. They had been missing out on rides together because of homework.

That's what 16-year-old Colleen Frainey of Tualatin, Ore., did. As a sophomore last year, she was taking all advanced courses. The pressure was making her sick. "I didn't feel good, and when I didn't feel good I felt like I couldn't do my work, which would stress me out more," she says.

Mom Abigail Frainey says, "It was more than we could handle as a family."

With encouragement from her parents, Colleen dropped one of her advanced courses. The family's decision generated disbelief from other parents. "Why would I let her take the easy way out?" Abigail Frainey heard.

But she says dialing down on academics was absolutely the right decision for her child. Colleen no longer suffers headaches or stomachaches. She's still in honors courses, but the workload this year is manageable.

Even better, Colleen now has time to do things she never would have considered last year, like going out to dinner with the family on a weeknight, or going to the barn to ride her horse, Bishop.

Psychologist Alvord says a balanced life should be the goal for all families. If a child is having trouble getting things done, parents can help plan the week, deciding what's important and what's optional. "Just basic time management — that will help reduce the stress."

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Adolescence

How to Help a Teen Out of a Homework Hole

The more students fall behind in the pandemic, the less likely they are to feel that they can catch up.

By Lisa Damour

Pandemic school is taking its toll on students, especially teens. A recent study , conducted by NBC News and Challenge Success, a nonprofit affiliated with the Stanford Graduate School of Education, found that 50 percent more kids in high school report feeling disengaged from school this year than last. In December, Education Week reported that schools were seeing “ dramatic increases in the number of failing or near-failing grades ” on report cards.

A major symptom of school disengagement is not turning in homework, a problem that can easily snowball. The further students fall behind, the more overwhelmed they often become and the less likely they are to feel that they can catch up .

The good news is that finding out about missing homework is a first step to helping kids get back on track. You just need to keep a few considerations in mind.

Empathy will get you further than anger

At this point in the pandemic, finding out that your child has let schoolwork slide may trigger an angry response. Everyone is worn down by the demands of pandemic life and many parents are already operating on their last nerve . Getting mad, however, is likely to cause kids to adopt a defensive or minimizing stance. Instead, try to be compassionate. What students who have fallen behind need most are problem-solving partners who want to understand what they are going through.

If you’re having trouble summoning your empathy, bear in mind that there are many good reasons a student could fall off pace this year. For instance, Ned Johnson, a professional tutor and co-author of the book “The Self-Driven Child,” noted that most teens have very little experience managing email, which is now a main source of information for those in remote or hybrid arrangements. “We know how overwhelmed we as adults are by email. Imagine not being comfortable with it, and then suddenly getting everything — from Zoom links to assignments — that way.”

Some students learning remotely may also have unreliable broadband service; others may miss key information because their attention is split between the teacher on the screen and distractions at home.

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Is it time to get rid of homework? Mental health experts weigh in.

It's no secret that kids hate homework. And as students grapple with an ongoing pandemic that has had a wide range of mental health impacts, is it time schools start listening to their pleas about workloads?

Some teachers are turning to social media to take a stand against homework.

Tiktok user @misguided.teacher says he doesn't assign it because the "whole premise of homework is flawed."

For starters, he says, he can't grade work on "even playing fields" when students' home environments can be vastly different.

"Even students who go home to a peaceful house, do they really want to spend their time on busy work? Because typically that's what a lot of homework is, it's busy work," he says in the video that has garnered 1.6 million likes. "You only get one year to be 7, you only got one year to be 10, you only get one year to be 16, 18."

Mental health experts agree heavy workloads have the potential do more harm than good for students, especially when taking into account the impacts of the pandemic. But they also say the answer may not be to eliminate homework altogether.

Emmy Kang, mental health counselor at Humantold , says studies have shown heavy workloads can be "detrimental" for students and cause a "big impact on their mental, physical and emotional health."

"More than half of students say that homework is their primary source of stress, and we know what stress can do on our bodies," she says, adding that staying up late to finish assignments also leads to disrupted sleep and exhaustion.

Cynthia Catchings, a licensed clinical social worker and therapist at Talkspace , says heavy workloads can also cause serious mental health problems in the long run, like anxiety and depression.

And for all the distress homework can cause, it's not as useful as many may think, says Dr. Nicholas Kardaras, a psychologist and CEO of Omega Recovery treatment center.

"The research shows that there's really limited benefit of homework for elementary age students, that really the school work should be contained in the classroom," he says.

For older students, Kang says, homework benefits plateau at about two hours per night.

"Most students, especially at these high achieving schools, they're doing a minimum of three hours, and it's taking away time from their friends, from their families, their extracurricular activities. And these are all very important things for a person's mental and emotional health."

Catchings, who also taught third to 12th graders for 12 years, says she's seen the positive effects of a no-homework policy while working with students abroad.

"Not having homework was something that I always admired from the French students (and) the French schools, because that was helping the students to really have the time off and really disconnect from school," she says.

The answer may not be to eliminate homework completely but to be more mindful of the type of work students take home, suggests Kang, who was a high school teacher for 10 years.

"I don't think (we) should scrap homework; I think we should scrap meaningless, purposeless busy work-type homework. That's something that needs to be scrapped entirely," she says, encouraging teachers to be thoughtful and consider the amount of time it would take for students to complete assignments.

The pandemic made the conversation around homework more crucial

Mindfulness surrounding homework is especially important in the context of the past two years. Many students will be struggling with mental health issues that were brought on or worsened by the pandemic , making heavy workloads even harder to balance.

"COVID was just a disaster in terms of the lack of structure. Everything just deteriorated," Kardaras says, pointing to an increase in cognitive issues and decrease in attention spans among students. "School acts as an anchor for a lot of children, as a stabilizing force, and that disappeared."

But even if students transition back to the structure of in-person classes, Kardaras suspects students may still struggle after two school years of shifted schedules and disrupted sleeping habits.

"We've seen adults struggling to go back to in-person work environments from remote work environments. That effect is amplified with children because children have less resources to be able to cope with those transitions than adults do," he explains.

'Get organized' ahead of back-to-school

In order to make the transition back to in-person school easier, Kang encourages students to "get good sleep, exercise regularly (and) eat a healthy diet."

To help manage workloads, she suggests students "get organized."

"There's so much mental clutter up there when you're disorganized. ... Sitting down and planning out their study schedules can really help manage their time," she says.

Breaking up assignments can also make things easier to tackle.

"I know that heavy workloads can be stressful, but if you sit down and you break down that studying into smaller chunks, they're much more manageable."

If workloads are still too much, Kang encourages students to advocate for themselves.

"They should tell their teachers when a homework assignment just took too much time or if it was too difficult for them to do on their own," she says. "It's good to speak up and ask those questions. Respectfully, of course, because these are your teachers. But still, I think sometimes teachers themselves need this feedback from their students."

More: Some teachers let their students sleep in class. Here's what mental health experts say.

More: Some parents are slipping young kids in for the COVID-19 vaccine, but doctors discourage the move as 'risky'

Managing stress for a healthy family

Families are susceptible to mounting pressures from finances and work. By taking small, manageable steps to a healthier lifestyle, families can work toward meeting their goals to be psychologically and physically fit

Parenting, Families, Relationships

As the nation continues to face high-levels of stress, families are susceptible to mounting pressures from finances and work. Raising a family can be rewarding and demanding even in healthy social and economic climates, so stressful times can make things much more challenging.

Most U.S. adults (83%) cite inflation as a significant source of stress, according to APA’s October 2022 Stress in America survey . Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, households with children have consistently fared worse than households without children. Adults living with children have reported more difficulty paying daily household expenses, providing adequate food for their family, and have been less secure in their housing payments compared to other households, according to a 2022 Kaiser Family Foundation analysis of federal data.

While children are resilient , financial worries can have a devastating long-term impact on the younger members of a household. When times get tough financially, research shows , families can enter a downward spiral. Economic difficulties, such as being unable to pay bills or having to move in with relatives, cause parents’ stress to increase. Parents may then take their frustration out on their children or withdraw altogether. Without parental support, children act out or do poorly in school, setting them up for economic trouble in adulthood.

Children model their parents’ behaviors, including those related to managing stress. Parents who deal with stress in unhealthy ways risk passing those behaviors on to their children. Alternatively, parents who cope with stress in healthy ways can not only promote better adjustment and happiness for themselves but also promote the formation of critically important habits and skills in children.

Parents know that changing a child’s behavior, let alone their own, can be challenging. By taking small, manageable steps to a healthier lifestyle, families can work toward meeting their goals to be psychologically and physically fit.

APA offers these tips to get you and your family started down a healthy path:

Evaluate your lifestyle. As a parent, it’s important to model healthy behaviors for your children. Children are more likely to lead a healthy lifestyle and less likely to associate stress with unhealthy behaviors if the whole family practices healthy living and good stress management techniques. So, ask yourself―How do I respond to stress? Do I tend to overeat or engage in other unhealthy behaviors, such as smoking and drinking alcohol, when I feel stressed? In what ways could my stress coping skills be improved?

Talk about it. If you notice that your children are looking worried or stressed, ask them what’s on their minds. Having regular conversations can help a family work together to better understand and address any stressors children are experiencing. Low levels of parental communication have been associated with poor decision making among children and teens . Talking to your children and promoting open communication and problem solving is just as important as eating well and getting enough exercise and sleep.

Create a healthy environment. Your home, workspace, and even social environment can influence your behaviors. Altering your environment can help alleviate stress. A study by researchers at the University of Connecticut, for example, found that in times of extreme stress, people leaned on cleaning because it gave them a sense of control . Look around your home and even your car and ask yourself, does this space feel clear and relaxing? Clearing up your home space for the family is something you and your children can control, and it teaches children to focus on those things they can control when feeling stressed.

Focus on yourself. The correlation between health, obesity, and unhealthy choices is strong. When you and your family are experiencing stress, make a conscious decision to take care of yourselves. Get adequate doses of nutrients, physical activity, and sleep. When you feel overwhelmed it is easy sometimes to fall into cycles such as eating fast food, plugging into sedentary electronic activities like playing video games or watching TV, or not getting enough sleep. Research shows that children who are sleep-deficient are more likely to have behavioral problems . P arents have an extraordinary amount of influence on their children’s food choices . A healthy dinner followed by an activity with your family, such as walking, bike riding, playing catch, or a board game, and topped off with a good night’s sleep can do a lot to manage or lessen the negative effects of stress.

Change one habit at a time. You may aspire for your family to make multiple important changes at once such as eating healthier foods, being more physically active, getting a better night’s sleep, or spending more time together. However, if you are already overextended from juggling many different responsibilities, doing all of this at once can feel overwhelming. Changing behaviors usually takes time. By starting with changing one behavior, you and your family are more likely to experience success, which can then encourage your family to tackle other challenges and to continue making additional healthy changes.

If you or a family member continues to struggle with changing unhealthy behaviors or feels overwhelmed by stress, consider seeking help from a health professional, such as a psychologist. Psychologists are licensed and trained to help you develop strategies to manage stress effectively and make behavioral changes to help improve your overall health.

Is it time to get rid of homework? Mental health experts weigh in

by Sara M Moniuszko

It's no secret that kids hate homework. And as students grapple with an ongoing pandemic that has had a wide-range of mental health impacts, is it time schools start listening to their pleas over workloads?

Some teachers are turning to social media to take a stand against homework .

Tiktok user @misguided.teacher says he doesn't assign it because the "whole premise of homework is flawed."

For starters, he says he can't grade work on "even playing fields" when students' home environments can be vastly different.

Mental health experts agree heavy work loads have the potential do more harm than good for students, especially when taking into account the impacts of the pandemic. But they also say the answer may not be to eliminate homework altogether.

Emmy Kang, mental health counselor at Humantold, says studies have shown heavy workloads can be "detrimental" for students and cause a "big impact on their mental, physical and emotional health."

Cynthia Catchings, a licensed clinical social worker and therapist at Talkspace, says heavy workloads can also cause serious mental health problems in the long run, like anxiety and depression.

And for all the distress homework causes, it's not as useful as many may think, says Dr. Nicholas Kardaras, a psychologist and CEO of Omega Recovery treatment center.

"The research shows that there's really limited benefit of homework for elementary age students, that really the school work should be contained in the classroom," he says.

For older students, Kang says homework benefits plateau at about two hours per night.

"Most students, especially at these high-achieving schools, they're doing a minimum of three hours, and it's taking away time from their friends from their families, their extracurricular activities. And these are all very important things for a person's mental and emotional health."

Catchings, who also taught third to 12th graders for 12 years, says she's seen the positive effects of a no homework policy while working with students abroad.

The answer may not be to eliminate homework completely, but to be more mindful of the type of work students go home with, suggests Kang, who was a high-school teacher for 10 years.

"I don't think (we) should scrap homework, I think we should scrap meaningless, purposeless busy work-type homework. That's something that needs to be scrapped entirely," she says, encouraging teachers to be thoughtful and consider the amount of time it would take for students to complete assignments.

The pandemic made the conversation around homework more crucial

Mindfulness surrounding homework is especially important in the context of the last two years. Many students will be struggling with mental health issues that were brought on or worsened by the pandemic, making heavy workloads even harder to balance.

But even if students transition back to the structure of in-person classes, Kardaras suspects students may still struggle after two school years of shifted schedules and disrupted sleeping habits.

'Get organized' ahead of back-to-school

In order to make the transition back to in-person school easier, Kang encourages students to "get good sleep, exercise regularly (and) eat a healthy diet."

To help manage workloads, she suggests students "get organized."

"There's so much mental clutter up there when you're disorganized... sitting down and planning out their study schedules can really help manage their time," she says.

Breaking assignments up can also make things easier to tackle.

"I know that heavy workloads can be stressful, but if you sit down and you break down that studying into smaller chunks, they're much more manageable."

If workloads are still too much, Kang encourages students to advocate for themselves.

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Is more homework putting stress on families?

For some families, the start of a new school year means a return to squabbles over homework. A recent study examining the link between homework and family stress suggests some possible reasons for the tension, and argues that the youngest kids are simply getting too much.

The study, published in The American Journal of Family Therapy , found first-graders get nearly three times the amount of homework recommended by national education groups, while second-graders get around 1.5 times what is recommended. Kindergartners get nearly as much as first- and second-graders.

The researchers, affiliated with the New England Center for Pediatric Psychology, Brown University, and other institutions, compared the amounts of homework reported through nearly 1,200 parent surveys to a so-called “10-minute rule” endorsed by the National Educational Association and the National PTA. According to this standard, students should receive about 10 minutes of homework per grade level: First-graders should get about 10 minutes of homework each night; second-graders, around 20 minutes; and so on, up to 120 minutes a night for 12th-graders.

The parents surveyed reported that first-graders were getting about 28 minutes of homework per night, while second-graders were getting an average of 29 minutes per night.

“When a child is 5, 6, 7 years old, they are really learning how to interact with the world,” said Stephanie Donaldson-Pressman, contributing editor of the study and clinical director of the New England Center for Pediatric Psychology. “Homework takes time away from free play and learning creative thinking. It increases stress and cuts down on time for building social skills.”

Past research, including a 2006 analysis by researchers at Duke University, has found that the link between homework and achievement is stronger for later grades (seventh through 12th in that particular analysis) than for earlier ones.

The National Education Association, the country’s largest teachers’ union, has noted that increases in homework in the lower grade levels over the past two decades have been associated with neutral, or sometimes negative, effects on achievement. However, the organization also notes that homework in the elementary school level can help kids develop study skills and habits.

Some studies that have found a positive association between homework and achievement have also found that the benefits seem to diminish beyond a certain amount of work. This has fueled education groups’ support for the “10-minute rule.”

The new research also explored how parents’ involvement in kids’ homework impacts levels of stress within families. Particularly since the advent of the Common Core, Donaldson-Pressman said, many parents feel pressured to explain assignments and instruct their kids, which puts parents with less education or with limited English at a disadvantage.

Not surprisingly, as parents’ confidence in helping their kids with homework declined, the level of family stress increased. Families in which neither parent had a college education experienced significantly more homework-related stress than did families in which at least one parent had a college degree. Spanish-speaking families reported higher stress levels than did English-speaking families.

Parents can help reduce stress around homework by creating an environment conducive to doing it, said Donaldson-Pressman, coauthor of the book “The Learning Habit: A Groundbreaking Approach to Homework and Parenting that Helps Our Children Succeed in School and Life.”

“Kids should have a place to do their homework, with no distractions and no screens, and they should stay there for a finite amount of time — 10 minutes per grade level,” she said. “If they don’t have homework, they can read a book in that allotted time. Having a routine with a set amount of time . . . builds good study habits and time-management skills, which can be very empowering for kids.”

Ami Albernaz can be reached at [email protected].

Mental Health , Research
Written by Cara Goodwin, Ph.D.

Homework: The Good and The Bad

Young boy sitting at a table doing homework

Homework. A single word that for many brings up memories of childhood stress. Now that you’re a parent, you may be reminded of that feeling every time your child spills their backpack across the table. You also may be questioning how much homework is too much and wondering how you can best help your child with their schoolwork.

Here, Dr. Cara Goodwin of Parenting Translator explains what the research actually says about homework. She outlines specific ways parents can support their kids to maximize the academic benefits and develop lifelong skills in time management and persistence.

In recent years, many parents and educators have raised concerns about homework. Specifically, they have questioned how much it enhances learning and if its benefits outweigh potential costs, such as stress to the family.

So, what does the research say?

Academic benefits vs risks of homework

One of the most important questions when it comes to homework is whether it actually helps kids understand the content better. So does it? Research finds that homework is associated with higher scores on academic standardized tests for middle and high school students, but not for elementary school students (1, 2).

In other words, homework seems to have little impact on learning in elementary school students.

Additionally, a 2012 study found that while homework is related to higher standardized test scores for high schoolers, it is not related to higher grades.

Not surprisingly, homework is more likely to be associated with improved academic performance when students and teachers find the homework to be meaningful or relevant, according to several studies (1, 3, 4). Students tend to find homework to be most engaging when it involves solving real-world problems (5).

The impact of homework may also depend on socioeconomic status. Students from higher income families show improved academic skills with more homework and gain more knowledge from homework, according to research. On the other hand, the academic performance of more disadvantaged children seems to be unaffected by homework (6, 7). This may be because homework provides additional stress for disadvantaged children. They are less likely to get help from their parents on homework and more likely to be punished by teachers for not completing it (8).

Non-academic benefits vs risks of homework

Academic outcomes are only part of the picture. It is important to look at how homework affects kids in ways other than grades and test scores.

Homework appears to have benefits beyond improving academic skills, particularly for younger students. These benefits include building responsibility, time management skills, and persistence (1, 9, 10). In addition, homework may also increase parents’ involvement in their children’s schooling (11, 12, 13, 14).

Yet, studies show that too much homework has drawbacks. It can reduce children’s opportunities for free play, which is essential for the development of language, cognitive, self-regulation, and social-emotional skills (15). It may also interfere with physical activity, and too much homework is associated with an increased risk for being overweight (16, 17).

In addition to homework reducing opportunities for play, it also leads to increased conflicts and stress for families. For example, research finds that children with more hours of homework experience more academic stress, physical health problems, and lack of balance in their lives (18).

Clearly, more is not better when it comes to homework.

What is the “right” amount of homework?

Recent reports indicate that elementary school students are assigned three times the recommended amount of homework. Even kindergarten students report an average of 25 minutes of homework per day (19).

Additionally, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) found that homework has been increasing in recent years for younger students. Specifically, 35% of 9-year-olds reported that they did not do homework the previous night in 1984 versus 22% of 9-years-old in 2012. However, homework levels have stayed relatively stable for 13- and 17-year-olds during this same time period.

Research suggests that homework should not exceed 1.5 to 2.5 hours per night for high school students and no more than 1 hour per night for middle school students (1). Homework for elementary school students should be minimal and assigned with the aim of building self-regulation and independent work skills. A common rule , supported by both the National Education Association (NEA) and National Parent Teacher Association (PTA), is 10-minutes of homework per grade in elementary school. Any more than this and homework may no longer have a positive impact. Importantly, the NEA and the National PTA do not endorse homework for kindergarteners.

How can parents best help with homework?

Most parents feel that they are expected to be involved in their children’s homework (20). Yet, it is often unclear exactly how to be involved in a way that helps your child to successfully complete the assignment without taking over entirely. Most studies find that parental help is important but that it matters more HOW the parent is helping rather than how OFTEN the parent is helping (21).

While this can all feel very overwhelming for parents, there are some simple guidelines you can follow to ease the homework burden and best support your child’s learning.

1. Help only when needed.

Parents should focus on providing general monitoring, guidance and encouragement. Allow children to generate answers on their own and complete their homework as independently as possible . This is important because research shows that allowing children more independence in completing homework benefits their academic skills (22, 23). In addition, too much parent involvement and being controlling with homework is associated with worse academic performance (21, 24, 25).

What does this look like?

Be present when your child is completing homework to help them to understand the directions.
Be available to answer simple questions and to provide praise for their effort and hard work.
Only provide help when your child asks for it and step away whenever possible.

2. Have structure and routines.

Help your child create structure and to develop some routines. This helps children become more independent in completing their homework. Research finds that providing this type of structure and responsiveness is related to improved academic skills (25).

This structure may include:

A regular time and place for homework that is free from distractions.
Have all of the materials they need within arm’s reach.
Teach and encourage kids to create a checklist for their homework tasks each day.

Parents can also help their children to find ways to stay motivated. For example, developing their own reward system or creating a homework schedule with breaks for fun activities.

3. Set specific rules around homework.

Research finds that parents setting rules around homework is related to higher academic performance (26). For example, parents may require that children finish homework before screen time or may require children to stop doing homework and go to sleep at a certain hour.

4. Emphasize learning over outcome.

Encourage your child to persist in challenging assignments and frame difficult assignments as opportunities to grow. Research finds that this attitude is associated with student success (20). Research also indicates that more challenging homework is associated with enhanced school performance (27).

Additionally, help your child to view homework as an opportunity to learn and improve skills. Parents who view homework as a learning opportunity rather than something that they must get “right” or complete successfully to obtain a higher grade are more likely to have children with the same attitudes (28).

5. Stay calm and positive.

Yes, we know this is easier said than done, but it does have a big impact on how kids persevere when things get hard! Research shows that mothers showing positive emotions while helping with homework may improve children’s motivation in homework (29)

6. Praise hard work and effort.

Praise focused on effort is likely to increase motivation (30). In addition, research finds that putting more effort into homework may be associated with enhanced development of conscientiousness in children (31).

7. Communicate with your child’s teacher.

Let your child’s teacher know about any problems your child has with homework and the teachers’ learning goals. Research finds that open communication about homework is associated with improved school performance (32).

List of 7 strategies for parents to help with homework

In summary, research finds that homework provides some academic benefit for middle- and high-school students but is less beneficial for elementary school students. As a parent, how you are involved in your child’s homework really matters. By following these evidence-based tips, you can help your child to maximize the benefits of homework and make the process less painful for all involved!

For more resources, take a look at our recent posts on natural and logical consequences and simple ways to decrease challenging behaviors .

Cooper, H., Robinson, J. C., & Patall, E. A. (2006). Does homework improve academic achievement? A synthesis of research, 1987–2003. Review of educational research , 76 (1), 1-62.
Muhlenbruck, L., Cooper, H., Nye, B., & Lindsay, J. J. (1999). Homework and achievement: Explaining the different strengths of relation at the elementary and secondary school levels. Social Psychology of Education , 3 (4), 295-317.
Marzano, R. J., & Pickering, D. J. (2007). Special topic: The case for and against homework. Educational leadership , 64 (6), 74-79.
Trautwein, U., Lüdtke, O., Schnyder, I., & Niggli, A. (2006). Predicting homework effort: support for a domain-specific, multilevel homework model. Journal of educational psychology , 98 (2), 438.
Shernoff, D. J., Csikszentmihalyi, M., Schneider, B., & Shernoff, E. S. (2014). Student engagement in high school classrooms from the perspective of flow theory. In Applications of flow in human development and education (pp. 475-494). Springer, Dordrecht.
Daw, J. (2012). Parental income and the fruits of labor: Variability in homework efficacy in secondary school. Research in social stratification and mobility , 30 (3), 246-264.
Rønning, M. (2011). Who benefits from homework assignments?. Economics of Education Review , 30 (1), 55-64.
Calarco, J. M. (2020). Avoiding us versus them: How schools’ dependence on privileged “Helicopter” parents influences enforcement of rules. American Sociological Review , 85 (2), 223-246.
Corno, L., & Xu, J. (2004). Homework as the job of childhood. Theory into practice , 43 (3), 227-233.
Göllner, R., Damian, R. I., Rose, N., Spengler, M., Trautwein, U., Nagengast, B., & Roberts, B. W. (2017). Is doing your homework associated with becoming more conscientious?. Journal of Research in Personality , 71 , 1-12.
Balli, S. J., Demo, D. H., & Wedman, J. F. (1998). Family involvement with children’s homework: An intervention in the middle grades. Family relations , 149-157.
Balli, S. J., Wedman, J. F., & Demo, D. H. (1997). Family involvement with middle-grades homework: Effects of differential prompting. The Journal of Experimental Education , 66 (1), 31-48.
Epstein, J. L., & Dauber, S. L. (1991). School programs and teacher practices of parent involvement in inner-city elementary and middle schools. The elementary school journal , 91 (3), 289-305.
Van Voorhis, F. L. (2003). Interactive homework in middle school: Effects on family involvement and science achievement. The Journal of Educational Research , 96 (6), 323-338.
Yogman, M., Garner, A., Hutchinson, J., Hirsh-Pasek, K., Golinkoff, R. M., & Committee on Psychosocial Aspects of Child and Family Health. (2018). The power of play: A pediatric role in enhancing development in young children. Pediatrics , 142 (3).
Godakanda, I., Abeysena, C., & Lokubalasooriya, A. (2018). Sedentary behavior during leisure time, physical activity and dietary habits as risk factors of overweight among school children aged 14–15 years: case control study. BMC research notes , 11 (1), 1-6.
Hadianfard, A. M., Mozaffari-Khosravi, H., Karandish, M., & Azhdari, M. (2021). Physical activity and sedentary behaviors (screen time and homework) among overweight or obese adolescents: a cross-sectional observational study in Yazd, Iran. BMC pediatrics , 21 (1), 1-10.
Galloway, M., Conner, J., & Pope, D. (2013). Nonacademic effects of homework in privileged, high-performing high schools. The journal of experimental education , 81 (4), 490-510.
Pressman, R. M., Sugarman, D. B., Nemon, M. L., Desjarlais, J., Owens, J. A., & Schettini-Evans, A. (2015). Homework and family stress: With consideration of parents’ self confidence, educational level, and cultural background. The American Journal of Family Therapy , 43 (4), 297-313.
Hoover-Dempsey, K. V., Battiato, A. C., Walker, J. M., Reed, R. P., DeJong, J. M., & Jones, K. P. (2001). Parental involvement in homework. Educational psychologist , 36 (3), 195-209.
Moroni, S., Dumont, H., Trautwein, U., Niggli, A., & Baeriswyl, F. (2015). The need to distinguish between quantity and quality in research on parental involvement: The example of parental help with homework. The Journal of Educational Research , 108 (5), 417-431.
Cooper, H., Lindsay, J. J., & Nye, B. (2000). Homework in the home: How student, family, and parenting-style differences relate to the homework process. Contemporary educational psychology , 25 (4), 464-487.
Dumont, H., Trautwein, U., Lüdtke, O., Neumann, M., Niggli, A., & Schnyder, I. (2012). Does parental homework involvement mediate the relationship between family background and educational outcomes?. Contemporary Educational Psychology , 37 (1), 55-69.
Barger, M. M., Kim, E. M., Kuncel, N. R., & Pomerantz, E. M. (2019). The relation between parents’ involvement in children’s schooling and children’s adjustment: A meta-analysis. Psychological bulletin , 145 (9), 855.
Dumont, H., Trautwein, U., Nagy, G., & Nagengast, B. (2014). Quality of parental homework involvement: predictors and reciprocal relations with academic functioning in the reading domain. Journal of Educational Psychology , 106 (1), 144.
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How to Reduce Homework Stress

If homework is a source of frustration and stress in your home, it doesn’t have to be that way! Read on to learn effective strategies to reduce your child’s homework stress.

Author Katie Wickliff

Published March 2024

If homework is a source of frustration and stress in your home, it doesn’t have to be that way! Read on to learn effective strategies to reduce your child’s homework stress.

Key takeaways
Homework stress can be a significant problem for children and their families
An appropriate amount of quality homework can be beneficial for students
Parents can help reduce homework stress in several key ways

Table of contents

Homework stress effects
How to reduce homework stress

As a parent who has felt the frustration of watching my child be reduced to tears because of her homework each night, I’ve often wondered: do these math worksheets and reading trackers really make a difference to a child’s academic success? Or does homework cause stress without having a positive impact on learning?

If your child experiences a significant amount of homework stress, you may feel at a loss to help. However, there are several things you can do at home to minimize the negative effects of this stress on your child–and you! We’ve put together a list of research-based practices that can help your child better handle their homework load.

The Effects of Homework Stress on Students

Does homework cause stress? Short answer: Yes. It’s been well documented that too much homework can cause stress and anxiety for students–and their parents. However, do the benefits of homework outweigh the costs? Is homework “worth” the frustration and exhaustion that our children experience?

Findings on the benefits of homework at the elementary school level are mixed, with studies showing that homework appears to have more positive effects under certain conditions for certain groups of students.

After examining decades of studies on the relationship between homework and academic achievement, leading homework researcher Harris M. Cooper has proposed the “10-minute rule,” suggesting that homework be limited to 10 minutes per grade level. For example, children in 3rd grade should do no more than 30 minutes of homework daily, while a 1st grader should do no more than 10 minutes of homework. The National Parent Teacher Association and the National Education Association both endorse this guideline as a general rule of thumb.

Because of these research findings, Doodle believes that an appropriate amount of quality homework can help students feel more positive about learning and can provide parents with a critical connection to their child’s school experience . But to keep learning positive, we need to reduce the amount of stress both students and parents feel about homework.

1. Routine, Routine, Routine

Creating an after-school routine and sticking to it helps children feel organized, but with sports, tutoring, or music lessons, many children have varying weekday schedules. As a former classroom teacher and private tutor, I suggest that families post a weekly schedule somewhere visible and communicate that schedule with their child.

At our house, we have a dry-erase calendar posted on the wall. Every Sunday evening, I write both of my children’s schedules for the following week–including homework time. We go through the calendar together, and they reference it often throughout the week. I can tell both my son and daughter feel better when they know when they’ll get their homework done.

2. Create a Homework Space

Ideally, your child should have a dedicated homework space. It doesn’t matter if that space is a desk, a dining room table, or a kitchen countertop. What does matter is that the homework area is tidy, because an unorganized homework area is very distracting.

3. Start Homework Early

Encourage your child to start their homework as early as possible. Help them review their assignments, make a plan for what needs to be completed, and then dive in. Naturally, children are more tired later in the evening which can lead to more stress.

4. Encourage Breaks

If you can see your child becoming frustrated or overwhelmed by their homework, encourage them to take a breather and come back to it later. As a teacher and tutor, I called this a “brain break” and believe these breaks are essential. Taking a short break will give your child a chance to step away from a frustrating problem or assignment.

5. It’s Okay to Ask for Help

Sometimes, homework can become just too stressful and overwhelming. In that case, it really is okay to stop. Children can learn to advocate for themselves by making a list of questions for their teacher and asking for help the next day. Depending on their age, you might need to help role-play how to approach their teacher with their frustrations.

Additionally, parents should never feel afraid to contact their child’s teacher to talk about homework issues. When I was teaching elementary school, I always wanted parents to feel comfortable reaching out about any issues, including homework stress.

6. Get Plenty of Rest

Sleep is critical to a child’s overall wellbeing , which includes their academic performance. Tired kids can’t concentrate as well, which can lead to feeling more overwhelmed about homework assignments. According to the American Academy of Sleep Medicine, kids aged 6-12 should get at least 9 hours of sleep each night.

7. Consider a Homework Group

Organizing a homework group a few times a week is another way for your child to view homework more positively. Working as a group encourages collaboration, while discussions can solidify concepts learned in class.

8. Encourage Positivity

No matter what your school experience was like, it’s important to model a growth mindset for your child. A growth mindset is the belief that your abilities can develop and improve over time. So if your child says something like “ I can’t do this! ” first acknowledge their frustration. Then, encourage them to say, “ I may not understand this yet, but I will figure it out. ” Speaking positively about tough experiences takes practice, but it will go a long way in reducing homework stress for your child.

9. Develop Skills With Fun Games

Feeling stressed about homework is no fun. Completing worksheets and memorizing facts is necessary, but playing games is a great way to inject some excitement into learning. Doodle’s interactive math app is filled with interactive exercises, engaging math games, and unique rewards that help kids develop their skills while having fun.

Lower Math Anxiety with DoodleMath

Does your child struggle with math anxiety? DoodleMath is an award-winning math app f illed with fun, interactive math questions aligned to state standards. Doodle creates a unique work program tailored to each child’s skill level to boost confidence and reduce math anxiety. Try it free today!

FAQs About Homework Stress

Many studies have shown that homework and stress often go hand-in-hand, often because many children feel pressure to perform perfectly or they have trouble managing their emotions–they get overwhelmed or flooded easily.

You can help your child reduce homework stress in several ways, including by establishing a routine, creating a homework space, encouraging breaks, and making homework fun with online games or math apps.

Lesson credits

Katie Wickliff

Katie holds a master’s degree in Education from the University of Colorado and a bachelor’s degree in both Journalism and English from The University of Iowa. She has over 15 years of education experience as a K-12 classroom teacher and Orton-Gillingham certified tutor. Most importantly, Katie is the mother of two elementary students, ages 8 and 11. She is passionate about math education and firmly believes that the right tools and support will help every student reach their full potential.

Parents, sign up for a DoodleMath subscription and see your child become a math wizard!

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Homework and Family Stress: With Consideration of Parents’ Self Confidence, Educational Level, and Cultural Background

August 2015
American Journal of Family Therapy 43(4)

New England Center for Pediatric Psychology

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Because differences are our greatest strength

Homework anxiety: Why it happens and how to help

By Gail Belsky

Expert reviewed by Jerome Schultz, PhD

Quick tips to help kids with homework anxiety

Quick tip 1, try self-calming strategies..

Try some deep breathing, gentle stretching, or a short walk before starting homework. These strategies can help reset the mind and relieve anxiety.

Quick tip 2

Set a time limit..

Give kids a set amount of time for homework to help it feel more manageable. Try using the “10-minute rule” that many schools use — that’s 10 minutes of homework per grade level. And let kids know it’s OK to stop working for the night.

Quick tip 3

Cut out distractions..

Have kids do homework in a quiet area. Turn off the TV, silence cell phones, and, if possible, limit people coming and going in the room or around the space.

Quick tip 4

Start with the easiest task..

Try having kids do the easiest, quickest assignments first. That way, they’ll feel good about getting a task done — and may be less anxious about the rest of the homework.

Quick tip 5

Use a calm voice..

When kids feel anxious about homework, they might get angry, yell, or cry. Avoid matching their tone of voice. Take a deep breath and keep your voice steady and calm. Let them know you’re there for them.

Sometimes kids just don’t want to do homework. They complain, procrastinate, or rush through the work so they can do something fun. But for other kids, it’s not so simple. Homework may actually give them anxiety.

It’s not always easy to know when kids have homework anxiety. Some kids may share what they’re feeling when you ask. But others can’t yet identify what they’re feeling, or they're not willing to talk about it.

Homework anxiety often starts in early grade school. It can affect any child. But it’s an especially big issue for kids who are struggling in school. They may think they can’t do the work. Or they may not have the right support to get it done.

Keep in mind that some kids may seem anxious about homework but are actually anxious about something else. That’s why it’s important to keep track of when kids get anxious and what they were doing right before. The more you notice what’s happening, the better you can help.

Dive deeper

What homework anxiety looks like.

Kids with homework anxiety might:

Find excuses to avoid homework

Lie about homework being done

Get consistently angry about homework

Be moody or grumpy after school

Complain about not feeling well after school or before homework time

Cry easily or seem overly sensitive

Be afraid of making even small mistakes

Shut down and not want to talk after school

Say “I can’t do it!” before even trying

Learn about other homework challenges kids might be facing .

Why kids get homework anxiety

Kids with homework anxiety are often struggling with a specific skill. They might worry about falling behind their classmates. But there are other factors that cause homework anxiety:

Test prep: Homework that helps kids prepare for a test makes it sound very important. This can raise stress levels.

Perfectionism: Some kids who do really well in a subject may worry that their work “won’t be good enough.”

Trouble managing emotions: For kids who easily get flooded by emotions, homework can be a trigger for anxiety.

Too much homework: Sometimes kids are anxious because they have more work than they can handle.

Use this list to see if kids might have too much homework .

When kids are having homework anxiety, families, educators, and health care providers should work together to understand what’s happening. Start by sharing notes on what you’re seeing and look for patterns . By working together, you’ll develop a clearer sense of what’s going on and how to help.

Parents and caregivers: Start by asking questions to get your child to open up about school . But if kids are struggling with the work itself, they may not want to tell you. You’ll need to talk with your child’s teacher to get insight into what’s happening in school and find out if your child needs help in a specific area.

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“Stress-Free Homework: Tips, Tools, and Solutions to Lower the Household Stress Level” [Video Replay & Podcast #194]

In this hour-long webinar-on-demand, learn how to solve homework problems with ann dolin, m.ed. this adhd experts webinar was first broadcast live on august 29, 2017..

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Play this free webinar and download the slide presentation of "stress-free homework: tips, tools, and solutions to lower the household stress level," plus get more strategies from additude via email..

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Episode Description

Many parents, especially those with children with ADHD, say homework is one of the biggest sources of family frustration, resentment, and stress during the school year.

Fortunately, there are strategies to help the majority of families master the homework struggle. This webinar will present proven research-supported strategies to turn a “smart but scattered” student into an “organized and empowered” one.

This webinar will address:

how to have a conversation with your child and communicate instead of “telling” him or her what to do
key questions to ask that will end power struggles during homework time
word-for-word conversation scripts that will help you collaborate and reason with your child
three organization “quick fixes” to implement so that your child spends more time working, and less time “searching”
practical ways to tame procrastination and help your child focus and finish
the timers, tasks, and apps that are most effective in helping your child get started and finish homework

Watch the Video Replay

Enter your email address in the box above labeled “Video Replay + Slide Access” to watch the video replay (closed captions available) and download the slide presentation.

Download or Stream the Podcast Audio

Meet the Expert Speaker:

Ann Dolin M.Ed. , has more than 20 years of teaching, tutoring, and consulting experience. In 1998 she founded Educational Connections , a tutoring company that has grown to employ 200 tutors and has worked with over 8,000 students in the Washington, D.C. area. Her first book, Homework Made Simple , won the Publishers Association 2011 Parenting Book of the Year Award. For more information, visit Ann’s website at www.anndolin.com .

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This ADHD Experts webinar was first broadcast live on August 29, 2017.

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)

Does homework stress crimp kids' family life, well-being?

December 29, 2000 Web posted at: 1810 GMT

December 30, 2000 Web posted at: 2:10 AM HKT (1810 GMT)

December 29, 2000 Web posted at: 1:10 PM EST (1810 GMT)

(CNN) -- Too much homework can create family stress, cut into family time and foster tension and tears among American students, according to some experts.

Where Cheryl Weaver's kids go to school in Piscataway, New Jersey, homework has become a problem that local officials -- and concerned parents -- decided to do something about. The local school board recently voted to ease the pressure on students by setting firm limits on homework, according to school superintendent Ronald Bolandi.

The idea, Bolandi said, was for educators to "give assignments that children can go home and try (without) having to get their parents actively involved in teaching them or getting their parents to hire tutors." Also, weekends and holidays are homework-free, he said.

"They're in school for six-and-a-half hours a day," Weaver said of her children. "They don't need to come home and do another two or three hours of homework. That's more than a full-time job."

Critics contend there is no link between children doing homework and doing better in school. Other experts argue, though, that homework is good for teaching students to manage their time and to study independently.

CNN Parenting Correspondent Pat Etheridge looks at the debate.

16 Effective Stress-Management Activities and Worksheets

The interview is in 10 minutes, yet I want to run away.

Sound familiar?

Fear and anxiety lead to stress responses – cognitive, physical, and behavioral.

Deeply embedded and automatic, they evolved to provide humans with warnings, guiding present and future behavior while attempting to maintain a relatively stable internal state known as homeostasis (Brosschot, Verkuil, & Thayer, 2016; Varvogli & Darviri, 2011).

However innate these responses may be, there are ways to manage the stress you perceive.

This article offers our favorite stress-management activities and worksheets to help you deal with whatever challenge lies in your path.

Before you continue, we thought you might like to download our three Stress & Burnout Prevention Exercises (PDF) for free . These science-based exercises will equip you and those you work with, with tools to manage stress better and find a healthier balance in your life.

This Article Contains:

A note on stress-management approaches, keeping a digital stress diary with quenza, our 3 favorite stress-management worksheets, 3 activities to help manage stress, stress management within therapy sessions.

Worksheets for Your CBT Sessions

3 Printable Tools for Children

Top 3 exercises for helping students, for group therapy sessions, a take-home message.

Stress, or rather the perception of stressors, can be managed, and there are ways to do so:

Preparation increases our sense of control and improves confidence.
Relaxation reduces anxiety and restores focus.
Maintaining physical health via a healthy lifestyle, balanced diet, and exercise underpins overall mental wellbeing.

Another way to manage stress is to reframe our perception of it.

Rather than see it as unwelcome and to be avoided, pressure can provide an essential opportunity for development and learning. Viewed as an opportunity to thrive, stress can be the motivation to perform at our very best and adopt a growth mindset (Lee, Park, & Hwang, 2016).

In what follows, we will point you toward a range of useful worksheets and tools you can use to help your clients better manage stress. Most are free, but some of these come from our own Positive Psychology Toolkit© , which is a comprehensive subscription-based resource containing more than 400 exercises, activities, interventions, questionnaires, and assessments you can use to support your clients.

If you’re looking for more ways to grow your coaching or therapy practice using engaging, science-backed tools, be sure to check it out.

Despite the dangers of experiencing prolonged stress, many of us are likely to be tuned out to our body’s signals that we are experiencing stress.

Likewise, we may not have stopped to consider the factors in our lives that are most responsible for causing us stress.

To help strengthen your clients’ awareness of the drivers and experience of stress, consider inviting them to complete a one-week stress diary.

The purpose of a stress diary is to help them look for patterns and insights into the most common causes of stress in their life and their reactions to stressful events. From here, you can help your clients find effective ways of dealing with stress in the future.

For a great, easy-to-administer tool, consider taking a look at the Stress Diary tool available via the blended care app Quenza .

The platform features a growing library of pre-programmed psychoeducational activities, within which is the Stress Diary Pathway. This pathway invites clients to reflect on the day’s stressful experiences for eight days and culminates in an in-depth reflection into the patterns of stressors, as well as the client’s reactions to these across the eight days.

Download 3 Free Stress & Burnout Prevention Exercises (PDF)

These detailed, science-based exercises will equip you or your clients with tools to manage stress better and find a healthier balance in their life.

Download 3 Stress & Burnout Prevention Exercises Pack (PDF)

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A 2022 report found that in the UK alone, 17 million working days were lost due to stress, depression, and anxiety.

But help is at hand.

Multiple, evidence-based stress reduction techniques have been shown to lower stress levels, “ resulting in a reduction of disease symptoms, lowering of biological indicators of disease, prevention of disease and improvement of patient’s quality of life ” (Varvogli & Darviri, 2011).

Many of these techniques are described below and will help you to manage stress in your life.

1. Breath Awareness

Breathing exercises can be a powerful way to place your body in a relaxed state. Sitting in a comfortable position and drawing your attention to your breath can release tension and offer a method for ongoing relaxation and a tool to use for times of stress.

Breath Awareness was created to help individuals cultivate a mindful awareness of their breathing and the present moment rather than get caught up in their thoughts.

Once comfortable, clients are asked to release any unnecessary tension and tune in to their breath. They are invited to observe the movements and sensations in their body with each inhale and exhale, without trying to change anything.

The exercise can be useful during moments of distress to unhook someone from their thoughts or as a mindfulness exercise.

Try out the Breath Awareness worksheet and practice it daily.

2. Anchor Breathing

Similar to the last activity, anchor breathing involves inhaling and exhaling consciously while focusing on the physical experience. In this exercise, clients are also instructed to imagine a peaceful scene – being on a boat, feeling calm and safe.

Deep breathing techniques have been shown to lead to decreased oxygen consumption and heightened alertness. EEG recordings have also recorded increases in theta wave amplitude when participants engage in certain deep breathing exercises, which is associated with reduced symptoms of generalized anxiety disorder (Jerath, Edry, Barnes, & Jerath, 2006).

By showing patients how combine mindful breathing with calming, peaceful visualization, Anchor Breathing provides an effective relaxation technique, reducing residual stress levels and providing support during acute episodes of stress (Varvogli & Darviri, 2011).

3. The Five Senses Worksheet

Mindfulness can be cultivated by paying attention to what we observe and feel while using our different senses one at a time. During mindfulness practice, distractions are observed, and attention is gently returned to the body part receiving focus.

This exercise works in a similar way to the Body Scan exercise, which helps clients cultivate a mindful awareness of different body parts. Evidence from functional magnetic resonance imagining found that body scan meditation heightens brain activity linked to increased awareness of the present moment, focus, and stress reduction (Sevinc et al., 2018).

To read more about the steps involved, you can view or download The Five Senses worksheet .

If you’re looking for more tools, our free Mindfulness Exercises Pack includes the popular Leaves on a Stream tool and audio meditation, as well as two other mindfulness tools and audio files that you can download for free.

1. Nature effect

The powerful effect of being outdoors has been validated many times and should not be underestimated.

Visitors to a park in Zurich were found to have significantly lower levels of stress, a reduced number of headaches, and a 40% increase in feelings of wellbeing. These positive effects were further elevated in those taking part in sports (Hansmann, Hug, & Seeland, 2007).

While drugs and therapy are often used as treatments for soldiers returning home with post-traumatic stress disorder, the medications and treatment frequently have to be continued for many years without providing a lasting cure. In response, nature-based therapy has begun to receive increased scientific attention.

In a 2016 study, veterans reported that merely being in the garden, often performing mindfulness activities, could improve the symptoms of their post-traumatic stress disorder (Poulsen, Stigsdotter, Djernis, & Sidenius, 2016).

The simple act of getting out into an open space can provide stress relief. We delve deeper into this in our post on Environmental Psychology .

2. Exercise

We are all aware of the physiological rewards of exercise, but the psychological benefits are equally impressive and backed up by research.

A seven-week exercise program was found to improve people’s moods ; reduce perceived stress; and increase optimism, self-belief , resilience, and a growth mindset (Cassidy, 2016).

Exercise regimes need not be extreme to be effective. Even modest levels of physical activity if performed regularly provide ongoing support for mental wellbeing, a growth mindset, and reduced levels of stress.

A great way to inspire you to start exercising may be found in our article on Mindful Running and Exercises .

3. Mindful movement

By replacing or combining some of our everyday car journeys with walking, we can become fully present in our day-to-day lives and improve mental health.

Indeed, a trial in 2017 found that combining walking with relaxation techniques is a great way to reduce levels of stress (Matzer, Nagele, Lerch, Vajda, & Fazekas, 2017).

Mindful walking combines the benefits of exercise, nature, and mindfulness.

Its goal is not to reach a destination, but to build an awareness of the moment, using the feet to anchor in the present. Pleasant and unpleasant bodily sensations such as muscle soreness are merely observed without opinion and let go.

3-Minute stress management: reduce stress with this short activity – Therapy in a Nutshell

Many people seek help when stress makes healthy living difficult. Therapy can help address immediate difficulties and work on the underlying causes (Strauss et al., 2018).

1. Anxiety Record

We often feel more vulnerable when we are asked to share what is making us anxious. The Anxiety Record worksheet helps individuals to understand what is causing their anxiety and learn appropriate coping skills.

Using this worksheet, clients can record their anxieties, triggers, and their effects. Afterward, they are guided through a breathing exercise and asked to revisit their answers to the questions.

A few prompts from this exercise are listed below:

When do you feel anxious?
What thoughts are you having before or during feeling anxious?
Do you think these thoughts are realistic?
What thoughts could you replace them with?

Click to download the Anxiety Record worksheet and give it a try.

2. Biofeedback training

Biofeedback builds on the concept of homeostasis introduced earlier. Using technology to measure and report brainwaves, skin temperature, breathing, and heart rate, the individual learns how to gain self-control over apparently involuntary bodily functions.

A recent meta-analysis of 24 studies confirmed that biofeedback training led to improvements in coping and offers a promising approach for treating stress and anxiety (Goessl, Curtiss, & Hofmann, 2017).

Individuals can ultimately learn to control their heart rate and blood pressure, reduce levels of stress, and even successfully treat high blood pressure and cardiac disease. Performed with a qualified therapist, these changes ultimately persist beyond the therapy (Varvogli & Darviri, 2011).

Worksheet Suggestions for Your CBT Sessions

Many of us experience spontaneous thoughts as images rather than individual words or an internal conversation (Beck & Beck, 2011).

A child pictures an angry parent, and an employee imagines a demanding boss. They can be powerful, representing moments of fear or anxiety, and can be used in Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (CBT) sessions.

The following questions can form the basis of a conversation to explore a mental image and the individual’s relationship with it, cognitively restructuring its interpretation.

Consider the mental image
Did you imagine what your boss might look like when you asked about the promotion?
Can you imagine him now? What would he look like?
How are you feeling?
Can you see how you stopped at the worst image?
Can you picture what happens next? And then?
Do you feel better in the new image than before?
Let’s review from stopping at the worst image through to completion.

Imagery can feel as real to the mind as being in the situation, so playing through images in advance can restructure thoughts and emotions and reframe the stress.

2. Daily Exceptions Journal

A journal can be a fruitful way to track life’s ups and downs. Positive CBT encourages monitoring the client’s strengths and the positive outcomes of life rather than focusing on the negatives.

By capturing what went well in a Daily Exceptions Journal, it is possible to identify and record the skills and talents for reuse in other areas of your life.

Subsequently, walking through the journal during therapy reinforces successes, provides praise, and encourages discussion of the problems overcome.

Sensory awareness involves paying attention to a specific sensory aspect of the body. It can be a great way to teach mindfulness to children.

Such activities can also improve focus, increase self-awareness , help regulate emotions , and reduce anxiety.

1. The Raisin Meditation

The following exercise is a fun, palpable way for a child to develop mindfulness as a skill and notice the present.

Work through the Raisin Meditation worksheet following the steps with the child, paying attention to each sense in turn.

Children paying increased attention to their senses can learn to improve their focus and feel calmer.

2. Nature Play

Ongoing research has recognized the importance of playing and spending time outdoors on children’s mental wellbeing (Dankiw, Tsiros, Baldock, & Kumar, 2020).

Practicing underused senses such as sound can heighten a sense of awareness and promote mindfulness. This can be especially true in an unfamiliar environment, including walking through the countryside with family.

Step	Sounds
1	Pause and listen
2	What can you hear that is nearby?
3	What can you hear that is far away?
4	What is the loudest sound?
5	What is the quietest sound?
6	Can you walk without making a noise?

The questions can be tailored to the environment. Starting or pausing somewhere relatively quiet may assist the child’s focus more at the start.

Print the Nature Play worksheet here.

3. Anchor Breathing

Anchor breathing can be quickly learned and helps a child to focus their mind on one point.

Such mental training offers a valuable method for gaining perceived self-control and reducing stress.

Step	Sounds
1	Imagine being on a boat, feeling calm and safe.
2	Attached to the boat is an anchor. It keeps you there, where you want to be, and happy.
3	Our bodies, like the boat, also have anchors, and they can help us focus. Our belly, our nose and mouth, and our chest and lungs can help us feel grounded.
4	With your hands on your chest, breathe in deeply.
5	Breathe out slowly.
6	Feel your ribs rise and fall.
7	As your mind wanders, gently bring it back to the anchor point.

The Anchor Breathing method also works with hands placed gently on the belly or in front of the nose.

The following three examples, along with the activities described above, can be learned quickly and implemented into a student’s daily routine to help manage both acute and chronic stress.

1. Urge Surfing

Coping with (often self-destructive) urges can be difficult, especially in times of stress. Such behavior can become a crutch, making us feel like we are taking control, when in reality, we are relinquishing it.

The Urge Surfing worksheet is available with a subscription to the Positive Psychology Toolkit© . Backed up by scientific research, mindful self-acceptance can teach individuals to observe their cravings rather than act upon them.

2. Meditation on the Soles of the Feet

Meditation on the Soles of the Feet provides a safe space to work on managing strong emotions and regulating the urge to be aggressive , often a byproduct of stressful situations (Kruk, Halász, Meelis, & Haller, 2004).

The individual is not asked to stop angry thoughts – anger does serve a useful purpose at times – but rather to bring them under control through a shift of focus.

The client, standing or sitting with their feet on the ground, is asked to cast their mind back to a time that caused them to react very angrily. Then they are told to stick with those angry thoughts, letting them flow without hindrance. After that, they shift their attention to the soles of their feet.

Stretching and moving their toes, they feel the texture of their socks, the surface of the ground, or the insole in their shoes. They maintain focus, breathing naturally until feeling calm and in control.

Learning to manage anger more effectively reduces stress and anxiety, and increases feelings of control.

3. Mindfulness

Working through the Leaves on a Stream and anchor breathing techniques, which are part of our free Mindfulness Exercises Pack , will help students focus awareness on the present moment and acknowledge and accept their feelings, thoughts, and emotions.

Research has identified the benefits of combining mindfulness and group therapy to help manage stress and increase resilience and positivity (Seyyed Moharrami, Pashib, Tatari, & Mohammadi; Babakhani, 2017).

Here is an example of a group exercise in mindfulness.

Walking Down the Street

The ability to observe, rather than react to, thoughts, emotions, and sensations is central to positive psychology.

The challenge is that the event and our thoughts about it are far from being the same.

The steps involved in the following exercise can be performed individually or in a group exercise, where everyone benefits from hearing one another’s thoughts.

Step	Ask the group to:
1	Vividly imagine walking down a street and seeing someone they know well. They like the person and are happy to see them.
2	Make the image as real as possible: sights, sounds, smells, and bodily sensations. Become aware of and discuss associated thoughts and emotions.
3	Picture saying hello, while waving.
4	Imagine that your friend, rather than acknowledging you, walks by without a hint of recognition.
5	Consider how this makes you feel. Become aware of the thoughts that go through your mind.

Walking through the scene and discussing it in the group can help to develop positive behavioral change by separating thoughts and feelings from impulses and actions and, importantly, shape feelings while breaking a negative cycle of thinking.

World’s Largest Positive Psychology Resource

The Positive Psychology Toolkit© is a groundbreaking practitioner resource containing over 500 science-based exercises , activities, interventions, questionnaires, and assessments created by experts using the latest positive psychology research.

Updated monthly. 100% Science-based.

“The best positive psychology resource out there!” — Emiliya Zhivotovskaya , Flourishing Center CEO

Resources from PositivePsychology.com

Building resilience helps clients bounce back from stressful situations and use coping mechanisms to turn them into opportunities for growth.

The Realizing Resilience Masterclass© provides guidance, along with a set of practical tools, to build a more resilient mindset.

If you’re looking for more science-based ways to help others manage stress without spending hours on research and session prep, this collection contains 17 validated stress management tools for practitioners. Use them to help others identify signs of burnout and create more balance in their lives.

Stress does not have to rule us. Stress should not be allowed to prevent us from doing what we want or need to do.

Instead, stress should be an enabler and drive us forward to build what we want and take on challenges that will allow us to grow.

There should be no excuse to hide from stress or become overwhelmed by it.

By using tools for coping and taking control, we can see stress as something natural that can invigorate and motivate us to overcome both planned and unexpected challenges.

These activities we shared will definitely help you manage stress. However, there are many other stress-management techniques to try out too. Identify those that work for you and implement them into your life. You will reap the benefits, especially before the next job interview or presentation.

Thank you for reading!

We hope you enjoyed reading this article. Don’t forget to download our three Stress & Burnout Prevention Exercises (PDF) for free .

Arch, J. J., & Mitchell, J. L. (2015). An Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) group intervention for cancer survivors experiencing anxiety at re-entry. Psycho-Oncology, 25 (5), 610–615.
Beck, J., & Beck, A. (2011). Cognitive behavior therapy: Basics and beyond. Guilford Press.
Bergstrom, C. (2018). Ultimate mindfulness activity book: 150 mindfulness activities for kids and teens (and grown-ups too!). Blissful Kids.
Babakhani, K. (2017). The effectiveness of cognitive-behavioral therapy group on self-efficacy and quality of life of women with breast cancer. Multidisciplinary Cancer Investigation , 1 (1).
Brosschot, J. F., Verkuil, B., & Thayer, J. F. (2016). The default response to uncertainty and the importance of perceived safety in anxiety and stress: An evolution-theoretical perspective. Journal of Anxiety Disorders, 41 , 22–34.
Cassidy, T. (2016). Psychological benefits of adhering to a programme of aerobic exercise. Clinical and Experimental Psychology, 2 (2).
Dankiw, K. A., Tsiros, M. D., Baldock, K. L., & Kumar, S. (2020). The impacts of unstructured nature play on health in early childhood development: A systematic review. PLoS One, 15 (2).
De Vibe, M., Solhaug, I., Tyssen, R., Friborg, O., Rosenvinge, J. H., Sørlie, T., & Bjørndal, A. (2013). Mindfulness training for stress management: A randomized controlled study of medical and psychology students. BMC Medical Education, 13 (107).
Goessl, V. C., Curtiss, J. E., & Hofmann, S. G. (2017). The effect of heart rate variability biofeedback training on stress and anxiety: A meta-analysis. Psychological Medicine, 47 (15), 2578–2586.
Hansmann, R., Hug, S., & Seeland, K. (2007). Restoration and stress relief through physical activities in forests and parks. Urban Forestry & Urban Greening, 6 (4), 213–225.
Jerath, R., Edry, J. W., Barnes, V. A., & Jerath V. (2006). Physiology of long pranayamic breathing: Neural respiratory elements may provide a mechanism that explains how slow deep breathing shifts the autonomic nervous system. Medical Hypotheses , 67 (3), 566–571.
Kruk, M. R., Halász, J., Meelis, W., & Haller, J. (2004). Fast positive feedback between the adrenocortical stress response and a brain mechanism involved in aggressive behavior. Behavioral Neuroscience, 118 (5), 1062–1070.
Lee, C. S., Park, S. U., & Hwang, Y. K. (2016). The structural relationship between mother’s parenting stress and child’s wellbeing: The mediating effects of mother’s growth mindset and hope. Indian Journal of Science and Technology, 9 (36).
Matzer, F., Nagele, E., Lerch, N., Vajda, C., & Fazekas, C. (2017). Combining walking and relaxation for stress reduction: A randomized cross-over trial in healthy adults. Stress and Health , 34 (2), 266–27.
Poulsen, D. V., Stigsdotter, U. K., Djernis, D., & Sidenius, U. (2016). ‘Everything just seems much more right in nature’: How veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder experience nature-based activities in a forest therapy garden. Health Psychology Open, 3 (1).
Sevinc, G., Hölzel, B. K., Hashmi, J., Greenberg, J., McCallister, A., Treadway, M., … Lazar, S. W. (2018). Common and dissociable neural activity after mindfulness-based stress reduction and relaxation response programs. Psychosomatic Medicine , 80 (5), 439–451.
Seyyed Moharrami, I., Pashib, M., Tatari, M., & Mohammadi, S. (2017). The efficiency of stress management group therapy in job‌ stress and self-efficacy of nurses. Journal of Torbat Heydariyeh University of Medical Sciences, 5 (1), 42–49
Strauss, C., Gu, J., Pitman, N., Chapman, C., Kuyken, W., & Whittington, A. (2018). Evaluation of mindfulness-based cognitive therapy for life and a cognitive behavioral therapy stress-management workshop to improve healthcare staff stress: Study protocol for two randomized controlled trials. Trials , 19 (209).
Varvogli, L. & Darviri, C. (2011). Stress management techniques: Evidence-based procedures that reduce stress and promote health. Health Science Journal , 5 , 74–89.

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The resources was very helpful. thanks.

Interesting article although I wasn‘t able to open the links as it sent me to a site saying I had to purchase a toolkit in order to access them! I don‘t know why I get sent emails with resources that I‘m unable to access. Shame!

Glad you found the article interesting, and I’m sorry our distinction between the free and paid resources here is not as clear as it could be — I’ll flag this with our editor. Yes, some of the resources listed are freely available while others are available to subscribers of the Positive Psychology Toolkit . However, the three resilience exercises mentioned at the beginning are free and should instantly arrive in your inbox and be available to use.

– Nicole | Community Manager

These will be most helpful with the Native American population I serve

Very practical exercises of relaxation. True we have to rule ourselves not left to unnecessary stress which consequently results in low well being and reduce quality of life. Thank you Jeremy

Very helpful and easy to understand and practice documents. Grateful.

The article was more helpful and am looking forward to read more of this kind.

Hi Moses, So glad you found the resources helpful. Another great tool for dealing with stress is journaling, which you can read up about in our dedicated article here. – Nicole | Community Manager

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Red-hot lava from iceland volcano smothers major road: video.

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GRINDAVIK, Iceland – Videos recorded from the ground and the air show a surge of thick lava from a volcano that erupted in Iceland in May, covering a road that leads to and from the evacuated town of Grindavík.

The incredible videos, recorded by Marco Di Marco, show the red-hot lava slowly creeping over Grindavikurvegur, which remains closed due to the eruption and lava flow.

The Icelandic Meteorological Office (IMO) said this is the third time lava has flowed over the road since the series of eruptions began at the end of 2023.

The IMO said lava is continuing to surge forward to the northwest along a similar channel to the one that flowed over the road on Saturday. However, the flow is still a few hundred meters away from the road and moving very slowly.

The office also warned that lava is still accumulating southeast of the volcano and could move into the area in the next few days.

Aerial video shot from above the area shows just how massive the lava flow is.

When the video begins, it moves closer to the lava over the road, and you can see two small dots.

Lava from a volcanic eruption in Iceland covered a road near the town of Grindavík.

If you look closer, you can see that those dots are actually people. The video gets even closer, and you can see just how small those people are when compared to the molten rock that lies just ahead.

The video also shows work being done to build protective walls around the area in an attempt to keep the lava from flowing even closer to Grindavík.

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There is some good news for anyone with plans to travel to Iceland. The popular tourist destination Blue Lagoon, which was forced to close and evacuate visitors several times, is back open for business.

According to information on its website, the eruption is a safe distance from the facility, but it may take a bit longer to arrive.

An active lava pond forming near the volcano's crater.

“Our primary access road has been damaged by lava flows, requiring visitors to use a temporary alternative route to reach our site,” Blue Lagoon said on its website .

Any guests with reservations at Blue Lagoon will need to present a booking confirmation at the entry point in order to access the facility.

Some information in this story was translated via Google Translate.

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Exploring the roles of tale gene family in maize drought stress responses, 1. introduction, 2. materials and methods, 2.1. plant materials and stress treatment procedures, 2.2. tale family member identification in maize, 2.3. phylogenetic analysis and categorization of zmtale family members, 2.4. structural and motif analysis of zmtale family genes, 2.5. chromosomal localisation of the maize zmtale gene, 2.6. zmtale gene collinearity analysis within the maize genome, 2.7. expression analysis of zmtale family genes, 3.1. identification of the zmtale family in maize, 3.2. analysis of physicochemical properties of proteins encoded by the zmtale gene family, 3.3. distribution of zmtale genes across chromosomes, 3.4. phylogenetic division and classification of zmtale family members, 3.5. gene structure analysis of zmtale members, 3.6. collinearity analysis of zmtale gene family, 3.7. analysis of zmtale gene expression, 3.8. analysis of zmtale gene expression under drought stress and qpcr validation, 4. discussion, 4.1. the functional domains and evolutionary dynamics of the zmtale family, 4.2. the tale gene family as transcription factors in plant development, 4.3. the role of tale gene family in response to abiotic stress, 5. conclusions, supplementary materials, author contributions, data availability statement, acknowledgments, conflicts of interest.

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Gene Name	Sequence ID	Length (aa)	WM (Da)	pI	GRAVY	Aliphatic Index	Predicted Location (s)
ZmTALE1	Zm00001eb001720_T001	310	34,336.78	5.73	−0.555	75.61	nucleus
ZmTALE2	Zm00001eb001770_T001	620	66,061.11	6.16	−0.486	68.18	nucleus
ZmTALE3	Zm00001eb005020_T005	587	62,181.77	5.82	−0.439	67.31	nucleus
ZmTALE4	Zm00001eb013560_T001	598	64,715.13	6.69	−0.21	88.63	nucleus
ZmTALE5	Zm00001eb021970_T001	612	64,715.25	6.34	−0.338	69.69	cytosol
ZmTALE6	Zm00001eb031950_T001	95	10,998.39	4.88	−0.489	78.11	cytosol
ZmTALE7	Zm00001eb032780_T001	668	72,679.92	5.76	−0.627	64.64	cytosol
ZmTALE8	Zm00001eb051900_T002	651	71,815.74	5.68	−0.686	63.16	cytosol
ZmTALE9	Zm00001eb051910_T002	374	40,996.23	9.07	−0.523	84.47	cytosol
ZmTALE10	Zm00001eb052120_T001	332	36,589.86	5.96	−0.726	65.66	nucleus
ZmTALE11	Zm00001eb055920_T001	359	39,826.68	6.41	−0.635	73.43	nucleus
ZmTALE12	Zm00001eb055940_T001	360	39,643.75	6.03	−0.52	69	nucleus
ZmTALE13	Zm00001eb056260_T001	755	79,167.79	6.49	−0.495	62.07	nucleus
ZmTALE14	Zm00001eb058930_T002	364	40,276.27	5.91	−0.642	62.88	nucleus
ZmTALE15	Zm00001eb108700_T001	116	13,112.02	4.97	−0.231	91.72	nucleus
ZmTALE16	Zm00001eb116630_T001	362	40,246.68	8.32	−0.55	79.5	chloroplast
ZmTALE17	Zm00001eb117820_T001	360	39,215.02	6.23	−0.626	64.72	nucleus
ZmTALE18	Zm00001eb130180_T001	295	32,493.47	5.51	−0.554	68.51	nucleus
ZmTALE19	Zm00001eb147970_T001	587	63,158.83	7.29	−0.441	68.07	nucleus
ZmTALE20	Zm00001eb181490_T001	136	15,591.79	4.91	−0.207	96.76	nucleus
ZmTALE21	Zm00001eb202140_T001	671	69,914.65	6.06	−0.413	62.43	nucleus
ZmTALE22	Zm00001eb206760_T001	314	34,111.33	6.02	−0.514	71.34	nucleus
ZmTALE23	Zm00001eb217350_T002	639	70,848.35	5.46	−0.71	63.87	nucleus
ZmTALE24	Zm00001eb217470_T001	163	18,005.31	4.59	−0.325	77.98	mitochondrion
ZmTALE25	Zm00001eb217480_T001	214	24,066.87	7.77	−0.762	67.57	nucleus
ZmTALE26	Zm00001eb234270_T001	300	32,669.76	5.89	−0.544	70.73	nucleus
ZmTALE27	Zm00001eb239680_T002	539	56,452.11	6.73	−0.251	68.78	nucleus
ZmTALE28	Zm00001eb264910_T001	298	32,662.69	5.32	−0.579	65.91	nucleus
ZmTALE29	Zm00001eb268690_T001	498	54,229.07	6.68	−0.381	73.78	nucleus
ZmTALE30	Zm00001eb289480_T001	576	61,910.33	8.29	−0.45	68.87	nucleus
ZmTALE31	Zm00001eb299420_T001	351	38,800.64	6.4	−0.677	64.7	nucleus
ZmTALE32	Zm00001eb322410_T001	150	16,469	6.29	−0.038	104.07	nucleus
ZmTALE33	Zm00001eb347710_T001	592	64,138.12	9.24	−0.449	70.12	nucleus
ZmTALE34	Zm00001eb354670_T001	167	18,305.62	5.48	−0.423	81.8	nucleus
ZmTALE35	Zm00001eb354880_T002	327	35,593.02	5.27	−0.512	67.25	nucleus
ZmTALE36	Zm00001eb384240_T002	491	52,469.65	7.19	−0.317	66.86	nucleus
ZmTALE37	Zm00001eb386830_T001	316	34,522.64	5.69	−0.563	69.05	nucleus
ZmTALE38	Zm00001eb403720_T001	318	34,768.18	5.64	−0.458	80.13	nucleus
ZmTALE39	Zm00001eb437470_T001	93	10,577.17	9.23	−0.605	82.9	nucleus
ZmTALE40	Zm00001eb438600_T001	93	10,547.08	9.23	−0.633	82.9	cytosol

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Share and Cite

Qian, B.; Wang, Q.; Zhang, C.; Guo, J.; Yu, Z.; Han, J.; Xia, H.; Zhao, R.; Yin, Y. Exploring the Roles of TALE Gene Family in Maize Drought Stress Responses. Agronomy 2024 , 14 , 1267. https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy14061267

Qian B, Wang Q, Zhang C, Guo J, Yu Z, Han J, Xia H, Zhao R, Yin Y. Exploring the Roles of TALE Gene Family in Maize Drought Stress Responses. Agronomy . 2024; 14(6):1267. https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy14061267

Qian, Buxuan, Qi Wang, Chuang Zhang, Jia Guo, Zhijia Yu, Jiarui Han, Hanchao Xia, Rengui Zhao, and Yuejia Yin. 2024. "Exploring the Roles of TALE Gene Family in Maize Drought Stress Responses" Agronomy 14, no. 6: 1267. https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy14061267

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Mother Helps Stressed Teenage Daughter With Homework
Tips to Reduce Homework Stress
How to Make Homework Less Stressful: 11 Tips for Parents
How to Make Homework Less Stressful: 11 Tips for Parents
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More than two hours of homework may be counterproductive, research
• Greater stress: 56 percent of the students considered homework a primary source of stress, according to the survey data. Forty-three percent viewed tests as a primary stressor, while 33 percent put the pressure to get good grades in that category. ... • Less time for friends, family and extracurricular pursuits: Both the survey data and ...
Is homework robbing your family of joy? You're not alone
Homework stress parents family time children . Parents are struggling to help. Four out of five parents reported that they have had difficulty understanding their children's homework.
Is homework a necessary evil?
As homework load increased, so did family stress, the researchers found (American Journal of Family Therapy, 2015). Many high school students also seem to be exceeding the recommended amounts of homework. Pope and Galloway recently surveyed more than 4,300 students from 10 high-achieving high schools.
When Homework Stresses Parents as Well as Students
Less-educated or Spanish-speaking parents may find it harder to evaluate or challenge the homework itself, or to say they think it is simply too much. "When the load is too much, it has a tremendous impact on family stress and the general tenor of the evening. It ruins your family time and kids view homework as a punishment," she said.
The Truth About Homework Stress: What You Need to Know
Effects of homework stress at home. Both parents and students tend to get stressed out at the beginning of a new school year due to the impending arrival of homework.. Nightly battles centered on finishing assignments are a household routine in houses with students. Research has found that too much homework can negatively affect children. In creating a lack of balance between play time and ...
Homework's Emotional Toll on Students and Families
The stress homework places on families starts early. There are parenting strategies available to deal with those struggles, certainly — but when, and why, did our evenings at home become so dedicated to that particular interaction? ... homework was a family flash point of a different kind. Ms. Pope and her colleagues intentionally designed ...
Stanford research shows pitfalls of homework
* Greater stress: 56 percent of the students considered homework a primary source of stress, according to the survey data. Forty-three percent viewed tests as a primary stressor, while 33 percent ...
School Stress Takes A Toll On Health, Teens And Parents Say
Homework was a leading cause of stress, with 24 percent of parents saying it's an issue. Teenagers say they're suffering, too. A survey by the American Psychological Association found that nearly ...
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According to Mr. Johnson, "Lowering expectations, for now, can actually help kids to get back on track.". Dr. Braaten also noted that much of what students gain from school is not about ...
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Family stress, measured by self-report, increased as homework load increased and as parent's perception of their capacity to assist decreased. Contrary to the 10 Minute Rule, primary school children received about three times the recommended load of homework.
Is it time to get rid of homework? Mental health experts weigh in
For older students, Kang says, homework benefits plateau at about two hours per night. "Most students, especially at these high achieving schools, they're doing a minimum of three hours, and it's ...
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Talking to your children and promoting open communication and problem solving is just as important as eating well and getting enough exercise and sleep. Create a healthy environment. Your home, workspace, and even social environment can influence your behaviors. Altering your environment can help alleviate stress.
Homework and family stress: With consideration of parents' self
Family stress was examined in the context of children's homework load and parents' perception of their capacity to assist their children with homework. Homework load was measured utilizing the 10 Minute Rule promulgated by the National Education Association. Family stress, measured by self-report, increased as homework load increased and as parent's perception of their capacity to assist ...
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Emmy Kang, mental health counselor at Humantold, says studies have shown heavy workloads can be "detrimental" for students and cause a "big impact on their mental, physical and emotional health ...
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A recent study examining the link between homework and family stress suggests some possible reasons for the tension, and argues that the youngest kids are simply getting too much. The study ...
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In addition to homework reducing opportunities for play, it also leads to increased conflicts and stress for families. For example, research finds that children with more hours of homework experience more academic stress, physical health problems, and lack of balance in their lives (18).
How to Reduce Homework Stress
Encourage your child to start their homework as early as possible. Help them review their assignments, make a plan for what needs to be completed, and then dive in. Naturally, children are more tired later in the evening which can lead to more stress. 4. Encourage Breaks. If you can see your child becoming frustrated or overwhelmed by their ...
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Family stress was examined in the context of children's homework load and parents' perception of their capacity to assist their children with homework.
Homework anxiety: Why it happens and how to help
Sometimes kids just don't want to do homework. They complain, procrastinate, or rush through the work so they can do something fun. But for other kids, it's not so simple. Homework may actually give them anxiety. It's not always easy to know when kids have homework anxiety. Some kids may share what they're feeling when you ask.
Homework Problems? Solutions That Will Reduce Family Stress
Solutions That Will Reduce Family Stress. "Stress-Free Homework: Tips, Tools, and Solutions to Lower the Household Stress Level" [Video Replay & Podcast #194] In this hour-long webinar-on-demand, learn how to solve homework problems with Ann Dolin, M.Ed. This ADHD Experts webinar was first broadcast live on August 29, 2017.
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December 29, 2000. Web posted at: 1:10 PM EST (1810 GMT) (CNN) -- Too much homework can create family stress, cut into family time and foster tension and tears among American students, according ...
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Our 3 Favorite Stress-Management Worksheets. A 2022 report found that in the UK alone, 17 million working days were lost due to stress, depression, and anxiety.. But help is at hand. Multiple, evidence-based stress reduction techniques have been shown to lower stress levels, "resulting in a reduction of disease symptoms, lowering of biological indicators of disease, prevention of disease and ...
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Exploring the Roles of TALE Gene Family in Maize Drought Stress ...
The TALE gene family plays a crucial role in regulating growth, development, and abiotic stress responses in plants. However, limited studies have been conducted on the functions of the ZmTALE gene family in maize under drought stress. This study identified 40 members of the ZmTALE family within the maize genome through Blast comparisons, distributed unevenly across the first nine chromosomes.

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