Deliberate Practice
Deliberate Practice
Deliberate Practice
7.3 Homework
Students are expected to spend some time outside class to
complete assigned homework. Kaur (2011) found that Grade 8
students in Singapore believed that homework can serve six
functions: improve
Rohrer (2009) reviewed studies about the spacing effect and the
mixed effect and concluded that both effects can increase the
efficiency and effectiveness of practice and review, although the
review covered only very few studies about mathematics. This
overlearning- consolidation-discrimination approach to assign
mathematics homework problems deserves further research.
Teachers face other challenges about homework. These include:
late or no submission, poor quality work, complaints from parents
about the perceived heavy homework load, considerable time spent
on marking and giving feedback to homework, and record keeping
when homework grades are included in summative assessment.
Wong (1998b) described a workshop at which heads of mathematics
departments of Bruneian secondary schools used de Bono’s
Thinking Hats to generate ideas to handle these homework
challenges. Using Green Hat Thinking, they suggested letting
students choose their own homework problems, grading
for answers and effort, and conducting workshops for parents on
homework in order to gain their cooperation. Automatising marking
using ICT is another feasible way to reduce this chore; see Chapter
6. These suggestions can be converted to action plans and their
effectiveness evaluated by the teachers themselves.
The two explanations above make use of the symbolic mode and
the number mode. They are abstract and not easily internalised by
the weak students. Explanation 3 includes the concrete and pictorial
mode. Information processing theories suggest that when more
modes are used to process information, the chances of noticing
mistakes are higher.
x
× x 1 1 1
x
x2 x x
1 x 1 1 1
1 x 1 1 1
1 x 1 1 1
9 Skill Questions
Students should also be trained to ask themselves similar questions in order to monitor
how well they have mastered the skills. This helps to develop metacognition.
10 Concluding Remarks
Students need to master standard skills so that they can use them with accuracy, speed, and
consistency. This will reduce cognitive load on their working memory so that this limited
resource can be used to process non-routine materials in the given problems. To do so,
students must make sense of the concepts underpinning the rules, even though poor sense-
making does not necessarily hinder mastery acquisition, as skills can be learned by repetitive
and deliberate practice. Teachers can expedite skill mastery by using well-designed worked
examples and exploiting a judicious combination of massed, distributed, and miscellaneous
practice for homework and revision. These are some of the desirable characteristics of
quality direct instruction.
Standard skills, however, should not be all there is in mathematics learning. In the next
chapter, teaching of mathematical processes will be shown to build on strong conceptual
foundation and consistent skill mastery.