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When I was a kid, I would come home from school and my parents would kick us out of the house until dinner. We would play all day, come home exhausted, eat dinner, and head to bed. Just before bed though, my parents would inevitably ask if we had finished out homework. Being exhausted, not wanting to do anything but sleep, we would essentially lie and say yes. If we did have homework to finish, we would race to school the next morning, head to the cafeteria, and try to get everything done in 30 minutes. This was obviously not a good system, and my grades showed that over the years.
Later, when I was in high school, I found that I had developed a problem. My problem was that I hated school and I got horrible grades. I then got yelled at by my parents, and that made me hate school more, and my grades never improved much. Luckily for me, I did manage to squeeze through with a diploma, and I made it out alive after four years! Sound familiar? Know anyone like this? Well, there was no way I was going to go to college, with as much as I hated school, so I headed for the military instead. Four years later, after dealing with too many ignorant people in the Army Infantry, I decided that college couldn't be THAT bad...Right? There was no way that I was going to end up like these people! So, off I went to college.
Shortly after beginning my freshman year, I soon re-discovered the fact that I was not good at school. I couldn't concentrate...I couldn't remember...I couldn't get good grades. After 3 months, I had a GPA of 2.3. What was my problem? It had to be something like ADHD! It couldn't be my fault! I just wasn't good at this kind of stuff. Well, soon found a new reason to be at school...a girlfriend. She was cute, wealthy, and smart. We started hanging out a lot, and when we weren't together I knew that I could find her studying in the cafeteria with our geeky classmates. Soon, I was hanging out there too, and I began to understand what my problem with school was.
The Science of Studying
When you learn something new, that information is stored in your short-term memory for a very short period of time. People exposed to a lot of stimuli will typically lose that information faster, while less exposure allows you to keep the information longer. In the end, however, it is just a matter of time before you have to free up your cache for new info.
In order for you to remember that new information long-term, and be able to recall it effectively, it has to be transferred to long-term memory while it is whole. While it is whole! So how is that done? The key to transferring information from short-term to long-term memory is using the processes of elaboration and repetition. This codes the information and transfers it to your long-term memory where you can later recall it for things such as final exams and anniversaries. Homework is just such a method of elaboration and repetition. Ever wonder why you had to write out every known variation of 2 x 2? Coding!
So, I started to realize this and decided to go with my hunch. I began to meet with the geeks in the cafeteria after every class or after school, and we would do homework together. I found that I was actually a pretty smart guy and I didn't have ADHD after all (don't get me on the subject of ADHD). I remembered things well, recalled them fast, and my grades soared. Soon I was a straight A student. Needless to say, years later, I am the proud owner of a BS and an MBA, and I love learning.
Moving On: The Next Generation
About 10 years ago, I took legal custody of my brother, and raised him as he was going through high-school. He was crack baby, had ADHD, had a mom that didn't care, and was just plain crappy at school. I decided to test my hunch again on him, and made a rule. No computer, television, phone, or friends until homework was finished. He came home from school, sat down at the table, and began his homework while we (or my wife) stayed around to help, and then corrected his work before he was allowed to go outside. Everyday, his homework was 100% complete, while the information was fresh in his head, and 100% correct before he could do what he wanted to do. He eventually graduated with good grades, and is now working on his Masters.
Move forward 5 years, and now my kids are in the same boat. They have the same routine, and they have good grades. The key here is that they MUST get that homework done, and done correctly, while the information is fresh in their heads. It has to be repeated and transferred to long-term memory. The whole "I'll do my homework after dinner" thing just doesn't work because they go play and replace all that school information with play information. In essence, it becomes diluted or disappears.
So, why was I such a bad student when I was a kid? It was because I was never taught study habits. I never knew how the brain worked. I never succeeded. I would love to blame my parents, but I can't. They were just your average recovering hippies, and neither of them had a degree or access to Google.com. They just didn't know any better, so it had to be ADHD.
But now you do know better! If you're not doing this already, make a change. Have your kids do their homework immediately after school, and they don't leave the table until it is complete and correct. Help them transfer that knowledge before it gets replaced by phone numbers. Your kids will thank you in about 14 years, when they are graduating from college. They will thank you because this works...
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