First of all, homework encourages students to undertake independent learning which they will be required to do when they get to University. Many people argue that schools spoon-feed their students, which makes them completely unprepared for what awaits them at higher education when all research and further reading must be done on the student’s own time. By setting homework in the form of projects, students will be able to learn on their own and develop skills that will serve them well in later life. It also helps to teach the students responsibility and time management skills, seeing as the teacher is not there to make them learn.
Secondly, a lot of students prefer to learn on their own and teach themselves, rather than having a teacher lecture them. Homework encourages children to do this and may also help them to revise it more thoroughly. Whatever students have learnt in the classroom can then be reinforced and solidified by completing homework tasks.
Homework can also be beneficial for the teacher as when they collect homework in to mark it, it gives them a good idea of how much their students understand what is being taught.
Practice makes perfect as the saying goes. So the only way to get better at algebra is to practice it, which is why teachers set homework. It help to encourage a great number of skills that students will find extremely useful not only in school and any further education that they may go on to, but also in jobs that they will have.