Guidelines for Proportion of Work To Be Completed In School and At Home

Ms He Ting Ru asked the Minister for Education (a) whether the Ministry conducts assessments on implementing guidelines regarding the proportion of schoolwork and homework that should be completed (i) in-school and (ii) as take-home assignments across pre-school, primary, secondary and tertiary levels; and (b) if so, what are the Ministry's findings.

The Ministry of Education (MOE) does not dictate the proportion of schoolwork to be done in school or at home. Based on the teachers' professional judgement and the students' learning needs, teachers may include class work as part of a lesson or assign work to be done at home to reinforce learning. Schools have homework guidelines to keep homework purposeful and manageable.

MOE monitors the implementation of these guidelines at the system level. Based on our findings, all schools have a homework policy which articulates the objectives of homework and how homework load is monitored and regulated. Schools review their homework guidelines regularly to calibrate homework load, with due consideration for student learning and well-being.

For pre-schools, the involvement of families in their children's learning is key. As such, home-based activities, such as take-home activity kits, may be provided in preschools. This encourages families to extend their children's learning at home and to foster family bonding and interactions.

Our Institutes of Higher Learning also have their respective academic policies and guidelines to ensure that student workload is appropriate and aligned to learning outcomes.