As the years go on in schooling, the work load seemingly is supposed to increase; however, the opposite occurred. Since entering high school, in all of my classes there has been a decrease in the amount of worksheets or “busy work” assignments given out as the years go on. Instead, the focus has turned towards test and projects as the meat of many courses’ grades. While many may applaud this change, it is not necessarily for the best because busy work provides students with more practice, more “grade cushioning,” and less time spent for each class.

The main purpose of busy work is to provide students with more of an opportunity to gain practice and hone their skills on the lesson taught in class. While many argue that it should be optional for students who want the practice, this notion goes against the point of busy work. Busy work helps instill the idea of “practice makes perfect” into students by forcing them to continue working on lessons even if they already understand. Furthermore, if we look towards sports, there is a reason practice is mandatory. If athletes were instructed to only practice when they felt it necessary, most would not because they would not even know what they need to practice until after losing a game 51-4. The same concept can be applied to students; without busy work students only realize the areas they struggle with after a test or quiz, which is already too late.

On top of practice, busy work provides more cushioning towards students’ grades. Without the points of busy work, one bad test score can be detrimental towards a student’s grade. For example, if a student scored in the low 90s on five tests in a row, but on the sixth test scored a 60, there grade would drop to a B, all because of one outlier. However, with the points that come from busy work in a grade, the impact of a bad test score is drastically lessened.

The biggest argument that is made against busy work, is that it unnecessarily time consuming. However this simply is not  true since without busy work the alternative is enormous projects. Oftentimes, students are thrown into these projects that will make their grade drop from an A to a C with just one misplaced comma. In addition, since these projects are weighed heavily into your grade, one must spend hours and hours on end perfecting every aspect of your coveted World War II replica made entirely out of toothpicks. To add more salt to the wound, these projects only provide students with the practice of getting the most out of an Elmer’s glue stick, not actual preparation for a test. Projects end up being time wasters that students end up stressing about for weeks, while busy work is a quick thirty minute or less assignment.  Overall, busy work provides more benefits than a project would for the student.

While doing busy work is not the most fun way to spend an afternoon, it is definitely a much better option than its alternative. Busy work helps students from any skill range by giving them the necessary practice for any problems they may have. With busy work’s various benefits, its departure from several classes’ should not be applauded but instead mourned.