The Effects of Penalties On Homework that is Submitted Late for Grading on Learning in a Statics Course

Abstract Syllabus Revisions to Help Improve Students’ Academic Performance in a Mechanics Course A literature review of research on homework indicates that doing homework is very important to academic success for a variety of reasons: 1) Homework is an important tool for learning in the classroom Carbine II (2009). 2) Homework is positively correlated with student achievement Hill, Spencer, Alston and Fitzgerald (1986). 3) It is also an inexpensive way of improving student academic preparation, because it does not require the hiring of new staff or the modification of the curriculum Hill, Spencer, Alston and Fitzgerald (1986). 4) Graded homework is a significant predictor of final grades Galyon, Blondin, Forbes, and Williams (2013); and 5) Graded homework can facilitate timely progress toward graduation Young, Dollman and Angel (2016). It is recommended that a viable option for the improvement of final course grades is to experiment with the impact of graded homework on final grades Young, Dollman and Angel (2006). This paper is based on the implementation of that recommendation. Specifically, the paper is about the results of data collected on how the timely completion and submission of graded homework correlated with grades earned in exams in a 100-level engineering technology course on Statics at a regional campus of a state university and with how students perceived an instructor whose homework policies were strict. The instructor used the syllabus to lay out the homework policy in the course [Harris (1993), Appleby (1994), Eberly, Newton the required formats of its presentation; and the definitions of homework that was on time, moderately late, very late, or unacceptably late, as well as the penalties associated with each type of late submission. For this experiment, the instructor chose to start stiffening the penalties for the late submission of homework progressively after each semester and did so for three consecutive semesters. He started with a very lenient policy in the first semester, a strict policy in the second, and a stricter policy in the third. During each semester, students were placed into three categories: those who rarely/never submitted homework; those who submitted it late; and those who submitted it on time. The scores on exams for each group were noted and the performances of the three groups were compared at the end of each semester. Analysis of the data showed that those who submitted no homework earned the lowest scores on exams every semester; those who submitted their homework on time earned the highest scores on exams every semester; and those who submitted their homework late earned scores that were between the first two. This pattern remained qualitatively consistent from one semester to the next. Effect on teaching evaluations. Scores given to the instructor by students on one specific item of the teaching evaluations (the extent to which they perceived the instructor as helpful) decreased with time progressively: They were highest when the policy was lenient; lower when the policy became strict; and the lowest when the policy was the strictest. Thus, the stricter the penalties, the less helpful the instructor appeared to the students.