1 Does Homework Design Matter The Role of Homework's Purpose in Student Mathematics Achievement

Contemporary Educational Psychology 43 (2015) 1024
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Contemporary Educational Psychology

j o u r n a l h o m e p a g e : w w w. e l s e v i e r. c o m / l o c a t e / c e d p s y c h
Does homework design matter? The role of homeworks purpose in

student mathematics achievement
Pedro Rosrio a,*, Jos Carlos Nez b, Guillermo Vallejo b, Jennifer Cunha a, Tnia Nunes a,
Rosa Mouro a, Ricardo Pinto a
a
b
Department of Applied Psychology, Universidade do Minho, Braga, Portugal

Department of Psychology, Universidad de Oviedo, Oviedo, Spain
A R T I C L E
I N F O
Article history:
Available online 13 August 2015
Keywords:
Homework purposes
Mathematics teachers
Amount of homework
Randomized pretestposttest clustered
design
A B S T R A C T
This study used a randomized pretestposttest clustered design to examine the effect of 3 homework
purposes (i.e., practice, preparation, and extension) on 6th graders mathematics achievement and how
this relationship was modulated by the amount of completed homework. A total of 27 mathematics teachers and their 638 students participated in this study. Once a week for six weeks, the teachers assigned
tasks that had a specic type of homework purpose according to their treatment condition. At the end
of the six weeks, the students completed a non-standardized mathematics achievement test. The results
of multilevel modeling showed that after controlling for student characteristics and class-level variables, extension homework positively impacted students mathematics achievement, while practice and
preparation homework did not. These ndings were not related to the amount of homework that was
completed by the students. The ndings highlighted the importance of the teachers role in the rst phase
of the homework process (i.e., designing homework with a specic purpose) and provide important data
for teachers and school administrators to reect upon when conducting actual homework practices.
2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
1. Introduction
The Russians launch of the Sputnik satellite in the late 1950s
provided an opportunity to reect on the quality of educational
systems, specically the American system, for preparing new generations for a technological and competitive world (Cooper, 1989;
Cooper, Robinson, & Patall, 2006). Homework policies were among
the American educational systems response for addressing these
educational challenges (Cooper, 1989; Cooper et al., 2006). In the
literature, homework is dened as the set of school tasks that are
assigned by teachers for students to complete outside of school hours
(Cooper, Steenbergen-Hu, & Dent, 2012) and viewed as an important instructional tool (Cooper & Valentine, 2001; Fernndez-Alonso,
Surez-lvarez, & Muiz, 2015; Hagger, Sultan, Hardcastle, &
Chatzisarantis, 2015; Marzano & Pickering, 2007). The homework
process is complex and involves three actors (i.e., students, parents
and teachers), who have goals and behaviors that can sometimes
be misaligned and in conict (e.g., Cooper, 1989; Cooper et al., 2006;
Nez et al., 2015; Trautwein & Kller, 2003; Warton, 2001). Previous research has primarily focused on students perceptions of
homework behaviors (e.g., homework management, homework
* Corresponding author. Escola de Psicologia, Universidade do Minho, Gualtar,

4710-052 Braga, Portugal. Fax: 25604224.
E-mail address: prosario@psi.uminho.pt (P. Rosrio).
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cedpsych.2015.08.001
0361-476X/ 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
effort, homework completion, homework emotions) (Dettmers et al.,

2011; Goetz et al., 2012; Rosrio et al., 2011; Trautwein, Ldtke,
Schnyder, & Niggli, 2006; Xu, 2011; Xu & Wu, 2013) and parental
involvement in homework (e.g., Dumont, Trautwein, Nagy, &
Nagengast, 2014; Patall, Cooper, & Robinson, 2008). Despite the importance of teachers variables on the homework process, there is
limited research on the impact of teachers homework practices on
students learning and achievement (e.g., Bang, 2012; Epstein & Van
Voorhis, 2012; Trautwein, Niggli, Schnyder, & Ldke, 2009). Thus,
the present study aims to ll this research gap with a study of the
impact of homework purposes on students academic achievement.
1.1. Factors that inuence homework
The Cooper homework model (1989) synthetizes factors that have
the potential to inuence the effect of homework on students homework behaviors and academic achievement (e.g., exogenous factors,
such as student characteristics, assignment characteristics, initial
classroom factors, home-community factors, and classroom
follow-up).
Due to limited space, we only address the variables that encompass homework assignment characteristics. According to Cooper
(1989), homework assignments can vary in the following aspects:
the amount (empirically measured by the amount of time students spend completing homework and the frequency students are
assigned homework), purpose, degree of individualization, degree
P. Rosrio et al./Contemporary Educational Psychology 43 (2015) 1024
of choice, completion deadlines, and social context (i.e., the way that
students complete the homeworkindividually, in a group, asking
for help).
Recently, research on homework has analyzed the relationship
between several of the previously mentioned homework variables, students homework behaviors and their relationship to
academic achievement (e.g., Cooper, Lindsay, Nye, & Greathouse,
1998; Cooper et al., 2006; Nez, Surez, Cerezo, Rosrio, & Valle,
2013; Trautwein, Kller, Schmitz, & Baumert, 2002; Xu, 2008). The
amount of time spent on homework is one variable that has attracted attention from researchers (e.g., Cooper et al., 2006; Keith,
1982; Trautwein & Ldtke, 2007; Trautwein, Schnyder, Niggli,
Neumann, & Ldtke, 2009). There have been mixed results for the
relationship between the amount of time spent on homework and
homework effectiveness (e.g., Dettmers, Trautwein, & Ldtke, 2009;
Nez et al., 2013; Trautwein, 2007). For example, Keith (1982) reported a positive association between the amount of time spent on
homework and students academic achievement in high school, while
other authors found low, null or negative relationships in elementary, middle and high schools (e.g., Cooper et al., 2006; Nez et al.,
2013; Rosrio et al., 2009, 2011; Trautwein, Schnyder et al., 2009).
In contrast, research that has examined homework frequency has
consistently shown a positive association between homework frequency and academic achievement (e.g., Coleman, Hoffer, & Kilgore,
1982; Dettmers, Trautwein, Ldtke, Kunter, & Baumert, 2010; Farrow,
Tymms, & Henderson, 1999; Fernndez-Alonso et al., 2015).
There are extensive data on the relationship between homework behaviors (e.g., the amount of time spent on homework and
homework frequency) and students academic achievement;
however, there is limited research on the relationship between different types of homework purposes and academic achievement
(Epstein & Van Voorhis, 2001, 2012; Hallam, 2004; Warton, 2001).
In fact, the phase of homework preparation (e.g., the design and
purpose of the assigned tasks) has not yet been extensively studied
despite its importance to the subsequent steps in the homework
process (e.g., Bang, 2012; Epstein & Van Voorhis, 2001, 2012; Warton,
2001).
1.1.1. The role of homework purposes
Despite the relationship between homework behaviors and students academic achievement, assigning more homework does not
lead to better homework performance when teachers do not consider other homework characteristics, specically the purpose for
each homework task (Epstein & Van Voorhis, 2001). Lee and Pruitt
(1979) proposed a description of homework assignment purposes
to increase the benets of homework tasks. These authors described four types of instructional homework purposes: practice (i.e.,
practicing the material that is covered in class to master skills), preparation (i.e., preparing the next lesson), extension (i.e., transferring
prior learning to new situations) and creative (i.e., integrating several
competencies into one task as a research project) (Lee & Pruitt, 1979,
p. 32). The same authors call for teachers to attend to the importance of assigning homework tasks that are aligned with purposes
that can promote students engagement and meaningful learning.
Epstein and colleagues research on the topic (see Epstein & Van
Voorhis, 2001; Van Voorhis, 2004) identied 10 homework purposes that can be organized into three groups: instructional (i.e.,
practice, preparation, participation, and personal development),
communicative (i.e., parentchild relations, parentteacher communication, and peer interactions), and political (i.e., policy, public
relations and punishment). Recently, Epstein and Van Voorhis (2012)
reinforced that homework purposes are an essential aspect of homeworks ability to maximize impact on students learning and
academic success. According to these authors, when homework tasks
are devoid of clear homework purposes, students are more likely
not to complete the homework. Thus, as Epstein and Van Voorhis
11
(2012) suggested, there is a call to clarify the effects of homeworks

contrasting purposes on students academic results. These ndings
could provide information on teachers and school administrators
homework practices, schools homework policies and, consequently, improve homework practices.
Based on previous research (e.g., Epstein, 1988, 2001; Epstein
& Van Voorhis, 2001; Lee & Pruitt, 1979), Cooper (2001) dened
homework purposes as an assignment characteristic that could potentially inuence homeworks utility. He proposed four instructional
homework purposes, as follows: practice or review, preparation, extension and integration (for a full description, see Cooper, 2001).
Moreover, Cooper (2001) stated that homework can serve other purposes that are not related to instruction: parentchild or parent
school communications, directives from school administrators and
student punishments. Several years later, Cooper et al. (2006) concluded that practicing and reviewing the material taught in class
was the most frequent homework purpose used by teachers. Other
studies that were conducted in different academic domains (e.g.,
mathematics, language, physics, science) and with different grade
levels (i.e., elementary and middle school) support these ndings
(e.g., Danielson, Strom, & Kramer, 2011; Kaur, 2011; Tas,
Sungur-Vural, & ztekin, 2014). However, these studies did not
address the impact of homework purposes on students academic
achievement.
More recently, Xu (2008) proposed a taxonomy that comprised
fteen homework purposes that were then reduced to three (i.e.,
peer-oriented, adult-oriented and learning-oriented reasons) as a
result of a factor analysis that assessed the validity of the homework purposes scale (Xu, 2010a). In a multilevel study, Xu (2010b)
analyzed the relationship between 8th- and 11th-grade students
perceptions of homework purposes and found several variables that
were related to the homework process (i.e., interest in homework,
feedback perceived by students, affective attitude toward homework and homework help from the family). The author found that
the three homework purposes (i.e., peer-oriented, adult-oriented
and learning-oriented reasons) were positively associated with affective attitude toward homework, interest in homework, teacher
feedback and homework help from the family. The studies by Xu
(2008, 2010a, 2010b) focused on students perceptions and did not
examine teachers reports on the purpose of the homework. Moreover, the relationship between homework purpose and academic
achievement was not addressed in Xus studies (2008, 2010a, 2010b).
To our knowledge, only two studies have analyzed the inuence of homework purposes on students academic achievement,
with conicting results (i.e., Foyle, Lyman, Tompkins, Perne, & Foyle,
1990; Trautwein, Niggli et al., 2009).
Foyle et al. (1990) used an experimental design in a classroom
with 64 5th-grade social studies students. They found that homework purposes (i.e., homework for preparation and practice)
combined with cooperative learning improved 5th graders social
studies achievement compared to a group with no assigned homework. The authors concluded that students in the group with
assigned homework increased the amount of time spent on task and
benetted from the two types of homework assignments (Foyle et al.,
1990). However, there were no signicant differences between the
two types of homework purposes (i.e., practice and preparation).
The authors suggested that there is a need for additional research
to verify whether their ndings could be generalized to other subjects. In contrast, Trautwein, Niggli et al. (2009) used teachers reports
of 8th-grade French as a second language students to analyze the
predictive effects of homework objectives (including homework purposes), other variables that were related to teachers practices and
beliefs toward homework, and students homework effort, emotions and academic achievement. The results indicated that students
had lower grades in classes that assigned homework tasks with drill
and practice objectives compared to classes that had homework
12
assignments that were designed for other purposes (e.g., to promote

students motivation). Using multilevel modeling, this study contributed new insight into the role of homework purposes on student
outcomes; however, homework purposes were assessed by teachers reports rather than homework purpose practices. Moreover, this
study did not address the issue of causation; all variables were collected at the same time, and, thus, the authors suggested that future
studies should use a longitudinal approach. Finally, Trautwein, Niggli
et al. (2009) suggested that future research should analyze the relationships between these variables in research in other academic
domains and grade levels.
2. The present study

The current study was designed to examine the relationship
between three instructional homework purposes (Cooper, 2001;
Epstein & Van Voorhis, 2001; Lee & Pruitt, 1979) and mathematics achievement in 6th-grade students using multilevel modeling.
Multilevel models provide an innovative method for examining
homework purposes in mathematics in this quasi-experimental
study.
To our knowledge, research on homework purposes has been conducted on French as a second language (Trautwein, Niggli et al., 2009)
and social studies (Foyle et al., 1990); the opposing results could
be due to the different school subjects or grade levels that were used
in the two studies. We chose to study mathematics because it has
high educational relevance with other subjects (e.g., science, technology, and engineering) and professional development (e.g., see
Hagger et al., 2015; OECD, 2013). Moreover, because mathematics
is a school subject that has a high use of homework (e.g., Rnning,
2011; Xu, 2015), it is important to understand how to improve homeworks effectiveness on students learning and academic
achievement.
Moreover, because Portuguese students scores on the PISA 2012
were above the OECD average (OECD, 2014a), examining the relationship between homework purposes and mathematics achievement
could help to design good practices for mathematics homework, in
addition to teacher practices. Importantly, interviews with school
administrators and mathematics department directors revealed that
there are important differences in expectations between students
at the end of elementary school (i.e., the 6th-grade level) and types
of homework purpose (i.e., practice, extension).
The current research only focuses on instructional purposes
because the literature indicates that homework assignments with
this purpose are more related to the content of achievement tests
and, therefore, to students academic achievement (Cooper et al.,
2006; Muhlenbruck, Cooper, Nye, & Lindsay, 2000) compared to noninstructional purposes (e.g., to promote communication between
home and school). Furthermore, instructional homework purposes are most often assigned by teachers (Cooper et al., 2006;
Danielson et al., 2011; Foyle et al., 1990; Kaur, 2011; Tas et al., 2014;
Trautwein, Niggli et al., 2009).
Previous research that has used non-experimental designs suggests the need for conducting controlled studies to better address
the issue of causation (e.g., Dettmers et al., 2011; Ramdass &
Zimmerman, 2011; Xu, 2011; Xu & Wu, 2013). Although the ability
to control for all variables is limited in the classroom context, the
present study uses a randomized pretestposttest clustered design
so that homework purposes are as ecologically valid as possible in
an authentic learning environment.
The present study controlled for gender, prior knowledge of mathematics, mathematics self-ecacy, amount of time studying
mathematics, and parents educational level. Recent research suggests that, compared to boys, girls organize their work space better
and more eciently monitor their motivational processes, for
example, controlling the negative emotions that emerge while doing

homework (Xu, 2010a). First, compared to boys, girls report using
these strategies to more frequently complete homework (Xu, 2007),
spend more time doing their homework (Trautwein, 2007; Wagner,
Schober, & Spiel, 2007) and have more positive attitudes toward the
homework (Rosrio, Mouro, Nez, Gonzlez-Pienda, & Valle, 2006).
Thus, girls are less likely to attend class without having completed
their homework and are more disposed to view homework as less
boring than boys (Xu, 2006). Second, prior knowledge is an important variable that inuences the relationship between homework
and academic achievement (Trautwein et al., 2002; Trautwein,
Schnyder et al., 2009). Data from several studies showed that prior
achievement positively and signicantly predicted students academic achievement (e.g., Fernndez-Alonso et al., 2015; Hemmings,
Grootenboer, & Kay, 2011; Nez, Vallejo, Rosrio, Tuero, & Valle,
2014; Zuan et al., 2012). Third, self-ecacy was controlled for
to avoid biased results because it is a positive predictor of academic achievement in elementary (e.g., Rosrio et al., 2009, 2011) and
secondary schools (e.g., Kitsantas, Cheema, & Ware, 2011; Lee, Lee,
& Bong, 2014). Moreover, the amount of time spent studying is positively associated with academic achievement (e.g., Carroll, 1963;
Rosrio et al., 2009, 2011). Finally, the literature has shown that the
parents level of education has a positive impact on students academic performance (e.g., Fernndez-Alonso et al., 2015; Gustafsson,
Hansen, & Rosn, 2013; Nez, Vallejo et al., 2014; OECD, 2013;
Rosrio et al., 2005). Although parents vary in their educational intentions, strategies, and actions, they generally believe that helping
their children with their homework is a parental responsibility
(Epstein & Van Voorhis, 2012; Hoover-Dempsey, Bassler, & Burow,
1995).
To address the call for research on the role of homework purposes (one of the homework characteristics) (Epstein & Van Voorhis,
2012; Foyle et al., 1990; Trautwein & Ldtke, 2007; Trautwein,
Schnyder et al., 2009; Warton, 2001), we conducted a quasiexperimental design to analyze the relationship between the three
instructional homework purposes (i.e., practice, preparation, and extension; see Cooper, 2001; Epstein & Van Voorhis, 2001; Lee & Pruitt,
1979), the amount of homework assignments completed and mathematics achievement. The purpose of our study was twofold. First,
we examined the impact of teachers homework purposes on students mathematics achievement. Second, we analyzed how this
relationship (between the type of homework purpose and mathematics achievement) could be modulated by the amount of
completed homework.
To address these goals, we conducted a randomized pretest
posttest clustered design. Specically, 27 teachers (classes) were
randomly assigned to three different homework purpose conditions (i.e., practice, preparation and extension), with 9 teachers in
each treatment group. Over a six-week period, once a week, each
teacher assigned homework according to the treatment condition.
At the end of the six weeks, the effects of homework purpose on
mathematics achievement were assessed with an exam that covered
the content that was worked on in class (see section 3.2).
In the current study, we addressed the following specic research questions:
1. Are there statistically signicant differences in mathematics
achievement between the different types of teachers homework purposes?
2. What types of teachers homework purposes are the most
effective?
3. How are different homework purposes related to the amount of
homework that is completed?
4. How are the class variables, index of parental education and
index of students engagement on homework, related to mathematics achievement?
3. Method
3.1. Participants
Our study focused on the 6th grade level. Sixth grade was selected because it is the nal grade level of elementary school in the
Portuguese educational system, and students complete a national
standardized exam in mathematics at the end of the school year
(June), which counts for 30% of the students overall mathematics
grade. Sixth-graders have three mathematics lessons per week for
90 minutes each and typically spend a large portion of the school
year reviewing concepts and skills that were taught in elementary
school in preparation for the national exam in June. Each year, elementary schools are ranked according to their students results.
Thus, school administrators and teachers from the mathematics department seek to understand practices that could enhance their
students results on the exam. School administrators and teachers
also want to learn how to best prepare their students for junior high
school, where students are expected to learn higher-level mathematics concepts.
Our sample consisted of 27 mathematics teachers from the 6th
grade, including 20 women and 7 men between 28 and 54 years
old (M = 38.67; SD = 8.22). These mathematics teachers teaching experience ranged from 5 to 30 years (M = 19; SD = 8.81). Participants
included 638 6th graders who attended seven public schools in
northern Portugal. Of these students, 321 (50.3%) were girls and 317
(49.7%) were boys, with ages that ranged from 10 to 13 years
(M = 11.41; SD = 0.62). Finally, 211 students were in the rst treatment condition (i.e., practice homework purpose), 208 in the second
condition (i.e., preparation homework purpose), and 219 were included in the third condition (i.e., extension homework purpose).
Three hundred and four (47.6%) parents of the participants had completed the 9th grade (Portuguese compulsory education), 95 (14.9%)
completed the 12th grade, 199 (31.2%) held a degree, and 40 (6.3%)
did not respond.
3.2. Instruments and measures

3.2.1. Adjustment variables
3.2.1.1. Prior knowledge of mathematics. Previous knowledge (which
served as a pre-test and a control variable) was obtained from students grades on a nal mathematics exam that was conducted the
previous year. Data were collected in the schools secretariat. In Portuguese compulsory education, grades are 1 and 2 (negative), 3
(passing), 4 (good), and 5 (excellent).
3.2.1.2. Mathematics self-ecacy. Self-ecacy in mathematics was

assessed with 10 items that were adapted from Jot, Usher, and
Bressoux (2011). Following Banduras (2006) guidelines for constructing self-ecacy scales, the current study phrased the 10 items
to assess the students perceived skills in computation, numeracy,
and geometry (e.g., I know arithmetic properties, for example, the
commutative property of addition). To adjust the items to the
content that the students should have already known, the same team
of mathematics teachers that created the nal non-standardized test
(i.e., two faculty members from the Mathematics Department and
three 6th-grade school teachers) helped the researchers phrase the
items. The nal list of items was evaluated by ve experts, and the
general diagnostic reliability was excellent: = .93 (p < .001), according to Landis and Koch (1977). It is important to note that the
three 6th-grade school teachers who created the nal exam and the
10 items for the Mathematics Self-ecacy questionnaire were not
part of the quasi-experimental study. Students responded on a scale
from 1 (not at all true) to 5 (completely true) (Cronbachs = .82).
13
3.2.1.3. Amount of homework completed. Homework was assigned

once a week for six weeks. In the subsequent classes, teachers recorded whether the student completed the homework that was
assigned in a daily log. At the end of the six weeks, these diary logs
were delivered to the research assistants. The variable for amount
of homework assignments completed was measured by the total
number of homework assignments that were completed by the
student.
3.2.1.4. Mathematics study time. Study time was assessed using an
open-ended question that assessed the number of minutes the students dedicated to studying mathematics (beyond the time spent
completing homework) over 6 days. In line with Plant, Ericsson, Hill,
and Asberg (2005), students responded to this question every day
by completing a study time log. A 5-point Likert scale was used to
record responses: Today I (1) did not study; (2) studied for up to
15 minutes; (3) studied for 1530 minutes; (4) studied for 3060
minutes; and (5) studied for >60 minutes. On the following Monday,
the students delivered the 6 daily logs to the research teams in a
sealed envelope.
3.2.1.5. Parents educational level. In accordance with Xu (2015), students responded to two items about their parents education level
(one for the father or guardian and another for the mother or guardian). The students responded to one of the following options for both
items: until 9th grade (Portuguese compulsory education), until 12th
grade, graduate, and postgraduate. A composite variable for parental education was obtained by averaging these two items (Cronbachs
= .78).
3.2.2. Outcome variables
3.2.2.1. The mathematics achievement testMAT(description). This
information (which served as a post-test) was obtained based on
the students grades on a nal non-standardized mathematics exam
that was specically designed for this study by two faculty members
from the Mathematics Department and three 6th-grade school teachers. The exam focused on geometry content that was reviewed in
the homework that was assigned during the research study. The
questions on the exam were organized into two sections (see two
examples for each section in the Appendix). The rst section consisted of 5 multiple-choice questions that evaluated students
knowledge about geometry (i.e., dots, lines, geometrical gures and
solids), and the second section had 5 mathematics problems that
were about perimeters, areas, and the volumes of geometrical areas
and solids (two of the problems involved questions that were related
to daily life routines). The duration of this exam was 45 minutes.
For the purpose of this study, each question was graded with a dichotomy as follows: 1 represented the correct answer and 0
represented the wrong answer. The nal score was divided by 2 to
adjust the result to Portuguese Compulsory Education guidelines
with grades that ranged from 1 to 5, as was explained above.
3.2.2.2. Psychometric properties of the MAT. Item response theory
(IRT, which is also called latent trait theory) provides a valuable
method for analyzing the psychometric properties of an outcome
measure. As Lord (1980) notes, IRT begins with a mathematical statement as to how the responses to the questions on the test depend
on the level of ability or skill of the examinees. In the current study,
the type of grading (the binary response format, right/wrong) and
the model t statistic helped to select a uni-dimensional twoparameter logistic (2PL) model. This model estimates the probability
of correctly answering the item as a logistic function of the difference between individual levels of knowledge, the slopes (or the
discrimination parameters) and the item diculty (or the intercept parameters). According to the GCONV = 0.00000001 criterion,
optimal convergence was obtained with 17 iterations using SAS PROC
14
IRT 9.4 TS1M2 (SAS Institute, Inc, 2014). The deviance (2 times
the log likelihood) for the 2PL model was 3385.37 while the deviance for the 3PL model was 3363.09. A likelihood-ratio test compared
the two models and indicated that the 3PL model was signicantly different from the 2PL model (2 = 22.28, df = 9). However,
because the standard errors for several of the guessing parameter
estimates were close to zero, we chose the 2PL IRT model.
Descriptive statistics, Cronbachs alpha reliability coecients, the
eigenvalues from the polychoric correlation matrix, and the estimated item parameters are presented in Table 1. Our goal was to
assess students mathematics achievement, and, thus, we used a unidimensional IRT model. The eigenvalue for the rst factor of the
polychoric correlation matrix was 5.92 times the second, which suggests that a one-factor model is sucient. Moreover, the Scree Plot
showed that the rst factor explained a greater percentage of the
variance (almost 52%). Cronbachs alpha for the test items was 0.78,
and the standard error of measurement (SEM) for this reliability estimation was 0.47. Table 1 also shows the parameterizations for the
10 items of the MAT according to the 2PL model. The slope parameter values ranged from 0.9 to 2.3, which suggest that all items
adequately measured the latent trait, and the threshold parameters ranged from 3.14 to 1.25.
Table 2 presents the values for the chosen ability levels (: 4,
3, 2, 1, 0, 1, 2, 3, 4) for the item response functions (IRF) or item
characteristic curve (ICC), the test characteristic function (TCF), the
item information functions (IIF), the test information function (TIF),
and the standard error of measurement (SEM) for each level of the
latent trait. For dichotomous items, the IRF is the probability of a
correct response on the item. For example, the IRF indicates that
when is zero, which is average, the probability of correctly answering Item 10 is almost 0.11. When is 2, the probability is almost
zero, and when is +2, the probability increases to 0.99. The IRT
analysis also provides information about the skill level at which an
item is more informative. The IIF indicates the precision to which
each item measures the different trait levels, and, hence, provides
an alternative technique for selecting items. Among the 10 items,
two (item3 and item9) had slope values that were slightly less than
1, which suggests that these two items provided less information
than the other items. Finally, there are two important aspects of the
TIF 2PL model. First, the MAT test produced its maximum
Table 1
Descriptive statistics and item parameter estimates.
Item
Mean
SD
Alpha
Slope
SE
Diculty
SE
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
.873
.776
.521
.430
.508
.824
.498
.424
.593
.333
.333
.418
.500
.495
.501
.382
.500
.495
.492
.473
.771
.763
.773
.761
.765
.763
.750
.765
.775
.752
2.145
1.882
.998
1.512
1.349
2.308
2.095
1.378
.899
2.249
.3275
.2384
.1290
.1644
.1514
.3262
.2303
.1540
.1279
.2967
<.0001
<.0001
<.0001
<.0001
<.0001
<.0001
<.0001
<.0001
<.0001
<.0001
3.141
1.953
.117
.375
.068
2.707
.035
.398
.467
1.258
.330
.196
.098
.114
.107
.293
.135
.110
.099
.182
<.0001
<.0001
.1166
<.0001
.2631
<.0001
.3968
<.0001
<.0001
<.0001
Eigenvalues of the polychoric correlation matrix

Factor1
Factor2
Factor3
Factor4
Factor5
Factor6
Factor7
Factor8
Factor9
Factor10
5.145
.870
.793
717
.607
.496
.432
.341
.332
.266
Table 2
Summary of the two-parameter logistic model for the Mathematics Performance Test.
Item
Item response functions (IRF) and test characteristic function (TCF)

1
.000
.004
.124
2
.000
.002
.044
3
.001
.006
.032
4
.000
.000
.003
5
.000
.001
.011
6
.000
.001
.038
7
.000
.000
.001
8
.000
.000
.005
9
.002
.013
.069
10
.000
.000
.000
TCF
.004
.027
.327
Item information functions (IIF) and test information function (TIF)
1
.000
.053
1.444
2
.000
.020
.430
3
.003
.019
.100
4
.000
.000
.020
5
.000
.005
.057
6
.000
.015
.563
7
.000
.000
.013
8
.000
.000
.027
9
.006
.037
.185
10
.000
.000
.000
TIF
.009
.150
2.839
SEM
10.541
2.520
.593
Note: SEM = Standard error of measurement of chosen ability levels ().
.845
.530
.168
.039
.102
.663
.029
.047
.288
.002
2.713
.995
.965
.549
.346
.529
.990
.515
.337
.689
.105
6.021
.999
.997
.880
.874
.917
.999
.974
.841
.924
.883
9.292
.999
.999
.978
.989
.991
.999
.997
.982
.985
.998
9.922
.999
.999
.996
.999
.999
.999
.999
.998
.997
.999
9.990
.999
.999
.999
.999
.999
.999
.999
.999
.999
.999
9.999
1.741
2.548
.451
.248
.482
3.439
.357
.246
.591
.035
10.136
.314
.066
.345
.799
1.495
1.310
.152
3.167
1.226
.618
1.629
10.808
.304
.000
.010
.341
.727
.400
.000
.321
.734
.203
1.791
4.527
.469
.000
.000
.069
.072
.047
.000
.013
.097
.043
.035
.375
1.163
.000
.000
.013
.007
.005
.000
.000
.011
.009
.000
.044
4.767
.000
.000
.003
.000
.000
.000
.000
.000
.003
.000
.006
12.909
information at approximately zero on the latent-trait variable;

however, it had an asymmetrical distribution for ability level, which
indicates that the scale works best for individuals with average or
below average levels of mathematical competency. Second, the
measure is slightly less precise for above-average ability levels.
3.3. Procedure
First, we obtained consent from the Portugal Ministry of Education to conduct the present study in the schools. After obtaining
consent, the research team contacted 15 public schools in the northern part of Portugal. Seven schools that were located in an urban
school district in the northern part of Portugal agreed to participate in our research. In these schools, the families of the students
are globally lower-middle class because of the high percentage of
students (ranging from 38.2% to 43% in the seven schools) who
receive free or reduced-price lunches. These demographic data were
collected from the participating schools oces.
Next, all 35 6th-grade mathematics teachers from the enrolled
schools were invited to participate in the research through an email
that explained the overall study objectives. Twenty-seven teachers (a response rate of 77.1%) communicated their intention to
participate via email. Then, a total of 702 students parents from
the enrolled were informed about the study aims and procedures
through a letter and were asked for permission for their childs participation. Six hundred and thirty-eight students returned signed
parental consent forms (a response rate of 90.8%), and only those
students were allowed to participate in the study. Participation was
voluntary for teachers and students, and participants condentiality and anonymity were assured (e.g., eliminating the names and
researchers personal notes that could link the participants to their
teachers or schools). Finally, the 27 teachers (classes) who agreed
to participate (with their students who assented to participate) were
randomly assigned to three different homework purpose conditions (i.e., practice, preparation and extension), with 9 teachers in
each treatment group (for details, see Table 3).
Two weeks prior to beginning the study, the volunteer teachers
participated in a 4-hour informational meeting to discuss the project
goals and the research design in detail (e.g., information on the
number of homework assignments, types of homework purposes
and tasks that were in accord with the three purposes, and graded
homework as a follow-up practice). Three weeks post-intervention,
the teachers attended a two-hour evaluation meeting to analyze their
experiences while participating (e.g., comments and suggestions that
could help in future research) and discuss preliminary data. Teachers who fully participated in the research were offered a 27-hour (1
ECTS) training course about learning and instruction processes that
was conducted at the University (Universidade do Minho).
The data were collected in March and April. The three experimental conditions reected the instructional homework purposes
that are dened in the literature (Cooper, 2001; Epstein & Van
Voorhis, 2001; Lee & Pruitt, 1979) as follows:
15
1) Practice homework (Epstein & Van Voorhis, 2001; Lee & Pruitt,
1979) aims to practice skills taught in class, increase speed, demonstrate mastery, retain skills, review work, and study for tests
(Epstein & Van Voorhis, 2001, p. 182). In this condition, the enrolled teachers assigned two types of homework assignments:
The students had to review the material that was covered in class
and write ve main ideas about it in their notebooks (homework assignments 1 and 3); and in the other four homework
assignments, the students had to complete exercises from their
textbook while focusing on the content that had been covered
in class (homework assignments 2, 4, 5, and 6). For example, in
homework 4, at the end of the topic on geometry (i.e., geometrical volume), the students completed the following exercise:
Calculate the volume of a cube whose side is 5 cm.
2) Preparation homework (Epstein & Van Voorhis, 2001; Lee &
Pruitt, 1979) aims to prepare students for the next class. The
homework can be designed to stimulate students thinking
about a topic, for example, when teachers ask students to
outline ideas for an essay that will be written in class (Epstein
& Van Voorhis, 2001, p. 182). In our study, there were two
different types of assigned homework. In three of the homework assignments (i.e., 1, 3 and 5), students had to learn the
topic for the next lesson in their textbook and prepare a brief
oral presentation to present in class. In the other three homework assignments (i.e., 2, 4 and 6), students had to study the
topic that would be discussed in the next lesson in their textbook and write ve main ideas in their notebooks. For
example, in homework 4, the students read about geometry
(i.e., geometrical volume) in their textbook and wrote the definition of volume and the different types of geometrical solids
that they learned in class in their notebooks.
3) Extension homework (Cooper, 2001) aims to promote the
transfer of learning to new tasks. According to Lee and Pruitt
(1979), extension assignments differ from practice assignments in the degree of application in the abstract thinking
required. Practice assignments require very little abstract
thinking (p. 32). In this study, students had to solve two mathematics problems in their notebooks for each of the six
homework assignments. For example, in homework 4, the students had to nd the answer to the following mathematical
problem: The pot that Antnios family uses in the kitchen
is 10 cm high and has a 15-cm radius. Calculate the approximate value of the pots volume and determine how many
liters of soup Antnios family can serve for dinner using that
pot. Show how you reached your answer.
Prior to starting the research, university teachers from the Department of Mathematics, the participating teachers and the research
team analyzed whether the tasks that were to be assigned were
related to the three purposes, as Epstein and Van Voorhis (2001)
suggested, and worked to calibrate the level of diculty of the tasks
that were assigned for each condition.
Table 3
Distribution of student and treatment by teacher and school.
School_1
School_2
School_3
School_4
School_5
School_6
School_7
Teacher1 (T_HW2)
njk = 26
Teacher2 (T_HW3)
njk = 17
Teacher3 (T_HW1)
njk = 23
Teacher4 (T_HW1)
njk = 24
Teacher5 (T_HW1)
njk = 23
Teacher6 (T_HW3)
njk = 23
Teacher7 (T_HW2)
njk = 24
Teacher8 (T_HW1)
njk = 22
Teacher9 (T_HW3)
njk = 25
Teacher10 (T_HW2)
njk = 25
Teacher11 (T_HW2)
njk = 26
Teacher12 (T_HW3)
njk = 27
Teacher13 (T_HW1)
njk = 27
Teacher14 (T_HW2)
njk = 19
Teacher15 (T_HW3)
njk = 23
Teacher16 (T_HW2)
njk = 26
Teacher17 (T_HW1)
njk = 25
Teacher18 (T_HW3)
njk = 26
Teacher19 (T_HW3)
njk = 25
Teacher20 (T_HW1)
njk = 22
Teacher21 (T_HW1)
njk = 17
Teacher22 (T_HW2)
njk = 25
Teacher23 (T_HW3)
njk = 28
Teacher24 (T_HW2)
njk = 25
Teacher25 (T_HW1)
njk = 23
Teacher26 (T_HW3)
njk = 24
Teacher27 (T_HW2)
njk = 22
Note: T_HW1 (practice homework), T_HW2 (preparation homework), T_HW3 (extension homework).
16
In the Portuguese school system, 6th graders have three 90minute mathematics lessons per week. In this study, teachers were
asked to only assign homework in the rst class of the week. Over
the six weeks, all teachers taught the topic of geometry (i.e., points,
lines, geometrical areas and volume), and each week, the homework that was assigned focused on the same content despite the
experimental condition (i.e., practice, preparation, extension). In each
experimental condition, the weekly homework that was assigned
was the same in all classes.
In the week prior to starting the intervention in the class, the
questionnaires and measures (i.e., mathematics self-ecacy, mathematics study time and parental educational level) were
administered to students during regular classes in the second term.
For each homework assignment in the three conditions, the protocol was as follows: at the end of the class, to clearly state the
homework assignment, students were asked to write the homework assignment in their notebooks. In the next lesson, teachers
began the class by checking whether the students had completed
the homework by completing a homework diary log. To control for
the inuence of the homework follow-up practices on achievement, all homework assignments were collected and graded by the
teachers using the Portuguese grading system for elementary school
(i.e., 1 and 2negative, 3passing, 4good, and 5excellent). During
the subsequent lesson, the graded homework was returned to the
students. There was an exception for the preparation homework assignments 1, 3 and 5 (i.e., students had to learn the topic for the
next lesson in their textbook and prepare a brief oral presentation
to present in class). In these assignments, the teachers gave a grade
(using the same grading scale) after the students oral presentation of their homework in class. At the end of the sixth week, all
students completed the same non-standardized mathematics
achievement test (see the measures section).
To ensure compliance in each experimental condition, teachers were required to send an email to the rst author of the study
at the end of the second class of the week that reported whether
the protocol had been followed. At the end of the study, each teacher
sent their homework diary log to the rst author and received a
summary table for conrmation purposes. To further examine the
measures reliability (i.e., whether the teachers followed their homework purpose condition protocol), ve students from each class were
randomly chosen to receive an email in which they were asked to
reply by attaching the homework task that was assigned by the
teachers. Fleisss Kappa statistic (Fleiss, 1981) indicated that the
general diagnostic reliability among the randomly chosen students from each class was excellent: = .95 (p < .001), according to
Landis and Koch (1977). When a teacher or student did not send
the e-mail as planned (a delay of two days), a research assistant
phoned to remind them about the required e-mail. Eventually, all
information was collected. The information sent by the teachers and
students matched. There were minor deviations to the protocol (e.g.,
sometimes the students wrote down the homework assignment in
their notebooks at the beginning of class and not at the end as
planned; some teachers checked whether the students had completed the homework by completing a homework diary log at times
other than the beginning of the class, as was originally planned).
Overall, participant teachers followed the protocol; thus, no data
were excluded from the analyses.
3.4. Design and data analyses
This study was conducted in students and teachers classrooms to assess homework purposes as ecologically valid in an
authentic learning environment. This study used a randomized
pretestposttest clustered design. In cluster randomized trials, groups
of individuals (rather than the individuals themselves) are randomly assigned to experimental conditions and individuals in the
same clusters are measured over time. Given the hierarchical nature
of our data, analyses were conducted using a two-level hierarchical linear model (HLM). To avoid enumerating all possible models,
we used a ve-step modeling strategy for selecting the best model
by computing the information criteria. Initially, an unconditional
model allowed for determining the amount of variance explained
at the individual and class levels. Additionally, this unconditional
model was a reference for assessing the goodness-of-t for more
complex conditional models. The second step tested a model with
all student-level predictors xed. In this step, the intercept was
assumed to vary across the classes, but the slopes were held constant. The third step added a class-level predictor to the model t
at the student level. The fourth step used the mean structure from
the second step to assess whether the slopes from the studentlevel predictors had signicant variance components across classes.
Finally, the fth step added cross-level interactions between the class
variables and those student variables that had signicant random
slopes. In the absence of a theory providing contrasting data, we
used a data-driven strategy to move toward a simpler structure by
eliminating predictors or (co)variances that did not appear to be
related to the criterion variable at each step.
The level-1 model included the following 6 student-level variables: mathematics prior knowledge (math achievement on the pretest; MAT1), mathematics self-ecacy (not very well = 1,. . ., very
well = 5; MSE), parents educational level (elementary = 1,. . ., postgraduate = 5; PEL), student gender (girl = 0, boy = 1; SG), amount of
completed homework (minimum = 0, maximum = 6; AHWC), and
amount of time studying mathematics (the number of weekly hours
dedicated to studying; MTS). Specically, the resulting initial studentlevel model can be written as
MAT 2ij = 0 j + 1jMPT1ij + 2 jMSEij + 3 jPEL ij

+ 4 jSGij + 5 j AHWCij + 6 jMTSij + eij.
The level-2 model incorporated the types of homework purposes (T_HW), the explanatory variable of major interest in the
current study, and two covariates. For the purpose of this study,
parents educational level was aggregated at the class level to create
an index of parental education (Grp_PEL) and AHWC was aggregated at the class level to create an index of student engagement in
homework (Grp_AHWC). The resulting class-level initial model consists of
0 j = 00 + 01T_HW j + 02Grp_PEL j + 03Grp_AHWC j + u0 j,

1 j = 10; 2 j = 20; 3 j = 30; 4 j = 40; 5 j = 50; 6 j = 60.
Multilevel analyses were conducted by tting the variance component structure with parameters from the full maximum likelihood
(ML) estimation method as implemented in SAS PROC MIXED 9.4
TS1M2 (SAS Institute, Inc 2014). After selecting the most parsimonious model, we analyzed the effects and differences in the tted
model, specically those related to the effects of homework purposes. Benjamini and Hochbergs (1995) false discovery rate (FDR)
controlling method accounted for the risk for false positives in the
pairwise comparisons alpha level (i.e., p < .05) using the ESTIMATE statement in SAS PROC MIXED and the HOC option in SAS
PROC MULTTEST 9.4 TS1M2 (SAS Institute, Inc 2014).
As mentioned, we conducted a two-level hierarchical linear model
(HLM). The HLM may not have been sucient to meaningfully
analyze the hierarchically nested data structure, such as students
nested in classes (teachers) and classes (teachers) nested in schools.
However, it is important to note that there was not a sucient
number of schools (i.e., seven) to conduct a full 3-level HLM analysis in this study. As such, we conducted auxiliary analyses to provide
descriptive information about the schools and explore school effects
on students mathematics achievement. Specically, we calculated
the intra-school correlation, which measured the proportion of the

variance between the schools, and the intra-teacher correlation,
which measured the same between teachers. We also analyzed
whether the level-3 predictors varied across schools.
4. Results
4.1. Descriptive analyses
Pearson correlation coecients, means and standard deviations for the variables that were included in the model are presented
in Table 4. Based on the variables averages, we conclude that selfecacy and mathematical achievement levels (pre and post) are
close to the average. In addition, students completed most of the
assigned homework. Moreover, students spent an average of 15
minutes per day studying (excluding homework time). Finally, parents average educational level was less than 12th grade.
4.2. Multilevel analyses
The analyses were performed using a set of 2-level HLMs because
there was not a sucient number of schools to conduct a full 3-level
HLM analysis. However, empirical justication was provided prior
to conducting the 2-level HLM analysis. To examine the potential
effects of the different schools, we t a three-level unconditional
HLM model and a model with school-level predictors.
17
4.2.1. Three-level analyses

Although the current study does not include any school-level variables in the model, student-level data for PEL (i.e., parent education
level), MAT1 (i.e., prior mathematics achievement) and AHWC (i.e.,
homework engagement) were aggregated to describe the set of 6thgrade students in each school. The results from the three-level
unconditional HLM and a model with school-level predictors are
presented in Table 5.
The estimated overall mean across schools was 3.37 and was signicantly different from zero (p < .0001). The signicant variance
components reveal that there is signicant heterogeneity among
the students within teachers (classes) at baseline (Z = 17.47, p < .0001).
Furthermore, the variation between teachers was statistically signicant, Z = 2.51 (p = 0.0061), while there was no signicant
difference in the variance between schools, Z = 0.21 (p = 0.4182). The
ML estimates for the three sources of variability indicated that there
was substantial variation across teachers (but not schools) in students performance in mathematics. Approximately 14% of the total
variance occurs across teachers, and less than 1% of the total variation in mathematics achievement results from differences between
the schools. The remainder of the variance was due to withinclassroom differences.
Moreover, there is little evidence of school-to-school variation.
The results for the conditional model (see Table 5) indicated that
there were no statistically signicant school-level aggregate variables. These ndings, together with not having sucient power to
Table 4
Means, standard deviations and Pearson correlations for the variables included in the research design.
1
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
M
SD
Gender
Mathematics self-ecacy
Homework purposes
Amount of homework completed
Mathematics time study
Prior knowledge (pretest mathematics achievement)
Mathematics achievement test (posttest mathematics achievement)
Parents educational level
.060
.008
.039
.090*
.029
.031
.002
1.508
.500
.320***
.024
.004
.102**
.104*
2.012
.822
.041
.131***
.215***
.123***
4.940
1.275
.041
.035
.077
2.756
1.226
.783***
.347***
3.254
.897
.409***
3.375
.952
1.940
1.089
.082*
.127**
.000
.680***
.699***
.368***
2.612
.837
Note: Gender (1 female; 2 male).

* p < .05; ** p < .01; *** p < .001.
Table 5
Three-level unconditional HLM model with school level predictors for mathematics achievement.
Parameter
Fixed effect
Intercept
Grps_MAT1
Grps_PEL
Grps_AHWC
Parameter
Random variance
2
Variance decomposition (Percentage by level)
Level 1
Level 2
Level 3
Reliabilities
Between teachers
Between schools
Unconditional model
Conditional model
Estimate
SE
df
tValue
Pr > |t|
Estimate
SE
df
tValue
Pr > |t|
3.3653***
.0810
41.53
<.0001
.7609
.5731
.2180
.0624
2.3798
.6748
.3057
.3227
3
3
3
3
.32
.85
.71
.19
.7701
.4581
.5273
.8590
Estimate
SE
ZValue
Pr > Z
Estimate
SE
ZValue
Pr > Z
.21
2.51
17.47
.4182
.0061
<.0001
.0784
.7749
.0299
.0443
2.61
17.48
.0450
<.0001
.0057
.1214
.7751
.0277
.0485
.0443
.86
.13
.01
0.79
0.50
Note: = Variance between schools; = Variance between teachers within schools; 2 = Variance between student within classrooms. Grps_MAT1 (index of prior Mathematics achievement), Grps_PEL (index of parental education), Grps_AHWC (index of students engagement).
18
conduct a three-level analysis due to the small number of schools,

provide an argument for using a simpler, two-level analysis with
students at level 1 and teachers at level 2, ignoring the schools
effects.
4.2.2. Two-level analyses
To address our rst goal (i.e., to examine the impact of teachers homework purposes on students mathematics achievement),
we examined a fully unconditional model that separated the variance from mathematics achievement into between and withinclass components. Table 6 shows the results from tting the model
to the data. The estimated mean on mathematics achievement in
this sample of classes (3.3646) is different from zero (p < .001).
However, it is notable that there were statistically signicant differences in average student mathematics achievement levels between
classes (u0j = 0.127; p < .001) and mathematics achievement levels
within classes (eij = 0.775; p < .001). Our data also indicate that 85.9%
of the variance in mathematics achievement occurred at the student
level and 14.1% at the class level. The magnitude of the intra-class
correlation, which was approximately 0.141, contradicts the hypothesis of independence that is assumed by the classic regression
model and indicates the need for analyzing the data at two levels
(individual and class).
The conditional Model 1 included six student-level variables (prior
knowledge, student gender, parents educational level, amount of
homework completed, amount of mathematics study time and mathematics self-ecacy). Table 6 shows that the deviance statistics and
the number of estimated parameters for conditional Model 1 were
1010.9 and 9. The likelihood ratio test, which compares the fully
unconditional model to the conditional Model 1, indicated that Model
1 had a signicantly better t to the data than the fully unconditional model, 2(6) = 677.1, p < .001. Model 1 explained 63.8% of the
variance in mathematics achievement tests at the student level and
91.5% at the class level.
Conditional Model 2 included three class-level variables (type

of homework purposes, aggregate parents educational level and aggregate amount of homework completed) and four student-level
variables (prior knowledge, mathematics self-ecacy, parents education level and amount of homework completed). As indicated
in Table 6, the deviance statistics and number of estimated parameters for conditional Model 2 were 999.1 and 11. The likelihood ratio
test that compared Model 2 to Model 1 indicated that Model 2 had
a signicantly better t to the data than Model 1, 2(2) = 11.8, p < .003.
Conditional Model 2 accounted for an additional 0.13% of the variance in mathematics achievement at the student level and an
additional 5.8% at the class level.
The nal conditional model (Model 3) included one class-level
variable (type of homework purpose) and four student-level variables (prior knowledge, mathematics self-ecacy, parents
educational level and amount of homework completed). The deviance statistics and the number of estimated parameters for
conditional Model 3 were 996.6 and 9. When testing conditional
Model 3 against conditional Model 2, the results 2(2) = 2.5, p = .287
were not signicant. However, both of these models were not signicantly different, and Model 3 was chosen as the best tting model
because it was more parsimonious (see Table 6). Moreover, the AIC
(BIC) weight from this model suggested that there was a high probability that Model 3 was the best of all examined models. Overall,
Model 3 explained 63.9% of the variance in mathematics achievement at the student level and 96.2% of the variance at the class level.
As indicated in Table 6, four student-level variables had statistically signicant effects on mathematics achievement. Specically,
participants mathematics achievement was positively affected by
prior knowledge (0.602, p < .001), mathematics self-ecacy (0.318,
p < .001), parents educational level (0.060, p < .01) and the amount
of homework completed (0.163, p < .05). At the class level, there was
a signicant relationship between the type of homework purpose
and students mean achievement scores. However, there was no
Table 6
Results of tting four multilevel regression models for mathematics achievement.
Parameter
Fixed effect
Intercept
MAT1
MSE
PEL
Gender
AHWC
MST
T_HWC1
T_HWC2
T_HWC3
Grp_PEL
Grp_AHWC
Random effects
Initial status, u0j
Level-1 error, eij
Fit statistics
Deviance
Number of parameter
AIC
BIC
Unconditional model
Conditional model 1
Conditional model 2
Conditional model 3
Estimate
SE
df
Estimate
SE
df
Estimate
SE
df
Estimate
SE
df
3.3646***
.0771
26
0.3869**
0.5913***
0.3311***
0.0556*
0.0662
0.1654*
0.0089
.1154
.0326
.0356
.0227
.0429
.0667
.0182
26
604
604
604
604
604
604
0.0146
0.6040***
0.3134***
0.0513*
.2791
.0326
.0356
.0227
22
606
606
606
0.4278
0.6015***
0.3180***
0.0600**
.1077
.0324
.0352
.0218
24
606
606
606
0.1402*
.0667
606
0.1630*
.0667
606
0.0795
0.1631*
0.0000
0.0754
0.4873
.0629
.0584
22
22
0.1265
0.1891**
0.0000
.0621
.0609
24
24
.0414
.0317
22
22
0.0034
0.2795***
.0044
.0160
0.0006
0.2792***
.0048
.0161
0.1271***
0.7751***
.0433
.0444
1688.0
3.0
1694.0
1697.9
0.0108*
0.2805***
1010.9
9.0
1028.9
1040.6
Variance explained
Variance (u0j)
Variance (eij)
Unconditional model
Conditional model with covariates
Percentage of variance explained
0.1271
0.0006
96.0%
0.7751
0.2792
64.0%
.0066
.0159
999.1
11.0
1021.1
1035.3
996.6
9.0
1016.6
1029.5
Note: MAT1 (Mathematics achievement pretest), MSE (Mathematics Self-Ecacy), PEL (Parental education level), AHWC (Amount of homework assignments completed),
MST (mathematics study time), T_HWC1 (practice homework), T_HWC2 (preparation homework), T_HWC3 (extension homework), Grp_PEL (index of parental education),
Grp_AHWC (index of students engagement).
* p < .05, **p < .01, ***p < .001.
Table 7
Post hoc contrasts using the BenjaminiHochberg procedure for FDR control to identify the best types of homework purposes.
Group
comparison
Estimate
SE
DF
tValue
Fdr_p
Partial 2
T_HW2-3
T_HW1-3
T_HW1-2
.1891
.1265
.0626
.0609
.0621
.0614
24
24
24
3.10
2.04
1.02
.0049
.0529
.3180
.01458
.07933
.31799
.270
.181
.037
Table 8
Cell means and standard deviations on the mathematics achievement test for three
homework purposes as a function of the amount of homework completed.
T_HW
AHWC
Practice homework
Medium-Low
Medium-High
Medium-Low
Medium-High
Medium-Low
Medium-High
Preparation homework
Extension homework
evidence of a statistically signicant change in students mean

achievement scores due to the aggregate amount of homework completed and the class-level aggregate parents education. In addition,
there was no evidence that the amount of homework completed
differed depending on the type of homework purpose.
As previously noted, a useful method for testing pairwise differences between groups in a manner that is consistent with the research
objectives is to perform a series of contrasts. The BenjaminiHochberg
FDR controlling procedure was adopted to assess the statistical significance, and Table 7 shows the signicant contrasts at p < .05.
Post hoc tests revealed that there was a signicant difference
between the T_HW2 and T_HW3 groups (t = 3.10, p = .0146) and
a marginally signicant difference between the T_HW1 and T_HW3
groups (t = 2.04, p = .0793) (see Table 7 and Fig. 1). The difference
between the T_HW1 and T_HW2 groups was not signicant (t = 1.02,
p = .3180), which indicates that the treatment that was responsible for a change from pre- to post-test is T_HW3 (extension
homework).
To analyze the interaction between the type of homework purposes (T_HW) and the amount of homework completed (AHWC)
and its effect on mathematics achievement (our third goal), we dichotomized the AHWC (low when AHWC 4 and high when AHWC
>4). Table 8 shows the descriptive data for this analysis and that there
was no interaction between the amount of homework assignments completed and the type of homework purpose. As previously
noted, the type of homework purpose differentially relates to mathematics achievement.
19
Final mathematics
achievement
n
DS
49
161
27
181
7
212
2.92
3.40
2.96
3.35
3.00
3.54
0.86
0.88
0.98
0.90
1.15
1.01
Note: T_HW (type of homework purposes); AHWC (Amount of homework assignments completed).
4.3. Ancillary analysis

Despite diculties in controlling for variables in the school settings, there is a general call for studies that use experimental designs
and are conducted in holistic educational environments (e.g.,
Dettmers et al., 2011; Xu & Wu, 2013). Although there were diculties conducting the current study (see section 6), our preliminary
results are promising and provide important educational insights
that justify additional analyses. To further our understanding of
homework purposes and the study dynamics, we organized a postresearch evaluation meeting to analyze the participating teachers
experiences. Consistent with McInerney (2012), we conducted a qualitative analysis of notes that were completed by the authors of this
research about the participants interventions. The discussion of these
ndings will be limited; however, we believe that the topics discussed below will help calibrate our interpretations and deepen our
understanding of the complex process of homework purposes.
4.3.1. The design
It was dicult to recruit schools to participate in the study. Sixthgrade teachers are often intensely focused on preparing their
students for the national nal exam, and thus, they had a limited
disposition toward embracing research projects that would consume
Fig. 1. Graphical representation of changes in the mean of academic achievement in mathematics from pretest to posttest for each type of homework purpose.
20
time and effort. Initially, the participating teachers were not

completely comfortable with the proposed random selection criteria. None had previously participated in a controlled schoolbased investigation, and thus, it was important to discuss the features
of an experimental design and the associated gains for their practice to increase adherence with the design. The following statement
illustrates teachers opinions toward participating in the current
study: Im thankful for participating in this research because over
my fourteen years of teaching experience I never thought about the
purposes of my homework like this. I realize now, I had a more intuitive approach (T14).
The collaborative work that was completed in the informational meeting for the types of homework tasks assigned in relation
to the intended purpose was also an important aspect that was referenced by participants: Calibrating homework tasks and aligning
tasks with the purposes was a very good experience. . .. For my students I never check on this relationship For sure, it is possible to
nd several mismatches in my daily practice. . .. I clearly need to
be attentive, this research alerted me to the importance of this topic
(T9). Several teachers also highlighted the importance and merits
of assigning homework with different purposes than those that they
usually assign. For example, one teacher said: I was not willing to
participate in this research, but my friend convinced me. . .. Besides,
my experimental condition [extension homework] was not my
natural condition, do you understand what I mean? I do not assign
extension homework often, and I was not happy when I found that
I was randomly assigned to that condition. After a brief reection
I decided to go with the ow, but soon I realized the merits of assigning extension homework Students were more engaged, I
became more engaged. . . (T4).
4.3.2. Homework purposes
In the post-research evaluation meeting, participating teachers
had the opportunity to reect on their perspectives of the purpose
of homework. For example, some teachers believed that it was important to adjust the type of assigned homework to address their
students educational needs. However, daily instructional constraints (e.g., the high number of students per class, the limited time
available for homework follow-up, the pressure for preparing students for the nal exam and to review all of the content) made it
dicult for teachers to prepare and design homework tasks that
matched students learning needs.
In line with the literature (e.g., Danielson et al., 2011), most of
our participants reported that they mainly used a single type of
homework: I always assign homework to instigate students to practice the contents worked in class (T9). Several teachers explained
reasons for this routine, as follows: I believe that assigning homework according to my students characteristics would be benecial
for them. In fact, I would like to assign tailored homework addressing students struggling with learning specic needs but also high
achievers needs; often we forget their needs. . .. However, Im teaching six classes, four from the 5th and two from the 6th grade, and
that makes it impossible. I would need extra time to prepare homework and then to grade it for the following class, time that I denitely
dont have. So, I end up assigning homework to help them practice the basic contents covered in class. Every student will be able
to do it and for me it is easier. If I assign problem solving tasks, the
majority of students will struggle to solve the exercises, and in the
next lesson Ill need a lot of time to explain it in class, time that I
need to cover the content, you see?! (T26).
5. Discussion
This study investigated the relationship between three homework instructional purposes and mathematics academic
achievement. To improve the reliability for the analysis, we
controlled for the effects of six homework-related variables (i.e.,

gender, prior achievement, mathematics self-ecacy, amount of
homework, amount of time studying mathematics, and parental educational level) that the literature indicated are important to
explaining a signicant amount of variance in mathematics performance (Fernndez-Alonso et al., 2015; Hemmings et al., 2011;
Kitsantas et al., 2011; Lee et al., 2014; Rosrio et al., 2009; Trautwein,
Niggli et al., 2009; Zuan et al., 2012) (see Table 6). Data from the
randomized pretestposttest clustered design were analyzed with
multilevel regression models that assessed whether different types
of homework purposes impacted students mathematics achievement, which type of homework is most effective, how this
relationship could be modulated by the amount of homework completed, and how the two Level-2 aggregated parental education and
homework completion covariates were related to mathematics
achievement.
The unconditional means model suggested that teachers differed in their students average mathematics achievement scores
and that there was even more variation among the students within
teachers. In fact, the variance component within teachers was nearly
six times the size of the variance component between teachers. The
conditional 2-level HLM analysis revealed that the variance in the
student level residual errors was almost three times smaller than
the original when the model included prior achievement, mathematics self-ecacy, the amount of homework, and parental
educational level as explanatory variables. In contrast, the results
also revealed that the residual variance between teachers was substantially smaller than the original when the explanatory variable
that represented the type of homework purposes was added to the
model.
For our rst goal, after the six sessions, the homework data
showed statistically signicant differences in mathematics achievement when comparing homework purposes (i.e., homework
extension vs preparation homework or practice homework) in favor
of homework extension. According to our ndings, homework that
has the purpose of extension (e.g., promoting problem solving skills)
is benecial for improving students achievement in mathematics.
Our data complement that of Zhu and Leung (2012). Analyzing
TIMSS 2003 data, these authors (Zhu & Leung, 2012) found that
homework that was focused on problem solving had a signicant
positive effect on students mathematics achievement. The other
types of homework that were analyzed in that study (i.e., gathering statistics data and reporting and nding one or more applications
of the content covered) had no effects on students academic achievement. However, Zhu and Leung (2012) identied that a limitation
in their study was that the last two types of homework were less
prescribed than problem-solving (one type was not prescribed) and
that the TIMSS test questions were primarily focused on problem
solving skills. Thus, students were expected to have higher scores
on the TIMSS tests when they completed problem solving focused
homework. To overcome this limitation from prior research, our
study designed the nal exam (used as a post-test) that reviewed
all of the skills that were enhanced by the prescribed homework
assignments (e.g., the practice skills taught in class, transferring learning to new situations). Furthermore, the PISA 2012 results (OECD,
2014b) corroborated Zhu and Leungs (2012) ndings, which showed
that problem-solving was associated with higher levels of school
achievement in both mathematics (r = 0.81) and science (r = 0.78).
Moreover, students who were open to solving mathematics problems, that is, students who felt that they could handle the information
provided while seeking explanations for the presented data and
solving complex problems (see OECD, 2014b, p. 18), scored 31 points
higher in mathematics, on average, than those who were less open
to problem solving.
Homework with the purpose of extension is often perceived by
students as academically demanding and research has found a
positive predictive effect for this homework characteristic on academic achievement at the class level (e.g., Dettmers et al., 2010) and
at both levels (Trautwein et al., 2002).
These ndings emphasize the importance of a homework preparation phase in which teachers calibrate the homework tasks
diculty to match the students proximal zone of development
(Vygotsky, 1978) and promote homework engagement (e.g., adjusting the task diculty and matching the students educational
needs). In fact, Zakharov, Carnoy, and Loyalka (2014) concluded that
tasks that are adjusted for diculty have a positive impact on students performance. Our participants reported that this practice was
valued; however, in everyday classes, they face several constraints
in performing this instructional practice (e.g., the vast number of
topics to discuss in class during the school year, the number of students per class (an average of 26), and the number of classes they
teach at different grade levels (i.e., 5th, 6th and 7th grade). Thus,
teachers often assign the same homework to all students most of
the time.
In summary, the data indicated that when comparing the three
homework instructional purposes, students who completed homework that had a purpose of extension had higher grades in
mathematics. These results are aligned with Trautwein, Niggli et al.
(2009), who found that homework that had a purpose of drilling
and practicing had a negative relationship with school achievement. Moreover, the literature suggests that teachers most often
prescribe homework that has a purpose of preparation and practice (see Bang, 2012; Danielson et al., 2011; Kaur, 2011; Muhlenbruck
et al., 2000). Our preliminary results should be further examined
in future research, even though the data indicate potentially interesting educational questions. Because higher grades in mathematics
are negatively related to more prescribed homework assignments, this issue is important for teachers, school administrators
and researchers to address. For example, a statement from one participating teacher, which was corroborated by several other
participants in the post-research evaluation meeting, may help understand teachers reasons for assigning homework that had a
purpose of practicing tasks: I know problem-solving is the homework task with more impact on achievement, but they [students]
often struggle to complete those tasks, and I have to spend more
time to correct it in class, and I dont have that time. So I usually
assign practice tasks (T3). Future studies should conduct in-depth
analyses on teachers reasons for assigning particular homework
tasks. Still, we believe that our preliminary ndings could help teachers and school administrators to design homework policies and
school-based interventions for homework. For the second research aim, this study adds to the literature by comparing the
purposes of homework (the three that were analyzed) and their association with students mathematics achievement by examining
how completing more or less homework could affect the above relationship. The ndings showed that despite the homework purpose
(i.e., practice, preparation or extension), it is always better to do more,
compared to less, homework. In summary, data from both goals indicated that the amount of homework did not affect the relationship
between homework purposes and academic achievement. Thus,
when possible, mathematics teachers should prescribe homework that has a purpose of extension.
Finally, we emphasize that the results were not signicant when
explaining mathematics achievement at the class level (i.e., when
considering Grp_PEL [parental educational level] and Grp-AHWC [the
index of students engagement in their homework]). In fact, it was expected that the Grp-AHWC variable would be associated with a
signicant percentage of the variance for students achievement in
each class, for example, as a result of the type of work in class or
the supervision and monitoring of that work (Rosrio et al., 2014a).
This nding is educationally important because it indicates that there
is no relationship between the instructional processes in each of
21
the classes enrolled (e.g., monitoring the work performed in class)

and the amount of homework that was completed by the students. Thus, completing more homework was primarily related to
student-level personal characteristics (e.g., motivation, attitude and
interest, Bembenutty & White, 2013; Fernndez-Alonso et al., 2015;
Xu, 2005), homework self-regulation (Hong, Peng, & Rowell, 2009),
and homework management, including time management (Nez
et al., 2013; Xu, 2010c), and less inuenced by the teacher or the
instructional condition.
The last nding is aligned with several studies that found a small
relationship between instructional behaviors and completing assigned tasks (e.g., Fernndez-Alonso et al., 2015; Rosrio et al., 2014a;
Zhu & Leung, 2012). Additionally, with data-focused approaches for
teaching (e.g., Prosser & Trigwell, 2006; Rosrio et al., 2014b) that
used a multilevel design, teachers reported that their teaching approaches inuenced students approaches to learning, but their
inuence was low (Rosrio et al., 2013).
6. Study limitations and future research
The data from this study should be examined while accounting for several limitations. Our ndings show that using a randomized
pretestposttest clustered design and multilevel modeling, one type
of homework purpose (extension) was more related to mathematics achievement than the other two purposes (practice and
preparation). Although our data were analyzed at two levels (the
individual and class levels), it should be noted that the number of
units on the second level (class level) was limited and may have
signicantly impacted the estimated parameters and their associated probabilities (see Vallejo, Fernndez, Livacic-Rojas, & Cuesta,
2015; Vallejo, Tuero-Herrero, Nez, & Rosrio, 2014). For example,
if the number of classes had been greater than 30, it is possible that
the T_HW1-3 comparison (practice versus extension homework
purpose) would have reached statistical signicance at p < .001 (see
Table 6).
Moreover, this study examined only mathematics achievement
as an outcome variable. It would be informative and useful for future
research to explore the relationship between homework purposes
and the other variables that are related to students homework behaviors (e.g., homework procrastination, homework effort, time spent
on homework, homework completion rate, and homework feedback) and students homework performance (e.g., quality of the
homework presented in class). Moreover, it could be interesting to
examine whether students perceptions of the homework purpose
inuence their actual homework behaviors. For example, Rosrio
et al.s (2013) study on approaches to teaching concluded that students perspectives of their teachers approaches to teaching
inuenced their own approaches to learning and studying. It is possible that several of the homework purposes may have been better
suited for some students than others, depending on their previous achievement levels and academic goals (Valle et al., 2013). Thus,
future studies should also examine the degree of individualization in students homework while accounting for students prior
knowledge and other motivational aspects (e.g., self-set goals). In
the current study, the number of homework assignments completed by students and the homework follow-up practices that were
used by all of the teachers (i.e., return the homework graded in the
following class) were controlled for to reduce their possible inuence on achievement (i.e., teachers sent an e-mail reporting whether
the protocol had been followed and ve students in each class received an e-mail with the same purpose). However, we cannot
guarantee that the teachers did not use other homework followup practices in class (e.g., orally correcting homework), which would
completely discard the effect of these non-controlled homework
follow-up practices on the results. Future studies should address
this limitation by controlling for the effect of teachers homework
22
follow-up practices in class (Rosrio et al., 2014a). Moreover, this

study was conducted with students from the 6th grade; thus, it is
important to study homework purposes at other school levels and
over a period of time to learn and compare the results with the
current study. Finally, two measures in our study relied on selfreport data (i.e., amount of time studying mathematics and
mathematics self-ecacy), which allowed for collecting information about students perceptions of the learning processes but did
not capture real-time responses in authentic learning environments or multiple reporters views of the same constructs (e.g.,
parents reports of students study time). Future research should
address these limitations by, for example, using on-task measures
and multiple sources that provide the same information. Future
studies should further examine teachers perceptions of the homework assignment design (e.g., purpose, frequency, and amount) and
the reasons that underlie their educational choices. The results of
this further research could help to build an in-depth understanding of teachers perspectives during the rst step of the homework
process (i.e., planning and design) and the possible constraints on
teachers practices with respect to homework.
Finally, our study only focused on the teachers role in the rst
step of the homework process (i.e., homework preparation and
design). Our ndings show that homework purpose is an important homework variable, but it does not explain the complex
relationship between doing homework and academic achievement. Future research could explore other homework characteristics
(e.g., the homework quality, see Dettmers et al., 2010), in addition
to other homework behaviors that are the teachers responsibility,
such as grading homework and giving feedback (e.g., Cooper, 2001;
Nez, Surez et al., 2014), as they may inuence the relationship
between homework purposes and academic achievement.
7. Conclusions and implications for practice
Our data indicated that homework for the purpose of extension was the most effective type of homework. This nding is
educationally important because homework assignments that have
the purposes of drill and practice are most often prescribed by teachers (e.g., Danielson et al., 2011). In the post-research meeting,
participating teachers defended the extension homework assignments as being the most powerful for learning; however, three factors
(i.e., the limited amount of time for monitoring students homework, the large number of students in each class, and students
diculties with these types of exercises) were important justications for not assigning this type of homework more often.
Thus, teachers should acknowledge that homework with the
purpose of extension is complex. To promote the ecacy of this type
of homework purpose, teachers should provide specic instructions, solid guidelines and an appropriate amount of time for
completion to not burden students with extra academic tasks or unrealistic deadlines (Lee & Pruitt, 1979). The following statement from
one participant indicates the need to help teachers reect on their
practices, which in this case was homework related: This was the
rst time I looked at homework purposes with close attention. I had
never stopped to carefully reect on my assignments and their goals
(T7). School teachers with the support of school administrators and
school psychologists should consider analyzing the types of homework that are usually assigned and reect on their impact on
students learning and achievement. To empower teachers in the
homework process, it could be useful to conduct school-based training that addresses different aspects of the homework design (e.g.,
the homework purpose, types of tasks to match each purpose, and
anticipation of the time needed to complete the tasks for each type
of homework purpose). Our ndings should be interpreted and adjusted for the context of each class. It is important for teachers to
build a deep understanding of their students educational status (e.g.,
prior knowledge gaps) and design homework that ts their students learning needs (e.g., Cooper, 2001).
Furthermore, teachers could help students dene their own
homework goals, by emphasizing the importance of homework tasks
in helping students achieve their learning goals (Nez et al., 2013).
These educational initiatives could provide essential information for
designing more effective homework practices to improve, for
example, students homework engagement and consequently their
academic achievement.
Acknowledgments
This study was conducted at Psychology Research Centre, University of Minho, and supported by the Portuguese Foundation for
Science and Technology and the Portuguese Ministry of Education
and Science through national funds and when applicable conanced by FEDER under the PT2020 Partnership Agreement
(UID/PSI/01662/2013).
Appendix
Examples of the questions from the non-standardized Mathematics Achievement Test.
Structure
Type of
question
Example
First
section
Multiple
choice
Second
section
Mathematics
problems
Joana drew an acute-angle triangle.

Select one of the following amplitudes of
triangle angles that Joana drew.
a) 30, 90, 60
b) 30, 95, 55
c) 35, 85, 60
d) 35, 110, 35
The following gure shows a can of paint, in the
shape of a cylinder, with a 30-cm diameter base
and a height of 28 cm.
[gure]
Calculate the capacity in liters of the can of
paint.
Present the results rounded to the nearest unit.
Explain how you reached your answer.
(Use = 3.14)
(Note: 1 liter = 1 dm3)
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Contemporary Educational Psychology

Does homework design matter? The role of homeworks purpose in

Department of Applied Psychology, Universidade do Minho, Braga, Portugal

* Corresponding author. Escola de Psicologia, Universidade do Minho, Gualtar,

effort, homework completion, homework emotions) (Dettmers et al.,

P. Rosrio et al./Contemporary Educational Psychology 43 (2015) 1024

(2012) suggested, there is a call to clarify the effects of homeworks

P. Rosrio et al./Contemporary Educational Psychology 43 (2015) 1024

assignments that were designed for other purposes (e.g., to promote

2. The present study

example, controlling the negative emotions that emerge while doing

P. Rosrio et al./Contemporary Educational Psychology 43 (2015) 1024

3.2. Instruments and measures

3.2.1.2. Mathematics self-ecacy. Self-ecacy in mathematics was

3.2.1.3. Amount of homework completed. Homework was assigned

P. Rosrio et al./Contemporary Educational Psychology 43 (2015) 1024

Eigenvalues of the polychoric correlation matrix

Item response functions (IRF) and test characteristic function (TCF)

P. Rosrio et al./Contemporary Educational Psychology 43 (2015) 1024

information at approximately zero on the latent-trait variable;

P. Rosrio et al./Contemporary Educational Psychology 43 (2015) 1024

MAT 2ij = 0 j + 1jMPT1ij + 2 jMSEij + 3 jPEL ij

0 j = 00 + 01T_HW j + 02Grp_PEL j + 03Grp_AHWC j + u0 j,

P. Rosrio et al./Contemporary Educational Psychology 43 (2015) 1024

the intra-school correlation, which measured the proportion of the

4.2.1. Three-level analyses

Note: Gender (1 female; 2 male).

P. Rosrio et al./Contemporary Educational Psychology 43 (2015) 1024

conduct a three-level analysis due to the small number of schools,

Conditional Model 2 included three class-level variables (type

P. Rosrio et al./Contemporary Educational Psychology 43 (2015) 1024

evidence of a statistically signicant change in students mean

4.3. Ancillary analysis

P. Rosrio et al./Contemporary Educational Psychology 43 (2015) 1024

time and effort. Initially, the participating teachers were not

controlled for the effects of six homework-related variables (i.e.,

P. Rosrio et al./Contemporary Educational Psychology 43 (2015) 1024

the classes enrolled (e.g., monitoring the work performed in class)

P. Rosrio et al./Contemporary Educational Psychology 43 (2015) 1024

follow-up practices in class (Rosrio et al., 2014a). Moreover, this

Joana drew an acute-angle triangle.

P. Rosrio et al./Contemporary Educational Psychology 43 (2015) 1024

P. Rosrio et al./Contemporary Educational Psychology 43 (2015) 1024

Xu, J. (2006). Gender and homework management reported by high

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