Despite a century of research and the ubiquity of homework, the broader ideological purposes and educational consequences of homework across various communities remain under-researched. Homework has been extensively researched quantitatively in terms of its effects on academic achievement and its effectiveness as an educational tool, yet the results are inconclusive on the impact of homework on learning and achievement for primary school students, where the largest increase in time spent on homework has occurred internationally in Western liberal democratic societies such as Britain, USA and Australia. Of particular significance is the absence of cross-cultural studies in homework, that take into account the effects of gender, race and class-differentiated relations between home and school in the reproduction of educational inequalities (Apple, 2001; Baker and LeTendre, 2005; Cooper, Civey Robinson et al. 2006; Hutchison, 2007;Patall, Cooper, et al. 2008).This paper develops a cross-cultural comparative analysis of homework practices in Australia, Scandinavia and Britain. Global reforms in welfare state provisions have entailed changes in family, school and governmental responsibilities regarding the care and education of children. This research focuses on the interrelationships between families and education systems in Australia, Denmark and England, through the micro-practice of homework. It examines the role of homework in relation to social equality and inequality by investigating the cultural meanings and impact of homework on learning and family life in three different sociocultural contexts.There are two core sets of issues this research seeks to address. The first is the issue of class-based educational disadvantage for certain groups of students and the role of homework in intensifying educational inequalities. The second is the effect of homework on home – school relationships and on the identities of the parents, teachers and children who are subject to its regulatory functions. From this, three key research questions arise:· To what extent and through which mechanisms does homework transmit, preserve or secure educational privilege for different groups of students? ·What insights emerge into home-school relations through a cross-cultural comparison of homework as a socioculturally located practice? What are the implications for social and educational policies? The study draws on the theoretical perspectives of Pierre Bourdieu, and uses the concepts of habitus, field and various forms of capital - social, cultural, economic and emotional - to examine the web of social relations, educational ideologies and activities shaping the practice of homework and the learning dispositions formed through the meeting of institutional and family habitus.

This qualitative, multi-site ethnographic study was conducted in school communities in Australia, Denmark and England; two socio-economically and ethnically diverse primary schools in each country. Research techniques included on-line surveys, face to face and virtual interviews and focus group discussions with children, parents, teachers and staff in six primary schools and after-school homework programs, observation of students doing homework in after-school programs and the discussion of student produced video homework diaries and digital stories. It is argued that this form of data production enriches the interpretative dimensions of cross cultural research, in creating a virtual space in which all participants (teachers, parents and students) have access to their own self-consciously crafted data and that of other participants.

One aim of this study is to develop innovative research methodologies in virtual ethnography. The research develops Digital Story Telling as a technique which describes and situates learning and synthesizes the preliminary findings from virtual discussion spaces hosting cross-cultural conversations of home and school based educational practices, from the multiple perspectives of students, teachers and parents. The methodology developed through this project develops techniques for use in virtual ethnography within the social sciences that have the capacity to enhance international research collaborations across disciplinary and cultural boundaries. The analysis describes the sets of sociocultural practices shaping the field of homework in various national settings and investigates the extent to which homework activates certain forms of social and cultural capital in schools and families to produce educational advantage and disadvantage.