What boring homework really teaches smart kids

Homework is seen as a kind of cop-out. Kids spend all day at school learning and stuff, and then they have to go home and do more?

The most common reaction is hell-to-the-no!

It’s not hard to see their point of view. Isn’t that what parents are paying teachers for?

If you go to the butchers and pay for a steak, does the butcher make you carve it at home? If you go get a haircut, does the dude or dudette with the scissors make you do your own trims?

Then what’s with the take-home assignments?

I’ll tell you. It’s to teach one massively important life skill.

While homework doesn’t necessarily drive academic performance—especially not for the smart kids—it drives kids to be creative and forthright.

Instead of spending their valuable down-time on nothing math questions, the acidity of various cola brands, or the completely boring convict history of Australia, smart kids are driven to take a different path entirely.

Rather than completing boring homework, these clever cookies do what they want, then figure out how to smash out some work and get away with doing a rush job.