This is one issue that I'm passionate about. Research increasingly implies that homework is probably harmful in elementary; of dubious value in early middle school; and only valuable in high school and beyond.
> and objective performance assessments
I think some of these radical experiments are crazy. But, there's valid reasons to consider e.g. not grading missing absent assignments as a zero. A few of them:
A) If our goal is for grades to reflect demonstrated student mastery --- a missing assignment doesn't indicate that proportion of mastery "missing." Especially if it has been demonstrated satisfactorily on an exam or by other measures.
B) A couple zeroes on a gradebook can be an insurmountable hill to climb-- leaving no further grade incentive at all for students to work hard in the class.
C) Grades are strong motivation for already-strong students with the most involved parents, but can actually be demotivating for the bulk of your class. An effective teacher needs to find other ways to motivate students. For many students, grades are something that can make one feel bad about oneself but not provide an opportunity for positive differentiation.
The classes I teach are "easy A's" in the gradebook for most of my students... and are incredibly demanding compared to normal MS/HS fare. This requires buy-in from my students. I work to build genuine curiosity and in-class competition (on a variety of axes where all students can excel, not just the top couple dunking on everyone else).
Otherwise this resonates with me so much. Your kids are so lucky to have you.
Everyone's different-- what helps one student may harm a couple others. On average, homework looks bad for the young. One reason why is that there's no one there to enforce correctness, so you could easily have dedicated incorrect practice. There's some neat ideas about this, like flipped classrooms. (You send a video lesson home with 1-2 questions to enforce compliance with watching the lesson, and then have the practice happen in the classroom. But this is extraordinarily effort heavy for the educator and there are other drawbacks).
> Turns out I had undiagnosed ADHD and Autism, and makework was valuable for me early but useless for me as I grew into myself.
I had pretty rough middle school years, too. I'm trying to make it all better for my students.
> Otherwise this resonates with me so much. Your kids are so lucky to have you.
I'm a new teacher (previously an engineer/entrepreneur) and ... definitely one of the weaker members of faculty overall. I'm in awe of the teachers around me. But I'm definitely trying to understand as much as I can from research and my own observations of students.