Spanish views from a small town

It's five thirty in the afternoon and a seven -year-old child has arrived home from school. After eating a sandwich, he sits down, takes out his textbooks and notebooks and does his homework. A typical scene in a typical town. There are parents who don't want that to be so typical. Depending on the school and on the teacher, Spanish children sometimes get excessive homework. Given that many schools still have the split day of class in the morning, lunch at home at midday, and more class in the afternoon, that doesn't leave much time for after-school activities. It's even worse in the winter when darkness falls just after many of these children get home. This year, some important parent associations have called for a strike against homework on   weekends in the month of November. A growing number of people do not want children doing homework, claiming it is a failure of the school system to send home exercises that should have been covered in school. They want to foll...