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Five years ago, Grade 4 teacher Eric Armitage routinely sent home spelling lists, math practice sheets and a nightly reading prescription with his nine- and 10-year-old students.

Then, a perfect storm stirred a change. Just as he began hearing more about heavy homework loads overburdening children and stripping them of time to play, he became a stepdad to a boy in Grade 1.

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“A task that should have taken a very short time, after we got home, (we were) just stressed out and fighting at the dinner table about how we can get more work out of him. It was just such a negative arena we were playing in,” said Armitage, who teaches at Lochearn elementary school in Rocky Mountain House.

He thought: “If this is happening at my house, and it’s only one kid, it’s got to be happening in other places.”

Armitage is one of several Alberta teachers who say they can teach just as effectively — and maybe better — without loading down their pupils’ backpacks with exercises and assignments.