Ingles2, what I mean is that I am capable of thinking up things that I think a person should know about and then thinking up opportunities for them to learn about those things. In fact, I can think up better ways of learning than looking something up on the internet and writing it out on some bits of paper.
I agree that at secondary school there is not enough time in the school day to cover all the curriculum required to get good exam grades, and so teachers, who are experts in exam requirements should set homework.
But primary school age children shouldn't have exams as their main focus. They should be learning all the time, and it is a basic skill of a parent to know how to teach them about the world.
I didn't think 'ooh, I'll have a child even though I'm entirely vacuous and a cultural blank, and I'll pass nothing on to them and let the school be totally responsible for their education.'
I actually do have ideas and interests and areas of specialisms of my own, and some of them are shock! horror! not on the incredibly narrow national curriculum. Even the things on the national curriculum I do feel fairly capable of passing on to my children.
I know what my child can and cannot do, what their strengths and weaknesses are, and how they can learn in conjunction with me and their sibling. I don't need to be given a project by a school.
Here's my son's latest project: he is rearing six chickens, looks after them, and is collecting and selling their eggs himself. I suspect he has learnt a lot more about responsibility, commitment, biology and maths than copying something out off the internet and handing it in to a teacher.