Homework Overload

I'm practically banging my head against a wall EVERY night. I hate homework, I think more than anything else in the world right now. I don't understand why we spend 8 hours a day at school learning... why do we need to spend 3 or more hours when we get home doing the same thing? Granted, homework is designed to help you have extra practice... but wouldn't it make more sense to further your own knowledge on your own, not to be required. I also think that homework should be based on effort, not actual understanding of the subject... is it our fault that we weren't taught properly to our learning needs? Why does the school put so much stress on the way individual children learn, and not try to cater to each kind of person? There are some teachers that actually do extremely well at trying to help all children, but others have taught in one way for so long that they don't care to try a different approach. I'm just sayin!