So I'm really annoyed at my school's math homework system.  Basically, instead of taking homework and grading it every day, we have homework quizzes, which have us redo the problem from the homework while looking at our homework.  This opens a lot of loopholes for the amount of homework done in class, as people could potentially just write down the problems and show the work on the homework quizzes (a few teachers are actually smart like my Trig teacher).
I'm currently in AP Stats and Honors Trig and the homework system just irks me.  I have no incentive to do my homework because it isn't getting graded right away, and in the case of Stats, I know when my homework quiz is so I can just blow it off until the day before and do it all.
My question to you guys is how does your school/did your school handle math homework?  How do you think it should be handled?  Do you agree with my school's way of doing math homework?

oh my gosh.... this thread kind of freaks me out.....

This is EXACTLY how I did my homework checks for years.... Nobody else did it that way or told me to do it that way. I came up with that strategy after several attempts and fails at other methods of evaluating and assessing what students had known or done.  I tweaked it a little every year though, trying to address exactly what you've stated annoyance with.

(Honestly... I had NO idea ANYONE did this... it was all my idea, as far as I was aware! I thought other teachers would hate it...)

Anyways, last year when I was still teaching, I found a pretty feasible compromise.  I still did homework quizzes almost every day so that I could grade just a FEW problems and provide feedback to my students (as well as assess how successful or not I was).......  but I also ALWAYS walked around the room to see how much homework they had actually done.  I did this while they were taking the quiz so that no time was wasted.  Since I'm familiar with the homework, it was easy to tell who was BS'ing stuff and who wasn't.

However, there are always kids who copy other students' homework just to have something down.  This was another useful aspect of the homework quiz:  I'd pick questions that were unique enough (or had little twists), that cheating students would stick out like a sore thumb. 

Through practicing this method and other little tweaks, I cut down on cheating and improved my students' scores a LOT.

I totally, totally get you though. I didn't even like the method, but it was simply the most productive. Through a teacher's lens, you'd be surprised at how HARD it is to find a viable solution to the homework and accountability issue....

How did I do math homework? Is that what you are asking? 

If so, I remember 2 of my math classes. In Pre-Cal Honors of my first semester of my Junior year, we had a 90 minute or so block of class. The first 45, the teacher would usually teach what we were supposed to learn for the day. Then, she would give us a few problems that we had to do before the class was over. If we got them all correct, then she would give us the homework. I usually would get about halfway through my homework, and ask if I did it correctly. If I did, then I would save the last half of it for home. If not, I would ask for re-instruction, since I was pretty smart in math, and the entire Junior class knew it. I usually tutored a few people after school, and then some others every other day at lunch or breakfast. 

Then, when I had Geometer, which was combined with Trig, there was a textbook. All odds in the lesson. I would sometimes do the homework about a week ahead, and teach myself. The teacher actually appreciated it. I ended up becoming a teaching assistant for that class, and got the right to request 1 class, and it be guaranteed because I helped the teacher teach and tutored so many people. 

So, I mean, there were different methods of how homework were done, but it was generally just graded on if you did it, and they checked a few given problems to made sure you did it right. If I remember correctly, the teacher that did Pre-Cal would have "quizzes" on Wednesday, and "Tests" on Fridays. All of the homework also counted a test grade, and she graded every question, too. 

Singelli : Ever hear of methods like that? 

Singelli :  The only teacher who does it exactly how you do it (that I know of) is the math team teacher, and she only does that with the non-honors/AP classes.  I think that's a better way to make sure homework is done, because it gives more incentive to do it because you have a quiz EVERY DAY.  One of my teachers obviously doesn't think that, so she thinks the only way to have us do homework is to give us a comment on our progress report that says our homework isn't done.  That's not as damaging to me, but if I got bad grades on daily homework quizzes I would be more likely to do my homework.
I really think homework needs to be checked daily to be as foolproof as possible.  Too bad that none of my teachers do it, and as a result, I don't feel like I have to do my homework.

At my school it was all based on the teacher. There was one math class where homework was collected every day, graded and given back the next day, there were a few classes where it was taken and never seen again and the grades were never told, and there were some classes where the teacher would walk around and grade the homework right there on the spot. I'm not really used to having homework graded at all.

Maybe I misunderstood a bit of your first post?  How is what your current teacher does different from what I do?

(And simple comments on reports are stupid....A) Most people don't care.  B) Parents won't necessarily see it.  C)  Um... hello... it's a little too late to notify anyone.  :/)

I always thought grades on daily homework quizzes would offer incentives to students, but I found that it was a rather delicate balance.  If too many kids failed the quizzes by not doing their homework (or not understanding), their grades would shoot down, they'd get discouraged and/or mad, and then stubborn games would ensue.  If all the problems on the quizzes were super easy and everyone passed the quizzes with flying colors, students wouldn't strive to better their practice, and then flunk the tests.

I understand that checking homework daily is important... but it's also time consuming. This is where smart planning should take place.  Teachers should assign fewer problems, grade a random select few every day, or even have kids swap and grade every now and then.... There are tons of solutions... each with their own pros and cons.

thing1 :  I'm not sure which strategy you are referring to.

Singelli : Grading homework and using it as tests? I thought that that was what you were referring to in your posts. 

thing1 :  No no no.. I use them as quizzes.... not tests.  Also, why would you ask me if I've seen/used a method I described in my first post?  *scratches head in confusion*

Singelli : Not the methods in your post... the methods in my post. * facepalm * 

Edit Note: I summoned myself instead of Singelli * Double faceplam * 

mlb789 :
Those quizzes you're talking about are new to me...
We have a system where we do our assignments throughout the week and on Friday we typically pass our notebooks to the teacher for grading.
We used to have a system (actually, I think the younger classes might still be using it) where we handed in our assignments EVERY lesson and did our next assignments in our spare notebooks (this could be said for most subjects in our programme, actually). Ideally we had one notebook on our hands while the teacher was checking our other one.

Singelli : I'd like to know how you grade your papers, because the way my teacher does it just makes me mad.
When I'm doing my homework I don't need to organize my work too much. If it's a formula she has us do I know how to plug it into my calculator, and that means I don't need to show my work. Also, I'm not willing to take the time to show it because I don't need to show it in order to do it. I'm confused as to why teachers do this because it gets annoying when my grade isn't as high as it should be even though I'm acing quizzes and tests but missing heaps of homework on homework quizzes because I do my homework differently.
/rant.