Oh dear-- you have my sympathies. I was predicting the rest of your post right about:
But I thought he had been slowly working on this homework for the past 3 weeks.
Sort of how I anticipated that DD was slowly working, having "stretched herself" to choose a project for English Lit that was going to be a serious challenge...
Instead, she then proceeded to freak out that she didn't know HOW to do the execution of the project...
so she ignored it until 3 days before it was due. While she was otherwise SUPER over-scheduled. Yes, this was nearly an all-nighter, with me yelling at her about what a thoroughly dumb decision it had been to choose "yes, I'll challenge myself" and then fail to follow through, or-- you know--
ask for help.