I think we're saying essentially the same thing. I am trying to contrast superficial learning, that could take just a few hours in a school year, to in-depth exploration of a subject. That's why some out-of-class work is required in my kids' middle school. BTW, state and national capitals show up on the geography bee (required for all students at our middle school) and the AP Human Geography course from what I've seen.

There is evidence that some homework is generally beneficial in 7-12th graders. http://www.dukenews.duke.edu/2006/03/homework.html

Anecdotally, my kids have better time-management skills and better study habits than I did - because they have to structure their time carefully.