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Cost aside, I have no idea how you do this without burning kids out. I like the longer year as I think they forget too much over the summer but not the longer day. They're toast by 7th hour as things are now.
Do you think some of the burn-out might be because kids don't have enough breaks during the school day? When I was in high school pre-stone age in England, we had 30 minutes recess at 11am, and 90 minutes at lunch time. Lengthening the day while including more break times may actually make students more receptive to learning. Plus it would give teachers more time during the school day to do at least some of the grading and prepping they currently do at home.
Schools are closing in on eliminating recess... Kindergartener's need less running/playing and need to come inside to learn how to say "Grandma" in Chinese. Because that's going to make them smart. K is now the new first grade. No Child Left Behind makes sure to rob every child of their own childhood, turn every teacher into a mindless machine, spouting out whatever the government tells them to, and keeps the American family scrambling to keep up with this destructive mindset that is unsustainable. Homeschool. Your kid would be better off reading a simple book at home than going to that child factory where they will be stamped, labeled, and fed a bunch of irrelevant material to memorize for the almighty standardized test. Anything is better.
Do you think some of the burn-out might be because kids don't have enough breaks during the school day? When I was in high school pre-stone age in England, we had 30 minutes recess at 11am, and 90 minutes at lunch time. Lengthening the day while including more break times may actually make students more receptive to learning. Plus it would give teachers more time during the school day to do at least some of the grading and prepping they currently do at home.
I've often thought they need a social hour and wonder how it would work if they had one on a regular basis. As things are now, our kids get an extended lunch on teacher PD days. However, it has the opposite effect. They're impossible to get back on task after just a 45 minute lunch. Maybe it's just that it's not the norm when we do it or maybe kids are different today than they were in the stone ages .
I would like to see a longer year and a shorter day. I'd like to try the experiment of giving an hour for lunch. That's long enough to socialize, and, hopefully, get it out of your system, or catch a 20 minute nap if you need one. I'd also like to see more than 5 minutes passing time between classes. Kids don't have time to use the bathroom and can't ask questions after class. I've read that the japanese model has 15 minutes between classes just so kids can ask questions after class.
Cell phone radio jammers are used by many teachers in my area. They also built the school structures using thick sheet steel plates and other jamming measures inside of the school. Of course, they do not completely render handsets unusable, but they do cut the signal quite well. By definition, it is unlawful to use a radio jammer to block mobile phone signals, but the law is often turned to a blind eye due to the fact that many students would rather use their phones than do their schoolwork.
It would be quite a blessing if the children who simply could not really care about their education to be filtered out. But instead, education is treated like a right and not a valuable privilege that is to be respected. In certain places like Japan or Europe, you are simply kicked out if you don't perform. The difference is that there, the children treat education as a special privilege and not a right. Hence why their education system is miles ahead of ours here in America.
Where do you live? These devices are illegal in the United States.
The strongest opposition won't be from teachers. It will be from parents. Most parents realize that a 10+ hour school day would not benefit their children in the slightest. This just happens to be an education board and there are a lot of teachers here. Go ahead and implement this and see how much opposition you get. As a mom, I wouldn't stand for my kids being in school 10 hours a day. 7 is too much but we'd have to have support from home to have a shorter day.
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Originally Posted by Kobber
Do you think some of the burn-out might be because kids don't have enough breaks during the school day? When I was in high school pre-stone age in England, we had 30 minutes recess at 11am, and 90 minutes at lunch time. Lengthening the day while including more break times may actually make students more receptive to learning. Plus it would give teachers more time during the school day to do at least some of the grading and prepping they currently do at home.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ivorytickler
I would like to see a longer year and a shorter day. I'd like to try the experiment of giving an hour for lunch. That's long enough to socialize, and, hopefully, get it out of your system, or catch a 20 minute nap if you need one. I'd also like to see more than 5 minutes passing time between classes. Kids don't have time to use the bathroom and can't ask questions after class. I've read that the japanese model has 15 minutes between classes just so kids can ask questions after class.
As a mom also, I would not want a 10 hour school day. As it is I am one of those parents who is often resentful of the compulsory attendance aspect of public education when I know for a fact my kids are watching movies or doing pointless worksheets yet they are "required" to be present. It annoys me, but homeschooling is not an option so what can you do?
I also agree that more time between classes, and more break time would be a benefit, even if it meant an extended school day. When I build my schedule for college classes, some semesters I have no choice but to set up classes back to back all day long with only 10 minutes in between. Being on a large campus, that's often just barely enough time to walk from one class to the other. I hate it when my schedule is like this and my mind feels scrambled at the end of the day. When I am able to structure my schedule instead to have larger chunks of time in-between classes, I find I am able to use that time to review what was just covered, organize my notes, and prep for the next class while giving my brain a break.
I do see how kids could benefit from designated time to be social and get it over with. I seem to remember my high school days as one long attempt at getting away with talking or passing notes and never having the time to talk freely (so we focused even more on trying to socialize when not appropriate!).
Our 10 year old doesn't have recess anymore most of the time and even though they are supposed to have PE, it is often a matter of jumping jacks for 10 minutes then back to work. There doesn't seem to be any time at all for a release of that physical energy.
Where do you live? These devices are illegal in the United States.
I WISH they weren't. If I could use a jammer, I wouldn't have to police cell phone use or worry about kids using cell phones to cheat. Cell phones are a serious problem is schools.
Last year, I had to have six versions of my tests and they had to be very different. Why? Because a copy of the test would be out there by the end of 1st hour. I never did figure out who was managing to get the pictures out but they did. I used one set for 1st hour, one set for my two back to back hours (didn't have an issue with pictures in that class but if they had time to talk to friends they were giving them answers) and then one version for my last hour which had time to talk to other students.
The amount of cheating I see is disheartening. Kids refer to cheating as "The American way".
As a mom also, I would not want a 10 hour school day. As it is I am one of those parents who is often resentful of the compulsory attendance aspect of public education when I know for a fact my kids are watching movies or doing pointless worksheets yet they are "required" to be present. It annoys me, but homeschooling is not an option so what can you do?
I also agree that more time between classes, and more break time would be a benefit, even if it meant an extended school day. When I build my schedule for college classes, some semesters I have no choice but to set up classes back to back all day long with only 10 minutes in between. Being on a large campus, that's often just barely enough time to walk from one class to the other. I hate it when my schedule is like this and my mind feels scrambled at the end of the day. When I am able to structure my schedule instead to have larger chunks of time in-between classes, I find I am able to use that time to review what was just covered, organize my notes, and prep for the next class while giving my brain a break.
I do see how kids could benefit from designated time to be social and get it over with. I seem to remember my high school days as one long attempt at getting away with talking or passing notes and never having the time to talk freely (so we focused even more on trying to socialize when not appropriate!).
Our 10 year old doesn't have recess anymore most of the time and even though they are supposed to have PE, it is often a matter of jumping jacks for 10 minutes then back to work. There doesn't seem to be any time at all for a release of that physical energy.
I wish high school were more like college but we have legal issues with that. Unfortuantely, what kids do while at school falls on us if we're not watching them every minute so they must be in class every minute they can be. I understand the purpose of giving only 5 minutes passing time is to force kids to rush so they don't have time to stand around and get into trouble.
I really do believe that the biggest thing wrong with education in the US is failure to hold students accountable for their own action or inaction. Instead, we try to control them like cattle. Other countries don't have to do this because they hold their young people responsible. They consider them adults in training. We're so worried about getting sued, we're hovering over ours and prodding them along with bells.
You know all of the hoopla about pre-K? Well it seems that all of the gain everybody talks about disappears by about the 5th grade. The reason, the study said, is what happens at home during summer vacations. The kids who aren't poor or who have caring parents stimulate their young kids during the summer. They take them to the library, read to them, take them on trips, etc., they don't just plop them in front of the TV, send them outside to play or ignore them.
I don't know about a longer school day but making them go to school during the summer (as long as the schools have AC) seems like a good idea.
You know all of the hoopla about pre-K? Well it seems that all of the gain everybody talks about disappears by about the 5th grade. The reason, the study said, is what happens at home during summer vacations. The kids who aren't poor or who have caring parents stimulate their young kids during the summer. They take them to the library, read to them, take them on trips, etc., they don't just plop them in front of the TV, send them outside to play or ignore them.
I don't know about a longer school day but making them go to school during the summer (as long as the schools have AC) seems like a good idea.
Could you post a link to the study?
Something I find interesting about what you posted is my parents did just send us out to play during the summer. That forced us to use our imaginations to avoid boredom. I thought it was good for us. What I see being bad is TV or computer games for kids. That's mindless entertainment.
I agree on the longer school day/year. I can see a longer year being beneficial. It wouldn't even have to be a longer year. You could take the current time off and break it up. That 11 week long summer break is long enough for kids to forget a lot.
You could take the current time off and break it up. That 11 week long summer break is long enough for kids to forget a lot.
I've always agreed with this suggestion.
Within our current calendar, I would like to see our state assessments given later in the school year. There are 22 student days after we give the VA SOL Reading assessment. Once the testing is completed, most of the students and admittedly most of the teachers are "done".
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