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There are changes that can be made within a school that can have a big impact in education. I listed three:
Discipline enforcement
Holding students accountable
Administrators supporting teachers
I think working on these three could really improve education in any school.
These don't happen now, so how would they be enforced? That's what I'm talking about. I'm not saying various things will not help, what I'm saying is these things will not be done by those in charge. It is wishful thinking.
Which is akin to doing homework at home after dinner.
And there were some years where my son did have excessive homework especially in middle school.
He was in band and they played at the football games. You'd think the teachers would consider that before assigning the normal homework load. You had players, band, cheer and most of the school showing up a 6pm for a football game. School was over at 3:30 but band practice went til 5:00. I picked up my son and did FF to get him some food before having to return to school so he could play. Get home at 9pm and then start homework ?
You keep saying 'excessive homework', yet I'm wondering what amount of homework you consider excessive. One hour of homework? Two?
I understand the point you're trying to make, however I think it depends on what age/grade you're talking about. I understand not loading elementary and early middle school students with homework, however I think it's important to teach these individuals (high school included) to use their time wisely in the classroom and at home. If you're in high school and you know that practices/games can interfere with your studies or time spend at home, then you need to consider that before signing up for those activities.
When these high schoolers go to college, their professors aren't going to say "Well since you have to work tonight, I'm not going to assign you homework". Many college students have jobs, social lives, and extra curricular activities outside of the classroom and they have to prioritize all of these things. That is what high school is trying to do (although I know sometimes it can see overwhelming). Learning how to stay organized and multi-task.
To address the issue of teachers taking into consideration extra curricular events that may interfere with students getting their homework/studying done- this can be extremely difficult at the middle/high school level. It's not just one sport or activity that is taking place during the week. A teacher simply pushing back a test or not assigning homework on a Tuesday may work for the boys basketball schedule, but what happens when the girls have a game on Wednesday and the math bowl has a meet on Thursday, etc. And it's not as easy as just limiting the amount of homework either, because when these older students take 7 or 8 classes it starts to add up.
You keep saying 'excessive homework', yet I'm wondering what amount of homework you consider excessive. One hour of homework? Two?
I understand the point you're trying to make, however I think it depends on what age/grade you're talking about. I understand not loading elementary and early middle school students with homework, however I think it's important to teach these individuals (high school included) to use their time wisely in the classroom and at home. If you're in high school and you know that practices/games can interfere with your studies or time spend at home, then you need to consider that before signing up for those activities. When these high schoolers go to college, their professors aren't going to say "Well since you have to work tonight, I'm not going to assign you homework". Many college students have jobs, social lives, and extra curricular activities outside of the classroom and they have to prioritize all of these things. That is what high school is trying to do (although I know sometimes it can see overwhelming). Learning how to stay organized and multi-task.
To address the issue of teachers taking into consideration extra curricular events that may interfere with students getting their homework/studying done- this can be extremely difficult at the middle/high school level. It's not just one sport or activity that is taking place during the week. A teacher simply pushing back a test or not assigning homework on a Tuesday may work for the boys basketball schedule, but what happens when the girls have a game on Wednesday and the math bowl has a meet on Thursday, etc. And it's not as easy as just limiting the amount of homework either, because when these older students take 7 or 8 classes it starts to add up.
How many classes do you take in a college semester ? Is it 7 or 8 ?
No..it's anywhere from 3-5. And you can drop classes if the workload of all of them put together is too much.
And you can schedule a mix of easy classes and hard classes.
How many classes do you take in a college semester ? Is it 7 or 8 ?
No..it's anywhere from 3-5. And you can drop classes if the workload of all of them put together is too much.
And you can schedule a mix of easy classes and hard classes.
You can't do that in K-12.
Is that all you got from my post?
If you can learn to multi-task and prioritize in high school than you're well on your way to doing that in college (when teachers and parents aren't hovering anymore) and in your career. Obviously every school is different. The one I went to and the one in my corp. allows students to take 4-5 subjects a day (M/W/F classes and then T/R classes), which has a similar feel to college. Basically, if you can learn to deal with it in high school (with the support of parents, teachers, etc.) then you can deal with being independent in college and your career.
If you can learn to multi-task and prioritize in high school than you're well on your way to doing that in college (when teachers and parents aren't hovering anymore) and in your career. Obviously every school is different. The one I went to and the one in my corp. allows students to take 4-5 subjects a day (M/W/F classes and then T/R classes), which has a similar feel to college. Basically, if you can learn to deal with it in high school (with the support of parents, teachers, etc.) then you can deal with being independent in college and your career.
My post was about my son in MS..a 12 year old that I would not compare to a 19 year old in college or a 17 year old in HS.
Ivory,
The parents are the child's main teacher in everything in life, including education. You can send a child to the best school around, but he won'tdo well if the parents are helping out with the child's school work and modeling a good work ethic. Period.
Get politicans out of education. There should always be a set fixed amount for education in any state, and all schools should receive funds fairly. Politicians are crooked, bought off liars, so the farther they are kept from the money for schools, the better. Try to change the American culture to really value a good education. This is really going to be hard, but the American people have to understand that the young people today are our future, good education or bad.
Teachers aren't paid very well, they can't afford to buy supplies for the kids all the time either. Teachers are also under valued in this culture. School teachers really aren't respected at all by the community, or parents, so why would the children respect them?
As a parent, YOU are responsible for your childs education, in every way. Don't pass off all the responsiblity onto society. Know what your child is doing in school, do homework with them, keep an eye out on what grades they get.
By following and guiding your child's lessons at school, you are showing them that school work is important. It's important enough for you to know how that are doing, and what they are doing in school. Don't say that you are too busy, or too tired. Don't have kids if you don't care about them. Sounds blunt and nasty, but it's true.
Last edited by Oldhag1; 07-24-2014 at 07:30 AM..
Reason: Fixed formatting
You keep saying 'excessive homework', yet I'm wondering what amount of homework you consider excessive. One hour of homework? Two?
I understand the point you're trying to make, however I think it depends on what age/grade you're talking about. I understand not loading elementary and early middle school students with homework, however I think it's important to teach these individuals (high school included) to use their time wisely in the classroom and at home. If you're in high school and you know that practices/games can interfere with your studies or time spend at home, then you need to consider that before signing up for those activities.
When these high schoolers go to college, their professors aren't going to say "Well since you have to work tonight, I'm not going to assign you homework". Many college students have jobs, social lives, and extra curricular activities outside of the classroom and they have to prioritize all of these things. That is what high school is trying to do (although I know sometimes it can see overwhelming). Learning how to stay organized and multi-task.
To address the issue of teachers taking into consideration extra curricular events that may interfere with students getting their homework/studying done- this can be extremely difficult at the middle/high school level. It's not just one sport or activity that is taking place during the week. A teacher simply pushing back a test or not assigning homework on a Tuesday may work for the boys basketball schedule, but what happens when the girls have a game on Wednesday and the math bowl has a meet on Thursday, etc. And it's not as easy as just limiting the amount of homework either, because when these older students take 7 or 8 classes it starts to add up.
I, honestly, think we are way past the need for year round schools. If school was year round, we could shorten the day and lessen the workload on both students and teachers on a day to day basis. To cut one hour of school per day, you'd need to add 30 days to the school year. That's 6 weeks of school. Kids would still have 5 weeks off in the summer and teachers would have 4. I'd go one farther and make it a true trimester system with 5 classes taught at a time. That works out to a little less class time for each class compared to a 7 class schedule but 2 classes less homework per night for students and an hour more per day to get it done.
Ivory,
The parents are the child's main teacher in everything in life,
including education.
You can send a child to the best school around, but he won't
do well if the parents are helping out with the child's school work
and modeling a good work ethic.
Period.
Get politicans out of education. There should always be a set fixed amount
for education in any state, and all schools should receive funds fairly.
Politicans are crooked, bought off liars, so the farther they are kept from
the money for schools, the better.
Try to change the American culture to really value a good education.
This is really going to be hard, but the American people have to understand that
the young people today are our future, good education or bad.
Teachers aren't paid very well, they can't afford to buy supplies for the kids all
the time either.
Teachers are also under valued in this culture. School teachers really aren't respected
at all by the community, or parents, so why would the children respect them?
As a parent, YOU are responsible for your childs education, in every way.
Don't pass off all the responsiblity onto society.
Know what your child is doing in school, do homework with them, keep an eye out
on what grades they get.
By following and guiding your child's lessons at school, you are showing them that
school work is important. It's important enough for you to know how that are doing, and
what they are doing in school.
Don't say that you are too busy, or too tired.
Don't have kids if you don't care about them.
Sounds blunt and nasty, but it's true.
The responsibility has already been passed off onto society. Preaching that it shouldn't be that way changes nothing. Schools still have to deal with the situation.
I agree that teachers are disrespected, undervalued and under paid (that's why we need teacher's unions) but that will not change. Society will not change. We have to do the best job we can with what we have available. That's why I stated that we cannot fix it all. We can't fix parents and we can't fix society's attitude about education. We have to work within the parameters given to us.
How many classes do you take in a college semester ? Is it 7 or 8 ?
No..it's anywhere from 3-5. And you can drop classes if the workload of all of them put together is too much.
And you can schedule a mix of easy classes and hard classes.
You can't do that in K-12.
College is totally different than high school. To start with, few classes meet every day so students will usually have at least two days to get an assignment done. College students also spend a lot less time in class giving them more time to do homework. I understand the amount of homework assigned in college is down to about 1 hour per class hour (used to be 2 hours per class hour but we've dummied down college to accommodate less able students). If a student is in class 15 hours and gets 15 hours of homework, that's 30 hours per week. The average high school student is in school 35 hours per week (counting lunch because they're not on their own time). Students can expect their workload to go down when they reach college. They'll be taking 4 or 5 classes at a time not 6-8. They'll spend 12-18 hours in class not 30. A student taking a 12 hour load can finish everything in 24 hours a week. A student taking an 18 credit load will need 36 hours. College students no longer have a time crunch now that less homework is given and less is taught.
I don't know how you can leave parents out of this, but I presume you mean, since we can't impose any change on parents let's not propose any changes to that community - which makes sense for this discussion.
3 things -
1 - Return a sense of "value" to vocational education - we need welders - damn good ones, along with good builders, mechanics etc. Let's place a higher value on their roles and therefore their training, so they aren't lookked upon as solely the kids who can't make it in college.
2 - Devalue early specialization. There is preasure (from multiple directions) to focus learning in specialized areas earlier and earlier - this is a disservice to the student for two reasons: It allows them to ignore some things they should learn in school and the risk of a failure in their chosen subject becomes catastrophic. In my perfect world - High school and under graduate school would be years of exploration - Students would be guided to expanding their knowledge and academic viewpoints. They would be challenged to be able to communicate the "why's" and "how's" rather than just the "whats."
3. - Challenging standards - I think we have enugh high stakes assessments, they can be tweaked and improved, but I'm talking about local standards, teachers setting expectations and grading to them - not everyone is getting A's simply by passing at grade level. Teahcers would engage students, challenge them to question, answer and then re-question their answers. Along with the process would need to be helping identfy those who pursure academic education and those who head toward vocational training. Neither is better or worse, each just helps the individual seek out their happiness in a rewarding way. I want the best chemistry students to become the best chemists and the best body artists to become the best body artists.
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College is totally different than high school. To start with, few classes meet every day so students will usually have at least two days to get an assignment done. College students also spend a lot less time in class giving them more time to do homework. I understand the amount of homework assigned in college is down to about 1 hour per class hour (used to be 2 hours per class hour but we've dummied down college to accommodate less able students). If a student is in class 15 hours and gets 15 hours of homework, that's 30 hours per week. The average high school student is in school 35 hours per week (counting lunch because they're not on their own time). Students can expect their workload to go down when they reach college. They'll be taking 4 or 5 classes at a time not 6-8. They'll spend 12-18 hours in class not 30. A student taking a 12 hour load can finish everything in 24 hours a week. A student taking an 18 credit load will need 36 hours. College students no longer have a time crunch now that less homework is given and less is taught.
