Throughout high school I have
strived to get that glowing A on all my report cards and that is all I've
worked for. Every time I took a class my main goal was to get an A. Our school
system is based on these letters that every student thinks determines our fate.
Between us and our parents we believe that these measly letters are everything.
As a student I didn't even care if I learned or retained any information from
the classes I took. As long as I got an A, I reached my goal. Why has one letter
been our goal for 4 years?
As a student who is supposed to be learning
at school, I question if learning ever really happens. We are so consumed in
receiving good grades which we know will lead to being accepted into to college,
we ignore the fact that we should actually be learning what our teachers are trying
to embed into our brains. When was the last time you can say you did an
assignment without thinking about the grade? When was the last time you did an
assignment and reflected on why it was given to you and what you learned? We
all work for A’s because A’s equals college but once we get to college will we
even know what is going on? Because every assignment we do or test we take
revolves around the idea of an A instead of the idea of learning.
How can this be changed? Why does
our school system base our success off letters? The letters on our report card
may be acceptable for college but are our minds ready? All the students who
enter college as a freshman don’t all graduate at the end. Why? Was college too hard? Is the transition
from high school to college too big of a gap that students can’t handle the
pressure and change?
Rachel I think this thought has been going through most of our heads lately. We are all worried about our grades in high school that it takes the fun away from learning sometimes. Some students will cheat their whole way through school, and not learn a single thing when it's all said and done. The grading system that we have right now is the easiest way that we all know, so it will most likely stick around for a while.
ReplyDeleteTo be successful in college it's going to take a lot of extra time and an improvement of work ethic. Everyone in our ERW class has the potential to get their degree and I see that in the class room because I feel that we are all smart and want to be successful. If we all discipline ourselves and work hard then we will be successful in whatever we do.
Although I agree with everything you're saying how else will colleges figure out how we did in high school. Maybe rely on word-of-mouth from teachers but with all 200 students of theirs and all the colleges each student is applying to that is practically impossible. Or maybe they could rely on SAT scores but what would happen to the kids that are not good test takers. Realistically is there any other way that colleges will know our performance without the letter grades?
ReplyDeleteRach, I completely agree with you. I am literally always worried about what my grades are but what is really important is if I am learning or not. I feel like after I am finished with a class I just completely forget everything or feel as if I didn't even take away any new knowledge, even though I did well in the class according to my grade. Grades almost distract us because we end up just trying to figure out what exactly we can do to receive the grade we want rather than just focusing on the learning. I believe if we just focused on learning then the grades would come naturally. It's just so difficult for us since we are all wrapped up in those little letters that can help determine our future.
ReplyDeleteBig homie Rachel, I agree with everything you said. I can regulate to this blog because I feel like my high school experience has been one big video game. I played myself for the first 3 weeks until I let myself fail. Not fail in the grading book, but fail the ultimate goal of learning. Education is a very serious topic but many teenagers just play the game to advance on, not to pick up the necessary skills being "taught'.
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