Every year it seems the education system in the US just keeps getting crappier and more politically correct than ever before. I remember school, it wasn't too many years ago that I was in school. Did I benefit any from the public school system? Probably not.
I can't speak for private schools, for all I know those schools actually give a shit about educating their students. I do know that public school is nothing more than free daycare for children from the ages of 5-17.
I think the way teachers grade is ass backwards. There is really no need to be smart per sey, just do your homework like a mindless little drone and hope you at least get a D on the tests. I never was much one for homework though, so starting in the 6th grade my grades went downhill. I was a straight A student before all of that, but after a while I just stopped caring.
Here is the thing though, I still knew the material and I still did well on most of the tests. It didn't matter though, since I refused to do my homework I failed pretty much all of my classes from middle school on. Didn't matter that I did better on tests than a great deal of the class who did do their homework. Homework is what it all comes down to.
Homework may be a great way to create discipline, but as a means of educating it sucks. Seriously, if your mind doesn't have the capacity to understand the material without repeating it a million times for hours a night, you have problems. Homework will not solve those problems. But fear not, you may bite the big one when it comes to tests, but lucky for you homework is a huge chunk of your grade. Heaven forbid little Junior fails a class because he can't absorb enough knowledge to pass tests.
Looking back, it makes even less sense now than it did back then. A lot of stupid kids got good grades because they did their homework. I got bad grades, but I knew the material without reviewing it for hours and hours. So who really learned?
I think they really need to revamp the way grading is done. The one size fits all approach never works for anything, let alone educating. There should be testing done at the beginning of the year to see how proficient each student is. The dumb ones can get all of the homework they want, sure, why not? But for those a little more bright maybe test scores should play more of a significant role in the final grade received.
At the beginning of this post I stated that I probably benefited very little from the public education system, and that is the truth. Whatever skills I have, be it writing or whatever else, I have because I WANTED to learn. I read in my own free time as a kid, which has served me well. You cannot make somebody learn, no matter how much homework your shove down their throat. If they want to be dumb they'll be dumb. I didn't learn because I went to school, I learned in spite of going to school. Seriously, how many illiterate high school graduates are there? Probably a surprisingly huge number.
So, to conclude, not everybody learns the same way so certainly not everybody should be graded the same way. Is it so wrong to think things need to change?
I can't speak for private schools, for all I know those schools actually give a shit about educating their students. I do know that public school is nothing more than free daycare for children from the ages of 5-17.
I think the way teachers grade is ass backwards. There is really no need to be smart per sey, just do your homework like a mindless little drone and hope you at least get a D on the tests. I never was much one for homework though, so starting in the 6th grade my grades went downhill. I was a straight A student before all of that, but after a while I just stopped caring.
Here is the thing though, I still knew the material and I still did well on most of the tests. It didn't matter though, since I refused to do my homework I failed pretty much all of my classes from middle school on. Didn't matter that I did better on tests than a great deal of the class who did do their homework. Homework is what it all comes down to.
Homework may be a great way to create discipline, but as a means of educating it sucks. Seriously, if your mind doesn't have the capacity to understand the material without repeating it a million times for hours a night, you have problems. Homework will not solve those problems. But fear not, you may bite the big one when it comes to tests, but lucky for you homework is a huge chunk of your grade. Heaven forbid little Junior fails a class because he can't absorb enough knowledge to pass tests.
Looking back, it makes even less sense now than it did back then. A lot of stupid kids got good grades because they did their homework. I got bad grades, but I knew the material without reviewing it for hours and hours. So who really learned?
I think they really need to revamp the way grading is done. The one size fits all approach never works for anything, let alone educating. There should be testing done at the beginning of the year to see how proficient each student is. The dumb ones can get all of the homework they want, sure, why not? But for those a little more bright maybe test scores should play more of a significant role in the final grade received.
At the beginning of this post I stated that I probably benefited very little from the public education system, and that is the truth. Whatever skills I have, be it writing or whatever else, I have because I WANTED to learn. I read in my own free time as a kid, which has served me well. You cannot make somebody learn, no matter how much homework your shove down their throat. If they want to be dumb they'll be dumb. I didn't learn because I went to school, I learned in spite of going to school. Seriously, how many illiterate high school graduates are there? Probably a surprisingly huge number.
So, to conclude, not everybody learns the same way so certainly not everybody should be graded the same way. Is it so wrong to think things need to change?
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