For students, the biggest focus in school is grades. It is what everyone worries about, and all that anyone cares about. In all grade levels and in all subjects, it does not matter what was learned, as long as a good grade was the result. I am guilty of this too, obsessed with getting good grades. Part of this is the societal pressures put on students to succeed, another part is competition. Getting into college is very important,and the only way to do that is excelling in school. However, this should not be the only focus in school. Students stress out from all the homework, quizzes, tests and projects given every night but, "Grades follow learning, learning doesn't follow grades." This quote was said by my chemistry teacher Ms. Gallagher-Bolos, a big believer in learning, and not grades. This is Ms. Gallagher-Bolos's blog, look at the article "I don't show my own children their report cards," pertaining to this issue. gbnchem.blogspot.com
Reading this blog made me think a lot about the focus put on grades in school. Most people don't pay attention in class, don't care what they learn, and study very hard for the test so they can get a good grade. This puts tons of pressure on the student, trying to cram the night before, and this is a big reason why students get so stressed out. If we all payed more attention to learn the material when the teacher is teaching it, we would not have to study as hard. This is because we would have already learned all of the material, and the test would just show what we know. As opposed to studying FOR the test and memorizing the material. Studying for the test would be going over terms on a study guide or concept list, to make sure all of the material on the test would be learned, but not caring about the extra concepts not on the test but still pertaining to the subject matter.
My chem class has changed my views a lot about this topic. I still believe that grades are important, but not so much as it dictates intelligence, as I thought before. No matter what grades I get in my classes, I am still the same person and I am no smarter or stupider. I take school very seriously, always studying for my tests, very motivated to get the highest grades that I can. Because of this, it took time for me to realize that they don't take over the world. The good thing about colleges is that they don't only look at grades, which lightens the focus a little bit. ACT scores, essays and extracurricular activities are all parts of getting into college, emphasizing that grades aren't the only thing that matters. A big reason that students are so stressed out is because of grades for college. This stress is put on by parents, most teachers and other students as well. If everyone could realize that grades are not important as everyone thinks they are, stress could be eliminated and learning could be increased. This is not to say that grades don't matter and students shouldn't try in school, but less of the focus has to be put on the grades than the amount right now.
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ReplyDeleteI also believe that there is allot of pressure put upon students to do well in school. However I believe this pressure is good for our future status in our future professions. Many people don’t realize but education is no longer just a national competition but a global one. For college or even jobs you are not only competing with your classmates, but you are competing with a very wide variety of people that may work ten times harder that we do. I believe that we need to be instituted with this pressure from an early age so we can find ways to handle it and make ourselves more effective.
ReplyDeleteAs for grades them selves, that may be a broken system. Yet this system is what is feeding into the future systems of were our paths take us. For now students may rely on non academic measures to get them into college, but I feel as the future progresses students must make sure to shift the focus to mainly on academics, so we may compete in the global economy.