Reading this truely shocked me; why is an extended day at school even considered. The article even claimed that there were mixed results about students attending the molded schedule and the new extended one. If the results basically turn out the same, there is absolutely no reason for an extended schedule. Not only does it interupt what a student does in their daily life, it would cost the school more money. About 950$ per student.
What's even worse, is that parents actually favor the extended schedule, thinking that it will give their child more knowledge when in fact it does not. The teachers are also in support for this idea for it gives them more time to plan out what they do in class. For me, that does not seem exciting; I can barely handle listening to the same material for 8 hours a day.I have a feeling this will not be implemented in schools for it interferes with the sports programs and it just costs too much for our school to handle.
14 comments:
While I think this idea is slightly insane, I must play devil's advocate for a minute. If the school day were lengthened, students could learn more and teachers would teach more information that they could have previously eliminated, because it was not as important as some of the other topics covered. This would be especially beneficial to an AP class where teachers only stress the material that could possibly appear on the AP exam in May.
Furthermore, if we look at the US ranking in education compared to other countries, we are at the bottom. I find it funny that students from other countries are forced to learn our language, while we have the OPTION of studying another language. If we look at out current school day, we are no where near the time other nations spend in school. For goodness sake, in some countries they are forced to go to school on Saturday. We are not. I say we have it pretty lucky, but I don't favor the longer school days.
Last, I agree with you I don't think this new proposal will be put in place due to the fast pace of our daily lives.
I think that the idea of a extended school day is outrageous. Students that are already crammed with homework and school work while balancing their school sports activities dont need even more work on top of that. i feel that if the school day was extended then students would have to deal with even more stress then they already have to deal with.
- Vernon Wong
I remeber hearing about a school extending its hours in Oakland.Because of the crime rate among high school students in that community, the school decided to make the hours longer. By making school hours longer they hoped there would be a decrease in crime. It ended up being successful because the long school hours took the kids off the street, and therefore decreased the crime rate.
I think that lengthening the school time would only be appropriate in situations like these.
Well, I don't see anything wrong with an extended school schedule, provided that the expectations of homework and extracurricular activities are lowered to concentrate. While such a change will definitely seem outrageous, I think we can afford to consider it and do research to see if it will work. It will take some drastic changes to implement, though.
I think the cost alone would make this too work out successfully. I do agree with the summary saying that it is more convenient for teachers just because the longer class periods would make it easier to teach and like Emily said, teachers would not have to rush to cram in everything at the last minute before the bell rings. People in San Mateo High School say that since they have longer class periods (because of the block scheduling) teachers are less pressured with time because the extra 45 minutes or so guarantee that there will be enough time for their lesson plan. If there was an extra day off of school, however, I think this idea would be very useful. If the school day was longer, but we had three days off of school for example, this could make up for the time that would be lost during the school week so that students could do extracurriculars and sports on that extra day instead.
I can definitely understand why administrators would consider a longer school day. At a glance, a longer school day would give teachers who complain about short class periods more time to do what they want during classes. However,schools already have problems with students cutting class and I feel that a longer school day would only encourage this. On top of financial costs, longer hours would leave less time for extracurricular activities.
Perhaps we're looking at this the wrong way. The class periods don't have to be longer, but maybe the lunch period could just be extended. I think we can all say that we wish we had an extra half hour or even an extra hour during lunch to study, play a sport, or just to eat comfortably. In France, students have five days of school just like us, only the time at school is from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. with a two hour lunch break. Now this would basically mean that the class times are about the same if we were to adopt this system of adding an extra hour or so to lunch. And even if we were to extend the class times, I think it would be good considering a lot of people would have more time with certain teacher to get help if needed, and I've personally heard a lot of people say that they just don't get the material in class. Also, just to point out, the murder rate in the U.S. is much higher than in France, so... maybe this would help keep kids off the streets, but I'm just saying...
Personally, I'd like to see the length of the school day stay the same. I am not convinced that the length of the school day is the cause of our country's less-than-stellar academic performance. The 7:50 am - 3:50 pm is not terrible, and my attitude is "If it ain't broke, don't fix it."
Other countries may have different schedules, but that is because of their different cultures. Concerning Michael's example of France, French culture generally places larger emphasis on sit-down meal time (source: some cooking show on PBS hosted by some French guy). I attended a K-12 school in India for a couple of years, and my school day was 7:00 am to 4:00 pm. But there aren't many after-school sports or such in India, so a longer day makes sense for Indian students.
Though I agree that extending the school day would be unnecessary, it seems to me as though a lot of blame for school-related stress here is being attributed to the school itself. Not all of the stress is the school's fault. For example, the school does not force a student to take AP classes, or sports. Whatever personal reasons there are behind it, one has chosen the activity. By choosing those activities, one essentially tells the school (for the most part) that those combined activities would be within their capability. It is their responsibility as a student to create a situation for themselves in which they may work without overwhelming themselves.
I agree as well that extended school days would be unnesecary or even a step backwards, for I think that extending school hours would hurt students more then help them, for it takes time out of the students already busy schedule which would make it much more difficult for students to just "stop and smell the roses". Plus it probably will induce more stress in an already stressful enviorment. Also I don't understand in the logic in adding more hours if the school loses money becuase then schools would have to lower pay and cut school programs to make up for the deficit in funds.
I have a friend in Japan who goes to school for 9 hours and then goes to secondary school for another 5. That is what is really crazy. Maybe an extended school day is what America need to catch up with the rest of the world eventually. However, that is not at all practical today. First of all, our down economy cannot financially support this. Second, the America's culture does not have nearly enough discipline, like Japan, to pull this off. Third, this change will be resisted by almost everyone (students, anyways) who do not think that they can handle any more school. The cost is not at all worth it.
There has been an extensive discussion on this topic by now, but I read through the comment thread and was surprised that one idea never came up. I hope this isn't too much of a tangent because it doesn't relate directly to the length of the school day, per say, but one alternative option for changing American education for the better (a.k.a, boosting students' achievement levels) is for the start of the school day to be later in the morning. There is extensive evidence out there that starting the school day later in the morning increases students' overall alertness and productivity during the day, which leads to better grades and a more rewarding education and use of time. (This is explained by teenagers' delayed circadian rhythms, or internal biological clocks. That means teenagers feel more alert and awake at later times of the day than adults or children do. Do you find it easier to wake up on late start Wednesdays?) If schools tried this, I think it would be beneficial in several different ways and could achieve some of the same goals of lengthening the school day.
I'll be really honest: I am in favor of extending the school day. I think that more time at school would give students the opportunity to take more classes that they enjoy. Students who want to take a language and an elective in addition to their required classes could do that without an issue. If there were students who did not wish to take extra classes, that's okay too; they could leave school early, as many students at Aragon who don't have a seventh do. There are a lot of classes at Aragon that I would love to take, but they don't fit into my schedule. Having a longer school day, with more periods, would allow me to take those classes.
Also, having more periods would mean there could be more core classes. If we had more time slots for students to take chemistry, for example, the classes would be smaller and the instruction would be more personal. Smaller classes tend to lend themselves to better education; why would we deny people the opportunity to learn more in the same amount of time?
Obviously, the biggest problem with a longer school day is the cost. Schools like Menlo have a day with more periods, and many student groups (like sports teams and clubs) meet in the middle of the school day. This seems like it would be better for the students, who get to learn more, and the teachers, who have smaller classes, but Menlo has the capital to do that without regard to the state/ federal budgetary woes. Clearly, the SMUHSD does not have the necessary money to fund this educational possibility.
I think that the idea of extending school is crazy. I agree in that I don't think that extending school would increase the knowledge of students. Plus, it's pretty obvious that extending school would increase the amount of money needed for school supplies and related materials. Extending school would interfere dramatically, in my opinion, in the lives of students, especially high school students. I truly believe that the days when school is in session are enough to last a school year and no more days are necessary to add on to the hectic schedule.
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