How do you feel about longer school terms/days? - Page 2

[Linda on the move]

Originally Posted by motheringmina

What critics of the American education fail to acknowledge is that only the US educates all of its citizens. Other countries we compare ourselves track students according to ability and performance. So it is like comparing apples and oranges in many respects.

Excellant point. My DH is British and kids are tested at 11. How they do determines which school they will go to and what sort of career tracks will be available to them.

Amercians would seriously freak out over this kind of thing.

[meemee]

Originally Posted by sarahr

But Obama has to make policies for everyone, especially those without those resources. I think extending the school day and year is the best thing for them.

Such a thing does exist in california. it is called the START program. free afterschool care and homework help.

school is structure. we already have preschool which is essentially bootcamp for K.

longer days of what? more suffering.

instead they need to make the learning more age appropriate for ages. instead of forcing reading and math down the throat of K and first graders, they shoudl focus more on social science and other sciences as well as a second language. children will start off with hands on learning and loving school. it would meet the needs of all kids - average, slow starters as well as advanced starters.

teachers need to be trusted more and more power needs to be given to them to teach as freely as they can.

i have not read obama's proposal, nor have i read all the responses on this thread.

its like saying hey our economy is down lets bring it up by increasing our work hours to 10 hours a day to increase production.

i can see why obama wants it that way. that is the way he did it. his education. v. v. structured. getting up at 4 am in elementary school in asia to learn english with his mom, and then go to regular school which i think was what 8 hours.

no i dont want life to be a drugery for my dd. or for any children in this country. there are some good programs for less priviledged children. we just have to make them more universal.

i have worked with underpriviledged kids. i have worked with stressed parents, even some single parents holding two three jobs. nothing will serve them by just giving them support thru childcare. they need so much more, THEY WANT to be their children's teacher, but cant. how sad is that.

[williamsmommy2002]

I don't really want a longer school day. Ds1 who has anxiety issues has a bit of a struggle with 6 hours and homework. I don't know how I feel about a longer year. Ds1 qualifies for 6 weeks of summer school and a week of summer camp because of his special needs. He needs the summer school to keep the structure up and keep his skills up. While I think that is enough I'm not sure if it is. Of course my kids have special needs. I do think he needs time to be a kid, i'm just not sure where the balance is.


As for the "underprivledged" we are talking about here, I don't think those are the ones to be really worried about when it comes to programs. There is a rather large group of people in this country who are neither poor enough to get services or rich enough to afford these things on their own. Many of these people have working and often single parents. I grew up this way. This people are not the disadvantaged people that most people are thinking of. I'm sure with the economy the way it is, this group of people will only grow. What happens to these kids?

[cloudswinger]

Originally Posted by Linda on the move

Excellant point. My DH is British and kids are tested at 11. How they do determines which school they will go to and what sort of career tracks will be available to them.

Amercians would seriously freak out over this kind of thing.

Americans already track their kids, just not so obviously. And, in truth, if a kid really isn't college material, many are kind of dropped by the wayside, not moved into vocational schools.

In Florida we have a lot of magnet schools, with specialties in specific areas. Most are college bound, but a lot are limited enrollment so you have to have a certain GPA, plus win a lottery to get in. They pretty much have to choose their paths in High school, and it was proposed to move the mandatory choice down to Middle school. There are also magnet programs in elementary school. So pretty much their career tracks are decided once they choose which programs they go to. This was all called school choice.

It's all about how it's marketed. People will buy it if it's marketed correctly.

[eepster]

Will longer/more school days benefit students?

I think there are so many variable there is no single right answer for everyone.

Most MDC parents provide a good stimulating home/outside world for their kids. I doubt many of our kids need longer school days, but what about the rest of the country?

Some kids go home to a TV, other kids go to an underfunded after care facility. Would those kids benefit from an extended school day that included more extracurriculars and freeplay time in it? If it is well implamented yes.

Also, since he is proposing encouraging charters, schools would have more freedom to decide what was considered a school day.

[tbone]

I would not send my kids to public school if the days were longer and the school year was extended. No way , no how.

Enough of school children's days are wasted with routine tasks, (roll call, the line at the water fountain, handing out of the the numerous worksheets for busywork, etc). Our country's founding fathers, the multitude of inventors, nobel peace prize winners, and so on did not get smart by spending their entire childhood in school, and then coming home to spend all their family time doing more schoolwork.

I understand the opposing viewpoint that not all children have enriching home environments to go to after school, but instead of more school for kids, why not "school" for families who need it. Programs, workshops, seminars that teach families how to provide an enriching and nourishing family life for their kids.

Then there are those that would like to provide these things for there kids, but both parents have to work in order to make ends meet. This is where another big issue lies, and where more money should be spent instead. 2 parent working families should be an option, not a necessity. Families should rightfully have the ability to provide shelter, food, etc for their children with one income. OR, it should be mandatory that companies are more flexible with hours, leave time, etc, so that parents are forced to put their children in the care of others for up to 12 hours a day.

Wow, I really didn't mean to ramble on for so long, I'll get of my soapbox now!

[Amylcd]

My daughter is in school from 8:30 to 3:30, and then has at least two hours of homework each night. It is WAY too much, in my opinion. I am really beginning to dislike Obama (and not just for this issue).

[Ruthla]

How about educational resources being used for free "after school enrichment programs" that will function as "free childcare" for those who need it (regardless of whether or not they're poor enough to qualify for assistance), yet is entirely optional for those families who don't need or want it?

[Leta]

I think that if we went back to the neighborhood school model (which would amount to one-to-five room schools throughout much of the nation), we could eliminate so much of the hurry-up-and-wait that sucks time from the school day, and not need (need? really?) longer school days. Maybe we could even shorten school days. And surely we could shorten kids' commutes, thereby adding to their family/down time.

I am happy that Obama is president. I don't think trying to amend the No Child Left Alone Act is a bad thing. But I think real education reform is going to come from absolutely radical thinking, not just, "Oh, let's do more of what we've been doing."

[mom2ponygirl]

Originally Posted by sarahr

One of the most successful programs that I've read about in terms of decreasing the difference between rich and poor, minority and non-minority is the KIPP program: http://www.kipp.org/ From what I know of it, I think that having every child have access to something like this would do a lot for our society.

From what I've read about the KIPP program, even the founders say that it is not a program for everyone. They received a lot of flak for saying it, but they say a typical kid from an enriched home environment would not like it at all and not do as well in it.

I think it is a great program and we need more of it in this country, but it is not 'the' answer. There isn't one answer. We need choices! I like reading Deborah Meier(sp?) books about the schools she started in Harlem. Small schools, teacher-led (as in daily time to converse about plans for students, the principal is a teacher), housed within the larger school building. The cost savings of having one large facility but the chance to have schools with different structures and a small intimate setting. You could even have schools join together for specials like band, choir, sports, etc.

I think until we can start treating children and families on a more individual basis and find situations that fit their particular life circumstances, we will continue to see a decline in public education. The harder we try to fit everyone into the same sized and shaped box the more problems with poor fit we will see.

[mom2ponygirl]

Originally Posted by Leta

But I think real education reform is going to come from absolutely radical thinking, not just, "Oh, let's do more of what we've been doing."

Absolutely! When things aren't working, just doing everything harder rarely works. Trying different things often does. How to get the American public willing to try radically different things though? Some of these experiments won't work on the first go round. Although I think we have a lot of good information on how people learn - we just lack the will to try and implement the info.

[PlayaMama]

Originally Posted by Porcelain Interior

I realize most people/parents want the school to just "do their job" and not have to be involved, but I have to think half the problems we have today are caused by the big box effect in our schools, and our communities.

Originally Posted by sunnmama

I strongly disagree with Obama on this issue. School is great, but it is no subsitute for family and community.

Originally Posted by meemee

teachers need to be trusted more and more power needs to be given to them to teach as freely as they can.
---------
i have worked with underpriviledged kids. i have worked with stressed parents, even some single parents holding two three jobs. nothing will serve them by just giving them support thru childcare. they need so much more, THEY WANT to be their children's teacher, but cant. how sad is that.

i agree with most of these statements, especially the bolded one. the school where i worked has under 80 students k-12. and you know what? some of the high schoolers are still reading at a 3rd or 4th grade level. i can pretty much promise you this is not the fault of the teachers, and in some cases not the fault of the parents. some kids are just less smart. it doesn't make them less worthy but i think expecting every single student to be a rocket scientist is pretty messed up and only serves to set up an unrealisitic expectation that in turn causes low self esteem which isn't good for anyone.

as far as more hours in the classroom..... in a lot of cases that i know of it would help tremendously, you know why? because the world isn't mdc and lots of families do absolutely nothing to encourage learning a home. i ran an after school homework club for an hour, and my slowest math student was able to catch up to the class. it's not his fault, but his family could not help him with pre-algebra. was it helpful for him to have an extra hour of school? you bet!

honestly, i think there are more families out there like that than there are like you all here. not all kids have families like yours and being in school is the only place they get exposure to educational things. don't even get me started on the kindergartener that went home sick and came back the next day telling us how he watched freddy versus jason all day.

i'm not saying it's the answer at all. ideally obama would fund mothers staying at home with their kids rather than more school but that seems doubtful. which is why i'll be becoming a teacher while my dh homeschools the kids.

[philomom]

Year round school is an idea that needs to be realized in many areas of our country. Summer is the bane of the working parent's existence as daycamps for kids can run 400$ a week in cities. The other choice leaves kids unsupervised for long days during the summer. I see my working friends struggle and their kids feel "shuffled" during the summer months.

I'll fight a longer school day with every breath in my body. I keep my big kids on a strict 10 o'clock bedtime and one of them still has to be pried forcibly out of bed each morning. It's so tough when you feel they really need their sleep.

[Tanibani]

Originally Posted by motheringmina

I think they get our children long enough and they need to work with that they have and improve what is already in place. Not just add more demands and constraints.

Longer school terms/days - no way.

If the traditional, one-size-fits-all system isn't working now - how is giving them my child for a LONGER time going to help?

I don't see this happening right now (in California anyway) because we have a state budget crisis. Where is the money going to come from?

[SunshineJ]

Originally Posted by Leta

But I think real education reform is going to come from absolutely radical thinking, not just, "Oh, let's do more of what we've been doing."

This is so true! It's like when DD was first diagnosed with allergies and the Dr. said give her Benedryl. After 1 month there was no change and he told us to give her more. How silly - the medicine simply did not work for her and more wasn't going to do a blessed thing! But when we tried a totally different med, we literally saw a change over night. If something isn't working then it's just not working and more isn't going to suddenly make it all better.

I think one of the biggest problems with education in the US is that so many people try to make it one size fits all. Children (people) are all over the scale on what they have the ability to learn, how they learn it, etc. While I agree that ALL children should have a good education, that definition is going to vary by child. For a gifted child that may mean learning multiplication tables in kindy, for a child who's a little behind it may mean mastering the alphabet in kindy. Yet as a nation we see that as inherently unfair and will do everything we can to make sure that the gifted child doesn't get "ahead" of the children who struggle, and throw every resource we have to push a child who may not be ready to learn at that level yet. We fail to acknowledge that children just aren't on the same level academically, and at the same time fail to acknowledge that those who aren't on the same level academically may simply have other wonderful talents that are not school related. As long as we keep trying to fit all children into those same square peg holes the system will be adequate at best and children will be failed imo.

[Dr.Worm]

Originally Posted by Ruthla

I think kids spend too much time in school already, and kids need more time to be kids. Forcing more time in school, at the expense of recess and playtime, isn't the answer.

ITA and so does my nine-year-old DD!

[Leta]

Originally Posted by philomom

I'll fight a longer school day with every breath in my body. I keep my big kids on a strict 10 o'clock bedtime and one of them still has to be pried forcibly out of bed each morning. It's so tough when you feel they really need their sleep.

There is a really simple solution to this that few schools want to implement, and I don't understand why.

Right now, most elementary schools start between 8-9 am, and middle and high schools start an hour earlier, between 7-8 am. This is backward: as kids enter adolescence, their body clocks shift and they are far more inclined to sleep later (and often, stay up later at night). This natural and normal. (Google "pubertal circadian shift" if you don't want to take my word for it.)

Just switch the times, or even bump them back and hour or so. Start elementaries around nine and high schools around ten. In the schools that have done this (my aunt teaches at one), the teachers either love it ("I'm teaching kids that are awake!" ) or hate it ("I get out of work too late now." ), but, from a standpoint of learning, it's unambiguously better- test scores are up, kids say they like school more, etc.

A couple other advantages of this "non-traditional" schedule are that older kids have the opportunity to help their younger siblings get to school in the morning, and older kids getting out of school later, around 5 in the afternoon, leads to less deliquency, because many of the parents are home from work by then. (When I was in HS, everyone's house was deserted in the afternoons- if you wanted to smoke pot or behave promiscuously, you could just go home, so long as you had everyone out by the time your folks got home, three or so hours later.) It's a kid who is just determined to get in trouble who gets up before school to go do drugs, yk?

[ecoteat]

I teach middle school, and realistically, I think adding more minutes to the day wouldn't do much academically. Teachers, especially departmentalized teachers, are so set in what lesson and how much work fits into a class period, that adding 5 or 10 minutes to each period wouldn't do much to increase the amount of actual learning takes place. I can see a lot of teachers I know, if given 10 more minutes of class time, just not rushing through the same lesson they would do in less time before. And maybe there would be a few extra minutes to start homework or something. But that wouldn't lead to much of a change in learning. Lengthening the school year might, only because more lessons coulf be taught, but that's a miserable idea too.

And who's going to pay for this? No way are teachers' unions going to let this happen without a comparable shift in pay scales. My school certainly couldn't afford it without more money from the state, and that's certainly not going to happen without money from the feds.

I've been feeling like my school definitely needs to be more rigorous and have higher expectations. We are VERY laid back here. But this can happen without forcing the kids to be here more; we need to make their time here better.