Education in My School- Failures Part 2-ARCHIVED

Log 3
Friday, 9th December 2016

Introduction

Today, I will continue discussing about what I perceive to be the failures of the system. This post will continue the last topic, so if you haven't read the previous post, take your time! Let's take a short review, last time, I mentioned 2 main failures of the system, the assignments and the lessons. Today, I will discuss several more failures, and if I can, wrap up the failures, and maybe next time, I'll start presenting some plausible solutions. But if the failures are too extensive, we'll just have to see. Enjoy!

Behavioral Problems 

I decided to start off with a very serious problem in my school. That is the students' behavior, is horrible. Common behaviors are noisiness, and sometimes bullying. Yes, bullying still exists in my school, but it's rare and most people can stand it. Noisiness is very common, and it would be strange if the class wasn't noisy, because chances are, something horrible must have happened. But there are behaviors that I consider very bad, and quite disappointing. While not all students do this, some students are disrespectful of some teachers, to the point of calling names on them, when they are not around of course. A less insulting behavior are kids who interrupt the teachers. Yes, the teachers that are being disrespected are not so good either, but that doesn't justify calling them names. These kinds of behaviors are not the worst though, some are even worse.

Now this behavior is what I regard as one of the worst behaviors, a disrespect and ignorance of religion. You see, my school is a Catholic School, so it still regards religious faith highly. Now I am a faithful person, by that I meant someone who has a good relationship with God, and it troubles me that most students I know are quite apathetic with God. Well, to be honest, I do not care if they are faithful or no, as it is their own choice, but I do care when they start to disrespect it. The problem is, whenever we have a mass or prayer in the chapel or the church, most students are very noisy. Now look, I am okay if they don't want to pray and still stays at the chapel, that's fine, it's their own choice. But if they got noisy, and they disturb others who wants to pray, then they are disrespectful of others and they are ignorant. I find it very disturbing as this means most students don't even care about the needs of others, and they don't understand that their actions can affect others negatively. But that is not the end, one time, we had a Via Dolorosa in the chapel, and at one stop, there is the part where there is one of the last words of Jesus Christ. Christians know this, it is. "Eloi, Eloi, Lama Sabachtani" Or meaning, "My God, My God, Why have You forsaketh me?" This is a phrase that I believe all Catholics or Christians should know. Now something that is very disappointing is at that moment, the reader of the passage, actually laughed, yes, he laughed. What's worse is he is a Catholic. Now you see, this is very disrespectful and ignorant, whatever belief you have, even if you are an atheist. Imagine a guy is lying on his deathbed, and someone was there accompanying him. The dying man said some last words in a weird language, then the guy accompanying laughed because the words sounded weird. Do you think that's polite? No, and it's very disrespectful. In fact, that act probably constitutes as blasphemy.

Anyway, there are many more horrible behaviors of the students, and I don't remember them all, but there is something worse than the behaviors of the students. It is how the school handles the problems, that's what.

The Failures- Addressing Behavioral Problems

You might be asking, "What do you mean by addressing behavioral problems?" Well, this means how the school addresses such problems and how they try to solve it, and it has failed considerably. You see, the teachers' main effort to try and solve this problem is just lecture the students. And the students are very used to lectures, as it has happened in elementary school as well as grade 7. Looking by how the students' behaviors are just as worse as before, I concluded that the students are immune to lectures and they just ignore it altogether. Now before you ask about a counseling center, yes there is a counseling center within the school, but they only call students who has bad scores. Yes, they will call students who has bad behavior, AFTER they violate school rules, but you don't have to violate the school rules to have bad behavior. Another matter is lazy students, which is, almost everyone in my school, and procrastination is the norm.

Now the way the school also tackle this problem is, they almost always put the blame to students. Most of the time, they just advise students to have better attitude next time or something along those lines, but it is a misconception that only the students are responsible for their behaviors. Advising the students over and over again like a broken record won't help, as it is not as easy as, "Oh, I realized my mistakes and I will not repeat again!" And then the person actually does it. Yes, there's the talk of having a strong will and determination, but again, it's not as easy as telling them. And this has been proved by the students' behaviors, the school has repeatedly tried to fix their behaviors with similar methods, but it all fails.

In summary, I really think that the school should find another way. I have a theory, but we'll keep it for later. Now let's move on to the next failure, and maybe final, I hope.

The Failures- The Core of The System, Scores

I have repeatedly told all of you, that scores is a percentage of how much a student understands or master the topic or lesson learnt at the time. It is also a percentage of how well you have performed, and most of the time, a percentage of how much effort you have put into the assignments. All of it is true, even my principal confirmed this, but it has been mistreated now, and most students misunderstands the concept of scores. Most students understands scores more of this goal, this thing that you must achieve to pass the grade. They have a mindset that you must get a good score to pass. Scores are more like a ruler, a tool of measurement to measure your capabilities, not a goal or reward. But now, scores are treated more like this physical object that you get as a reward, students begin to treat scores more like a carrot, and not a ruler.

This understanding makes students become people who does things just to get a reward, or to avoid punishments, a slave under the carrots and sticks system. Of course, it is not the students' fault, as they have been taught this understanding since young, and teachers have explained this definition to the students. Well if it's just a misunderstanding, then we can just clear it up right? That is true but it's not just a misunderstanding, because it's how the schools use scores too.

The school has misused scores and perhaps they themselves misunderstands the concept of scores. They have used scores as a motivator for the students to do tasks and study. So essentially, scores are being used like incentives, by parents and teachers alike. It would make sense that students are taught the wrong definition of scores, as if they understand the true definition, students will probably rebel. Why would they rebel? You see, when a teacher asks, "Do you want to get scores or no?" This is usually said to a lazy student, either in studying or assignments. What the teachers are actually saying would be hard to translate, as I have said, scores are not really this object, but more of a tool of measurement written in percentage. So essentially, the teacher is asking you, "Do you want to be shown to have a good understanding and mastery of this certain topic?" I put the word "shown" on bold because it means that scores show people that a certain student has understood a certain percentage of the lessons learnt, but it doesn't necessarily represents the true understanding of the students. Students may obtain that number by illegitimate means, and they understand nothing in actuality.

Now answering the question of why students would rebel, they would understand that scores are something to measure their abilities, not a carrot. As the school enforces that students should get good scores, this means the school is implying that you must understand and master the lessons taught. Students would eventually question why should they master it, what kind of benefit will they get from doing it, and will it actually be useful for them in the future. At least, that is what teachers are scared of, but they are slightly wrong.

Final Statements

You might be asking, why did I cut off there? Well, this is because I will upload another post next time, that would explain about motivation, and the misconception behind it. There, I will also debunk the carrots and sticks theory. Anyway, let's wrap up. Today, I have told you the 2 more failures of the system, the way they address behavioral problems, and the core of the system, scores. Next time, we'll talk about motivation, and the 2 types of motivation, along with some argumentation.  This will not be the last failures post, because YOU can still share more ideas on the comments. I really hope you share your ideas, because this will not be going anywhere if I don't receive more ideas. Well, that's all from me for today, share your ideas in the comment, thanks for reading!

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