Zachary's Classroom

This week, I read two different articles, the first one was called UNH Grade Rules, which focuses on how the grading systems work for that university and what the level grades are. The second article I read was Kids Web Japan, this article talked about how the school systems work in Japan. While reading the articles I noticed that schools in New Hampshire and Japan are similar but also are very different. One idea that I found interesting was that Japan’s high schools are only grades 10-12 and the middle schools are 7-9. I thought it was interesting because our school at Hopkinton High School is in the 7th and 8th grade and then high school is 9th through 12th. Something else that I thought was interesting is that schools in Japan don't have cleaning crews to clean the schools. The teachers and students are required to clean their own classrooms. Most schools in New Hampshire have a janitor to clean the lunchrooms, bathrooms, and classrooms.  Even though the schools are different...

This week, I watched Sal Khan, let’s teach for mastery-- not test scores, which is a TedTalk that focuses on teaching mastery learning. The main idea of this TedTalk is that mastery learning is a lot more beneficial than the learning most schools use. One idea that I found interesting was that not a lot of teachers don't like teaching the mastery system because it's too much work sometimes. I thought it was interesting because being a high school student that struggles with taking tests when I don't understand something it annoys me that teachers don't want to teach in a way that students will understand. I disagree with this idea because I feel like teachers and school boards should require this type of learning. But doesn't because it could be too much work for the teachers. One piece of evidence that supports my view comes from Sal Khan’s TedTalk. It states that “It was logistically difficult. The teacher had to give different worksheets to every student, give on...

     This week, I read 10 Challenges Facing Public Education Today, which is an article that focuses on the challenges that students and teachers are faced in a public school. But, I focused on one of the sections of the article called “The Pressure Is On.” This section was about how stress is a very common thing in schools nowadays. The main idea of this section is that the stress levels in school are way too high and things need to be changed to make school less stressful. One idea that I found interesting was when Denise Pope related school to a pressure cooker for students and teachers and that they all stress feed off of each other. I thought it was interesting because I never thought of school as a pressure cooker but once I really thought about it, it really is. Like when one person is feeling pressure usually that pressure will be added to someone else. And stress is a very big thing in schools now. I know that if one of my friends gets stressed out I sometimes ge...