Goofing Off in College: High School Fails to Prepare

Free Time

 

Dear Ms. Understanding:

I thought that high school was supposed to prepare me for college. In high school, we had two out-of-class times, morning break and lunch. During those times, we played and socialized.

In college, we have hours and hours outside of class. I’ve continued to use those hours for recreation. My grades have gone into the tank. Did I miss something?

Likes Leisure

Dear Likes:

Assuming that your high school was college-preparatory, it gave you all that you need to succeed in college. You simply weren’t paying attention.

In high school, your teachers provided ample classroom “free” time and told you to use the time wisely, reviewing your text or starting your homework. Did you use that time wisely? I bet you focused on your peer group instead. Talk is cheap. Being jammed in with your friends all around you is no excuse. Tell them to be quiet!

In high school, you were kept in class all day long because you were not trusted to use outside time wisely. Your unwise use of outside time in college has certainly proven that to be a good idea. You complain that you weren’t given a chance to learn how to study outside of class. You weren’t old enough. When you’re older, you’ll understand.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Increasing Knowledge and Waistlines

Dear Ms. Understanding:

I’ve been putting on lots of weight lately. I go to school all day. I come home. I eat. I do my homework. I go to sleep. I wake up. I get fat. What can I do?

Expanding

Dear Expanding:

Have you ever tried walking home from school? School must start early in the morning, but that means that you have the advantage of going home before dark. Use it. For every extra mile that you walk every day, you will weigh about one pound less per month. If your walk home is not safe, take the bus. When you get home, use the extra time otherwise spent walking home to walk around the house. Better yet, turn on some music and dance to it. If you don’t have a partner, get a wooden chair–just like Elvis. Let’s rock! You see how much good all that gyratin’ did for Elvis.

Did you ask your folks to get you a dog? Get a really big, mean looking one, and you can walk the dog all night, and nobody will bother you. Ms. Understanding does it all the time.

After all this shuckin’ & jivin’, one fact stands out. None of us uses our time as wisely as we can. You have at least five hours between getting home and going to bed. If you spend three on homework and 30 minutes on dinner, that leaves an hour and a half. Use it and you’ll lose it–the weight, that is. Besides, if your social life disappears because you stay off the phone, that’s all for the better, because it leaves more time for taking a stroll–if it’s safe to do so.

If all else fails, see your doctor and ask for some diet pills.

Education: What Is Required?

Dear Ms. Understanding:

I’m a high school student. I want to be an educator. I’ve started a list How do we know what is educative and what is just school?

· School offers an inexhaustible supply of old fish that fails to please the senses. Education teaches us to fish so we can catch our own fresh ones.

· School runs on modified monologue. Students speak only by permission. Education cultivates intelligent conversation, dialogue and “polylogue.”

· Schoolchildren face the teacher. Educated students face each other.

· Schoolchildren attend by requirement. We must choose to be educated.

· School herds students into small spaces, the better to supervise them. –Educated students have space to think, move, and reason.

· School treats teenagers as overgrown children, the better to convince them that they have a continuing need to be herded into classrooms. Education treats children as becoming-adults and teens as adults.

· School is authoritarian, telling students what to think and when to deliver it. Education is authoritative. Useful information and perspective come from knowledgeable people, and students relate new information to old.

Educator Wannabe

Dear Wannabe:

We need the “old fish” as information “bait” for our own fishing. Do you want all talking at once? If they faced each other, we’d have chaos. Without required attendance, we’d have mass ignorance. Discipline breaks down when students are too spread out. Teenagers are still children and must be treated that way. Good teachers are authoritative, but authoritarian responses are sometimes needed. Any more questions?

Do You Really Understand?

Dear Ms. Understanding:

I train teachers. In one of my courses, I led a discussion of checking for understanding: How do we know that the light has gone on, that the student comprehends what the teacher is saying? In the midst of my discourse, a curious trainee asked, “What about long-term understandings that arrive in steps or by degrees?” I wanted to strangle that teacher-wannabe. Everyone’s concentration was broken. The lesson was ruined. What should I do next time this occurs?

Furious with Curious

Dear Furious:

Ignore the interruption, and go on. We must avoid the area of deeper understanding. If we go there, we might offend a parent or two, and that must never, ever happen. “Checking for understanding” is really just a nice way of asking, “Do you hear me?” Any inquiry into deeper understanding is bound to lead to the realm of opinion, and we must never go there. We must teach only agreed-upon matters of fact. A colleague once pointed out that we express opinion when we choose which facts to share. She’s entitled to her viewpoint. In school, we seek to mold students into unbiased absorbers of necessary information. Some spoilsports say that information without viewpoint is soon forgotten. Forget about that.