The week before finals week, every teacher seemed to leave study guides for their classes to do. Understandable.
8th grade English. They had the period to work on the study guide. They were allowed to use their textbooks and their notes.
So, this was a review assignment. Review of the entire semester. The study guide should have looked familiar. Yet, many students stared at it like it was completely foreign to them.
"What page is this on?" one girl asked.
"The whole book," I replied.
What part of semester review did they not get?
We never had finals, or midterms in my school, so all of my study guides were just unit reviews (only a couple of weeks long at the most, usually), and I had still had problems like that. Must just be the age. :)
ReplyDeleteIt seems to me the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few or the one however because someone isn't learning to tow the line, what do you get? problems! Oh well back to the drawing board.
ReplyDeleteEighth graders have to take finals? That's awful. I don't know how they expect fourteen year olds to remember an entire semester's worth of work.
ReplyDeleteOh those poor, poor babies. How horrible they have to take a FINAL exam over the entire book!! We had finals back in the olden days that covered the whole book. We really even had books then, too! LOL
ReplyDeleteI suspect it was only the less than academically inclined that were having issues.
DeleteAs I recall, finals (which we took at the end of the year in jr high and high school) covered EVERYTHING we'd covered over the course of that year. Do you think school is easier than it used to be?
ReplyDeleteYikes. That seems like a bad omen for finals.
ReplyDeleteI wouldn't be surprised if this girl wasn't doing so well in class before this.
DeleteAh yes, a book they were to review but never opened. Why am I not surprised.
ReplyDeleteIt'd been opened. They use consumable textbooks now, so she would have been annotating articles and answering questions in the book. If she was doing her work.
DeleteHAHA....I so remember being in school although it has been a LONG time ago.
ReplyDeleteYeah, brings back memories, doesn't it?
DeleteMakes you wonder what her grade must have been?
ReplyDeletebetty
Hi Liz - I know I struggled at school ... but I'm sure I'd have coped with this ... kids seem to get more help these days ... but interesting to read. Cheers Hilary
ReplyDeleteWhen I was growing up (I was in high school in the late 60's) we in New York State had the state wide Regents exams. And, in fact, we still do. An entire year of study and a final exam. Imagine that. Alana ramblinwitham.blogspot.com
ReplyDeleteThis isn't all that unusual. Not really.
DeleteI'm one who stress over test.
ReplyDeleteCoffee is on
That's fairly common.
DeleteTerror setting in
ReplyDeleteI was not terribly surprised, actually.
DeleteOye! I think we need to re-think this thing called education. I wonder what would happen if we said, "You can not go to school anymore. It's now only for a few of the privileged among us."? What a clamor that would cause. Here's hoping some students did benefit from the review.
ReplyDeleteIt's a thought. But I bet it would cause some other unforeseen consequences.
Delete*headdesk* Silly kiddos
ReplyDeleteYup
DeleteI couldn't even pretend to be that stupid back in school. And I never saw a computer until my late teens. I prayed for the encyclopedia set my parents never bought. Have these kids seen the inside of a library? I would have hives if I had your job.
ReplyDeleteYes, they've been inside the school library. That's where they get their textbooks for the school year and turn them in at the end of the year. Beyond that, the teacher may have them read various books that they would need to check out.
DeleteInteresting. We got our books from each individual teacher. I wonder which is easier on the staff.
DeleteHard to say. It's really easy for the teachers who don't have to transport their whole class to the library ;)
Delete