Academic Success Or Effective Learning

A child's main focus in life has always been being successful in school in order to achieve many riches in adulthood. Many people have supported these children to reach this goal by preparing them for about two decades. In return, their family members expect them that these clueless kids return the favor by going to college. Some have put their immense effort beyond their reach, but unfortunately there is a vast majority of students that do not have what it takes both academically and emotionally to earn a college degree or to even meet their own personal standards. Although they received all the help they could get, their parents forget to even consider that what matters the most for these young adults to go to college is their own willingness

Granted, grades serve their purpose, and a very good one at that. After all, they serve as a very reliable method of assessing progress. However, I realized one day that I had become a slave to my grade point average; I considered more successful when I received an “A” on a test or quiz, regardless of whether I actually knew the material or simply stored it in my short term memory long enough to reproduce it on the assessment. I believed my efforts were inadequate if I didn’t receive the score I wanted on a test, even if I learned and understood the topic. From this I gained the knowledge that why I should be mindful of my grades and test scores, I should not place them above the actual material or use them as the basis for my success. Rather than striving to achieve perfect test scores and the highest GPA, my focus is to fully learn and understand the subjects presented to

One example demonstrating that grades lead to limited learning of material, can be illustrated by a study that was conducted of students, some of whom were graded. One group of students was told about being graded and the other group was not. The group who was “told they’d be graded on how well they learned a social studies lesson had more trouble understanding the main point of the text than did students who were told that no grades would be involved” (Kohn). This experiment shows how students concerned getting a good grade detracts from the students overall understanding. In my experience, students have so much homework, activities, and pressure to excel that it becomes challenging to learn topics outside of those being assigned. For example, in order to complete history worksheets, students do not always read the passages to find the answers, but rather skim the passage for keywords

School is slave labor. Rather than enjoying or learning from their classes, students are forced to do useless work that will often be forgotten immediately. Grades are meant to show much a student understands a class, but instead are used as a scale of how well a student can regurgitate answers onto a test. Students only work for good grades because of the threat of being punished for failure, and the promise of reward for passing. The punishments in this case are detention or trouble from teachers, and the rewards are making the honor roll or getting bragging rights. The real reward for learning should be having new knowledge, but this is not taken into consideration. Jerry Farber, a professor at U.S.D, made the strong claim that grades are useless and harmful in his essay, “A Young Person’s Guide to the Grading System.” I wholeheartedly agree with Farber’s objection to our current grading system.

Most students’ do assignments and prepare for tests only to get a good grade. They do not care about learning, as long as they are able to graduate. Learning does not come from being graded, it takes discipline and passion to learn. When trying to learn something new most people practice and or study rather than being graded.

“When students focus their attention on grades and how they are performing, learning may not result”-Joseph Holtgreive.

There are several scholars in various institutions who are deeply concerned with how education is being delivered in American institutions. As a matter of fact, they consider that the American system of education is broken -even dead. In particular, Tony Wagner last January 2015 released a documentary titled Most Likely to Succeed, in which he explores the question how to better prepare students for the 21 century. He radically asserts that the school’s role of transmitting academic knowledge is obsolete and that in today’s world skills, disposition and motivation matters more than knowledge (Wagner, 2015). Although this might be true, knowledge, skills, and embodied learning experience are not mutually exclusive. Furthermore, when knowledge is combined with a learning experience that is fully integrated, its power is profoundly transformative. On the other hand, Sir Ken Robinson in his speech at The RSA in How to Change Education describes the relevance of changing education from the ground up. He proposes going back to basics, not on the matter of subjects, but to redefining its purpose and revitalizing the connection between educators and students. I believe students are demanding a different approach to education, they feel something is missing and, alas, they are looking for it outside College’s campuses. Pew’s statistics state that students when asked to how do they prepare themselves for the labor force, half of all college graduates say gaining more

Of all the problems we have in our education system, grading is the most misunderstood. Alfie Kohn reinforces the idea that grades have a negative impact on students,in his essay from “Degrading to De-grading”, by stating that grades encourage students to take the “easy way”, by taking the least challenging courses. Another point Kohn makes is that students’ learning is negatively affected by grades because the students only recite the information for the test. After the teachers test the information the students just “learned”, the information becomes irrelevant to the student.The students quickly forgot the information and never really learn it. Not only do grades harm the student, but also the teacher. Grades harm

In my freshman year of high school, I started my first semester class with my first failing grade. I did not realize how essential it was to continue my middle school streak of having outstanding grades. As students at one time, we have all earned poor grades. Maybe, we didn’t understand the impact our grades would have on our future. Or maybe, we simply didn’t want to put in a great amount of time and effort. To earn good grades in school, students must study, complete assignments, and learn new subjects in class. Without doing these things, grades will reflect and drop quickly. Students earn poor grades because of bad attitudes, difficult home lives, and busy extracurricular activities.

Although student-athletes are supposed to be attending college to receive an education, for most their academic success takes a back seat to athletics. Due to the athletic stressors placed on student-athletes and the demanding time commitments they have, it is difficult for them to get the best academic experience possible. It typically takes the average student-athlete six years to graduate rather than the normal four years and 88% of all student-athletes obtain their degree by the age of 30 while the average student graduates by the age of 21 or 22 (Brown, 2011). The Adjusted Graduation Gap (AGG), a model that compares athlete’s graduation rates by conference as well as compares them directly to the rates of non-athlete students at the same institution. According to the AGG, in most conferences,

In the article “Letter from the Editor-in-Chief: Are Grades a Necessary Evil?”(No.2, 2013) the author Russell L. Herman emphasizes our attention to the question about necessity of grades as an indicator of the true efforts among students. Russell L. Herman compares the different thoughts of teachers about this statement: some instructors against the grade system because they think that students should come to class in the purpose to learn something, not to have higher grades. Other instructors identify grades as an indicator of educational level. Furthermore, the author support the idea that grades show real “efforts, practice, and improvement” of students, however, Russell L. Herman calls to understanding that grades is not indicator

Plato’s view on education is one I personally find myself in agreeance with; I hold to the belief that education is an ongoing, cooperative process and not a one sided spewing of facts. Education should

I was writing for a grade — I was no longer exploring for me. I want to get that back. Will I ever get that back?” This came out of the mouth of a girl student many years back, and I am almost sure you can relate as well. Why is it that we spend hours doing homework just because we need a good grade and not because we are interested or find it as fun? Well that is because all the fun in school has been taken and now is replaced with pointless activities to keep us busy. Furthermore, when students perform for points or letters, they lose interest in learning. Although, I agree that students should spend time studying and completing assignments in order to help them learn, I do not believe a student should be put on a scale. A scale such as class rank only lowers students self of steam telling them “they aren’t good enough” or “they are not smart”. In addition, that to me is ridiculous. A student should never feel less than the person should sitting next to them but equal. Alfie Kohn author of The Schools Our Children Deserve stated “To put it positively, students who are lucky enough to be in schools (or classrooms) where they don’t get letter or number grades are more likely to want to continue exploring whatever they’re learning, more likely to want to challenge themselves, and more likely to think deeply. The evidence on all of these effects is very clear, and it seems to apply to students of all ages.”(Ellis) Which many educators and parents also have seemed to agree. We are all in school to do one thing which is learn, not be disappointed in

Although some perform poorly and then go on to believe that grades are defining and not needed, they do keep us knowing that we have done well, have not done well, what we excel at and what we need to work on.

Academic success could never be fully measured by degrees alone, but it can include a person’s well-being as well as their mind and certain characteristics about a person that make them unique. This success can be achieved in different ways by these different people with different strengths, but there is the same ultimate goal in sight of each and every student enrolled in college at some point. However, this goal of being successful in not only school but in life, can sometimes turn out to be the opposite of how we plan. Of course, a student can achieve success by earning degrees and still fail in life. Academic success can also be a huge constituent to a students vocational calling in college as young students make a transition into adulthood.