Summer Learning Loss: A Big Factor In Student's Education

Making kids go to school during the summer would take a toll on the way they act towards their classmates—especially towards their teachers. Some students would try to act out and get into trouble so they can go home and relax. Others might even go to the extent of getting suspended or expelled so they wouldn't have to go to school at all.

They state, “...some have found that students lose a lot of what they learn during the school year when they go into summer.” This supports my claim because during summer, students focus on having fun, not on education. Also, the frequent breaks allow for teachers and students to regenerate and refresh without forgetting the materials that have been taught previously. Traditional schools don’t have as many breaks and this can lead to children becoming worn-out and not doing their best. Another problem is coming back to school in fall and not getting the concepts the teachers are reviewing or using.

In his article “Go Year-Round: A Push for True Summer School”, Milton Chen, the executive director of Edutopia, urges readers to use the year-round schooling system. He explains in brief words what the summer vacation was for. “…when farm families needed young people home during the summer months to replace the three R's with the two P's -- plantin' and pickin' " (Chen). He carries on discussing that the problem with the school days is not only the amount, but the schedule of the school day. The curriculum is too tight; neither the students nor the teachers have the time to step away from the books and text and learn from the outside. The students do not have the chance to go into the outside world and observe what is going on in the society that they live in. Additionally, the teachers do not have the chance to decide how their time is spent because it is spent on the strict schedule of the classroom.

Do students get bored towards the end of summer? Do students forget what they learned from the school year before? Sarah attends a high school in Indiana, while Hannah goes to a high school in Illinois. Due to the year round schooling (YRS) in Indiana, Sarah has a shortened summer. Sarah receives two-three weeks off of school for winter break, fall break, and spring break. Once Sarah gets back from her breaks, her teacher has one day of review and moves on. Hannah does not have to go to school during the summer but only receives a week or two off here and there. When Hannah returns to start school after summer ends, her teacher takes two weeks to review what they learned the year before. The breaks for Sarah last a lot longer than they do for Hannah. The extensive summer break disconnected Hannah from school and she forgot everything. Year round schooling would benefit students because it would reduce negativity toward school and stress.

In a key portion of “Year-Round School Is What’s Needed, Not Camp,” Granderson explains scientific studies shown on the learning process. The article questions why educators haven’t proposed the issue to the school board. In this section of the article Granderson introduces a neuroscientist that says, “during summer vacation kids can forget anywhere from one to three months’ worth of math and reading skills.”

Year-round school maintains that students forget knowledge and skills they learned during the previous school year. There are studies that support this theory. Students show loss of knowledge in math and language arts knowledge over the long summer break. Students must re-acclimate themselves to the school schedule, their new teachers and their classmates, as well as to school rules and expectations, homework, and non-academic demands such as participation in sports. From teachers experience the first month of each new school year is spent figuring out what the student has remembered from the previous year and reviewing what they have forgotten over the summer

What do you do during summer break? Do you go on a long family trip, or do you have to get a job? Now imagine if those plans were ruined by year round schooling. Year round schooling is not beneficial for students and teachers because it can cause more stress, students get summer jobs, and people go on family trips and spend time with family and friends during summer break.

As a student, this issue affects me immensely as I experience the results firsthand. From personal experience, I can say that year-round schooling is much better because after every summer, my peers and I tend to forget most of what we’ve learned, causing teachers to spend valuable teaching time to review with us. I also believe that during the many days that we have summer vacation; we could learn a lot more. Although many people view summer vacation as a time to spend valuable time with family, from

Year-round schooling is characterized by its 45-90 day periods of instruction (varying with different multitrack systems) separated by 15-30 day breaks (varying with different multitrack systems) (California Department of Education). There is no current scientific evidence to show that year-round education lessens the amount of material forgotten during the summer (McMillen 68); in fact, this memory loss is maximized as it occurs more frequently as it accompanies the shorter, habitual breaks. Constant breaks can also multiply some of summer’s negative effects. One common issue associated with summer is students’ loss of focus as summer approaches and trouble becoming accustomed to the beginning of the following school year (Worsnop 439). This would be a, though minimized, a recurring difficulty with constant breaks. Furthermore, teachers

Year round school eliminates regression of learning due to extended time off. Having a year round school can reduce what people known as summer learning loss ("The Pros"). Almost every child will experience a decrease in their math over the time of summer break each summer break ("SUMMER LEARNING"). “On an average students lose two months of reading skills over summer” ("SUMMER LEARNING"). After

Dr. Matthew Lynch from, “Education New” states that, “Students tend to forget a lot during summer break, so a shorter time away from school might increase retention rates” (Watson). Dr.Lynch is saying that having a shorter summer break will tend more to the students, because they will remember and learn more than what a student who has the whole summer off.

The minute that everybody has been expecting for has at long last arrived. The people are inclining toward the edge of their seats, listening for the last chime to ring to unleash them to freedom. We all love it when summer vacation has arrived, but the time just passes by so fast. A high percentage of the students want there to be a longer summer vacation, but are there really any benefits? Well yes in fact a longer vacation will be associated with many benefits such as increased social life, health benefits, and educational plus financial gains.

There is controversy over whether or not summer break makes kids forget what they should have previously learned. Coming from myself, a senior in high school, summer break is all about forgetting school and living it up during the duration of the break. This causes teachers to have to pretest students to see what all they actually did remember and then go over the same material trying to get them to remember. With year-round schooling you do not have to worry as much about the loss of learning. The longest break with year-round schooling is three weeks. Any break will causes some memory loss but the three month break that regular schooling provides makes the chances not remembering material increase greatly. Year-round schooling, allows the same

A large portion of the knowledge gained during the last school year is lost over the long idle months and must be retaught for weeks, which wastes a lot of time that could be spent learning new material. This puts students behind in that year’s curriculum, and over many summers, can add up to students being months or years behind where they would be if no learning was lost. There is a solution to this

One of the reasons Florida should convert to year-round schooling keeps the learning process going. Text 2 states that students “spend less time reviewing material since students don’t forget everything over the summer.” Because there are multiple