Why Are Our Kids Failing?

Question

The Class of 2006 showed the sharpest drop in SAT scores in the last 31 years. Do you think students today are less educated then they were 30 years ago? If so what should be done about it?

Answer 1

New methods of teaching. Seven years ago, when I was still in high school, I was BORED. My classes were neither stimulating nor challenging. It seemed as though the teachers weren't passionate, and that attitude rubs off on the students. They don't care. They find other ways to entertain themselves and school isn't at the top of their list of priorities. I think if there were more hands-on methods of teaching, maybe students would do better in school.

I disagree with whomever up there said that school should start later in the morning. Go to bed at a decent hour, get 8 hours of sleep, AT LEAST, and you shouldn't have to worry about being tired and needing coffee. There's no reason you should stay up late during the week, when you know you have school in the morning. Save the late nights for the weekend. Trust me....someday you'll look back on your high school years and wish you could have done something differently.

Answer 2

I don't think that a childs intelligence should be measured by some standerdized test. Some kids are not good at taking tests.

Parents are not the only problem, there are just as many teachers who are the problem as well. It is made out by alot of people that it is the parents fault. That they do not care, they are using school as a babysitter, and are not involved enough. The cost of living is getting higher all the time. Most parents are doing the best that they can balancing full time jobs and raising a family. Now days, it usually takes 2 incomes or one really big income to support a family. It is very difficult for a parent to choose between working to bring in money to support their kids without welfare and not working or working part time and being able to spend more time with their kids. Sometimes it just isn't any easy choice for a parent to make.

Look at the changes in the school system now compared to 30 yrs. ago. They have taken corporal punishment and God out of the school. Kids are being more disrespectful, being violent, and making worse grades than they were 30 years ago. School nowdays is so much more complicated than it was when I was in school. There are many times that I can't even understand my kids homework, so how they can is beyond me.

I see nothing wrong with teaching kids the way they were taught 30 yrs. ago. I think things should go back to the way they were.

Answer 3

There are different reasons for this. One, the New SAT could be a reason but I read in an article, that doesn't seem to be a common reason. Personally, I think that kids today are too dependent on things like calculators. They spend too much time on them to do simple calculations and maybe that's how they get worse math scores. For reading, kids don't read enough these days, they just listen to their Ipods, or watch TV or instant message for hours. Technology is a good thing, but it has made people kind of lazier.

Maybe, for reading, I'd suggest forcing students to read a certain number of books in the summer, then analyze them without the use of cheat sites like www.sparknotes.com or www.gradesaver.com. They have to hand it all in to the teachers of the next year for a big grade. For math, calculators shouldn't even be allowed, because the SAT is a test such that calculators aren't even needed even for th hard problems. Nothing is impossible in the test, you just have to think a lot more thoroughly.

Also, this is personal experience of my parents. Kids in America have better oppurtunities to succeed than in countries in India for example. Education is so tough there that if someone fails one test, that is their only chance and they become poor for the rest of their lives. America is a place with so much oppurtunity that if someone fails the SAT, they can take it again and again. They can still succeed in life. They can even get a job easily in India just because they are from America.

I'm part of the Class of 2007, myself, and I cannot believe this decline of the SAT's. It's not really a hard test once you apply yourself. Kids today are failing simply because they are probably too lazy to work hard.

Answer 4

I think kids are pushed to learn so many more things than I was when I graduated high school in 1970. Our government has SAT that is so far off real life that it might as well be fiction.

We need to learn to read, write, math, and some history. We can't expect all children to be the same. Some will have an aptitude towards things that others don't. Some will do well in math, while others do well in mechanics. The tests we have now are cookie cutter, conformity tests.

Give any 18 year old a computer and he or she will know how to search the web, and find things they need My 81 year old parents don't know that, does that make them dumb? No!

We are a society of individuals until it comes to education, then we are all expected to be the same. Crap!

Answer 5

I think students are just as educated, if not more. I think we need to take a long hard look at the role of the parent. More and more I see parents who don't care about what their child is doing. It's sad and it is causing our children to fail. The teachers where I teach are dedicated and work really hard in their classrooms, yet we have had to establish an intervention program because of the growing amount of students who fail. What is the common denominator? Lack of parental support and economic status. Lets stop blaming the schools and start putting more responsibility where it belongs....on the parents who indulge their children with "things" and don't instill a work ethic.

Answer 6

It's parental guidance early in life that is important.

Let them be independent, yet lay down ground rules and stand firmly by them. Let them be entertained, yet teach them to entertain themselves. Show them that there are consequences (good and bad) for every action, some may not come right away, and some can be life altering.

For every decision a parent makes there is a butterfly effect on the child. It starts from birth on. A child will learn to cry constantly if you pick them up and calm them down everytime. However, it works the opposite way too. If you read to your child; share your musical, artistic, and aesthetic tastes, even if they don't comprehend it they will learn from it.

Children are but the clay for mold. The parents are the sculptor, and there is no other way around it.

Answer 7

Our kids are failing at an expediant rate because we are raising a generation of DAYCARE kids. The parents have less and less to do in the teaching (manners/ethics/morals) than ever before. It is mostly left up to daycare unfortunately. The kids have no balance in their lives. All work and scheduled activities usually directed by people with good hearts but not real swift with the brains.

Answer 8

heck yes.... these days with the NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND laws should be getting better edu but if parents do not know the laws and know whats avail then no point to law... such as voucher system to private schools, free private tutor for failing schools and students and I dont mean those after school programs either.... become more informed parents.....remember your the best advocate your child has... if you are not working to get the best for them the government does will not stop and say do you want this program???

Stop letting kids say but I was told I could use this or that... we had to use our brains and now kids are given answers. Also, sit down for 5 minutes and make your kids explain an answer... not the whole page but only one answer... make sure they understand the homework... you don't have to understand but if they are saying ummmm and ohhh and just dont understand then can take care of it... but just take responsibilty and your kids will follow .... and tell them they can have the final word in any situation because your word is FINAL. Amazing how quick kids shut-up... because they can't argue with that fact.

Answer 9

It I am afraid to say comes from "main streaming". Children with learning disabilities are put in classes with "normal" children, that may learn on a faster scale. Now the teacher has to teach at a rate of speed that everyone can learn it, thus holding back "smarter" children.
To fix it, we need to go back to the separate schools/classes etc...
This nation has become a nation of "wussies". Not everyone is as smart as the other and not everyone can be a winner.

Answer 10

well in my school they improve every year..and plus the new sat started last year and its gotten harder and it makes it hard when the test starts at 7 in the morning and lasts for hours and they expect us to know way more the 30 years ago most teens no more stuff then there parents