College is an amazing opportunity and according to media and our schools, there is a college for everyone now a days. If this is true then why all the fuss and pain and miserable hours and sleepless nights dedicated to thoughts of college: the right college, the affordable college... and did I mention these thoughts are that of an 8 year old?
Teenagers and young adults all over America are facing this dilemma of college searches and it's beginning to even reach out to our youth to the point where it's not even healthy anymore.
I know of elementary schools where they are already teaching kids college prep classes in order to prepare them. I know living in this advanced technological age people are expected to learn more, and learn quickly, but what ever happened to being a kid? Back in elementary I was still learning the basics: reading, writing, math, science, and social studies. But apparently that's not the case anymore.
My cousins lives in Ohio and she is 8 years old. At her school they have AP level test and give their students 2 to 3 hours of homework every night. EIGHT YEARS OLD! Megan (my cousin) and I are some what good friends and she called me the other day crying out of stress from too much work.
It's one thing to be a high school student preparing for college but who's bright idea was it to start stressing out little kids, especially in the time where they actually like school? It's incredibly unhealthy, and in my mind cruel. Too much stress in bad for anyone, if we keep putting stress like this on our youth it's only imaginable what a screwed up, uptight world we will live in within the next several years.
I think this is a result of people wanting children to grow up too fast.
Let kids be kids and grow steadily in their knowledge, ya know?
-Amanda-
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Sounds... odd.
I'm in school to be a teacher and I know many many teachers and this doesn't seem... um... the norm I guess.
I babysit an eight year old and her homework barely takes ten minutes. She's doing great in school and learning a lot.
This just sounds like a great exaggeration or something.
I'm more confused than enlightened and I am definitely not convinced.
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You are the Voice of the Childwen of the Revowution! [Toulouse, Moulin Rouge]
Trust me I nearly thought my cousin was joking when she started to complain too, but then she stated telling me about her assignments and it was hard not to see why she was stressed. Also my friend's little brother who is now a 5th grader said he is going through the same thing. And according to my neighbor who is also in 5th grade, teachers are asking kids to start thinking about what college they want to attend now so they can get ahead.
I get if you want a little kid to like a sports team or something, or a college that their parents went to, but I never knew what college I wanted to go to as a kid, I didn't even really care about college until my dad started taking me to UT baseball games, and even then it was still for fun, not a school requirement.
I'm certainly not saying every school does this, maybe it's just prep schools or private schools but even then, I don't feel like a 10 year old needs to be stressing out about college
A wise man once said "I don't know ask a girl."
*Emily*
I'm still not really convinced.
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You are the Voice of the Childwen of the Revowution! [Toulouse, Moulin Rouge]
WoW why would they give elementary children AP classes for college??? This seems odd...where did you hear this from? Is it from a newspaper article or something? I would love to read it if so.
Actually I haven't found a newspaper article yet, but I haven't really looked into it too much. This was more of an impulse blog. I was hearing some people in my class talk about it and I thought they were joking about AP classes in elementary but when I asked them, they told me about their younger siblings and the stuff they were learning.
Granite I know plenty of kids in public schools like Brentwood, where I went, that don't take AP classes or stuff like that, but they are getting a lot more work and learning advanced math, certainly more than I ever did at that age.
But once I heard this circulating around my school i decided to ask some actual elementary and middle school students if it was true. Some thought I was crazy and others completely agreed with me, and I asked kids from various kinds of schools: public, private, parochial, home school.
A wise man once said "I don't know ask a girl."
*Emily*
And here I am thinking that my high school puts too much pressure on students...
i agree. it's way too much stress for an 8 year old, but it does make sense. kids learn more when they're younger because they are able to take in more information. i don't think they should push it that far, since what you do in elementary school doesn't count for anything in college
Ya exactly that was another point I forgot to mention. In middle school and elementary school, kids get all kinds of awards and honor roll certificates, and as great as that is, they're going to be very disappointed when they get into high school and realize that it was pretty much worth nothing as far as college goes.
A wise man once said "I don't know ask a girl."
*Emily*
Thats strange. I took AP classes in high school but that was when I was 18! not 8. These kids are being forced to grow up too fast. I mean, they need to enjoy their childhood, or whats left of it, instead of burying their nose behind books and homeowrk. Save that for high school, maybe college.
What makes you think that these super genius kids aren't getting a childhood, or that they aren't choosing this path?
~C
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I just see childhood as being fun and not stressful. Homework and studying for me is stressful, as for most younger kids, and would have made me a very unhappy child if I had to do so much of it then. I guess its not strange to think that these kids wouldnt have chosen this path of hard classes and waht not, because there are always a few kids who love doing homework and learning and reading whatever they can. But its hard to imagine so many kids in one area that go to the same school that all like doing that.