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Irrelevent Retention, Apparently.
R. Alex Whitlock
There is apparently a
debate brewing in Texas as to when the school year should start. According to The Chronicle, the state has mandated that school can't start earlier than the 21st this year without a waiver*.
But I digress. The case in favor of an earlier start date is ostensibly so that they can end the first semester before school starts**. The case against an earlier start date has to do with August electricity bills, summer jobs, and summer school. The focal point of the debate, however, comes down to whether or not Winter Break should interrupt a semester.
So I started weighing it over in my mind to try to figure out which, if any, side I was on in the debate. Then it occured to me:
We are debating whether Summer Vacation should be two months and one week or two months and three weeks because we are concerned about how much our students are going to forget in
two weeks. Let me repeat. We are worried about cutting down summer break to
two months or so in the summer in order to prevent our students from having to retain information after
two weeks.
Is an education that evaporates after two weeks of dormancy really an education at all? Is our grip of our kids on what they're being taught that perilously loose?
Of course it is. And this entire debate outlines how much we, as a society, don't care. This is why year-around schooling has never really taken off. We would rather have a flexible summer than not have to seemingly spend the first two months of every schoolyear going over what they've forgotten over the summer.
I've never really been a proponent of year-around school. I've mostly been indifferent. But I completely understand the pull against having a two-week break right before exams. Changing the context, however, suggests that it is more a symptom of a larger problem rather than a problem in itself.
* - This must be at least somewhat new because my sophomore through senior years school started significantly before the 21st. The only thing that actually prevented it from starting on my birthday my senior year was that for the first time ever they started school on a Wednesday rather than a Monday. My first couple years in junior high were had us taking exams after break, but school was practically starting in September about then.
** - I'm not sure I buy this, however, because I'm pretty sure that they have started around the 21st before and still gotten out before Christmas. Some of it apparently comes down to wanting a full week off for Thanksgiving and not having lopsided semesters (I think two of the "six-weeks" periods back then were 5 weeks in the fall and 7 in the spring or something).
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Observations
If I remember correctly, my senior year started August 11th. And, we had finals before Christmas break.
That said, in second grade, school started on September 5th.
UGH. Actually, giving this any thought at all makes me remember how much Texas schools suck. I'm so homeschooling if I ever reproduce.
It's like once they started starting before Labor Day, the creep became uninhibited.
I've gone back and forth on homeschooling. Not necessarily because my education was so bad, but because my education was quite good for public education (both by its "exemplary" ranking and comparing where I was compared to most of my classmates in college)... and I still consider it to have been a mediocre experience that wasted a lot of time. On the other hand any child of Camille's and mine will have some socialization problems to overcome... and homeschooling probably wouldn't help with that.
According to the teachers I've spoken to, the date has more to do with keeping students on the same school schedule so that when people move they don't have as many issues with their kids going a new school that is either way ahead, or extremely behind where their kid is.
At least that's how it was explained to me.
Having experienced both at the high school level and both at the college level, I'll come out in favor of pre-Christmas exams in High School and post-Christmas exams in college. Not least because, in college, you do need a bit of time to make up for the classes you missed.... (and you're not going to do that in high school!)
From personal experience?
Kids don't forget all that much. You don't "have" to re-teach them last year's curriculum over the first two months after summer.
If you find that you are, then the fault is on how they were taught in the years previous. But cutting out summer vacation won't help, because any break they get, they'll forget things if your teaching method doesn't do anything for retention.
Adrianne, I didn't realize that any colleges had exams after Christmas Break. I'm not sure I would like it. I'm definitely of the mind that I would prefer relax. That, of course, runs somewhat contrary to the point of this post :)
Mike,
I wouldn't say that it's a matter of style as much as priorities.
Kids can remember, but only what they really care to. Try as we might, I do not believe it possible to get most kids to care about math as long as they have a calculator that can solve most basic problems. A good teacher or teaching method may be able to move those that do care from 20% of the student population to 40%... but a majority don't care and don't see its relevence.
Which brings it back to priorities. Our priorities are that it's all about the test and about making the grade /and/ we seemingly have little interest in making the grade actually reflect what has or has not been learned. In that vein, maybe it's best that we have tests after a break!
But what's frustrating about the debate as I read it is that we are further subordinating learning by not only putting the emphasis on grades, but we're going out of our way to make it so that theat even grades are subordinated to a kid's psychological well-being.
Kavey,
Half of the schools in the area where I work go with one schedule and the other half go with another. It certainly creates some logistical problems. It probably would be better for everyone to go one way or the other.
It also has to do with TAKS - students across the state take TAKS at the same time. So, if School A applies for a waiver to start on August 10th, then their students will have extra days to cram in more knowledge before testing. The kids at School B, who start on August 21, will suffer. Or something. My kiddos go to school all year, though, and they don't take TAKS, so it's all good. :)
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