All posts by Junfeng Qiao

society changes influence how students view education

Perspectives & History of Adolescence

‘People between 20 and 34 are taking longer to finish their educations, establish themselves in careers, marry, have children and become financially independent, said Frank F. Furstenberg, who leads the MacArthur Foundation Research Network on Transitions to Adulthood, a team of scholars who have been studying this transformation.’(Cohen,2010)

Being adults means you finish your education, get a job and live on your own. Usually, getting married and having kids are expected to be an adult. Now with society changing, people get their first job at their late 20s or 30s after finishing the education and thus independence becomes later.

However, when people spend more time getting education and delayed their time to work, some people are having the second view about education. Unlike in the past, nowadays, going to college and successfully graduating do not guarantee good jobs or even jobs anymore. This profoundly influences how students view education and plays an important role when they decide whether they should go to college. Some people cope with the crisis by furthering their education, while some people choose to work after graduating from high school. In China, some high school students no longer put all the effort on study since they will go to vocational schools instead of colleges. For them, receiving higher education do not mean better jobs and better jobs. They can get into the vocational schools with quite low scores. After graduate, they can be qualified technical workers, get jobs easily and earn money maybe more than a college graduates earn. So what the point of studying hard is?

Those students do not care about study, and they pose a threat to the society. They have bad attendance, they fight outside of school, gang together and pick up a lot of bad habits. They are ruining their lives and endangering people around them. Those are the students high school teachers are dealing with.  So I am thinking what we can do to encourage them to study and be a better person.

 

Cohen, P. (2010, June 11). The long road to adulthood is growing even longer. The New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/13/us/13generations.html

 

Teachers are powerful

Culturally, Linguistically, and Socioeconomically Diverse Adolescents in Urban Contexts: Framing the Conversation

The research is about the risks the African American students from low income backgrounds go through and what the supportive factors are to help them successful graduate from high school in the high drop-out context.

In classes, there are always some students who perform under average. What the article teaches me is that before I draw the conclusion that the students do not work hard, I need to know what they go through in their lives. There are tons of factors contributing to their academic performance. It can be family reason, negative peer pressure, neighborhood violence, and etc. I have to know as much as possible about students and take everything into consideration.

Moreover, the article makes me notice the huge impact teachers have on students. As teachers, if we give students persistent caring and build supportive relationship, students can be encouraged to stay in the school instead of dropping out. Meanwhile, teachers should be professional. Being able to offer students “appropriate instrumental support and guidance” (P9) is essential to ensure students gain the knowledge. In addition, it is good to know students expect teachers to be strict/powerful and to have high expectation on them. I was always wondering what the role teachers should play when they deal with students. Should they just be teacher/student or be friends. Based on the reading, it seems like being a friend can be quite harmful.

Knowing your students

Reaching Adolescents and How to Respond, Urban Adolescents

Recently, most of assessments, like test, are to knowledge-based. They aim to diagnose whether students understand what they are taught. However, descriptive review sheds light on the importance of knowing students and ways of describing students comprehensively. More specifically, description can be done in five perspectives:”physical presence and gesture, disposition and temperament, relationships, interest and passions, and ways of thinking and learning.”(Himley 2000) It, to some extent, tells educators what we should know about a student to help them better achieve their goals. Teachers should try know their students as much as possible, so they can show students they do care about them and it helps to build a good relationships. Based on Krashen affective filter hypothesis, if students like the teachers, students can be more motivated and efficient. When it comes to assess students, the author pointed out that we should keep the assessments as descriptive as possible rather than diagnostic or conclusive. Personally, I view assessment as an instructional tool . It should be descriptive to enable both teachers and students grasp where students are in their learning progressions so that we can figure out ways to give students the help they need to move toward next steps. Also, without knowing their interest, gift, difficulty and personality, it is hard to give them what they need.