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Teens don't slack when it comes to stress

ANTHONY E. WOLF

From Tuesday's Globe and Mail

Latest comment posted at 2:24 AM EDT 30/04/08

Though you want to ease your child's worries about unrelenting school work, the reality is it's a fact of life ...Read the full article

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  1. CD W from Canada writes: Woo Hoo, my slacker child is NOT going to university! I save 50,000 bucks! Time for more booze and steaks, and by the way, slacker child, time to move out of the house!!! win win.
  2. Dmitri Gorskin from Montreal, Canada writes: When my daughter came to the school (College France) in small town near the Montreal(Longeile) one kid broke her head. It is normal.8 girls and 25 strong boys. The kids in Canadian school are very aggressive and very rich. They see a lot of cruel moves by TV. How to kill people in the movies? It is entertainment in Canada and normal only in Canada. There is not any prohibition against the TV companies. You have to buy alcohol in computer game for kids. The kids use very strange books in the school. They are very heavy. In three or more times more then were main. They were written in other countries.In france,UK. So, the kids cannot understand materials without teacher, but teacher not explain anything. They gave them a copy of the pages .That’s all. The kids stay at school from 7.30 a.m. till 4.30 p.m. It is very noisy. The school is very huge. I learned in school from 8.30 a.m. till 1.30 p.m. After I walk in the street, I was in the library, in the shop, and can see my friends. I live as all people in my town. The Canadian school looks like a punishment. Nobody asks kids, what they like, it was interesting or not.kids have to prepare lessons till 8 p.m. The kids in 7th classes don't know very simple things. How to prepare the food. There are not difference between girls and boys for teachers. The Moon more higher then Sun or not? They not learned the nature. They learn a lot of very abstract and useless things in the school. Not about first nation. They repeat the same things every year. It is terrible. My daughter start to come at school where knows Russian language. The books are very small. The teacher explained all materials.The materials are new every lesson. The kids not aggressive and they are very polite. Why kids can not study good manners in Canadian schools? My daughter asked me, where the school and country better then Canada? I think, it depends on the teacher and kids and society.
  3. Buenaventura Durruti from Canada writes: When I was in high school I was definetly one of those kids descried in the article: Perpetually anxious and terrified that mistakes and poor grades would end up holding me back from ever doing anything meaningful with my life. The end result was that I spent 12 grand on a year of university only to discover that it wasn't at all what I wanted to be doing life, so I then dropped out and spent the next two years even more depressed an anxious that I wouldn't be able to do anything meaningful with my life. Luckily it clicked with me that school wasn't the be all and end all and that even with out a degree I could live a happy and fulfilling life. The result from that is that while I'm not wealthy by any means, I'm doing work that is meaningful to me and living a lifestyle that I enjoy. Someday I might decide to go back to school, but I'll make damn sure that it's on my terms. Life is to short to spend it worrying about going to the best schools to get the best jobs to buy the best consumer goods. Since I stoped worrying about such things, I've been able to make my life 100% my own. I may be poor and ugly, but I'm also quite happy. I'd take that over being rich, beautiful and miserable any day.
  4. Alistair McLaughlin from Canada writes: I remember high school and the idiotic amount of homework assigned. It was retarded. Teachers didn't think they were doing a good job unless they were assigning mountains of homework. And no one cared what any other teacher had assigned. 99% was completely worthless, and a complete waste of time. Worried about stressing teenagers? Stop assigning mountains of homework. Do your job and teach the stuff in school. An hour per night, TOTAL, should be enough homework. Each subject should only be able to assign homework on one designated night of the week. Monday? Math and English. Tuesday? History and chemistry. Etc.... Half hour each. Teach the $hit IN class, and you wouldn't need to assign so much homework.

    I often hear the argument that "Kids need to develop the work habits to succeed at university." Since when did doing copious amounts of repetitive, non-productive work prepare one for ANYTHING? Doing work for nothing is the exact opposite of good work habits.
  5. pran manga from ottawa, Canada writes: You are bound to see any number of uninformed, unexamined and meaningless assertions about how useless homework is. But homework is important and has been for over a hundred years in virtually every country. I see the results of the new Canadian attitude against homework. Graduate students who can not do the work on their own, who do not do the required readings for their courses, who cheat and find ways to beat the system, who miss many classes, who can't write well, countless students with abysmal capacity in numeracy and math,etc. Yet with all these deficiencies they are horrified with a grade less than A or A . Some of them then turn to teaching and the cycle continues. We, as a nation , are shortchanging our future in an increasingly competitive world.
  6. Bungalo Bill from Canada writes: I think the teenage years are a good time to encourage one's son or daughter to dig deep and examine what is important to them.

    Will entering the 'rat race' be that fulfilling ? Will chasing the dollar, buying the bling be what turns their crank? Or is there more to life?

    No one answer though, as each person hears a different drummer. In the long run, we parents have to remember that our tune isn't the only true tune .....
  7. Friendly Anglo from Ottawa, Canada writes: OK. Here's my problem. 19 year old son, considered gifted. Quit high school, Failed art for crying out loud. Failed guitar, even though he can probably play it better than the others in the class. Just didn't bother showing up. Didn't like spending the time. Didn't like the teenagers. Figures people should be able to do whatever they want for 8 hours a day, not work for a living. Sounds great don't it?? Where do I sign up for that, I asked him. And tell me. Who wants to suck out the sewers? Somebody must want to do that.

    I just don't understand what the heck happened. I've always worked, his father has always worked. I think I must have made it too easy for him and now he expects everything will be easy. What am I supposed to do with that now!?!
  8. Kay Ay from Canada writes: I was thinking the same thing Bill.
    Unless you are planning to set them up in their very own replica house (to the one they are growing up in) it's necessary to explain how you lived in crappy apartments, etc before you paid off your student loans and could buy a house and aquire your very own mortgage.
  9. Alex Kitz from Toronto, Canada writes: re: Alistair McLaughlin's point,

    Why do mountains of repetitive work? "Since when did doing copious amounts of repetitive, non-productive work prepare one for ANYTHING?" Well friendo, welcome to the working world. And I might add, welcome to university. The simple fact of the matter is that what kids do in school DOES matter. It matters a whole hell of a lot. Like a long game of golf, every shot counts. Failing a class in 1st year university will hurt you just as much as failing one in 3rd year, or 4th year. That pressure kids feel is real and it's counter productive to pretend otherwise.

    The question shouldn't be, "is school putting too much pressure on these kids?" Rather, it should be, "are kids being taught how to deal with pressure?"
  10. Alistair McLaughlin from Canada writes: pran manga, I agree with everything you said. But do you think more homework is the answer to this? On THAT I would have to disagree. Assigning reams of useless, repetitive bunk will only lead to graduates who can produce reams of repetitive bunk.
  11. Alistair McLaughlin from Canada writes: Alex Kitz, you seemed to have missed my point entirely. I never said school wasn't important. I simply said that doing useless assignments does nothing to prepare one for the future. Yes, some of us end up in jobs where we do useless assignments. (Such as many people employed with the firm I work for.) But I hardly needed to practice ahead of time. I find that rather like smashing your knees with a hammer to prepare yourself for the eventual arthritis you will suffer from in old age.
  12. Neon Cab from Canada writes: Homework is for losers who can't learn in class -- and the same can be said for most people who continue to do it when they get jobs. Work smarter; not harder or longer.

    My grades in high school were low (C to C ) because they graded homework assignments and my refusal to do them all cost me a few points. I squeezed into university, but my grades probably wouldn't cut it anymore in today's age of grade inflation.

    That's a shame because when I went to university, no one graded the daily grind and only the big assignments mattered. If you didn't do the rote work you still had to demonstrate that you understood the subject when you wrote an essay or an exam. I did, and did better than many who spent every waking hour poring over books. I left university with a B average and headed to college.

    Now, here is where "show don't tell" becomes a religion. College is hands on. You can't forget or omit the theory but you can't rely on it either. At college you have to demonstrate that you can do it as well as you can talk about it. I left college with an A average and my name on the Dean's list.

    14 years in the rat race and I have a good work-life balance. I'll read work-related articles and books at home because I'm passionate about my trade but I don't bring home reports and assignments because I'm paid to complete them during business hours. And guess what, they're completed (or expected to be by the end of today) and I have time to take a moment and post here.

    Good luck to any losers who believe they have to do homework to succeed. Unless you're a lawyer or raking in serious money, you have to put a value on your life and keep it in mind when dedicating any extra time to work. On the other hand, kudos to those who have achieved that balance -- whether while still in high school or anywhere else along the spectrum until retirement -- your friends and family will appreciate you for it more than your boss ever could have.

  13. Zal Black from Canada writes: well Friendly Anglo from Ottawa...

    the best advice I tell my friends with teenaged children is for them to get a part time job at a fast food joint. I worked at mcDonalds from 15-19 and the most important thing I got from that was not extra money, experience on a resume or learning responsibilty - it was that I didnt want to be working in a job like that for the rest of my life! That exposure during the highschool years is priceless !!!
  14. Hugh Draper from Vancouver, Canada writes: How you do in school determines how you are going to do in life is a false and meaningless statement.
  15. Neon Cab from Canada writes: FYI "plus" signs don't work on this forum so please be forgiving when parts of my post don't appear right (i.e "C to C" should be C" to C-plus", etc.).
    Also, I just came across an article on The Star's site ("Jeff Bridges shaves it all off for Iron Man role", where he echoes many of our sentiments against useless rote work, saying: "What's my advice? Have fun. Don't take it too seriously. Take it sincerely, but not too seriously. Have fun. And love, man!"
    Plus, for some insight into the folly of grade inflation see "Failure to fail" in the April 2008 issue of The Walrus. Or for insight into the folly of rote work see "Numb brains, more errors" in the April 28 issue of The Globe and Mail.
    Doing rote work should not qualify as getting an education. People should have to prove it and be allowed to prove it without numbing their brains first.
  16. john wardle from Canada writes: "Since when did doing copious amounts of repetitive, non-productive work prepare one for ANYTHING?"

    Uhm...welcome to the working world?
  17. RD Lone from Vancouver, Canada writes: Some kids are perma-stressed and try hard just like how some kids are honor students. The majority are not. I don't know how one case can be generalized to everybody; if it was true there would be no drop outs.
  18. The Religious Left from Canada writes:
    I never did homework in high-school. I never did the small repetitive crap that was assigned. Never hurt me one bit in university. In engineering the profs don't care about the assignments either, it's all about the tests.

    One of the best things school taught me was to LOVE learning. That love of learning new things has served me far better than any amount of menial work.
  19. Alistair McLaughlin from Canada writes: Neon Cab, Hugh Draper and Religious Left, all excellent points. If high school were an indicator of success later in life, I'd be in jail right now, or worse.
  20. Ralph Shiell from Canada writes: Alistair McLaughlin, as you are no doubt aware, the plural of anecdote is not data.

    The more pertinent question is whether there is a statistically valid causal relationship between high school achievement and "success". Of course, that requires both defining success and then determining causality. I know what I suspect to be true, but am willing (as always) to be swayed by the hard data.
  21. Ford Thompson from Canada writes: Yeh going back to school always make me feel sick. Coming to ..the stress can be awful. I blame the fact that we have to do 5 years of work in 4. In calculus we learn a new idea every day! ie. 1.1 one day, 1.2 the next, with absolutely no time in which to review the issue. When your learning a new concept this is certainly not enough. Perhaps this is when homework would be useful, however if you have to do this in 6-8 subjects a night athletics hopefully some life outside of school, things get hectic quickly. I´ve decided to stay for a fifth year.

    Ford
  22. C C from Canada writes: I have no basis for comparison when it comes to a change in stress levels in school, but I'm in grade twelve and yeah there's stress. Sometimes more than others, especially at the end of the year. I've seen worse though.
    But I do sense a certain irony that the teachers (who preach to us all year about time management, planning ahead and doing things early) are rushing to fit everything in by the end of the year. I find it unfair that they feel it's ok to pile stuff on a much faster rate at the end. Like in one of my courses, the teacher assigned an independent study unit of the chapter that she won't have time to teach. It won't even be all that useful. Oh well, back to work on my sociology project!
  23. Cliff Pallette from Kearney ON, Canada writes: Repetitive, rote exercises may seem pointless, but they do help you cope with what you do eventually. I failed endlessly trying to succeed at many high school assignments and worked hard doing pick and shovel work in construction, but in the end it paid off. I've found a job I love, working for people I enjoy and manage a handful of great people. It's the endless persistence to finish the job that has paid off the most - don't slag mindless hard work as it does have its benefits.
  24. Rollo Tomasi from Pass Buck, Belgium writes: That's because by the time children reach adolescence, they get the message: How you do in school determines how you are going to do in life. The money you're going to make. The quality of your job. How high you go on the ladder of life.
    --------------------------------

    What a crock. Education may open doors, but it's not the only way, or close to it.

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