School extensions?!

[jvalencia]

Obama will try to extend school days and hours.
Express what you think about this!

 

[miles1]

Any parent can tell you that there's limits to a young child's attention span and stamina. I don't think there's a lot to be gained by lengthening the school day for education sake; the kids won't be paying attention and the little ones will be nodding off by 3:00 in the afternoon. What I do think is that we need to eliminate some of the many days off for "teacher in-service days", holidays that 95% of the population doesn't recognize, and seasonal breaks. There's no continuity to the learning process like this.

By the end of school, my 10 yo will have missed 6 1/2 days for teacher in-services that could be done during the summer, 4 one-day holidays that few businesses recognize, a full week break in Feburary and again in April, plus Thanksgiving break and two weeks at Christmas. Eliminating even one-third of this would result in more productive hours than adding another hour onto the the school day.

(My biggest gripe is the week in Feburary, just 5 weeks after the Christmas break. The only thing to do here in Connecticut in February is race to see who gets frost-bitten the fastest. Face it, most families cannot afford a WDW vacation in the middle of winter.)

 

[trr1]

The school year in Japan begins in April and classes are held from Monday to either Friday or Saturday, depending on the school. The school year consists of three terms, which are separated by short holidays in spring and winter, and a one month long summer break