If you agree with the main premise, find an argument that the writer DOESN'T use to support his/ her premise. (That step in particularly easy if you do the Singleton essay.) State and develop that argument. Your downshift might look like the following: State the author's main idea, develop it, state your supporting argument, and then develop with details you may have culled from research on the Internet.
If you agree with a supporting argument, note that the writer(s) don't do an adequate job of providing evidence and supporting detail. Do that job for him/ them. Your downshift might look like the following: State the author's supporting argument, develop it, and then give supporting evidence and detail that the author does not provide.
Note: The paragraph should not simply summarize. You are trying to develop the writers' arguments, not repeat them. Repeat only as much as you need to to get to your own supporting detail.
I realize you may disagree with both essays. Force yourself to find evidence for its position anyway. We're learning to argue (in the best sense of the word). Sometimes, you will write academic essays that state a thesis contrary to your own position. Successful essays go with the best evidence available.
Please post the paragraph by Tuesday at 5 PM.
I agree with Singleton’s main idea that giving student’s F’s will greatly improve the American education system. Singleton argues that giving a student an F when they do not fully understand all aspects of the material will force the student to remain at the same level of their studies until they actually grasp and understand all aspects of the subject. One argument that Singleton does not express is that if a student sees that his peers are receiving F’s in a class that they are not putting effort into then that student will be motivated to try hard so that they do not fail. The student will realize that one cannot simply slide through the course with minimal effort and they will be forced to try their best in order to pass.
ReplyDeleteIn “What Our Education System Needs Is More F’s,” Carl Singleton mentions one of the biggest effects of more F’s but does not develop it fully. The point that needs more development, in my opinion, is the subsequent action that parents would take to remedy their child’s educational situation. I believe that this is the most important consequence that would result if more F’s were given. Many current parents pay a vast amount of their attention to their child’s performance in school, if the average performance of children in school were to drop then parenting styles would trend more heavily towards the “helicopter” parenting style. For example, many Asian parents are extremely demanding of their children when it comes to getting grades and getting the most out of educational opportunities. Because of their demanding parenting style, many Asian children are very successful at school and learn the required material much better than their American counterparts. That being said, if professors gave more F’s in American schools, then more American kids would take their report cards home and more parents would be extremely disappointed and more parents would act to fix the failing performance. While Singleton does mention how parents would grow more concerned if there were more F’s given in schools across America, I believe that he could have developed the point further with modern day examples.
ReplyDeleteCarl Singleton, author of “What Our Education System needs is More F’s,” argues the point of his title. In other words, we need to stress students failed to master the material before they’re told in college so immediate action can be comprised to fix the where money is well spent. Moreover, the parents will see that and their responsibility will be either to make the school aware about how they are doing or hire a tutor. Those failings in subjects will be noticed at PTA meetings and by the school boards. Decisions about how the education system should spend their money would then be towards programs for students, or afterhours for teachers instead of competing with other school’s technology. For example, class of 2011’s SAT reading scores hit a record low although taxes are higher than ever.
ReplyDeleteIn “What Our Education System Needs Is More F’s,” Carl Singleton claims that schools have been issuing “unearned passing grades over a period of some 20 years.” He describes how a tolerance led F’s becoming D’s, D’s becoming C’s, and finally becoming B’s. Unfortunately, this progression of increasing grades is still prominent. Teachers’ generosity has become a thing to be exploited. As first, teachers would be lenient to students by dropping a low grade or offering second chances. Today, this lenience is used by students to get out of work, rather than the lenience only being used during specific situations. For instance, a student would need this lenience if there was a family emergency, but now students use it to spend a night watching TV. Singleton’s idea to give more F’s would hopefully fix this. In a stricter grading system, it will be difficult to abuse teachers’ mercy. Small lenience policies cannot save a truly failing student.
ReplyDeleteIn "What Our Education Needs Is More F's," Carl Singleton argues that in order to better educate today's society, the educators need to not be so afraid to give out more F's. If I am being honest, I would have to agree with this statement. Having teachers pass out more F's isn't something most students would agree with because no one wants to be the person to fail, but the education system has greatly gone down in recent years. One of Singleton's arguments is that by not passing a student, that student will be forced to remain where they are until they fully understand what is supposed to be learned. I know from experience that if I take a test on a subject that I don't fully understand, but I do well on the test, I won't push myself to learn the material like I should, and I will no longer study it. But if I do poorly on the test I will continue to work on understanding the material. Something Singleton didn't mention in his argument is the competitiveness that humans have. If a student gets an F and their friend gets an A, the student with the F will be motivated to work harder and learn the needed material in order to compete with the A their friend received. Most everyone I know is very competitive and will do whatever it takes to be the best, even if it has to do with school.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Carl Singleton’s argument that giving more failing grades to students will increase the overall quality of education. He argues that the more F’s teachers hand out to students who have not mastered the material will increase the quality of education in the long run. If the teachers were to hand out more F’s, like how Singleton suggests, they would have to hold themselves more accountable for the quality of teaching they put forth.The teaching would have to be held to a higher standard and and more effort would have to be put in by both teachers and students; there would be a continuous cycle of improvement. However, Singleton fails to mention how the teachers would react towards assigning more F’s to students. The teachers would hold themselves accountable for the increase of failures, and in some cases feel like they failed the students.
ReplyDeleteI believe that Carl Singleton’s theory described in his essay “What our Education System Needs is More F’s” will indeed decrease the quantity of illiterate students. Singleton states that teachers giving our more F’s will result in parents becoming more active with their child helping them to learn the required material and therefore making them worthy of a decent grade. I believe that giving out more F’s will result in coaches and club leaders also becoming more involved with improving the student’s education. If students no longer have the option to pass by using the loophole of taking extremely easy teachers, they will have no other option than to simply help the students learn the material. For example, years ago, there was a scandal at Florida State University where in order to get illiterate recruits (illiterate because they were not failed in high school) accepted into the university, they would claim that they were mentally handicapped. Once this was discovered, certain standards were set that the students had to meet and they were forced to hire tutors for the recruits in order for them to learn the necessary educational skills.
ReplyDeleteIn Carl Singleton’s “What our Education System Needs is More F’s” he argues that if teachers give students more F’s then the quality of education will be higher. Singleton wants teachers to give out F’s only to appropriate students who have clearly not mastered the concepts. Thus, he believes everything could be better if F’s were doled out properly and more often because then teachers, students, parents, and administrators would take notice and be properly motivated. Singleton has a good premise but ignores that the education system does not necessarily need more F’s but more honest grades. For instance, if an individual needs to fail and thus retake the course then that should be done, but if they truly deserve an A, it should mean something important since not everyone should get an A. More true assessments of work are needed because with everyone getting A’s and B’s that they might not deserve, it makes it hard to find out who is really the better individual when comparing report cards. Perhaps, two job applicants are showing off their report cards and both have 3 A’s but it does not mean much, especially according to slate.com since grade inflation makes it very difficult to see who is the better candidate. In addition other problems exist such as, it is difficult to interpret the report cards because the classes are different and one of the schools could have a policy to combat grade inflation by giving teachers a limited amount of A’s to hand out. For example, at Princeton University several years ago they started a policy to combat grade inflation where they only allow A’s to account for 35% of the grades, according to USA Today. But, any number of these problems could be possible and because of varying grade policies it is very hard to understand what grades mean today. Thus the US needs to institute a policy of giving out more F’s especially in high school in order for grades to actually become meaningful again.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Carl Singleton’s main thesis in “What Our Education System Needs Is More F’s,” that is handing out more Fs is an effective, fair and constructive way of improving the education system. Apart from the way it will affect students, parents, teachers and the school board, I feel an F helps students deal with the harsh realities of disappointment and the results of a lax attitude towards grades. Disappointment is a negative feeling that will lead students to change something about their conduct. Conan O’Brian once said, “The beauty is that through disappointment you can gain clarity, and with clarity comes conviction and true originality." To give students the courage to pave the way to self actualization, they need to be handed grades that directly correspond to the effort they put into their education, anything less than what is required is a failure and should be treated as such. This will breed a new generation of students, ones who will learn faster from their mistakes and change their tactics to push themselves harder and further.
ReplyDeleteCarl Singleton’s main point in “What Our Education System Needs Is More F’s” is that teachers should be giving students the grades they deserve, even if they are F’s. He believes that giving more F’s will be correct the current education system in America because it will not only motivate students to work harder but teachers as well. I agree with this tactic completely. If students are given grades they actually deserve, it will eliminate students from “just getting by”. Not only will students work harder to graduate from high school, but also it will cause teachers to work harder when preparing students. Eliminating grade inflation will better the American education system.
ReplyDeleteThe education in American is crumbling at the base and the solution that may work is taking away the millions of passing grades from those that do not deserve them. Giving passing grades to those that do not deserve them is setting them up for failure in the long run. Imagine how many students are put through the education system that never actually learn what they are supposed to even though the country is spending millions of dollars to put them through it. The accountability of teachers has been shot down the drain as many are only working for paychecks and benefits. Teachers no longer teach because they are passionate about teaching. They teach ways to do better on standardized tests, which slaughters their passion in teaching what prepares students for the future. In high school, many classes were spent learning standardized testing methods, which are almost impossible to fail in Ohio, yet many do. The students need to actually learn the material before they can be given the chance to succeed.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Carl Singleton’s argument in “What our Education System Needs is More F’s” that giving more failing grades would motivate students. At the moment our student population tends to be lazy and lackadaisical when it comes to their studies. This is a direct effect of their teacher’s inability to give a hard “F” to the students who aren’t performing up to the standards that they should be. By doling out more “F’s” you would be forcing the kids who are just coasting through to have to actually put forth an effort to pass, rather than skating by with the bare minimum. This crack down on the straphangers living “D’s get degrees” as life style rather than a colloquialism would also extend to the students who are doing well. At the moment the “F” is a grade seldom given so by gifting out more “F”s you would be shifting the whole grading system back a letter. This would mean a “B” would no longer be the norm making those students who do want to make dean’s list work even harder, and everyone in between them and Jeff Spicoli(Fast Times at Ridgemont High) would also have to put forth more of an effort than they have been.
ReplyDeleteIn Carl Singleton's " What our Education System Needs is More F's," he states that the over all quality of todays Education system would be dramatically effected if teachers were tougher on the grading scale. Singleton argues that if more kids are issued F's it will spark a revolution across the Education community and kids will benefit directly. I agree with his case and understand his reasonings for such a preposterous idea. Instead of handing out A's and B's to students that put forth any effort, they will be given the grade they deserve for the work presented, regardless how much effort was put forward. This may shock many readers but it is only fair to the students that actually turn in quality work. In todays world an A has become the standard grade a student should receive for good work. But in reality an A is for outstanding work that is rewarded to the top percentile of students, and a C is the grade given to a student for average work that is nothing special. Singleton's point may come off as harsh or unreasonable but I think he is trying to put an emphasize on how important this matter truly is, he may not want to fail everyone but he wants the scale to get tougher.
ReplyDeleteIn his article, Singleton argues that it would cost taxpayers more money to keep children in the grade levels at which they belong, thus motivating community members to place a higher importance on education. He goes on to state that, under this new system, children would be made to stay in the same grade until they learned the required material, instead of being passed to the next level. What Singleton does not account for is a potential consequence of this system. In a situation where the large number of failed children might become costly to taxpayers, members of the community would be likely to view the school system itself as the cause of the problem. In this instance, parents would begin to move their children to different schools. This would help Singleton's vision tremendously. Better, more efficient schools would gain more students, thus ensuring their success. Other, less successful schools would notice this trend and raise their standards.
ReplyDeleteCarl Singleton's main idea is the belief of failing kids who haven't "learned the required material." Teachers should not give credit to the student, until he/she is completely literate in each area. Furthermore, Singleton claims an F would force parents to get involved in their child's education. Even if the parent doesn't get involved, the child still has to know the material either way. I agree with Singleton that a child needs to know the material. Too often teachers are focused on incentives to make students pass statewide tests, but in reality, they aren't really learning or retaining anything at all. Higher standards by teachers and the school system in general must be required.
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