Speak about school education in the USA. Dwell on types of schools, stages, exams, curriculum, and problems.
American system of school education is rather developed complicated. Education in the United States is mainly provided by two sectors: the public sector and the private one. And first of all, I am going to speak about the public sector. Public education is free to all children living in the USA. It consists of pre-school education, elementary school, junior high school and high school, and the grade. Many Americans send their children to a nursery school, or pre-school at an early age. At 5 children go to kindergarten and begin their formal K-12 education.
Now, let me speak about elementary schools. The school year runs from early September to the following June. Students attend daily from Monday to Friday. The school day in elementary school usually lasts from about 8.30 a.m. to 3.30 p.m. Students spend most of the day with their class. The class is taught most of the time by the same teacher. A few times each week they will have a gym class or do music or art with another teacher. Students rarely have homework. The school day is divided into various sections and in the morning and the afternoon students have recess, a time when they can go outside and play, for about 15 minutes. The traditional subjects for …show more content…
elementary school students are called the three Rs: reading, writing, and arithmetic. It is thought to be important to give children the chance to study as many subjects as possible, so that whatever their natural skills are they will have the chance to develop them.
Students at junior high school take different lessons from different teachers who are specialists in their subjects. Students are required to study certain subjects, but they can choose which classes they take. At high school, students may take technical subjects such as computer programming alongside academic subjects. As in elementary school the aim is to help children develop their natural potential. When students graduate from high school they receive a diploma, a document to say that they have finished their courses.
There are no national exams, although some schools and states have their own exams. In order to receive the high-school diploma, students must get a minimum number of credits, which are given for the successful completion of each one- or half-year course. Some colleges and universities require the students to take the SAT (Scholastic Aptitude Test). The SAT can be taken two or three times, so that the student can improve the results.
Though there is no national curriculum in the United States, elementary school pupils usually follow a single curriculum, the chief aim of which is general education. The emphasis is placed on the basic skills — speaking, reading, writing and arithmetic. Other subjects in the elementary school include Art, Music, Physical Education, Computer and Foreign Language courses and such new subjects as drug and sex education. The secondary school curriculum is built around specific subjects rather than general skills. Most secondary schools have the same number of required "basic" subjects: English, Mathematics, Science, Social Studies and Physical Education.
Having analyzed the whole system of school education in the USA, it should be specially mentioned that education in America is not as effective as it should be because of a number of problems inherent within the system.
One of the problems with the American education system is that it has yet to form a consensus about the role of religion in the classroom. While this is not a statement meant to argue whether or not religion has a valid place in the public schools, it is fair to state that this is certainly an area of contention as opposing sides attempt to standardize how religion is treated, particularly in
textbooks.
Another problem is a lack of ethical stringency in schools. When it has been suggested that out of the top American students many cheated and had ambivalent views about it, it becomes clear that there is a lapse in ethical lapse in the system itself. According to one of the statistics in “Their Cheating Hearts” by William Raspberry, “80 percent had engaged in academic cheating and thought cheating was commonplace.
One more important issue that must be addressed in order to help save the deteriorating state of the American educational system is that of the grading system. Educational researchers, students, and teachers at all levels have confronted the issue of possible imbalance in the system. In many ways, it seems as though there is a great deal of time being wasted within the educational system (on the part of educational researchers, critics, students, and even teachers) about this supposed problem.
In conclusion, I would like to say that school education in Britain is rather developed and complicated and as the matter of fact schools offer broad education to many children with various abilities.