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Student in 7th grade GT class, Mesa View Middle School.

Have you ever been called a name? Was it because of your religion, skin color or just because you are different?  That is called discrimination, my friend.  It is a bad and hurtful thing to do to someone. It makes kids and adults feel horrible, because they may not discriminate other people. It may makes, people cry. When my cousin went to the first day of school, other kids made fun of him because his legs where crooked. He was born like that, now the’ re fixed. He cried and said, “I will never go to school again.” That does not only hurt them but their family too. A lot of people get bullied after just one person made fun of them.

Discrimination may also cause fights, because some people are very sensitive. Like one day that my friend was getting bullied and he was mad so he punched the dude. He got suspended. However, The other kid never talked to him.

Name calling is a big deal. Everybody does it. It still hurts to some people, but t others it doesn’t. That is awesome because if name calling didn’t hurt there would be no problem. I heard people call other people fatty,white,dumb Mexican, and other stuff with religion. As you see name calling is bad.

When there is discrimination for any thing and one person starts it well not only that person will bully them but everyone that hears. Bulling is most common at schools. They talk to us about it, we just don’t listen. I include my self. Bulling, name calling, and hitting are is discrimination in one way.

Either way sometimes people do that to protect someone or something. It may be necessary. It is good to protect ourselves. Although it does hurt people and nobody want’s that. If I were them I would not use it at all. One day my cousin told a girl to stop talking about her. Eventually the girl did stop because my cousin hit her.

Whenever someone hurts people in any way you should defend yourself. If you don’t, people won’t respect you. Everyone needs respect. So when you defend your self and you use words, do it in a good way. Defend, but don’t hurt!

Is it necessary for teachers to overload students with work?  A number of teachers and parents believe teachers should assign daily work and homework to review what students have learned in class.  On the other hand, some teachers and parents believe too much daily work and homework does not necessarily help students learn more.  As far as I am concerned, I believe that daily work is necessary, however, some daily work and homework seems to merely-busy work.  

Assigning daily work and homework may create undesirable behaviors.  Students who do not complete their daily work or homework cheat by using other students completed papers.  Students also tend to choose to miss class to be able to complete school assignments thus avoiding dreadful grades.  Parents may also interfere with helping their children because they are overloaded with work which of course does not benefit the student.

Being overloaded with daily assignments and homework is not beneficial for the student’s health.  It is essential for students to have a balance life to be healthy physically and mentally.  Students are stressed and overwhelmed because there is not a balance between school and other areas of their lives.  Students tend to work late into the night and are exhausted at school the next day.

Students overloaded with assignments do not have time for a social life.  Students do not have time to spend with their families.  Students do not have time to be with their friends by going to a movie or just going to a friend’s house.  Students do not have the time for their hobbies or playing sports.

In conclusion, I believe the best way to learn is quality not quantity of schoolwork.  I believe that teachers should require daily work to be completed in class and not assign a lot of worksheets or too much homework.

Homework is always given to students.  Homework is a major part of students’ grades.  I realize that homework is schoolwork and is very important, but some teachers give too much homework.

Teachers give homework to students to increase their learning.  Teachers just don’t realize how much homework they are giving to a student.  It always ends up that  students are assigned too much homework.  Teachers don’t get the fact that many students don’t have the time to do it.  Family issues, personal issues, and other issues pop up and interfere with school work.  Also, a single day has twenty-four hours. However, eight hours are spent at school and everyone should get a least eight to nine hours of sleep which only ends up to five hours between.  The students have only five hours in the evening to do homework and it depends how much school work and how many other events pop up.  That doesn’t give students enough time to do all their school work and have their personal lives.  

Homework is a part of school and life, but it can lead to many conflicts.  Some examples are stress, tension, and pressure.  Pressure is caused by teachers and the students thoughts.  Many teachers assume students have a lot time to get their work done and just start piling work on them.  Teachers also don’t help the student when they are needed.  Teachers expect all students to understand their homework and not have any problems or confusion with it.  Teachers sometimes give the students a quiz the next day and don’t understand the students need more time and help with the work.  Teachers need to know the fact that students need help and need less pressure on their shoulders.  Students understand they all have to go to school.  They know school involves hard work and plenty of learning but teachers shouldn’t assume things and expect all students to get their work completed every night.  Teachers shouldn’t pile  so much homework on the students.  I think that teachers should sometimes give students a change and a break!

SIBLINGS!!!!!

Do you have any siblings?  If you do, then you should know how I feel!  If you don’t have any siblings, well then tough luck, and try to understand me on this.  I have two siblings and that is almost too much for me, but man!  I feel sorry for the kids who have to put up with ten or eleven!  There are also the good things in having siblings, though.  

Sometimes siblings just don’t know their place!  They have no respect for family members and their authority at times!  Older siblings think that just because they’re older they have the right to boss you around!  Not cool!  If you have a spoiled brat for your younger brother or sister, well, I pity you and your parents for not teaching him/her a lesson.  As I was saying, younger siblings can be totally unfair because they probably get to do a bunch of this sweet stuff, like going to the movies, in your face while you have to do some boring homework or project.  When you don’t have homework and have all the free time in the world, they don’t have anything fun to do.  Of course they get to do all the fun things when you can’t go, though.  You know what I mean?  Totally not fair!

On the other hand, siblings can be a lot of fun.  They can do great things for you without you even knowing it!  They can comfort you when you’re sad or lonely, and that doesn’t matter on age either.  They may be just your brother or sister, but often they’re also your best friend.  At times they can also help you do things like homework or when you need advice.  Siblings help you from being a spoiled brat because you have to share with them.

So, what do you think?  Siblings have their good, angelic sides and their evil, little, devilish sides.  If you have siblings, be happy that you do.  If you don’t, well, let’s hope you put some thought into what you would do if you did have a sibling or two.

More Homework?

When I come home from an exhausting day of school, all I want to do is relax and have fun. Instead, I have numerous amounts of homework projects to do. So wouldn’t you want to have the rest of the afternoon and night to have fun and just relax? Or do endless amounts of homework?

One reason why teachers should not give a lot of homework is that it can interrupt the students personal life. The time for doing homework can come between them and the free time that they have to do something they actually want to do. Homework can also withdraw time from communicating and having fun with the student’s family. If you have too much homework, you would waste most of the time working on that, instead of spending time with your family. Now what would you do: A backpack full of homework or spend quality time with you family? Too much homework can also interfere with other school activities such as school sports and clubs. I know when I played school basketball, I was busy out of my mind with having practice and lots homework. Sometimes I’d stay up to about midnight just trying to get my homework done and ready for school the next day.

Another reason why giving a lot of homework isn’t a good idea is because it pounds too much pressure on the students. It can make some students go crazy with too much work and other activities at one time. Studies show that stress kills brain cells. If you want to get scientific, stress can destroy newly created neurons in the hippocampus, the brain region involved in memory and emotion. A lot of homework in one class can build up with another class’s homework. In some kids, like me, we have to remember a lot and end up forgetting something to try to remember one thing. If you have too much to remember, you can forget other important things.

Homework was rated the second most time-consuming work for teens after time spent at school, totaling 9.2 hours per week or just under two hours a day on average. Studies also suggest that teens are stressed about their work levels, with almost 40 percent feeling under constant pressure to do more than they can handle. So my conclusion is that some teachers need to give students a break and decrease the amount of homework or give no homework at all. Would you rather have the time to do whatever you want? Or spend all your time with your head strapped to books and homework?

   Do you feel that lunch is too short and you never have enough time to eat, talk to your friends, and ask a teacher for help on something? I feel the same way about lunch too! The two main things that I like about lunch, besides eating, are having the time to socialize and having free time.

   I can’t stand it when you are trying to talk to your friends in class and you get in trouble. I mean, you should be working, but kids do need some time to talk. 

   If we had a longer lunch hour we would have time to go talk to our teachers about something we don’t understand or need help with. Sometimes you need to go to the nurse or see a counselor, and lunch is the perfect time!

   Another reason I think lunch should be longer is, because we need some free time in the day. RIGHT? Lunch is a great time when you can catch up on homework. A great time to clear your mind or concentrate / study for a test. It also is the one school period where you can be a kid and just do nothing! 

    Time for socializing with friends, asking teachers about things you don’t understand, and some free time during the day to be a kid, catch up on your homework, and a great time to clear your mind and study, are the reasons why I think there should be a longer school lunch. All my reasons are things that we need to do, and we can’t do all of the things in 30 minutes, so I think we should have an hour!

     Have you ever considered ‘Going Green’?  It is a great thing to do.  It helps the environment in many ways, its super easy, and it can be lots of fun!

     Did you know that every time you drive your car it releases poisonous gasses and affects Global Warming?  There are other methods of transportation.  The cars we drive can pollute.  In other countries, such as Germany and Russia, they have electric cars.  When the car is not running, you plug it in and it charges.  There are other ways to get to places.  You can take a bus or subway to get there.  The bus and subway tickets are only a few dollars extra and you can talk on your cell phone as much as you want with out disobeying the law!  Another method is to ride your bike.  It has lots of bonuses.  You gain a few dollars by not having to refill the gas tank or buy bus and subway tickets, and you get lots of exercise.  Finally, you can carpool with friends to save money and the environment!

     A second way to ‘Go Green’ is to recycle.  Recycling has many plusses too.  First of all, its easy!  It is just like throwing things in the trash but more helpful to the rest of the world.  Recycling will cut down on trash, and whoever is on garbage duty won’t have to take the trash out as often.  Last, it will reduce the size of landfills.  If we do this, we can have more swimming pools, playgrounds, and amusement parks.

     As you can see, ‘Going Green’ is great!  It can be very fun.  Also,  it can help the environment.  Now, it is up to you,  will you Go Green? 

Now on to the bad things about technology. First of all the internet it separates us from reality. It takes away your sense of the real world. We can be anything and do any thing as long as we have that little Safari icon, and that is what draws us to it in the first place. When we log on to our email it is so easy to send things we don’t mean or wouldn’t say in real life. That’s why we are so far away from the real world when it’s on a few steps away.

Since we have texting and email; our generation has not learned how to communicate in person as well as people of other generations. If you see a few friends at the mall you’ll more then likely see one of them texting, and in extreme cases you’ll see friends emailing or texting each other when they are no more then two feet away. 

Not to mention all the disruptions they cause. For example, your in the movies and it’s just getting to the good part, then all of a sudden you hear an annoying buzzing sound that rings out all though the room. Your so  intent on finding out who has there phone on that you miss the end of the movie. Oh, and the person who’s phone rang is talking on it still. That happens so much that the movie theaters had to make commercials to remind people to turn off their phones. That’s a disruption nobody needs.

Just because there are so many bad things technology causes doesn’t mean that there aren’t any good things, which I will talk now. First of all and most important they allow to make advances in modern medicine. I watch a lot of show that have to do with medicine and a lot of the treatments they have are due to technology. Like an optical eye. 

Second of all they allow us to communicate with people around the world in the blink of an eye. Like Ovoo, if you’ve ever seen the commercial the application allows you to talk face to face with another person even if they’re half way around the world. This means better communication and faster service. These gadgets also allows us to multitask. Which gets more done. 

So technology has a good side and a dark side. So I think that because there are so many good things about technology I might just go over to the dark side, maybe.4