In recent years, it has been made clear that students would benefit from shorter class times. Having classes just shy of an hour long have many negative effects on students.
With the United States being known for their education systems, there should be more of a movement towards making accommodations that work towards more effective learning. One change that has been made in many high schools has been cell phone policies. In Walpole High School, every classroom has cell phone holders in order for students to give their undivided attention to their teachers during class. Much like cell phones, the longevity of classes also needs a change. At WHS, classes are just over 55 minutes long, which allows teachers to get through a good amount of content during one class period. Although more content sounds like a good thing, it is not productive work. About halfway through most classes, the majority of students lose focus of what they are working on. Despite making progress through the curriculum, students are not making progress by fully understanding lessons and being productive with their work during a long class period.
WHS student Deanna Pinto said “When I am stuck learning a certain subject for an hour I get distracted, so I think shorter classes would be beneficial for others too.”
Shortening classes would have a positive effect on the school environment by increasing the active learning of the students. Having shorter classes would allow students to better focus in class in order to fully take in topics and be more successful within their academics. Students would also be able to focus on specific topics properly by having homework on smaller sections at a time. Teachers would be allowing students to further process the information they learned that school day by having a decreased amount of time within their class. Along with students, teachers would also benefit from having more time to work on tasks such as creating more useful lesson plans, grading students’ work and more time to give students extra help.
With shortened class periods, more success would be brought to the students of WHS by allowing them to properly focus on their education. These accommodations would bring more focus and productivity into the school by giving the students a more constructive schedule.
