▶ Your Answer : Some people think that giving grades to
students does not contribute to studying hard. However, in my opinion,
evaluating students by grades actually makes students more interested in
studying. This is because grades give students a sense of accomplishment and
promote the competition among students.
To begin with, receiving grades from their studying
help students to feel they are accomplishing something. In other words, when
they get good grades according to their endeavor, they could feel satisfied
about themselves. If they got low grades, they might try hard to raise their
grades and get a sense of accomplishment. Since students recognize that they
can get fine results when they try hard, they will study harder when they are
graded. For example, there was a poll conducted by Korea University with its
students as respondents. The purpose of the survey was to understand whether
students study hard in Pass or Fail courses. The majority of students had
replied that they spend more time on leisure or other courses than Pass or Fail
courses. An overwhelming 78% responded that this is because they did not get
different grades according to their investments. They thought that it is
desirable to spend time and effort to study only enough to pass the courses,
because they could get nothing more than ‘P’ even if they study so hard. This
study proves that if it were not for grades, students would not spend much of
their time on studying.
On top of that, giving grades to students
prompts the competition among student. It is taken for granted that the
competition improves the result. They would compare their grades each other,
and be willing to learn more about subjects in order to get better grades than
their friends. They can be stimulated to study hard rather than watch the
television and use their cellphones when their friends are studying. I will
talk about my experience as an example. When I first attended my high school, I
did not do well at studying compared to my friends. It was hard for me to keep
along with difficult subjects such as math. I sometimes thought just giving up
boring and irritating subjects. However, once I got grades which were far lower
than those of my friends, I feel ashamed and started to crave getting at least
the same grades as my friends. I studied so hard in my first high school summer
vacation, and I could feel that my learning abilities are being improved.
Finally, I could get the highest grades in my class at the first test after the
summer vacation. After that experience, I become more interested in studying.
In a nutshell, students would be able to
feel a sense of accomplishment and be stimulated by their peers to study hard
when given grades. In this regard, I strongly believe that grades make student
more interested in studying. |