Are ACT tutors really necessary?

     This year as juniors we are faced with several standardized tests, ACT, PSAT, SAT, SAT2, the list goes on. These tests are important to our future and I know the majority of my friends feel that they will make or break your college admissions process. Many have already taken the ACT and many have private tutors they attend weekly. Each hoping to improve their score by one point, because that one point might be the different between acceptance and rejection.

     In my family I have three sisters and one brother, none of them ever had an ACT tutor and only one of them took a class during their lunch period with about twelve other students. So, when I entered my junior year my mom and I had no intention of ever getting a tutor and had briefly talked about taking that same lunch time class. But, as I began to hear about all my friends tutors and that many had already taken the ACT I began to wonder if I was blowing the tests off or if I was unprepared. One of my senior friends took the ACT on five different occasions and I already knee deep in my junior year don't even know when the ACT test dates available. Then I wondered if a tutor really made any difference.
    I do not know the answer to this question and I'm not sure where I can find the answer. When I was looking for reasons why tutors were unnecessary, I found tons of site listing all the reasons I should get a tutor. Although, all these sites were from tutoring agencies so they of course would provide "pro-
tutoring" information.
   A part of me thinks that taking the ACT on five different occasions will not change your score, that the only thing you can do to prepare for this test is to become familiar with the format. After this, I do think that taking it five times rather than four times will not make a difference in your score. But, then again I have little to no information on the subject, but I do hope to learn more with the help of my college counselor, parents, teachers, and even you!

    

Grades - Do they represent us?

In class the other day we discussed how we were going to be graded this year. The "traditional" grading system will not be used and our grades will be more of a "conversation" than and "announcement". Even on papers we won't be receiving a straightforward letter grade, between Mr. O'Connor's (+)'s and /'s, and Mr. Bolos' B+/A-, grades are opened up to a newer grading system. At first when I heard this I became very worried. I have always needed a letter grades and percentage to know how I am doing in the class. I rely heavily on those grade print out sheets to see exactly where I can improve.With no printout sheets and a very different grading style, I was worried. But, I can now look at it from a different way. I believe under this system grades will be earned rather than assigned by our teachers. I also like that each person will be graded individually rather than compared to the rest of the class.
            Last year I was enrolled in Modern World History, this class became my greatest challenge of my sophomore year. I had never had a history class with so much analysis, I had breezed through my freshman history class and assumed all history classes were like that. Although Modern World History was my greatest challenge, it was also my favorite class. Now I could tell you that I came out of that class with straight A's, but that is not the case. My greatest accomplishment in that class was getting a B my second semester. My first semester was disastrous, barely getting a B-, but I can tell you I learned SO much from that class and I improved as a writer and a researcher. The grading in that class was based on comparing students to each other, in that respect then yes I deserved  the grades I received. But I would give myself an A+ for effort!

Race

In class we have been discussing the subject of Race. We have yet to agree on a specific definition of what race actually is. So, I decided to look up a few different definitions of race.

The Merrian-Webster definition is:
- a family, tribe, people, or nation belonging to the same stock 
- a class or kind of people unified by shared interests, habits, or characteristics

The Dictionary.com definition is:

1.	a group of persons related by common descent or heredity.

2.	a population so related.

3.

Anthropology. a. any of the traditional divisions of humankind, the commonest being the Caucasian, Mongoloid, and Negro, characterized by supposedly distinctive and universal physical characteristics: no longer in technical use. b. an arbitrary classification of modern humans, sometimes, esp. formerly, based on any or a combination of various physical characteristics, as skin color, facial form, or eye shape, and now frequently based on such genetic markers as blood groups. c. a human population partially isolated reproductively from other populations, whose members share a greater degree of physical and genetic similarity with one another than with other humans.

4.	a group of tribes or peoples forming an ethnic stock: the Slavic race.

5.	any people united by common history, language, cultural traits, etc.: the Dutch race.

6.	the human race or family; humankind: Nuclear weapons pose a threat to the race.

I found all of these definitions very interesting because Merrian-Webster which is a more traditional dictionary gave a definition very close to the one I came up with when Mr. O'Connor and Mr. Bolos asked us to write one. My initial definition was: categories/classifications people are put into based on ethnicity/heritage, habits and physical characteristics. When I read the dictionary.com definition which is a collection of different well known dictionaries gave me a wider variety of definitions. One commonality between all of the definitions that I found was they all talk about race from an outside view. That is to say, it never mentions self-identification. After our discussion in class I changed wanted to change my definition to include an aspect of self-identification. I believe that the race you identify with the most should be the race you are classified with, not the race others put you in. What is your definition of race?

How Do We Learn?

        In class our teachers have introduced to us a different lecture format, the Lessig Method. This method is a style of lecture that includes images and short phrases that are projected onto a screen that accompany the lecture. Personally, I felt that I benefitted from this format having previously had experienced lectures with PowerPoints filled with texts. During the lecture i would be so focussed on copying down every word from the PowerPoint I would forget to actually analyze the information I was given. During our lecture of "The Peculiar Institution" I was more engaged and actively participating. This difference between lecture styles made me think of the different ways people learn and process information. 

Howard Gardner's Seven Intelligences are the basis of this very question. 
        Gardner proposed that humans have seven different intelligences in which we grow. These seven intelligences are linguistic, spatial, logic/math, body-kinesthetic, musical, interpersonal, and intrapersonal. He suggests that as children we develop in each of these intelligences at different rates. As we develop we favor certain intelligences and may become particularly strong in a specific intelligence. A key point in Gardner's theory is that comparing children to each other is almost impossible because just because a child is strong than another in math doesn't mean they are "smarter". Thus, during the developmental stages of children, how can schools and teachers cater to the different forms of learning. That is to say, children who are strong in the body-kinesthetic intelligence learn best when they are moving around while students who are stronger in the musical intelligence learn best when given songs and rhythms to memorize. 
         How are schools able to cater to each child's individual needs? Should they individualize education? These questions come to my mind. I worry about such individualized education because after schooling, the real world will not be as specialized and people may suffer without individual attention. Also, if schools recognize a child as a musically intelligent learner and cater specialize their education to only their strengths, then will their weaknesses ever develop?