User Reviews Parents say Kids say. Adult Written by Kerry D. April 6, Must see for parents, educators and mature teens Our children's physical, emotional and mental well being are so much more important than society's narrow view of them based on grades and achievement Continue reading. Report this review. Adult Written by MA11 March 28, Great Movie If you have children you will want to watch this movie. This movie is showing a new path for our children.
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Read more. Facebook Twitter Pinterest Email Print. Personalize your media recommendations. How old is your kid? Have an account? Sign in. The most critical point of the film was the final scene. In the closing frames, viewers learn that the film is dedicated to young Devon Martin who took her own life, because of a poor math grade.
The film closes with her picture and several frames containing advice for everyone from parents to students to teacher to school administrators. This is definitely a call to community action on behalf of children who the films claims are being robbed of their childhoods.
One thing that troubled me was the omission of the driving force behind the culture of competition and achievement.
Teachers are not giving ridiculous amounts of homework, because they love grading papers. They are facing the same pressure to perform that their students are facing. A variety of teacher interviews would have made the arguments presented in the film more credible. Education reformers are constantly discussing a lack of challenging curriculum for students. In this documentary, we did not hear any thoughts from those responsible for creating school curriculum.
No current school administrators were consulted to shed some light on why they feel homework is an important part of school education. I also find it odd that of all the families featured in the film, there was not one that was grateful for the extra time, effort, and attention teachers were putting into creating such challenging coursework.
There is obviously some benefit to a rigorous academic curriculum. Reel Link Films, n. The film took shape when the director Vicki Abeles had learned of her daughters stomach pains being caused by stress.
The mother in Abeles took the foreground, and never looked back, as she spoke with students, teachers, and parents coast to coast to try and determine what is to blame for the increase in stress amongst students today, and how our education system could be reconstructed to eliminate such pressures. In recent years, tests have been the primary measure of educational achievement. Tests are constructed long before lessons are taught, and lessons are therefore often overstuffed with content.
This is where teachers feel the need to assign homework, to make up for the content that they are unable to cover in class. Sara Bennett, founder of Stop Homework, believes that the practice of homework can be traced back to the implementation of testing as a measure of success and the aforementioned cycle that came as a result of the publication of A Nation at Risk Race to Nowhere Similar to Bennett, author Diane Ravitch seems to trace the derailment of educational reformation to the same instance.
This can be seen in its mission, as described by President George W. School as an institution is depicted within the film as a training facility rather than the learning facility that it is supposed to be.
The filmmaker attempts to get the viewer to truly question the purpose of homework with data as well as the use of her own feelings. It is meant to be shocking when Denise Pope of Stanford University gives evidence that suggests there is no correlation between homework and academic success at the elementary school level.
When students do become old enough for a correlation to exist, homework eventually loses its effectiveness after about an hour The film also made claims that homework times have doubled and tripled over the years. This may be true, but some critics argue that it is misleading. Some say that the numbers Ableles chose to use were too low 8 minutes a night in as compared to 22 in , though the number is tripled, 16 minutes is not as provoking as the term tripled , therefore deeming the fact insignificant.
Either way, that is not how I would like my child to appear to me at any time, ever. Another aspect that the filmmaker examines is how sports have grew less innocent. One story told is that of Sam, a high school wrestler.
He describes how pressure can come from competition between the sport and the school. For some, athletics have helped obtain an education. Balance is what our generation is missing, and Abeles makes that clear by including that pressure also comes from things that are thought to relieve it, such as sports.
The same can be said for the role of parents. Traditionally parents are viewed as a source of comfort, care and protection. But today, those qualities seem buried under a long list of achievements that a parent has for their child. Within the film is a clip from a forum on stress in a high school in Concord, CA. Coming from the mouth of a young student, Abeles wants viewers to become aware of the fact that our generation has set such a high standard for everything, to the point in which everything is a competition.
Our lives might as well be a race to nowhere. It is sickening to hear of the students who associate the feelings of rejection or failure with death.
Furthermore, it is literally deadly, as evident in the disturbing examples of students who chose to escape all of the tumultuous pressures via suicide. There is no reason a child should ever have to live under such stress, yet it seems to becoming more common. It has captivated many Americans, and Abeles continues show the film off as well as host discussions afterwards for those interested I found this pretty cool, that she comes to most of the screenings for discussion.
It examines how the education policy of meeting proficiencies has actually had a negative affect, how students feel pressured to cheat just in order to pass, and how teachers fix scores in order to secure their job.
Director Vicki Abeles seems to be urging parents to become involved before its too late. The film, Race to Nowhere, directed by Vicki Abeles, presented a take on education and the role of the family in schools that I had never been exposed to. Understanding the pressures that students face are important in shaping the pedagogical processes that schools undertake to create good students.
It seems it is impossible to do both. The solution Dr. Ginsburg suggests for everyone is to redefine success and get off the treadmill together. Madeline Levine Madeline Levine is a nationally known psychologist with over 25 years of experience as a clinician, consultant, and educator. She is also a co-founder of Challenge Success. For the past ten years, she has specialized in student engagement, curriculum studies, qualitative research methods, and service learning.
She is the author of Doing School: How we are creating a generation of stressed out, materialistic, and mis-educated students. She is co-founder of Challenge Success, a national research and intervention project that aims to reduce unhealthy pressure on youth and champions a broader vision of youth success.
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