Sunday, June 7, 2009

Should we be rewarded for our efforts in school?

My personal opinion is that we should not be rewarded too much for our efforts in school. The main purpose of us going to school is for us to gain knowledge, as well as gaining experience in a conducive environment with caring teachers. It is not for us to get rewarded for our efforts in school and rewards should be only a bonus.

Students have only one priority that is to study hard in preparation of the future. We should study because of ourselves and not for rewards or gift.

If a student is works hard only because he wants to get the reward, it beats the purpose of education as he is supposed to work hard for himself and not for the reward. Furthermore, if there are no more rewards, he may lose the urge to study and he will be obsessed with rewards only. However, if a student works for himself and not for the reward, he will be always eager to learn new things and he would be very successful in his life.

In certain cases, rewards are necessary or should be given to their children. The new generation of children spends most of their time watching television and playing computer games instead of reading a book or going for a jog. Rewards should only be the last resort and to motivate their ‘hopeless’ children to study. The rewards may also spur them to do better in their work and hence their academic performance would increase. At the least, their children would be smart and motivated to study.

Deals involving gifts and rewards should be given only after the test is over. The student will study because of himself and the reward will act as a small bonus to study harder next time. However, rewards should only be given occasionally as the student will feel that he is working hard for the reward too.

We should reward based on the effort not the result. A child who works very hard yet still does not achieve his goals should be rewarded after he took the test. Hence, the child will know that he is being rewarded because he studied very hard. I will also motivate the child to work harder so in the next text, the child will work as hard and achieve better results.

Hence, I feel rewards should be given minimally and only after the test. Reward based on the effort not the result.

2 comments:

  1. I strongly disagree with your point of view on this matter. Rewards are a form of encouragement, it's like a way to show that your efforts and achievements are recognised and it is to show that people notice your success. If you win something and then there is no reward or award because that person thinks you did not put in enough effort, won't you feel disappointed? If you win, means you have put in effort? How could a person do well in anything without putting in great effort? Therefore, if you give rewards based on EFFORT, I think it's absolutely pointless. As I mentioned earlier, REWARDS ARE MEANT TO RECOGNISE ACHIVEMENTS AND SUCCESSES.

    Alright, let me give an example. If you do well in Projects' Day, you may get up to 6 ACE points for the main subject and 2 for the others, if you get inside the Finals. Now, without the ACE points, you think anyone would even want to put in effort to do their project well? Everyone would rather spend their time revising for the tests and do CIP. It's the ACE points that actually motivates most of us to meet our mentors regularly, put in effort in creating our web reports etc. You get it?

    Lastly, why do Hwa Chong give out so many awards? It is to recognise people with different achievements in different areas. Without these awards, I'm sure many students who don't get the ARE or OSA will leave Hwa Chong empty-handed. How would we(you included) feel? Someone who is good in Sports may not get the ARE because his academics may not be that well, so he would feel that Hwa Chong is unfair, because he is not recognised for his achievements in the sporting arena. Think about that.

    To end it off, I feel that awards are necessary to boost our morale and to recognise our efforts cum successes in different areas, and for people who only puts in effort but doesn't deliver the results, we should not give them the recognition. Thank you.

    Derrick

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  2. Hmm,there are no corect answers on this issue but I would like to point out certain things:

    You said rewards are a form of encouragement so if you win a race or do well in school, I doubt you will need any more encouragement. However, if someone or you put ina lot of effort in a race or a test but do not do well, isn't this the time you need encouragement.

    I doubt we study or practise very hard because of the reward but for the experience. Besides there are natural talents such as runners or pianists etc.,they do not even need to put so much effort and is capable of outshining the other other competitors.

    If you think that rewards are meant to recognise achievements and success, why are there still awards for improvement? Why do parents give rewards to their child if they do not do so well but put in a lot of effort?
    My mother said that she saw me putting a lot of effort in PSLE and said that she would buy me lunch no matter how much I scored.

    Furthemore, the question is about REWARDS not AWARDS. Awards are rewards but rewards may not be award. Rewards may range from a pat on the back to buying a present. What you were focusing on were awrds not rewards.

    Let me talk about somthing else. If projects days weren't made compulsory, imagine how many students would not want to participate despite the ACE points as incentives.

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