Recess - good or bad?

Read the article below. What are Anthony's strongest two points? Do you agree with him, or are you skeptical of his argument?

Anthony Pantalena

Age 13

Recess

Some schools are taking away recess from kids, but that may hurt them more then help. Recess helps students focus, and can improve your school’s reputation. Also, students with recess have better social skills. Recess should be a part of the curriculum of HKMS. Studies at Texas University have shown that kids who have recess work better in school than kids who don’t. The studies show that kids need a break to run around after a lot of work. Then they will be less stressed and more focused on stuff like class work. Like one time I had a ton of homework on the weekend, and taking breaks after finishing something helped me to keep relaxed and stay focused. Also, the brain needs down time to recycle chemicals that help long term memory. This way, they will remember about a lesson a teacher gave, a project that is due, or what homework is due. Overall, recess will help the kids have better grades in every class.

Because kids will get better grades, recess should help your school to get a better reputation. People looking for a place to move would look to Easton for their wonderful school reputation. Thus, more people would move to the great town of Easton, bringing more money to our town because more people means more people buying houses, property, and paying taxes. Also, more kids in our school would mean more friends for everyone, for everyone would find new friends in the new kids.

Recess gives kids a taste of the real world. In recess, kids have to learn how to resolve conflicts on their own, without adult help. Also, they learn how to work with each other, and cooperate. Like if there is a controversial incident in a game, the teams must work it out with each other. This gives the kids a taste of the real world, because they will have to work it out without any adult help, and that is what life is like. This will help the kids build character, and make more friends. Making recess go back in HKMS should make these kids grow in to good, responsible young adults.

So overall, recess helps kids concentrate, raises your reputation, and if you don’t do it, bullying will increase. I hope that this has convinced you to add recess to HKMS.

© Copyright 2007 Anthony Pantalena (UN: tonythetiger at Writing.Com). All rights reserved. Anthony Pantalena has granted Writing.Com, its affiliates and syndicates non-exclusive rights to display this work.

Cost - Benefit Analysis

Often when a decision that will affect lots of people needs to be made (greasy small burger/delicious steak with fresh peas), those who will make the decision do a cost - benefit analysis. What would the extra cost be of serving some of the delicious dishes that were suggested? For example, what might it cost to set up a seafood buffet? We could start by figuring the cost per student of a certain amount of seafood, but that might not give us accurate figures. Sometimes students go for bigger portions of food that they love, especially if they only get to have it occasionally. So the costs of providing a seafood buffet to middle school and high school students could be exorbitant.
What would the benefit be? The students might really enjoy the buffet, but what is the real benefit to a school of having students enjoy their lunch? Do happy students work any harder? Do they behave impeccably? Do they even tell their parents how wonderful lunch was?

It seems possible that the school doesn't care whether students like lunch - the school just needs to make sure that the students have an opportunity to eat a certain amount of nutritious food. Beyond that, any extra cost incurred doesn't result in any benefit, so it would be a waste of precious money. Is this a fair way to look at things?

Predictable?

Last week, The Washington Huskies beat Idaho to end a losing streak that extended back into last season. This week the Huskies knocked off the perennial power USC Trojans. The Huskies were unranked and 1-1. The Trojans were 2-0 and coming off of a huge win over the Ohio State Buckeyes in Columbus. USC has better recruits every year and a very successful program. Why was this result somewhat predictable?

Making predictions

Observing patterns can help us make predictions. What patterns in your day at school have you observed? What characteristics do your teachers have that make them predictable?

Tom Terrific

When you are young and extremely talented, it can be difficult to receive criticism. In twenty to thirty words, describe the lesson that Gil Hodges tried to pass on to Tom Seaver. How might somebody with less character than Tom have reacted?

In a perfect world . . .

In twenty to thirty words, describe what you wish the cafeteria would serve for lunch. Why would this be the best meal?

A picture is worth a bunch of words

In twenty to thirty words, describe the action in the picture. Michigan's #45 is Obi Ezeh, and the quarterback for Western Michigan is Tim Hiller. For the best possible score, describe the action from the point of view of somebody in the picture.