Persuasive Essay

My english teacher had his classes write a persuasive essay on, Your principal is considering a new grading policy that replaces letter or number grades on report cards with pass or fail. What is your position concerning this issue? Write a letter to your principal stating your position and supporting it with convincing reasons. Be sure to explain your reasons in detail. So this is my essay on the subject.




Help me! My mother's going to kill me! I failed algebra! I was doing fine in that class until our principal changed the grading system to pass or fail. See, there are many reasons why we should keep the letter/ number grade. First, it's easy to keep track of how well you are doing in a particular class. Second, student’s care for and interest in learning will drop. Lastly, parents will not freak out as much with the letter grade system. We should keep to the letter grading system.

First, with the letter grade system both the student and the parent can keep track of how well they are doing. People can go online and see how close they are to failing the class. For example, an A means you most likely will not fail the class. A C means you're hugging your chances of passing that class. An F means you have failed that class. Also, it's easier to keep track of how well you are doing, because you aren't just passing or failing you can be somewhere in between. That can help you know whether or not you simply don't understand the class or if something else is wrong.

Secondly, the small amount of interest that students feel towards their grades will drop tremendously if we result to just pass or fail. The students will only see it as "oh well, I didn't do so great. I guess I shouldn't even try." With tests and other such materials the students will not study for the test, because they believe they have no chance of getting a good grade when their midterm grade says "F." They will come to believe that the only way to get a "P" on your report card would be to get the teacher to like you and you'll be fine. The incentive to study, gain further understanding of concepts, and willingness to participate in class will diminish because the student only needs to “pass” a class, not succeed in their educational pursuits.

Finally, parents won't get mad at a kid as much if they bring home a low letter grade as they would to the "F" meaning failed. Parents have a tendency to think, when you get a C- or something like that, that you can just do a little extra credit and you'll be fine. They think the exact opposite when you bring home the grade "F" as in pass or fail. They doom you a failure; when really you could just do a small amount of extra credit and you would have a "P." With no other options except pass or fail, parents have no significant insight into how their student is performing. Even if their student passes a course, parents have no understanding if their student is the smartest in the class, gaining powerful skills to assist them in their futures, or simply getting by and learning virtually nothing.

In conclusion, we need to keep the letter grading system in our school. With the letter system it is extremely easy for a student and their parents to see how well they are doing in their classes. With the pass or fail grading system student’s interest in their grades and future education will most definitely drop. Parents also come into the equation as they consider their child’s report card. This is why maintain the letter grading system.

Favorite Book at this Present Time in Life

I just finished reading a book called Snow: a Retelling of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs by Tracy Lynn. This book is very much like its title. It is indeed a retelling of the classic story of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. The story takes place in two places in England: Kenigh and London. The author gives no exact time of which this story takes place, but I would say mid eighteen hundreds.

In this story Snow Whites is a duchess and her real name is Jessica. Her mother died in childbirth. Her father blamed her for his wife's death, and ignored her for a vast majority of her life. She was raised by servants. Then the day comes that her father decides to remarry, which brings an end to Jessica's carefree life.

This new step mother is overly strict, and expects the poor girl to know what other duchesses her age know, but if you'll remember with me, she never had the education in the first place.

Things are okay for Jessica until her fourteenth birthday party. There she "embarrasses" her father and stepmother for wearing a servant girl's dress and getting caught in it. Her stepmother becomes enraged over the "embarrassment" makes her actually be a servant girl. Of which she is forced to remain for two years. During this time she was never allowed outside, so her skin has become white as snow. A servant boy decided to tease her so he called her Snow and the name just stuck with her.

Her stepmother gets a personal servant named Alan, whom she orders to find many unusual things, so she can make (notice I did not write have) a baby.

One day Alan discovers that she, Jessica's stepmother, has grown so desperate that she wants to eat Jessica's heart. By doing so she has convinced herself that it will help her have a baby. He helps her escape to London.

Once there she fell a sleep on an old, worn out couch in a side ally. There she is awakened by three mysterious people who blind fold her and take her to their hideout. In the hide out she discovers that these people are not human. These people are half human, half animal. In total there are five (yes I know there's so post to be seven, but in this story there's only five) of these Lonely Ones as they call themselves living together in an abandoned basement. One, name Chauncey, was a rat. Another was a raven hence he was named Raven and another being a cat once again her name is Cat. They had two other brothers The Mouser, a mouse, and Sparrow, a sparrow. (Yes not very original names, but that is what their names are). There she goes by her nickname, Snow.

This odd family basically adopts her. In return she cooks and cleans for them. Over time she gets to know each and everyone of them rather well. Then her ideal world is destroyed when her stepmother finds out that Snow is not dead, and begins to search for her. I’ll make you read the rest, but I will tell you this, she’s not awoken by a kiss.

Creativity

Some people are born creative. Others learn to be creative, and then there's people like me, we have no creativity whatsoever. My sister is one of those people who when they have to they can be really creative. Her teacher told her and her class that they had to make a game dealing with Europe. This game had to be based off of an already existing game. My mother and my little sister went to the D.I. and found the game Clue with almost everything it normally comes with. The teacher, who my sister claims actually teaches them while they're in school instead of sending it home as homework, insisted that their games be similar to the original game. So my very creative and talented sister decides that instead of there being rooms; like the Ballroom and the Billiard Room; she'd make them be countries in Europe. I believe she used Sweden, Norway, Russia, Germany, France, Greece, Italy, England, and Spain for her countries. Instead of figuring out who murdered the owner of the manor who's name I can not remember, you have to answer questions she, with some help from me, made up from facts she and I had learned from throughout our lives and a little help from the internet. If you get them right you get a chip with that country's flag on it to represent that you answered your question right. With some help from both my mother and myself, my sister made up the rules for her game which she named Journey around Europe.

Here are the rules we made up:1. Miss Scarlet always goes first, play continues to the left of Miss Scarlet.
2. On your turn, roll the die and move the number of spaces indicated.
3. You may only enter a country at the border(s).
4. Once inside a country, you select a card from this country. The player to your left asks you the question on the card. If you answer correctly, you get a flag chip for that country and your turn ends. If you answer incorrectly, your turn is over.
5. If you answer the question correctly, on your next turn, roll the die to travel to another country. If you answered incorrectly, wait for your next turn. You have one more opportunity to answer a question in the country you are visiting before your travel visa expires and you must leave the country. You may return to the country, but you must exit the county and re-enter if you answer two questions incorrectly.
6. Continue travelling through Europe until you collect all nine flags. The 1st person to get all nine flags wins the game.

And that's basically how you play the game.

Here is a few of the random questions I came up with:
Q. How many cyclist ride in the Tour de France?
A. 100

Q. Where is the birth place of jeans?
A. The Languedoc-Rousillion city of Nimes.

Q. How many time zones are in Russia?
A. 11

Q. What were the daughters of the Czar called?
A. Grand Duchesses

This is why I have to ask my sister for almost every creative idea you think I have.