15-Morgan White : My burnt out elective

 

    In 6th grade when the middle school teacher, Mr. Woods would come around to begin his musical lessons with us and distribute interest. I only participated in it because I didn’t want to go do the other activities that the teachers had planned for the students who didn’t play an instrument. 

At that time, I picked up a clarinet and it looked really complex (come to find out it is) and was very discouraged because I had only ever played piano and done ballet. When it was time to register for our electives I put band as my very last option, I thought that ASL or even being a TA would be better, but I ended up with third period band. 

At first I was discouraged because I had recently stopped playing piano. I felt burnt out from it, practicing for 1-2 hours a day and 2 lessons a week. Shortly after I started being in a band class everyday instead of once a week, I found more joy in it. The people I was playing with started to improve slightly (for middle school at least). 

I decided to stick it out through highschool and partake in their marching band. I met some really great and horrible people that football season. And after football ended, it was time for the spring musical.

 As a freshman I auditioned but didn’t expect to get in since there was another player of my instrument who had done it before, I knew I was good, but I wasn’t better than her. Come to find out the night of the audition she was afraid of me taking her spot this year since I was so close to her skill level. 

That night we both found our names on the acceptance list and were overjoyed that we would be separated at the hip for the next 2.5 months. 

Going through covid though we barely got to perform this musical and I lost my passion for music again. I was failing band overzoom since I couldn’t play a majority of the time in my house, the lessons were confusing, teaching us things about music theory I had never heard before. 

While signing up for classes I had enough electives to take our schools auditioned band and our non audition band. Oftentimes seniors come back to the non audition band when they have enough room in their schedule and a period jazz band. 

We came back to school fully this year and I had 3 periods of band and I HATED it. We had to set up outside with these big tents to cover us from the sun when it was 90 degrees outside every single class period back and forth, wasting so much time and playing the same songs everyday for months. 

I wanted to quit. I had been through it all, in music over 10 years and then experiencing exhausting amounts of effort just to play songs we've played for years for 30 minutes. I was done. I wanted to change out my classes for Pre-Calc and be a TA. 

But then it got better, a lot better, we got some actual music that wasn’t just the songs we play at football games, I became the section leader of 2 sections between my two classes and we started to sound a lot better.

I got to do the musical this year and I found my passion again and now I’m planning to go to college as a major in musical education so that I can pass down and provide a happy space for kids to feel burnt out from music and maybe find their own passion in it. 

From this silly little pass time in 6th grade to a future expensive degree to do it all again

word count:630

15 - Connor King: Roller Coasters

My first roller coaster ride was at Disneyland when I had just turned 7 the month prior. I went with my dad to go on the ride. I remember waiting in line to go on the ride and feeling absolutely terrified. All that I could think of while waiting were the terrible things that could happen on the ride. Finally, we were seated in the coaster and my heart started banging out of my chest.

As we took off and started slowly climbing up to the drop my fear tripled. Finally, we got all the way up and started the drop. As my stomach started to rise from the force of gravity on me my fear started to go away. We reached the bottom and started going around in circles climbing smaller hills and doing smaller drops.

          However, as soon as it seemed that the ride started the ride stopped. When I got off with my dad he asked me “how was it?” To which I replied “not so bad.” Despite this seemingly good experience with a roller coaster I still talk myself out of going on any others.

Word Count: 189

15 - Kennedy H: PE could be made better

PE in our school district is required in 7th-10th grade and during 7th grade is your first experience in a typical kind of PE class. You have to wear a uniform, usually run about once a week, stretch and play some kind of sports game or just walk for a whole period. PE can be enjoyable if you know someone or have a friend to spend time with and I’ve found that I might have an acquaintance and I end up getting to know them much better during that class period as you are constantly doing something with a partner or merely standing around and just talking to someone. But honestly this experience hasn’t been very effective. PE means physical education and being in a broad PE class very activities vary don’t always align with students interests. 

Seventh through tenth graders are some of the youngest and immature through their teenage years so having a PE class is a mental break from the rest of their schedule but also a way to get some energy out so I still think it should be required. But it’s not an effective class in the sense of teaching. I’ve had many amazing PE teachers but the system to be effective could be very different. PE is some of the only exercise many students get during the day so a PE class should probably teach them how to implement an exercise they like into their life or they may choose in the future. Yes we have body works and weight training available to sophomores but any younger grades don’t really get a choice in their class.

PE could be more effective if there was a variety of classes to many grades including different sports like tennis, running, maybe even soccer where students who either participate in these sports get some extra work and direct guidance on rules and techniques for the game or students not wanting or couldn’t be on that team for the school get exposure to a new activity. But exercise isn’t just sports there could me more classes on weights, crossfit, yoga, pilates and many other forms of exercise available. Equipment and enrollment could arise as an issue but it may offer smaller class sizes unlike general PE classes with 40 or more kids. Also these classes could be arranged in beginner to advanced levels so an athlete wanting extra learning options in a sport like baseball isn’t learning rules like other beginners may need. 

Word Count: 414

15- Megan U: Does lack of sleep affect our emotions?

 

367

As a student myself, i tend to lose sleep due to school and other extracurricular activities. I’m fully aware that it isn’t healthy at all and that i should always get a good night sleep but hey, whatever it takes for that grade right? Anyone reading this could most likely agree to this and those who don’t, just how? 

The answer to the title is completely obvious, of course it does affect our emotions and our ability to make decisions as well as reactions. In a room full of students, you could always tell who’s well rested and who’s not. There are those that use their time to sleep in class and those that are fully focused. Personally I think it’s important for us, especially students to always try to get at least 8+ hours of sleep. We don’t really know at all how to handle our emotions, so getting a good amount of sleep would help us lessen the possibilities of potentially lashing out on someone. Emotions could always take over us, if you think about it, really its unpredictable. We can’t always run on caffeine and energy drinks( though it does kind of work sometimes) taking care of our body especially during sleep is the only healthy way to fully refresh our mind and keep us awake. 

You could also try to take it from me; I myself don’t even sleep for a good amount of time to keep me awake. If i’m lucky, the best i can do is sleep for 7 hours max. In all honesty high school really changed my sleep schedule. Constant homework being handed to me and on top of that having to juggle sports. Sometimes when I want a little time to myself i let off by staying up and playing games all night. I do wish i had the ability to balance everything and be able to get a good nights sleep after, it would solve at least half of my problems. It’s understandable for teachers to get mad at us for sleeping in class but most of the times we have a reason to. So please try to cut some slack for us students, we do  try

15 - Richard Hsia: An Athlete's Worst

 

An Athlete's Worst 

"The mark of a great athlete is not how good they are at their best, but how good they are at their worst."

    Unfortunately this quote is wrong.

    Michael Jordan is one of the greatest basketball players ever, and has ascended so high into sports greatness to be considered one of the greatest athletes ever, regardless of the sport. It's been about 20 years since he stopped playing basketball, and this narrative still stands and is proof that his greatness will always outweigh his worst. 

    Many desperate Jordan haters will try to point to his years with the Washington Wizards towards the end of his career, where he was old and washed up. He was far from the player he used to be, and of course, didn't play like the elite player we remember him as. Many agree, however, that these years 'don't count' and really have no impact on his legacy. 

    Let's dismiss that, though. The worst Jordan played in his prime was in the Eastern Conference Finals in 1997. He missed all 11 shots attempted in the first half and missed 14 shots before making his first shot in this particular game. If you are not a basketball fan, take it from me that this is awful shooting, regardless of the player, and he holds the 2nd place spot for most shots attempted in a half without a made shot in a playoff game, ever. He ended the game with an awful shooting percentage and choked in an important playoff game. 

    But this is almost never, ever mentioned or taken seriously when someone tries to argue against Jordan's legacy. Nobody remembers his worst, because his best completely outweighs it. People only remember that he won that series in the end. They only remember that he won the scoring title that year, won finals MVP, and got his 5th out of his eventual 6th championship title. 

    In short, his absolute worst has been forgotten. It doesn't matter when compared to everything he's done at his absolute best. The mark of a great athlete will always be how they performed at their very peak, and a bad performance shouldn't and doesn't define them, regardless of how bad it is. 

376 Words

15 - Cassandra S: Physical Education's Importance

 

There are many teenagers in high school that complain about PE. They complain about it because it’s something that requires them to get up and move and they have to change into ugly uniforms in the smelly locker rooms. Even though it can be annoying, it actually has many benefits. In fact, PE is something that is important for teens as it has many physical benefits and it can give useful information.

Exercise can make you happier. The release of a certain chemical suppresses hormones that cause stress and anxiety. Stress and anxiety are something that is very common in high school as teens try to look their best and do their best academically and socially. Reducing stress and anxiety by exercising can definitely benefit teens and help them have a better high school experience. Because PE activity includes physical activities that are exercise, PE is important for teens for them to improve their mood.

In some cases, PE gives students useful information. For example, how to have better eating habits. During last year’s online school year, we were assigned to research how much from each food group our age group should be eating. Doing this research allowed us to know how healthy we were and give us an opportunity to change it if there was a food group that we were lacking a lot in. PE also gave us access to certain exercise routines that we wouldn’t have normally tried or thought about, and much more. Without PE teens wouldn’t have access to all of this information which would maybe cause them to be less healthy later in adulthood. This means that PE is important for teens to have.

Word Count: 280

15 - Alexis A: Sleep Well, Stay Stable

Sleep is what ultimately keeps us grounded. Any troubles or stresses of our lives are put to rest in the hours that our mind is asleep. Whether we get more or less of it, we are familiar with habits that can make or break what we feel after a nightly slumber. Inevitably experiencing a lack of sleep affects our brain, which can explain the build-up of these unstable emotions.

Emotions are justified by our reactions. According to the Ted Talk, How lack of sleep affects your emotions, the part of the brain where our strong emotional reactions come from is the amygdala. Being sleep deprived does not result in an appropriate response due to a hyperactive amygdala. This deep emotional center of the brain produces irrationality, in which negative emotions occur from a lack of sleep. By taking a deeper look into this part of the brain, it uncovers why we act in a specific manner that isn’t our normal selves. 

With emotional reactions, there comes its process. The prefrontal cortex is responsible for controlling the amygdala. The amygdala becomes hyperactive because of its communication with the prefrontal cortex. The Ted Talk provides a good comparison of this relationship by describing an all-emotional accelerator pedal with very little regulatory control brake. Disrupting this process shows how sleep is essential to who we are, and why it can’t be taken away as it's uncovered.

Sleep is something that changes with time but we are all aware of it. Understanding why we sleep is in the parts of our brain keeping us emotionally centered. Sleep acts as our first aid for our feelings, and only a good nightly slumber is the key to staying stable.

Word Count: 283