01 Dec 2018 - Daniel F
Students, although not technically forced, basically need to keep binders to be able to keep up with work, notes, and other class materials. Using 5 year old binders from our older siblings because we were too lazy to go to Staples in the late summer really takes a toll as the school year drags on. The cover is peeling off, the brackets don’t connect right, and it has the names of our older siblings on it. The last thing we as students need is getting 50 papers a class without a single one being hole punched.
In elementary and middle school, hole punched papers would flow like water from the Nile River. Teachers cared more about students staying organized. It’s not even they hole punched papers with a huge goal of trying to insert a psychological desire for organization, teachers just saw a hole puncher in their room and decided to punch the papers they were going to pass out. It wasn’t a big deal and it didn’t need to be. However, things have changed since then. Teachers for all of high school have, for one reason or another, refused to do the simple task of hole punching their classwork.
It is not that teachers in high school somehow do not have the ability to hole punch their papers. In almost every classroom, there is at least a basic 3-hole hole puncher. That is not even mentioning those fancy electronic ones that can punch 3 holes with the press of a button and can fit more papers. So, the question must be asked, what is the point of having a $110 electronic hole puncher (yes, really, $110) if you are not going to use it? I mean, would it hurt you to press a button and give your students the ability to easily put precisely hole punched papers into their binders?
People out there may be wondering, “why don’t you just hole punch it yourself?” The answer is quite simple. Students have to shuffle around the 12 different worksheets and packets and would have to wait in line to hole punch every single day. Teachers have access to the papers when they are all stacked neatly and organized by specific worksheets. This would be a the perfect time hole punch the necessary papers. But unfortunately, high school teachers refuse to do this.
Daniel is a regular contributor to the Verdant Leaf