Got some motivation for school

U

underaged!

Joined
Sep 11, 2004
Messages
1,675
Damn, my mom said she'll take me somewhere to get some knives or other "must be of age to purchase" place, if, I pass all my classes with a high D or better. I was thinking a Dodo, BM rescue hook (think you can carry in school?, I may talk to some school officials about that), maybe a torch lighter, Meerkat, and Delica. This will be at the end of the quarter, so I should have some chrismas money :p .

I'm failing like maybe three classes right now :mad: , and BF isn't helping any :D. You think I should go for it, it's a **** load of work but I want to pass as well. :mad: :mad:
 
Good grades = Good Job = Good Money = Good knives.
Bad grades = no job = no money = no good knives.

Life is full of difficult choices, this should not be one of them.
 
That's the truth. Right now, you have only one job: learn. Learn well enough to pass your tests and learn well enough to learn what comes next.

Don't learn so you can get knives. Learn so you can get a life.
 
Ok... I agree with you, but the stuff that I can get by doing well in school makes my current life better right?

Anyway Sci. Homework done WOOT! (too bad I'm already passing that class, english now)
 
I've spent the last thirty years arresting people who thought that "school was for losers." They imagined that they could doss around instead of learning, then money would somehow fall from the trees to support them.

I'm now arresting their children and grandchildren.

Get an education. Please. You don't want to spend the next fifty years asking, "You want fries with that?"

maximus otter
 
underaged! said:
Damn, my mom said she'll take me somewhere to get some knives or other "must be of age to purchase" place, if, I pass all my classes with a high D or better.
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Please God, tell me that there is a new way of grading exams :eek: otherwise your mother is doing you a great disservice. Rewards are for A's and maybe B's. And yes I would like fries with that.
 
maximus otter said:
Get an education. Please. You don't want to spend the next fifty years asking, "You want fries with that?"

maximus otter
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THEY DON'T EVEN ASK YOU THAT NOWADAYS!!!!! They forget to put your side orders. They mess up your drinks and they get the size wrong.

And they always have a blank look on their faces.

Underaged:

You're getting rewarded for D's?
Do you have some disease you're not telling us about?
 
There are plenty of students who do care about learning as much as they can. They're not doing it for short-term gifts but for lifelong knowledge. Some day in the near future you will recognize these people. They will be the people who you admire. They may even be the people you resent. When you meet them, just remember one thing. You could have been one of them.

It's never too late to start, but that doesn't change the fact that you've wasted valuable time. Don't set yourself up for terrible regret. :(

Ask your mother to help you set higher standards for yourself. Take the initiative and be a man. Talk to her about what you're learning and forge a deeper friendship.
 
Your mother is to be commended for trying to get you to improve your chances in life. If you were my kid, I would be more inclined to kick your butt over D's than to reward them. But she is your parent and is the one who must figure out what makes you tick.

The real question that you must answer, however, is this: Do you want to go through life living on a "D" level? I don't mean just financially. Is that all that you aspire to? Is that all that you think of yourself? To be permanently below average?
 
Of course there's exceptions - but you probably don't have to bust your butt to come away with passing grades (say C's?). Show up to EVERY class, do EVERY assignment. The exams and tests won't be so hard if you've done the work and been in class. Sure getting high grades takes some hard work - getting passing grades usually just takes showing up and doing the work. The hard part is probably stopping doing things that are dragging you away from class and work. Dump the mindset where you're trying to decide if you "want" to be there or do an assignment. Make that decision now and don't revisit it. If you've got friends or activities that are dragging you down make some decisions about those as well (that's REALLY going to be the tough part.) If you're showing up and doing the work things will break your way - if you're struggling teachers are going to see you're effort and be more interested in helping you, etc.
 
GO FOR IT! I am just finishing up college in May, and am hoping to finish with like a 3.85 GPA. You want some real motivation to do well in school, no nice light of a reward at the end of the rainbow?? :confused:

Get a job doing landscaping, and keep it for at least a year. If that doesn't motivate you to keep in school and get good grades I don't know what will. I did landscaping for like four years, and it is what has been keeping my butt in the classroom and doing well. The hours are loooong, the work is hard and dirty, and the pay sucks. You have to work in the heat of the summer, pouring rain, and the freezing cold of winter, but I don't think that last one will be a problem for you.

When school was out for summer I would work 7 days a week, 10 hours a day doing hard labor. At the end of the night I went home with every muscle in my body aching, and got up early again the next morning to do it again.

BTW, at about your age when I was in JHS I was also failing math pretty badly. I have turned things around and am now acing calc 3. It is possible, it just takes a lot of hard work and dedication. The payouts in the long run are worth it though.
 
I would try for Cs. Then if you slip a little youl get a D. On the other hand if you try for a D and slip youl end up with an F. Im a junior in highschool and it can be hard sometimes, especialy in english, But if you try hard enough you shoul get a C or B. And if you realy put yourself to it You could get an A!
 
If you were my kid and got home with a D (on scale of A to F, right ? F is negative and A is the best) i'd give you a good ass whooping and terminate your allowance.

This being said, you must be pretty young, in early teens i guess. You'll soon learn that school is much more fun than you ever thought and when it's all over you'll begin to regret it. Not the learning for exams part, those aren't that interesting, but hanging out with your buddies, enjoying "easy life - that's what's great in school. COupled with a summer-time job so you make some money (mowing the lawns, etc.), makes you feel like you can do anything, it's a great feeling. Like a knife ? Purchase one with the money you earned. Ditto for computer upgrades. One parents realise you're responsible person that can take care of himself the "freedoms" come in no-time :D
 
Reward for high D's? I have to agree with all that was said here so far. I have always been an above average student with below average grades because I'm a total slacker. But now a dozen years after graduating from high school I find myself regretting all that slacking. When I look back at my transcripts I see a lot of C's, D's, and F's with a lot of dropped classes mixed in there for my undergraduate work but I eventually managed to turn that around and break the 3.0 mark for my Bachelor's Degree. Now I'm in grad school and my current cumulative GPA for my graduate work is something like 3.96 and I have not missed a single class in the last 2 1/2 years since entering my program. Took me a long time, but I finally figured out how much money and time I was wasting and finally got it in gear. If you're like I was then this all probably means nothing to you, but you'll probably figure it out sometime--just hope it's sooner than later.

Which school do you go to?
 
The ones that bust their ass to get a quality education will be the ones signing the average students paycheck and saying "Don't forget to mop the bathrooms before you leave."
 
My kids get all "A" the lowest grade in my house is a B+. They each got $20 no $60 knife for getting a "D".

Underaged. Learn this lesson now while you are still young. If you are as smart as you appear to be on this forum. You should easily be pulling down Bs it is a matter of personal effort. You need to ask yourself Is pulling up my grades to a "D" worthy of my mom buying a $70 knife. Are you doing your personal best.

As a employer I would rather Hire a kid who had all Ds and worked his butt off to get them than some slacker who was getting Bs or Cs because he was too lazy to get As.

My opinion of your situation is that your just beinga lazy teenager and not applying your brain power. If you get a D you see it as the Bare accepted minimum to get a reward. In real life it does not work that way and your mother is not going to be around forever.

Come on Kid..you seem like a nice enough kid..apply yourself and surprise the heck out of your mom. Tell her your going to pass all the classes and when you get B/Cs then you will let her buy a knife for you. Heck I will buy a knife for you. Ds when your capable of more doesnt merit a new knife.

Just my thoughts..good luck...school is very important.
 
Motivation to pass all your classes with a "High D" or better? :eek:

When I was in school, that motivation would have been just the privilege to leave the house.

My parents expected me to try hard, and get decent grades. They expected me to graduate on time. I didn't need to be motivated. Others in my class were getting cars and trips to europe as graduation presents. Me? Zip. And I liked it that way.

My grades weren't top notch, but were fairly good - more B's than A's. Anything below a C, and my ass would have been stuck in summer school.

My grades slipped a bit in college, but went up in my MBA program. Final GPA - 3.87.

Stop slacking and start applying yourself. Unless you think you look good in a paper hat.
 
Well, allow me to add my two cents. I felt the same as you when I was in High school--why study all this crap when you will nevver have a use for it? Trouble is, there's a whole wide world out there that you know very little about, even in the age of computers. Since I was so damned lazy in high school, I paid for it later big time. I went to college--and lo and behold--it wasn't like high school. You get to pick what you want to study, for the most part. Turned out, there were a bunch of really cool subjects there. However, the ones that interested me the most weren't accessable. All that math that I thought that I'd never need? I needed it just to understand what was going on. So I had to bust my @ss--and I kid you not, trying to make it up. So maybe I would have enjoyed those years a little more if I hadn't had to do that.

So, underaged-- you sound like a good kid (if you'll pardon the expression- I'm not patronizing you). Do you know what you will want to do "when you grow up"? People who like knives usually like other cool toys? You may need math- you might need physics. To apply for the job--at any level--, you will certainly need to be somewhat articulate.

And, one other thing. I bet that I am not the only guy on these forums to have quoted poetry to get a beautiful young woman to study some biology with me.
 
Thoughts from a guy who made it through high school and college, and now teaches and coaches kids daily:

I teach two 8th grade physical science classes. To be perfectly honest, you have to TRY to get below a B in my class the way the curriculum is set. I give "completion" grades for homework (I reteach all concepts the class is struggling with, homework is used for ME to see what I need to cover more in depth,) weekly in class projects and assignments that we do together, complete study guides for tests that I make AFTER I make the test and follows the test almost exactly, and I have my students keep a vocabulary notebook for the semester that requires them to spend 5 minutes in class to copy down 4-5 definitions. I don't even move on to the lesson until everyone has had time to complete vocab.... and the notebook is 10% of the grade for the class!

Here is why I gave the background. Out of my 2 classes, one is a class on a "honors" track and the other is not. No student has below a B in my "honors" track science class. In my non-honors track class, The grades run the entire scale from A-F.

Is my non-honors class stupid? No! The kids in that class are every bit as intelligent, and in some cases more so, then the honors class. The difference is work ethic and attitude. The percentage of missing homework assignments between the 2 classes is unbelievable. The amount of study time spent by the students in the 2 classes is also vastly different.

So, here's the point. Achievement in high school has very little to do with intelligent, and everything to do with work ethic and attitude. Focus on applying yourself and making yourself a better student and building a better life for yourself. Get a college degree and find a job that fulfills your life. D's should never be acceptable. Even if your parents seem to think it's okay, you should never accept it for yourself. You should NEVER strive to be average. Strive to be the best. That attitude will take you further in life.

JR
 
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