So, here it is:
Junior year. The worst year of high school. Why? Because it’s the year before all the fun and the year after all the innocence.
The year of AP tests. SATs. More tests. And finally, the fall: college applications.
By the time most sophomores reach junior year, in the beginning, it is a pleasant journey. I know because I was one of them. I went into junior year thinking it was going to be easy because the only hard class(es) I was taking was APUSH. The other possible hard class I could have is physics. None of my other classes were all that tough. So I thought.
I had some friends who had basically whizzed through sophomore year, taking AP calculus, chemistry, whatnot. But junior year, they too had some struggling. Maybe it’s the overwhelming of tests and quizzes. Maybe it’s the pressure from parents, teachers. Whatever it was, the stress was there. It was bearing down on us. Hard. Each one of us felt the pressure, felt the weight. And the only thing we could do was struggle to not go under.
I struggled. A lot. So did many of my friends. Whenever someone asks me, “how was school?” I’d usually reply with, “okay.” I couldn’t explain to them that I was struggling because they wouldn’t understand. (Note that mostly adults ask this). And if I do reply that it was hard, they would immediately become concerned, asking if I needed help or tutoring. Then as the questions become more insistent and seeking, I would flip. I would lose my self-control and snap at them.
I don’t know how many times I lost my temper at someone I cared about, whether it be my family, friends, or even my beloved baby. The need for independence was great. I wanted to be able to succeed on my own. To be able to overcome the challenges and show the success to my parents. But whenever I hit a wall or fell, I struggled to go on. I was proud; possibly too proud. I didn’t want anyone’s help. I refused to challenge myself further and I lost motivation and will to move forward. Nearing the end of the school year, there was a month of ongoing testing. AP tests. SATs. Finals. ACTs. It never stopped. At one point, I just gave up. I went home one day after a full day of testing and I just left everything. I didn’t open a book. I didn’t look over notes. I ignored all invites for a group study. I locked myself away in a place of nothingness. And I regretted it the next day.
My word of advice for all you incoming juniors: never ever give up. Once you let the control slip, it’s over. You can’t reverse time and redo it again. Keep pushing yourself, motivating yourself. Don’t procrastinate. Skip the fun and do the important things first. Or even better: incorporate the fun with the work. My APUSH project was to make a skit about a time period. The ending: we had created a rap about the entire period we were covering and it was a lot of fun. Definitely helped me study for my finals because it was an easy way of remember what went on in that time period.
I know this is sounding so dark and depressing. It actually isn’t all that bad. I was able to pick myself up after that one downfall and I made it down the final stretch. I finished my tests. I checked back into the world. I moved on.
Sometimes you wish you can go back and redo something. So did I. But my dad taught me something: “Whatever you did in the past is in the past. move on and think about the future because that’s where the present will be and that’s what you should think about instead of worrying about what you did wrong earlier.”
his simple advice helped me move from worrying about how I did on my physics final to studying for my APUSH final. Move from the spat I had with my best friend to organizing our next outing.
Most importantly: never ever try to pull all-nighters or cram in an extra hour of studying. Make a study schedule and start at least a week early. I tried doing the day before test: no workie. In fact, it made me even more nervous because I didn’t have enough time. Go over everything slowly, spanning over a few days and the last night before the day of the test, scan everything. At school, run a few things over with a friend to clarify or maybe quiz each other. Then the period before the test: forget about it. Do not look over any notes. Because then, all you would remember is the stuff you looked over right before.
Now everyone has their own method of studying. The said above is just my advice for you. You can chose to follow it or not. It doesn’t matter to me. Do what you feel works.
Now studying. It doesn’t sound all that fun, right? I know. But for me, there was a time where I really enjoyed it: 4th period pre-calc. it was the “study time” for APUSH. I had at least 5 other APUSH students who were in the same class as me. We threw nuggets and quizzed each other, pulled our desks in a circle, and received dirty glances from our math teacher. It was lots of fun.
Speaking of fun, between the hard work load and month of testing, prom. I wrote a commentary about this for my radio show. That is another story for another day, but prom is definitely a lot of fun. a relief from the school work. a day to hang out late with your friends. And of course, the date.
I definitely have much more to say but let me say this: no matter how hard it gets, there is always a fun side to something. “When you are at the bottom, there is no other way to go except up. And up you go.”
Final advice: organize outings with friends every month or so as a stress reliever. Seriously: it really works.
No comments:
Post a Comment