This week I had the opportunity to watch the film “Succstress” made by a former Northern Highlands Student. The film covered topics, but two that stuck out to me were dealing with the stresses of high school and the competition within the school.
Many techniques to reduce stress were introduced in the video. One that stuck out was tapping. This is when you tap on different points on your body to allow you to access the body’s energy and sends signals to the part of the brain that controls stress. In the few days since I have watched the video, I have begun to use these techniques when I am stressed or taking a test. Im not sure that it has actually reduced the stress, but I do feel that it helps because it takes my mind off of what I was stressed about. It’s a good distraction.
The video also talked a lot about goals of students and whether their motivation is intrinsic (wanting to do well for themselves) or extrinsic (wanting to do well for a reward or good grade). A lot of the time I do take a class because I am generally interested in the course and the curriculum that will be taught. However, I find that I will pick a class I’m interested in, but it will be from a list of AP classes. In other words, at least some of the motivation is intrinsic, but I am also in it for the reward. In order to stop this, I think that the relationship between peers in school needs to change. One common question in school when a test gets handed back is “What did you get,” or after scheduling everyone asks “How many AP classes are you taking?” It is a constant competition to have the better grade or be taking more harder classes. One way to stop the competition to do better on a test could be to have more whole class projects. If everyone had to work together and would receive the same grade, then students would be working together rather than working to beat each other,
These were some of the takeaways I had from the “Succstress” video and I urge you all to go and watch it!
Kate's Corner 