How to Thrive in High School
The high school years can be some of the most memorable for a student, but also some of the most challenging. Here are some tips we have in order to help our students thrive during their high school experience.
1. Learn How to Study
School is for learning and to learn you need to study. It’s not just about what you can absorb while in the classroom, but how you interact with the material outside of the classroom as well. Studying may look different depending on the subject or project, but it is something you need to get good at. Find out how and where you study best. A few tips are to rest or get a snack before studying, so hunger or tiredness do not distract you. Also, finding a good study environment is key. Don’t study in your bed as your mind associates it with sleep, or a place where there are too many distractions, whether it is in the form of television, music, or people-watching. We won’t cover all of them here, but there are plenty of blogs and websites with lists of tips and tricks to help improve your study habits, so go check them out.
2. Make a Study Schedule
When making a schedule, we often plan out how we’ll make time for our extracurricular activities, but sometimes we forget to block off enough time for getting homework or projects done. One way to manage your time better is to create a study schedule at the beginning of the year and stick to it. Even if you do not have homework in a certain class, you can organize your notes, review the content, and prepare questions for your next class. It may sound like a drag, but it will make paper writing and studying for tests much easier, and will save you time in the long run.
3. Trust Your Teachers
At the Academy, this should be easy. Their genuine smiles and love for God and others make them the perfect people to deserve your trust. Your teachers have your best interest at heart, so don’t be dismissive if they offer correction or discipline. Also, don’t be afraid to ask for help when you need it. Teachers are there to help you learn, and they want to make sure you do. When they give you advice, be sure to listen, because they are saying it for your benefit, not theirs.
4. Be a Friend
Like the old saying goes, “if you want a friend, be a friend,” which is almost just a reverberation of the golden rule applied to friendship. Remember that your classmates aren’t your competition, they’re your teammates, so be sure to show them the respect, kindness, and forgiveness that you would want shown to you. Having a good set of friends, makes the good times better, and the hard times easier. If you have a hard time making friends, then ask someone you know for advice on how to be a better friend. Of course, being a friend isn’t always easy, but the work you put into it is definitely worth it.
5. Get Perspective
Learn what does and does not matter in the long run. There are a lot of things in high school that seem like they are such a big deal, but will hardly be remembered a year or two later. Whether it was a trending style, an event you did or did not get to attend, or an embarrassing situation, you’ll soon find out that some of these things are not near as big of a deal as they seem in the moment. Other decisions you make will have a big impact on your future, even if they only seem as simple as turning in an assignment on time or being obedient to your parents. Gaining perspective will keep you from being overly dramatic about unimportant things, and keep you focused on what matters most.
6. Honor Your Parents
What does honoring your parents have to do with surviving high school? A little. So why are we bringing it up? Because it has everything to do with thriving during high school. Having a healthy relationship with your parents can make all the difference during your high school years. If you are stressed with all you are trying to do in high school, consider how much more they are responsible for every single day. You can be a blessing to them by ensuring to respect and obey them. This will not only make your parents happy, but God as well. Stress at home affects our school life and can negatively impact your academic performance. How do you expect to succeed at school if you are unable to do well at home?
7. Don’t Forget God
If you are not spending time connecting with God, then don’t be surprised if you are having trouble staying afloat in any aspect of your life, let alone high school. God’s Spirit helps us to stand firm in the midst of trials. By remaining connected to the vine, we are able to be full of the wisdom and life God gives. This will help us walk according to his ways, so that we do more than just get through every day, but that we live it to the fullest for God.
Biblical Education Put into Practice: Monthly Service Project Highlights
At least once a month, Jr High and High school students have the great privilege of serving those in need in our community and the greater Nashville area. It’s a practical way our students are learning to put the biblical education they receive in the classroom into practice.
At least once a month, Jr High and High school students have the great privilege of serving those in need in our community and the greater Nashville area. It’s a practical way our students are learning to put the biblical education they receive in the classroom into practice.
This month, students served both on our school campus and neighboring communities. It is such a joy to see our students work together, strategize, and display teamwork to meet needs. Here are a few highlights:
Life Care Center- A group of students went to the Life Care Center, an elderly home in Madison, TN. They sang three worship songs and played bingo with the residents. One of our students even got to call out the bingo numbers for the game! The presence of youth brighten the day for the residents, and it’s a blessing to see our students shine in this way.
Hopewell Neighbors- A group of students also planted flowers at an elderly woman's home across the street from our school and raked leaves in one of our neighbor's yard!
School Playground & Elementary Students - Students weeded our elementary playground and the memorial garden to beautify our school campus.
Parents Day Out and Pre-K - Students weeded around the Parents Day Out Program building to beautify our entire campus.
Ugandan Students - Students wrote letters to our home education students in Uganda and encouraged them in their studies with midterms taking place. They were so precious as they have felt more and more connected to these students over the years and looked forward to connecting with them in this way.
The Elderly at McKendree Village & Chippington Towers - Students used their time yesterday to plan for a Christmas party at McKendree Village and Chippington Towers. This is a highlight for the residents each year!
“In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.” - Matthew 5:16
Exploring the Visual, Auditory and Physical Styles of Learning: The Benefits of Various Teaching Styles
Simply put, learning styles are the different ways in which a person intakes information. While there are multiple ways to analyze this, one of the easiest ways to break this down is through our senses.
Simply put, learning styles are the different ways in which a person intakes information. While there are multiple ways to analyze this, one of the easiest ways to break this down is through our senses. Students learn through seeing, hearing, and handling the subject matters taught to them. Some children are more prone to retaining information when presented in a certain way, and thus one student may learn more quickly through hearing a teacher’s lesson while another may better grasp the concept if that same information is formulated into a graph. With that said, here is a quick breakdown of some of the learning styles and how they can be used.
Visual: Here are some ways in to use visualization to your advantage: Use multiple colored pens when taking notes to color-coordinate certain ideas, create graphs, charts, webs, and illustrations to depict the information you were taught, make a mind-map to see how various ideas connect to each other, or put facts on images and make a review collage.
Auditorial: Some people prefer learning through hearing the information, so here are some study ideas: Listen to energizing but not distracting music while studying, memorize facts by putting them to the tune of a popular song, download lectures and re-listen to them in the car on the way to soccer practice, read through your notes out loud, or take turns with a study partner re-teaching each other the information by putting it in your own words.
During a lesson exploring the digestive system, students participate in hands-on experiments to guide their understanding of the course material.
Physical: Get moving! This style of learning requires you to use your body: Act out what you are trying to learn as if rehearsing for a play, read your notes while walking or chewing gum to keep your subconscious busy with movement to help your mind focus on what you need to memorize, put choreography or dance moves to the information you are trying to memorize, or place index cards of facts around the room and connect them with string. Anything that gets your body moving in sync with your brain as you digest the information can be beneficial for a kinesthetic style of learning.
For rather obvious reasons, the smelling and tasting methods are rarely used. While delicious, writing your notes in icing on a cake and then eating it is neither practical nor efficient, even if you do technically digest the information.
What’s a way to wrap all of this into one useful study tip: draw your notes. Edutopia explains how drawing while notetaking can increase retention rates by utilizing multiple learning styles at once. The student is intaking the information audibly by listening to the lecture; by depicting the information in charts, symbols, or pictures, they are constructing visuals; and by using their hands to draw, they are keeping their body physically active.
While certain learning styles may come easier to some than others, we should avoid pigeonholing anyone to a specific style. If not understood correctly, a student may lay blame on the way a topic was conveyed rather than trying to take responsibility for trying extra hard to understand the concept. Rather than looking to strengthen a weakness, they may turn it into a handicap. This may be why the developer of the multiple intelligence theory, Howard Gardner believes it best to leave behind the term “learning styles,” even though he does highly encourage educators to “pluralize” their teaching methods.
SOURCES:
Northern Illinois University Center for Innovative Teaching and Learning. (2020). Howard Gardner’s theory of multiple intelligences. In Instructional guide for university faculty and teaching assistants. Retrieved from https://www.niu.edu/citl/resources/guides/instructional-guide
“Howard Gardner's Theory of Multiple Intelligences.” Northern Illinois University. (visited 24 March 2022)
Cherry, Kendra. “Gardner's Theory of Multiple Intelligences.” VeryWellMind.com. July 28, 2021 (visite 24 March 2022)
https://www.verywellmind.com/gardners-theory-of-multiple-intelligences-2795161
Terada, Youki. “The Science of Drawing and Memory.” Edutopia. 14 March 2019. (visited 4 April 2022)
New Year, New Logo: Here’s what it represents.
We gave our school logo a fresh look for the start of our 10th year! Here’s the meaning behind the design.
Our logo just got a wonderful makeover for our 10th year, and we couldn’t be more excited about it. This emblem shows off some core values of our school. The new logo is a silhouette of a phoenix head in front of five blue flames, all above an open book. It looks amazing, but what does it mean? Well, let us explain…
The Flames:
The five blue flames are representative of the five goals set in our mission statement, the first of which is providing holistic education. There are also five categories which make up holistic education: academic, emotional, social, moral, and spiritual. The next is implementing this holistic education to teach children how to be responsible, kind, and ethical neighbors. The last three also deal with how we strive to shape students into being ones who are competent persons, who are globally conscious, and who are historically relevant.
The Phoenix:
The Phoenix serves as the school’s mascot, but was chosen so due to what phoenix’s are known best for: resurrection. We believe resurrection is a core element of our faith in God. The resurrection of Jesus reveals that God is the final judge and that life in him can triumph even over death. It is the epitome of hope, and is essential to our walk of faith. Our desire is to instill this undying flame of perseverance in the students, teaching them to stand firm in the fact that their hope in God does not disappoint (Rom. 5).
The Book:
The open book in front of the Phoenix is from where all our values derive: the Bible. It is not a closed book left on a shelf only to serve as a reminder of ancient traditions, but it is one we constantly open to study, so we know how to maneuver an ever changing world. Through meditation and study, we derive principles and lessons that can be applied in a relevant way to a watching world, allowing us to be a light in a world too often characterized by darkness.
A special THANK YOU to Genovations Media for the fresh design. Your team is always a pleasure to work with!
Does Spirituality Belong in the Classroom? How Prayer and Worship Impact a Student's Experience
What happens when spirituality becomes a big part of what takes place at school? Does it disturb the child’s learning process or make it more dynamic?
What happens when spirituality becomes a big part of what takes place at school? Does it disturb the child’s learning process or make it more dynamic? Some may send their kids to a Christian school more so to get out of the public education system than to have their child involved in the spiritual practices a Christian school offers. If that is the case, then what they don’t realize is how those spiritual practices actually shape these schools into the wonderful places of holistic education they are trying to be. Spirituality is not a hindrance to one’s mental capacities, but instead encourages the building up of the mind as a part of one’s overall development as a person. So let’s take a look at how spiritual elements such as Bible reading, prayer, and worship actually work in favor of a child's education.
People who think that spiritual things could prevent students from learning facts often forget to consider how useless learning facts are if not applied in a way that is beneficial to a society. Without God’s word guiding us, how could we effectively apply the knowledge we gain? Learning the Bible develops wisdom, allowing students to put to good use what they learn in their classes. Even the brightest students may not know how to produce much with their lives if they are void of the ethical guidance from Scripture. This requires students to develop their critical thinking skills in order to figure out how to exercise the information they are absorbing in a way that aligns with God’s will. This turns students into future leaders because they have direction and know how to utilize the knowledge and skills they possess to get there.
Each week, all K-12 students participate in chapel worship and bible teaching. This intentional time of focus on spiritual development is a guiding exercise for students to implement throughout other parts of their week.
Alongside learning the Bible, prayer is another essential component. It is not just the regurgitation of dead, religious words, but a connection to a living God. This is why prayer should be our first response when encountering problems, because without asking God for a heavenly perspective of how to solve the issue at hand, our solutions are going to be inadequate. By encouraging students to connect with the God who created the universe, it teaches them to step back, look at the bigger picture, and approach the issue with creativity. This gives them confidence to overcome the obstacles life will throw at them, in whatever form they may be, allowing them to be innovative thinkers as they move out of schooling and into the workforce.
Worship through song is a method to connect with God, and focus one’s mind and energies on him. Worship and prayer can lead to better emotional stability by providing an outlet as they share their struggles with the Lord. Spiritually healthy individuals will not be overcome by the distractions life lets in, but will be able to maintain focus on their times of education, knowing it is an essential step in the journey God has planned for their life. These spiritual activities of Bible reading, prayer and worship create focused, ingenuitive students who can critically think and who have direction. These are the types of students we want to develop, and spirituality in the classroom is how to get there.