Hi there!
I’m doing a research project about American schools for my English class, but I’m still a bit confused about some details. If you happen to be free, could you possibly spare some time to help me out with some questions? I would be so grateful if you do so!!! It’s OK if you are not available, I just thought that it couldn’t hurt to ask 🙂
I see that the experiences vary from person to person, so I think the question should be “How was a day in your high school like?”
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r/teenagers
Though beware of the melodrama.
Do you have any specific questions? It can definitely vary depending on the school. I went to a K-12 public charter school in the northeast.
My high school started at 7:05am. I was always dropped off by family but I’d say most kids took the bus. Homeroom was first where you sat and waited for everyone else to get there and attendance was taken. You could also go to breakfast if you wanted. The pledge of allegiance and morning announcements were made during Homeroom.
We had a school uniform consisting of polo shirts and khaki pants. The shirts could only be maroon or white. No hats or hoodies, things like that. When you entered the school they had someone checking to make sure you were in uniform.
But every so often there were “dress down days”, and you could pay a dollar to be able to dress in whatever you wanted. Seniors were allowed to dress down every Friday as a major perk.
Then the day was divided into periods about 50 minutes long. Those were your classes. We had mandatory ones like English, history, Spanish, different sciences, and sometimes we could pick between things like art and music, and elective classes like journalism, anatomy, and psychology.
You acted out in class, you were written up and got a “referral” and sent to “in-house”. It was a small classroom ran by the disciplinarian. You usually spent the rest of the day there in silence and doing work.
Another form of punishment was “lunch detention”, where you were sent to a quiet classroom to eat lunch instead of the cafeteria with all your friends.
Lunch was 11:25. I always brought my own lunch so I cant really comment on the school lunches. Dominos pizza was there every Thursday I think and sold slices, and that was very popular.
We had a “student life” period rather than “recess” like lower grades. And this was a free period to do extracurriculars. I always chose a cheesy thing called “chill zone” so I could just sit around with friends.
Dismissal was 2:25 in the afternoon.
r/HomeworkHelp
1.About how many students are there in a class?
2.How many classes do you have in one day? When do they begin and end?
3.What are the 3 most-enforced rules in your high school?
4.What are 2 activities that you spend most time on apart from classes and school work?
5.Generally, how enjoyable is high school? Please rate on a scale from 1 to 10, 1 being the least enjoyable and 10 being the mot enjoyable.
Please feel free to talk about any other details about American high school life that you think I should know. Thanks!!!
We can answer, but there probably is no one answer. High schools vary wildly from county to county or even school to school in the US and can also change from year to year. For example, in my high school we had block schedules ( a small number of 1-2 hour classes that change on different days) and then switched to normal classes (multiple 45 minute classes every day). This changed year to year and school to school to this day. What is taught will differ greatly as will environment. This can depend on location, economics, politics, and more.
There is very few statements, if any at all, that could apply to every high school in America and even ones that apply to most usually won’t cover a large, large number
While that’s a large question and I don’t have time to be too elaborate, I would recommend looking into American magnet schools as that was many’s highschool experience including mine. If you have questions about it I can specifically answer those
Experiences will vary immensely, but here was a typical day at my pretty standard high school.
6:00 wake up
6:15 Shower/Breakfast/pack bag
6:45 get on school bus (if driving/getting ride, leave at 7)
7:15-11:30 Classes
11:30-12:00 Lunch
12-14:15 Classes
14:30-16:00 Sports Practice
16:15 Get ride/drive home
16:30-18:30 Shower/study
18:30-19:15 Dinner/watch news with family
19:30-21:00 Studying
21:00-23:00 Relax/read
23:00 Bed
First, I got up at 6:45 everyday. I live in a rural area so my school was 4.6 miles (about 7.4 km) away which took nearly 10 minutes to drive. Class periods started at 7:45 and lasted about an hour. Every period had a 5 minute break in between to get to class or go to the restroom. After 2 periods, we had a 10 minute break. Then we had lunch during the 5th period. For lunch, we typically ate with our classes. There were 7 periods my freshman and sophomore years and 8 periods my junior and senior year. School ended at 2:45. After that, anyone who played a sport would have practice after school. I was on the bowling team so I would drive to the bowling alley then drive home at about 6 pm everyday. Then, I would have about 2 or so hours of homework every night. Sometimes, I would have more.
For classes, we got to choose what electives we wanted to take, but the actual academics we did not have much of a choice. You could take AP courses or dual enrollment courses, but that was kinda it. For electives, over the course of 4 years, we had to take 1 foreign language class, 1 work class (shop class, home economics, etc), 1 fine art, 1 PE, 1 health class, 1 driver’s ed class, and 1 career prep class.
I graduated from high school over 30 years ago, so some things have changed since then. Basic day: take a school bus* to the school, arriving at about 7:30am. Go to “home room”. This is not a real class, just a short period for the teacher to “take attendance” (report to the school administrators which students are present and which are missing), listen to announcements over the school’s PA (public address) system, and say the Pledge of Allegiance (Southern state).
Then go to first period. This class will be different for different students. Some might be English, some math, etc. The school offered many different classes. In general, every student took some kind of English, some kind of math, and some kind of science every year. I think some kind of PE (physical education) was mandatory for at least one year. Other classes might be some kind of art**, foreign language***, business, social studies, etc.
We had seven periods per day, so you moved from one classroom to the next when a period was over. Your class schedule was different from other students, so there may not have been any other student you were in every class with for the whole day. However, the students who took advanced classes were likely to have many classes together. For example, there was only one AP (advanced placement****) Physics class each day, one AP English class each day, etc. So if you were taking several AP classes then you likely had the same classmates in all of those classes.
There was a 5-minute time period to change between classes. So you might go to your locker (each student had their own locker) to drop off books from classes that you had completed for the day, and get books for upcoming classes. You might also go to the bathroom during this time window, and walk to your next class.
Half-way through the day was lunch. Students went to the cafeteria, most bought lunch. Poorer students had “reduced price” lunch, and the poorest students got lunch for free. The government paid some or all of the cost for those students. We sat at long tables and ate cheap, unhealthy food from foam trays, with plastic forks.
After the school day officially ended (3:30pm?), many students stayed for after-school programs. This included foreign language clubs, chess club, business club (FBLA-Future Business Leaders of America), etc. It might include sports, though in Alabama each sport was a class (considered PE), so it took place during normal class time, for high school credits. In New Jersey, sports were after-school activities for which students did not get credits towards graduating. The after school programs ran for several hours. I forget how many hours (2? 3?), but enough time for the cross-country runners to run about 6 miles each day.
* Younger students (15-16) either took the bus, were dropped off by parents, or rode with an older sibling. Older students (17-19) drove themselves if they (or more likely their parents) could afford a car (and the very expensive auto insurance for a teenager!).
** I moved part-way through high school, from a very nice, well-funded school in New Jersey (NJ) to a poor school in Alabama. The difference in the curriculum was large. In (NJ), one year of a “fine, practical, or performing art” was mandatory. There were many choices, including practical arts such as industrial drafting (drawing plans to build machines or buildings), woodworking, and metal shop (including machining and welding).
*** The school in NJ offered 5 years each French, Spanish, German, and Latin. You could take 5 years of language in 4 years of school by taking year 3 and year 4 simultaneously (one was literature and the other was normal grammar and conversation, so they could be taken at the same time), or by taking year 1 of French or Spanish while in the 8th grade, before starting high school. The Alabama school offered only 2 years of French and 2 years of Spanish.
**** AP classes are the most advanced, and after passing the class a student can take the AP exam for that class. If they do well on that exam, most universities will give them credit for the equivalent university class. This is a cheap way to get college credits, and to not have to take some basic classes when you get to college. Only a small percentage of students (especially in Alabama) took AP classes.
Well highschool for me sucked and was a pain in the ass. First, I went to a highschool I never should went to; second, it was a brand new highschool so it took a couple years for things to get running smooth. It was also over crowded immediately, the day it opened it already had 20 trailer classrooms behind it.
A typical day would be roll out of bed, smoke a cigarette and drink coffee while taking a shit, hop in the car and pick up any buddies who needed a ride, grab breakfast at Bojangles, then head to school.
Fight the masses of hundreds of kids to get to my locker so I could empty all 100lbs of books I needed. The lockers were a pain in the ass because they weren’t the tall side by side lockers, they were the short top/bottom ones so they wouldnt fit an ar15, we all had to bring handguns which was bullshit.
Class periods were 1.5 hours each, and the subjects alternated by day, son on “A” days I’d have like English, math, science; then “B” days I’d have like gym, civics, and an elective.
Lunch was split into 3 periods because the school was already over crowded. The food actually wasn’t bad, we had dominos pizza and a bunch of regular school options like chicken sandwiches and stuff, I rarely had.complaints about my schools lunch. Lunch was when you did most of your socializing, where you smoked cigs like a badass or made out with your girlfriend or made sure you glock was loaded, maybe cycle a few rounds through.
We had 7 minutes to switch between classes, which wasn’t enough because as I’ve mentioned the school was way over crowded. Imagine 3000+ kids trying to change classrooms all at once. If you were lucky you’d pass a friend to gossip with or your gf to make out with real quick.
I think it ended at 2:20. At this point only kids with extracurriculars stayed, but everyone else left as fast as possible…which wasnt fast because again…overcrowded. Imagine like 500 cars all trying to leave a parking lot at with one entrance at the same time.
Once we finally got out of school we would all shoot our guns wildly into the air and go get cheeseburgers from McDonalds.
Then I’d go to my gf’s house to bone, and if I didn’t have a gf I’d go my buddies house to play video games, maybe drink a few beers, maybe shoot guns wildly into the air some more.
Junior and senior year: I got to school at 6:30/6:45 every day because I took AP sciences that started early at 7 AM. Then I would have an AP history class,first math class, foreign language, lunch, second math, English, second science.
I did not have to ever take arts, or PE at my school because I was able to opt out and I wanted to be valedictorian so that was advantageous.
After school, I had sports practice from 2:40-6 then I would chill and play video games until 11. I would only do homework in the morning so I wake up at 4:30 every morning to do my school stuff.
Schedule
4:30 – wake up/get ready
5- HW
6:30 – get to school
7 – class 1
8:15 – class 2
9:20 – class 3
10:15 – class 4
11:10 – lunch
11:40 – class 5
12:35- class 6
1:30 – class 7
2:20 – don
2:40 – practice starts
5 – lifting after practice/ extra work/ cutting weight
6:30 – dinner at home
7 – movies/video games/ gf
11 – asleep
Here’s someone who videoed their day at school. [A day in the life at American public school.](https://youtu.be/FGvdNUgC5Kk)
> I see that the experiences vary from person to person, so I think the question should be “How was a day in your high school like?”
For the first three years I rode a school bus to and from. The last year I had a car and a parking space at school, so I drove.
My school had 8 periods (including lunch period) starting at 8:15am and ending at 3:15pm. The time between class bells was 10 minutes if I recall correctly, just enough to travel between classes with an optional stop at one’s locker. I didn’t use my locker at all and instead opted to keep everything I needed for the day on my person. Due to the size of the school, “lunch period” spanned three periods starting between 11:15 and 1:15 and students were equally portioned into one of them. So your lunch may not be at the same time each semester.
Which classes you had at which period was mostly random, best I can tell, other than homeroom after first period. However, I was a bit unusual in that my first period was always the same because I consistently chose to take the broadcasting class where we ran the homeroom news show. As such, we were all exempt from homeroom.
An average day was pretty boring. Arrive in the morning, take classes, eat lunch, take more classes, go home. At lunch, depending on if my friends were in the same time block, I’d either hang out with them after eating or head to the library and read for the remainder of time. Same with the time between classes; if my friends were nearby we’d chat for a bit, otherwise I’d head straight to my next class and read for a bit.
I don’t know if I was lucky or smart (lol), but homework from my classes was rare and easy enough to crank out during lunch, so I didn’t often need to do anything after school.
That’s an overview. I’m happy to answer any specific questions.
People keep saying experiences varies which is true but it’s unhelpful to you. I graduated 5 months ago so I’ll tell you my typical day:
Walk in the building at 7 am. Most people took the bus but I was a car rider so my uncle took me to school. Classes started at 7:35 and when they did we’d stand for the pledge of the intercom. Most people never paid attention to it almost people stood. Most people don’t really care anymore only older people will get on your ass for it.
After that each class is about 40-55 minutes in length and our lunch break was about 20 minutes. In olden times people could leave the lunch rooms to go out and eat but that was not a thing at all in any of the schools near me or any of my online friend’s schools. Infact in mine we couldn’t even leave the lunch room.
We also had 5 minute periods in between classes to change rooms, unlike in Europe we move to a teachers class. The teachers doesnt come to us. That 5 minutes was also used to go to the bathroom.
Any questions?
My high school was on a Tri-Mester system which was great. You took 2-3 classes for 12 weeks each class 2 hours. Next Tri you went on to new classes. It made studying & homework easier as you only had 2-3 classes to deal with.
6:45-7:45: Lift weights. It was technically a class that started before the normal schedule day that is at 8:00.
8:00-3:20: 8 classes that were I think were 53 minutes except home room was shorter. Passing periods were 5 minutes. Lunch was 30 minutes.
3:45-6:15: Sports practice. It could be longer or shorter depending on the day and what sport. If we had a football game, for instance, we’d have meetings, preparation, warmups, etc. from after school until game time at 7:00. Then we’d be done with the day by about 10:00
6:45-9:00 or 10:00: Get home, eat, shower, homework, try to fit something fun in, go to bed.
I sit around and babysit other peoples children for money. I say babysit because these kids couldn’t give a flying fuck about what I have to say
As others have said, it differs region to region, but for me it was:
6:30: wake up, shower, get dressed, and catch the bus (I didn’t drive until my senior year)
7:15: arrive at school and either eat breakfast or hangout with friends until bell rings.
7:50: class begins and you go to first period.
A class period (math, science, etc) was 45 minutes long, and we had three lunch periods. I went first one year and last the in my jr year due to how my classes fell.
After lunch I went to the remainder of my classes.
2:45 was end of the day. You either ride the bus home, walked, or drive home unless you had practice for a sport.
My senior year I had a half day because I had enough credits. I started the day as usual but left around 11:45. You had to have a work permit for this to be ok, so I got a P/T job washing dishes. I worked two days a week and one was typically on Saturday lol.
Upper middle class suburbs, predominantly white, northeast US region. 2018.
I rarely woke up to allow ample time to eat. Oftentimes it was a rush. I hate mornings.
Wake up at 6:50 am. Breakfast. Shove food in my mouth if I woke up at like 7:20 and the bus was coming soon. The bus stop is right outside my door, I was lucky. My mom or dad would wait there at the front door and watch the outside and tell me when the bus comes.
Get on bus at 7:24 am.
If I missed the bus, it was probably because I slept in for an extra hour of sleep. In which case I would wake up at 7:20 instead of 6:30.
Close my eyes on the bus and manage whatever “sleep” i could.
Get to school around 7:30. The library opened at 7:40, oftentimes people would sit outside the library and wait until the librarian walked up to open it up.
Usually then we’d all file in and put our heads down on the table. Need a few minutes of extra sleep until that 7:50 bell rang to signal the beginning of class. Some days I’d be on the computer at the library instead though, to print something out if I needed to.
7:50 rolls around and that’s the start of first period.
Obviously schedules vary by student so I’m not going into that. Each period is 43 minutes long, with 5 minutes class change time in between periods.
Periods 1-5 are over. Time for lunch. Head over to the cafeteria where there’s a long ass line for lunch as always. They rotate hot lunch selections, or you can always get pizza. Or, my favorite, custom subs were made for us. Buy any of the above and it would be like $3.50 or something. Snacks were available at vending machines.
At my school you could sit anywhere you wanted, even outside. When I was a senior, if I didnt feel like eating school lunch, i could even drive to downtown and grab something to eat. No one really cares. It was nice
Lunch is half an hour. After that, periods 6-8.
8th period ends at 2:50.
After that youre done for the day.
There are a few options here depending on who you are.
I went directly to practice because I was on the basketball team for winter and track/field for fall/spring. That would last until like 5pm, and our school had late busses that would come by around 5:30 and pick us up and bring us home.
The other option, the most common option if you didnt have sports or other stuff after school, is obviously to go straight home.
You would just chill somewhere in the school or outside on the front grass area until the busses came at 3:30 to bring you home.
The third option would be to spend time after school at clubs or with a teacher to work on stuff or for help if needed. Again, late busses pick the late guys up later into the night.
People who lived closer may have walked home, people with licenses and a parking pass may have driven home.
Once you get home, you eat some food (god bless my parents), grind out some homework, then pass out at like 12am. Rinse and repeat.
Average day for you. Hope this helps and lmk if u need more info
I went to school almost 2 decades ago, but I’ll try to give a general run of the day. Mine was a suburban New Jersey school in a fairly built up area:
Around 7:30 AM you are supposed to be in first period. People would either walk, be driven/drive, or take the bus to school depending on their circumstances. I usually was driven to school until I got a car in the last year of school, there was no student parking and we had to pay to use a lot a couple blocks away. 7:30 was the first class of the day, and though they weren’t supposed to take attendance, they did do it.*
After first period was homeroom. In this section they took the attendance that was supposed to count*. And then after like 10 minutes, you went onto your other periods. Moving between class rooms on period changes.
Between periods 4 and 6, iirc, lunch was served for the different groups of students. You got assigned a group for lunch at the beginning of the year. It wasn’t by year or anything, it was mostly random, and just there to make serving the roughly 1.5K to 2K students in the school possible. The food was sub-par at best. Mostly soggy and fairly tasteless.
The rest of the day played out like the morning. 42 minute periods with students moving between classes for the 4 minutes or so between periods. There wasn’t that much time to go to your locker, so you had to plan a bit to make sure you had books for a few classes at a time.
School ended around 2:35. People went home whatever way they could. If they lived far enough away, they could take a school bus. Otherwise, people generally walked home. Until I got a car, I walked home (probably 1 to 2 miles). Unlike most of the country, my town has really good walking infrastructure, so you’re always on sidewalks and there’s crosswalks and marked crossings everywhere (this shouldn’t need to be remarkable, but it is for the US.)
*On my senior year, my first period (and last period) was a study hall (read: waste of time). I nearly flunked out because I would rather sleep and arrive at the end of the period than spend three quarters of an hour sitting in a daze trying to wake up in the cafeteria. I found out that the school used the first period attendance instead of homeroom attendance to assess if you’re in school, even though they told us otherwise at the beginning of the year, so I only officially was in school maybe 1/3 of the time, even though I came for every actual class every day.
My high school experience was 20 years ago. I think a lot has changed.
My school started at 8 because the elementary schools started at 8:30 and that allowed parents/busses to drop kids off on age order.
The biggest thing about my high school was that it was designed for 1200 students but we had almost 1500 students with just grades 10/11/12 in the high school (freshman were shunted back to the middle school).
My graduating class was 464 (with 20 students not graduating). However, of those I really went to “school” with a subgroup of about 50 kids in my year and another 50 of the years above/behind me that were all taking AP, college prep, or honors classes. We pretty much saw the same people all day as those were the kids all taking a full slate of non standard classes. The class where I interacted with the non honors group were 1) computer programming classes and 2) Debate/Forensics classes.
Schools vary state to state, school district to school district so there is no one typical day…
My school had 9 periods, running from 8am to a little after 3pm. 42 minute periods with 4 minutes between to get to next class.
Some classes were required, some elective. Schedule was the same every day (other than lab sciences that had double-period labs 2x week, study hall the other 3 days). Our freshman year schedule was set for us, but for the remaining years we got to pick our own schedules (ie. if taking US history, you might have option to take period 4 with Mr. Smith or period 7 with Mrs. Jones.)