As the start of a new school year evolves, students are learning the new way of working in a combined classroom full of juniors and sophomores.
“I think it’s a good way for new students to kind of meet, especially with crossing the two grades. For sophomores who are new coming in, who don’t know people, or don’t really know the school, it’s good for them to find someone,” junior Charlie Macemore said.
While students learn the new curriculum, most teachers are also learning it for the first time too. Since the chemistry class combined this year, the need for biology teachers has been erased for chemistry teachers. This means that a good majority of the science teachers at Eisenhower had to learn new information just like the students.
“It takes a lot of time to learn a new curriculum. I am putting in about five hours every weekend plus an hour a night to make sure I can bring my A game to chemistry,” science teacher Julie Sinning said.
Combining juniors and sophomores into one chemistry class can be challenging for the students with learning new material especially if the students were in different schools last year. Even though the course for last year’s biology were the same for both grades, at two different schools the teaching style can be easily mixed around.
“It’s just different having different grades in there. They probably feel like it’s interesting because it’s not like an elective, it’s an actual class so it can be confusing for students,” sophomore Devin Minard said.
Even though a combination of different grades can be tricky with the learning aspect, the social one can be thriving. Having a combined class can cause students to make new friends or talk to the ones they wouldn’t usually talk to because they’re not in the same grade.
“It’s very fun, I get to hang out with my friends that I wasn’t able to see before,” sophomore Justin Beatty said. “It’s also a great experience for other students to learn more things, socialize and come up with new ideas.”
