Additional Years Should Decongest, But DepEd's K+12 Does Not

Adding years to basic education is not necessarily a bad idea except for the fact that it lengthens the time a child must be in primary and secondary school before entering higher education. When the number and scope of subjects covered in basic education are simply too much, it is a must to either eliminate some subjects or add years to schooling. Basic education is obviously congested if a child has to be in school from 7 in the morning till 5 in the afternoon. That is a ten-hour school day. Add two hours of commute, a child can possibly spend 12 hours just for school. This cannot be good since an adolescent needs about 9 hours of sleep to remain healthy. Here is a report from the American Academy of Pediatrics.


The main reason why the American Academy of Pediatrics is focusing on the school start time is because of what happens at puberty:


Decongesting the curriculum can definitely add flexibility allowing for less hours required to be inside a classroom. And certainly, this could be achieved by adding years to high school. It defeats the purpose, however, if the two additional years come with additional subjects. Here are sample class schedules for the additional senior high school years of DepEd's K+12:



Unfortunately, the above is only one example from the myriad of wrong things with DepEd's K+12....





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