HELP!

[maleehi]

I need help on managing my stress. I'm currently doing very bad in Full French IB and I don't know if it is me or the Full IB but I really need help!

[Emmi]

Since you didn't provide us with much information at all about what kind of student you are, what you do in school, etc it's very hard to answer this question. And even then it's very hard to answer this question, but I'll take a shot at it from two approaches: it's you, or it's the full IB.

 

1. It's you:

 

You could be doing badly in French because your French skills aren't very good, and you're not putting in the effort to learn and practice your French. If this is the case, then you need to change up your study habits because whatever you're currently doing isn't working. Are you always doing the homework? If not, start doing it. Do you ask your teacher for help when you don't know something? If not, this may be good to do. Do you think you need a tutor (whether private or another student in the class)? Do you practice your French a lot outside of class, either by reading things in French like newspapers, speak it somewhere, listen to it, etc?

 

2. It's the full IB

 

IB is hard initially for most students because it's the toughest thing they've done so far in school. IB, conceptually, isn't what makes it hard, it's hard because you have to manage six different subjects, plus TOK and whatever other additional classes you take, plus extracurricular activities. Without good time management skills, doing well in the IB is really hard. Now be really honest with yourself: do you usually start assignments when they're assigned, or do you wait until the last minute to do things and stay up late to finish them? Do you study regularly in small little chunks so the material is always fresh, or do you cram the night before an exam to try to remember everything? When you have homework to do, do you work on it, or do you say "it's not due until Tuesday and it's Sunday, I'll just go on Facebook/other internet sites for four hours"? 

 

Regardless of which approach you take you need to change something that you're doing since it's not helping you right now. I feel like if you can get to the root issue of whichever is the problem, it will start alleviating your stress (which is bad, don't stress out too much please!). Besides, having good habits now will help you in the long run: uni's typically a lot harder than the IB is, so if you can't manage a few little IB subjects there's no way you're going to do well later on.

 

If absolutely needed, remember there may be other ways to get pre-university qualifications and IB isn't the only thing you have to do. If there's another program near you that you feel you'd do better in, that may be worth considering.

[maleehi]

I'm very sorry about the information part. I didn't quite understand the "what kind of student are you''. But to answer the ''what I do in school'' question here is what my schedule looks like on a regular school day;

Choir AM

Math 10 Pre-IB

Social 10 Pre-IB

Science 10 Pre-IB

Leadership 20

French 20 IB

Gym 10

Debate Club PM

Student Council PM

 

I do everything I can to get started on assignments as soon as I get them but I'll admit sometimes I do slack off. As far as studying goes even though I study in small chunks I seem to fail all my tests, quizzes, exams, etc. and then I get discouraged because of my marks.......

And now I seem to be tilting towards dropping from full IB to partial IB so I'm very confused as well as very discouraged and stressed. My parents are anyhow very strict so I don't have any accounts on any social media networks. I see some of my friends in full IB and they have accounts on social media and they seem to be on it 24/7 yet they get good grades, whereas I on the other hand cant seem to cope up at all. It doesn't help either being the youngest in the class because I skipped a grade. So now what?