08 Dec Are studies easier in the US than in France?

Studies here are very different from how it is France. What is paradoxical is that if we look at how many hours I spend on my homework here compare to what I do in France, I have much more work here. But in a way I feel like I have to study more when I am in Paris. I do not know how it is for more scientific studies but here I have 5 different classes, one History, one English, one Spanish, one Jewish Studies (literature) and one Communication and what has really struck me after a month was that in none of my class I was required to learn anything by heart! Not even in history! No dates or names… Usually after every History class in France I would have to remember at the very least 5 dates, the events and the names of the protagonists. In Literature I would have to know things about the author we studied and about the literary movements they were part of as well as the literary devices they used the most. In my English class I would have around 400 hundreds words to learn by heart every month etc…

I don’t think one way is better than the other because in France we don’t have lots of opportunities to really use our critical thinking or to give our own opinion. Here I love that my teacher tells me that there is not a right answer in Literature if you jusitfy your ideas. In France it does not work like that. The teacher expect a specific anwer even though literature is so subjective (The “I” is absolutely forbiden in our papers). We do know who was the king at a given time, when he was crowned, what are the different laws he made, who was his heirs and all those kind of things, but we don’t reflect on why this happened and what the people were probably thinking at the time. Here in my history class, we have to write a paragraf on each of our readings in which we reflect about what we read.

On the other hand it kind of makes sense to me now,  that American people have the reputation not to have general knowledge  at all. Most of those to who I talked to did not know at all where to place any European country on a map, there are also dates about their own country’s history that they don’t know and I do. But once again, they use their critical thinking way more than the average French student.

Also, French mentality is really negative compare to the American one. Here it seems to me that when they see that you have been putting a lot of effort into something the teacher will give you a relatively good grade. In France you can give all you’ve got and not pass the class. They believe that if you get bad grades it will make you want to work harder instead of thinking that if you get a good grade you will want to have this satisfaction again.

They are so demanding and snobbish that when I got back to France my As wont be worth an A in la Sorbonne. In France we are graded on 20 points and you need a 10/20 to pass. They told me if I got an A it would be a 16/20 because it already makes it easier to study in the US. Which I don’t think is really true. The grades might be easier but the work demands another kind of skills that we don’t necessarely have.