School and grading is so entrenched on our society...

[SueQ]

We just got back from a trip to the OBX. While there we visited the Wright Brother's Memorial. When we went into the visiter's center, the Park Ranger told my 5 and 7 yo's about the Jr. Ranger's program and how they can earn a badge by just filling out a paper while they toured the park. The boys thought that sounded fun so we did it.

When we handed in the papers, the ranger that was there at the time, looked over them and gave them each an A+ :rolleyes My boys didn't even know what it meant. :giggle Then DT said, "What if I missed seeing something would I have gotten a B+? Is a B+ or C+ bad? Do they mean you are not as smart?" It just brought back things from my past and why I hate the whole grading system. :banghead I hardly ever got A's and I always thought that I was dumb. :td I just now am realizing that I am not dumb but that I just am not a good test taker. :yes I learn better from reading good books and reciting what I have read. :tu I would have thrived under a CM type education. <I need a wistful smiley to insert here>

[Titus2Momof4]

I wonder if they ever write anything other than A+? Probably figured your boys were used to receiving grades, and figured they'd be excited about an A+. I never really thought about it before, but I do "grade". I'll do "11/12" or "100%" meaning they got all of them correct, or they missed one, or whatever. I've always said "people make mistakes, it's ok to make mistakes, we learn from our mistakes, you don't have to get them all correct to be smart, etc." Hmmm.. :think

[pneumaphile]

You're right that most people do it. But even when I was a public school teacher, I was unconventional in the way I graded. I used a rubrick - that's a paper that says everything that's expected of you on this assignment. And then, I just went down the rubrick and assigned the points if they did it, and didn't assign the points if they didn't. And then they had an unlimited amount of time (until grades were due in the office for report cards) to redo the assignment and get their scores up (though most kids opted not to do this).

So in my classes, it wasn't "smart" or "dumb" it was just did you do the work that was expected? Unfortunately, by the time I got my 12th graders, they were already used to be "smart" A students or "dumb" D students :( So they didn't even try to get a good grade in my class if they weren't used to getting good grades :(

At home when we school, I don't do grades - if they write something, sometimes I have them correct their spelling. That's really all, I like being low pressure.

[JessicaTX]

I don't know where my daughter got it from, but she loves to have A+ written at the top of her papers :giggle She also likes to play school with the younger ones, so she wrote A+ across a paper she'd made up for my 6 year old, and he said "Why did you write at on my paper?"

[Katherine]

I hardly ever got A's and I always thought that I was dumb. I just now am realizing that I am not dumb but that I just am not a good test taker. I learn better from reading good books and reciting what I have read. I would have thrived under a CM type education.

:hug

I always got A's until the fourth grade when I got a B+ in handwriting and locked myself in the bathroom--sobbing--for an hour until my dad finally forced the door open. :blush I was not an emotionally reactive child at all, so this was extreme behavior for me. My parents were :jawdrop

And people HATED me for getting good grades... competed viciously with me even though I had no desire to be competitive with them. :shrug :cry I shed more than a few tears over the animosity other people directed at me for simply putting a few correct answers on a stupid piece of paper. One schoolmate who was in my class from the 2nd grade on was so bitter about not being valedictorian/salutatorian (in elementary school :rolleyes :doh ) that he publicly pledged to "beat me" in high school (talked to me about it constantly--even though I didn't care :hunh :neutral ) and devoted his high school years to taking AP classes and correspondence courses to bolster his gpa. He was valedictorian, alright with a grade point average that could scarcely be calculated b/c of all the extra stuff he'd done. woo hoo. :shrug and I was salutatorian. I was actually glad he accomplished his goal, b/c I figured he'd be crushed if he didn't. :/

anyway... wandering off topic. :O Grading systems can wreak a lot of havoc on kids. :(

[ArmsOfLove]

Paula, I was hated for my good grades too :cry

and Amy, that is totally how I approach grading. In fact, with my children less than 100% isn't an option. We do it until they get it right and if they are struggling we back up and relearn :tu

[cindergretta]

We don't do grades. I check their work and if it is wrong, they re-do it until it is right. Not a punishment at all, mind you. Just doing it until it is right and they understand it. With as much help as is needed. If it is a silly mistake not made due to misunderstanding or having not learned, I let it go. :shrug

I wonder what they would do/think if I wrote a %/grade on their paper? :scratch

I was generally an "A" student, but I only hung out with fellow geeks and nerds, so I wasn't teased.... :shifty

[Heather Micaela]

he publicly pledged to "beat me" in high school (talked to me about it constantly--even though I didn't care ) and devoted his high school years to taking AP classes and correspondence courses to bolster his gpa. He was valedictorian, alright with a grade point average that could scarcely be calculated b/c of all the extra stuff he'd done. woo hoo. and I was salutatorian.
funny...my best friend (from jr high) and this boy from her elementry competed over every sigle test score their whole academic career. They were co-valedictorians.

Icheck their work and if it is wrong, they re-do it until it is right. Not a punishment at all, mind you. Just doing it until it is right and they understand it. With as much help as is needed. If it is a silly mistake not made due to misunderstanding or having not learned, I let it go.
my ds is just kdgn now and we do all the work together- but I think this would be my approach too

Grades are given becuase doing it till it is right isn't practical when you have to move along with the pack. I was an A student (nerd, geek, goody-good) in all classes but math, in which I was almost remedial. I would have loved to be able to do a problem till it was correct - not get a D because I couldn't keep up. :(

[Katherine]

Grades are given becuase doing it till it is right isn't practical when you have to move along with the pack. I was an A student (nerd, geek, goody-good) in all classes but math, in which I was almost remedial. I would have loved to be able to do a problem till it was correct - not get a D because I couldn't keep up.

I hear ya! :yes And it doesn't do kids any favors to just fail without grasping a subject, or to breeze by without being challenged by it and never *really* learn how to dig in and WORK academically.

funny...my best friend (from jr high) and this boy from her elementry competed over every sigle test score their whole academic career. They were co-valedictorians.

that actually sounds like it might have been profitable for them both since they were mutually engaged in competition. I had a friend like that in elementary school.... "Paul and Paula" :giggle We truly were friends (and all my friends were geeks too... :giggle :highfive) and would *good-naturedly* compare scores--usually at the prodding of classmates. The other guy was different b/c he was get distraught/frustrated about not "beating" me and b/c the competition was not mutual or welcome. I just got tired of hearing about it, yk? Paul was confident in his own ability/knowledge and wasn't trying to prove anything. The other guy needed to be better than me in order to feel good about himself, so that really skewed everything.

I actually met another guy during my college years who remembered me even though I barely knew who he was and he had a shocking amount of bitterness toward me for being a "good" kid. My husband met another person like that online, too. :/ Apparently the pastor of the church she grew up in knew me and told all the kids to be like me and held me up as some unrealistic spiritual ideal. :blush :bheart So there are people out there I don't even know who had wrong ideas about me and hate me b/c adults basically used ME as a spiritual/emotional bludgeoning tool. It's really weird/scary/sick. And I blame it on the adults who ran the system. Kids shouldn't have value judgements placed on them over the grades they make or how well they fit into the expected mold. :cry

[hbmamma]

btdt :cry People treated me as if I was showing off or had something to prove - especially in college (I was young when I started college FT)
I hate grades and I don't give them out to my kids - why give them a label?

[Chris3jam]

Another one here that doesn't use grades. I just do not think it's a good indication of how well any child may be learning anything. My 10 yo struggles. We work twice as hard as any child. . .easily. Yet, he still struggles. I still think he's doing fabulously. Every child is different. And I don't think grades can accurately assess a person's potential or ability. Sometimes, depending on the person, the competition may just cause too much stress or make a person just give up eventually, because they just have the idea they can never do anything well, because there will always be *someone* better (um. ... me. . . . :O).

[kwisie]

I hear ya! :yes And it doesn't do kids any favors to just fail without grasping a subject, or to breeze by without being challenged by it and never *really* learn how to dig in and WORK academically.
[/quote]

That's exactly why when my parents talked of HSing us, I didn't want them to. I made good grades at school, but I wasn't always challenged. I knew my parents would make me work a lot harder, b/c they knew what I was capable of. To me, working harder didn't sound very good, so I begged them not to HS. :O

[mykidsmom]

Paula, I was hated for my good grades too :cry

and Amy, that is totally how I approach grading. In fact, with my children less than 100% isn't an option. We do it until they get it right and if they are struggling we back up and relearn :tu


That's us. There's no pressure, my son just knows that we need to practice something more. I'll even take the words he missed from previous spelling lists and add them to the next list until he gets them. It works.

[Mother of Sons]

My kids want grades. I don't do them but when they started practicing handwriting their grandmother put grades on their papers (at their request) and they won't let up. They want an A+ really really bad and the problem is, A+ is for perfect, above and beyond work so I dont' want to give it for less than that. They get frustrated and want to give up then. I just refuse to do it at all because grades IMO are just a bad thing.