If I ever waited until I “finished” a blog entry to post it, this would be an empty blog. This post is another string of thoughts I have had this week that just never made it into a complete post, but I know that you could draw your own connections between these various thoughts…
I would love to make a graph showing attitude toward school and grades. Lower the grade, the worse the attitude. Continuously failing a kid does not “teach them a lesson” or help them eventually succeed. Making the curriculum more rigorous does not lead students to be more successful.
We spend a lot of time forcing kids to do things when they are not ready. Their first experience with a great many things is failure. I think teachers believe that it is just part of the process to fail something when you start, and slowly build up to success.
My daughter is seven and has never learned how to ride a bike. It just seemed as though there was never a great need to learn. There have been attempts over the years but each time she resisted so we never pushed it—it just did not matter whether she knew how to ride. Yesterday we were planning on going on a bike ride as a family at our local rail-trail. Suddenly it dawned on us that she could not ride, didn’t even have a bike, but really wanted to go. I dug an old bike out of the garage and handed it over to her on the driveway. The first time it was a bit shaky and I held her tight not even letting her wobble. The second time I held onto her shoulder to help her balance. The third time I ran next to her. The fourth time I just helped her on and let her go. The fifth time she did the whole thing by herself. Each attempt she experienced success, not failure, she knew what it was like to ride with the wind blowing back her hair. When she fell in subsequent attempts, she knew what it was like to feel success, and gathered herself up and did not feel like a failure. The earlier success gave her encouragement to try it again. Later on that day I saw her streaking up and down the driveway. At one point she stopped to come in and get a drink. I asked her what she was doing. She said, “I am racing people, and I always win.”
Do teachers fall into two groups? One who never let go of their kids, and one that never holds on and lets them fall and expects them to get back up with out any help?
Can you imagine what it must be like to spend seven hours a day, everyday, in a place with people that label you a “D” or an “F,” a loser, a failure. Everyday entering a race and never winning, never even knowing what the race is for or which direction to run? And if you even decided one day to try your best you would still not be labeled a success?
Scenario for you—a bit extreme but…you have student who has done nothing all year. Refused to do oral presentations, never turns in homework, and forget about studying. On the day of a presentation she gets up for the first time all year and delivers a speech she wrote for homework—the first thing she has done all year. Her 5 minute project on Civil War Battles is 2 minute speech about D-Day. She walks proudly back to her seat thinking she has nailed it….what do you do…she entered the race, you get to decide whether she is a winner or loser. Don’t give me any of the mushy garbage about telling her what a good job she did but yada yada…That only sounds good in your head, not hers. She thinks she is an A. Do you tell her she is an F?
11 responses so far ↓
So she fell down. Give her another chance. Practice with her. Help her with a speech about the Civil War. Give her a chance to get it right. Don’t give her an F or an A. Give her another chance, or two or three. Maybe she’s not ready to race yet. Be her training wheels.
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OK, maybe a bit of a stretch, but it’s how my mind works… Are you familiar with 6+1 writing? Well, if not, kids receive separate points for each facet of the writing. So, something might score high in ideas, but poorly in organization.
So, maybe assignments can be formatted so that a kid who makes an attempt can get SOMETHING for an appearance, but accurately scored for what he/she didn’t have. The kid gets a great score for enthusiasm and presentation, but a poor score in accuracy. The kid doesn’t feel pandered to and you have integrity. No mushy garbage from this guy!
I believe kids gather great momentum…. If they are accustomed to the letter grade F, they will keep the F’s coming. By the way, I am a firm believer in that the grade of F can ONLY motivate kids who typically get higher grades.
I think many teachers would be surprised at how little it takes to improve a kids outlook on grades. Earlier this year, a kid who I am close to asked me to check his grades. He is usually in the B range and he had a D in one class. He was late on a project. I gave him my very serious ‘teacher look’ and with a stern voice, I said, “And this grade is coming up TODAY. Get that project in.” Grade at the end of the day? B+. Wouldn’t work with a kid who was used to D or F’s and it wouldn’t work if you didn’t have a relationship with the kid…. but it works.
Wow, haven’t written this much in WEEKS! You hit a nerve!
BTW, long time no hear.
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I’m with Ani. Grades get in the way in very important moments like that one.
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I agree with ani about another chance but also with Terry about grades for different parts of the assignment. I understand this to be something like a rubric infeedback so that the student can see where they can improve but also give him/her the credit and acknowledgement of completing the task and submitting the presentation.
Gosh, this post really made me reflect on my practice. I have just such a student in my class at the moment & I strongly believe his lack of work is not just laziness (as stated by other teachers) but learned behaviour. He’s convinced himself that he is incapable of doing the work set (probably backed up – even if unintentionally – by previous teachers). Thanks for the wake-up call.
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[...] – Blogush has an excellent post on how we set our students up for failure and how we should or at least could be helping them to “race and always [...]
Found you through Jenny at Elementary, My Dear. Love the post, love the blog. You have a new subscriber.
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Paul,
This is so important; I blogged my thoughts here http://is.gd/FZIF.
As always, your posts make me think. I so appreciate your contributions to the blogosphere.
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[...] “I am racing people, and I always win.” from Blogush by Paul Bogush, Paul asks, “Can you imagine what it must be like to spend seven hours [...]
[...] In “I am racing people, and I always win.” from Blogush by Paul Bogush, Paul asks, “Can you imagine what it must be like to spend seven hours [...]
[...] Successful Teaching, she writes “Why Bother Trying?”. This post is in response to “I am always racing people, and I always win,” by Paul Bogush who writes Blogush. The idea being discussed is the ever-struggling student and [...]
Now I am pretty happy I took a hiatus, as this post has never hit more close to home than it does now, two weeks into summer school. I mean, these are the majority of the kids we get.
And I am all caught up, because if my students did even what your example student did, I would be…
I can’t say that I really agree with much of the previous comments, because caught up in that moment I feel like all of this would transcend grades.
“Don’t give me any of the mushy garbage”
Sorry, that’s all I have. I sat next to this student just today, the 5th grade version, as we were doing (apparently not so) simple addition. After every single problem he asked me if he got it right, he needs success, a lot of it, to motivate him to work, stop bothering others, etc. He has showed up late every day this week. I hear a emotionless “Yes, sir” every time I attempt to correct his missteps.
No amount of, “you did good here, butt not here, let’s talk aobut how you could make this better,” is going to help that kid, in my opinion.
What a grizzly situation you have put us in, Paul. And I think it no coincidence that there is one person here who hasn’t told us what they’d do. An iceberg, right?
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