Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Report card time

My 13dd got her report card & grades were pretty much what I expected. 4 A's, 2 B's. My (continued) frustration? If she had turned in all of her homework, she would have had all A's. She didn't even have to get everything correct on the homework, mind you, just TURN IT IN!!! Whadaya gonna do??

At least she turned in all her art projects this time around...

My fourth grader's grades seem to be based 10% on his subject matter mastery and 90% on my ability to track moving test dates and figure out why seemingly equivalent assignments have radically different weights. He has no interest in doing this and I am trying to make him at least conscious of it.

I have realized that I will be spending this year modeling grade grubbing for him and that is what he will learn. He's certainly not learning much else in school.

We sat down to review for a science test last night. He was told NOT to bring the book home, because all the material was on four worksheets. The material was further restricted to only the highlighted sections. I started quizzing him on the highlighted sections and he interrupted me to simply recite it all almost verbatim. It was such a minimal amount of material and it's heart-breaking to think how many times they must have gone over it for him to have memorized it.

I find the grades issue to be a tough thing. My son is clearly being tested on material that is way belong his ability level. Yet he does manage to make silly mistakes and get poor grades on occasion. It's hard to know how to balance the leaning and grades. At this stage (he's nine) it's obvious that his learning is still more important that his ability to prove it in an institutional setting. But at a certain point the ability to demonstrate knowledge using externally imposed standards becomes important and a lack if it will definitely constitute incompetence.

I don't want him to end up working in a comic book store talking about whether or not Superman's ability to fly violates the laws of physics.

DS9's report card comes home Friday. I'm expecting 2 or 3 Bs, mostly because of late/incomplete work and careless errors due to lack of challenge.

I tried to get his teacher to tally up the late assignments and tell him how much they affected his grade, but she wouldn't do it. I guess she didn't understand that I couldn't do it myself because I don't know the values and thresholds. Sigh.

We are getting ready to talk to DS about the necessity of jumping through hoops. So sad.

Ds7's 2nd grade report card is pretty boring - they get a Proficient, Improving, or something else I forget. It says "above grade level" for reading - and his teacher confessed that she didn't even test his reading level, as the aim is for 2nd graders to be at level 28 by the end of the year - and she knew that his 1st grade teacher had tested him up to level 50 for both reading and comprehension. He got P's for everything except music, which was a not so surprising "I". He did get an "E" in art (for some reason you can get an "exceeds expectations" in the specials, but not in regular class work) He got a separate 3rd grade math report card - all "P"s, plus a 96% for the 1st quarter. His 3rd grade teacher also said he's in the top group (of 4 kids) in math. They're focusing on figuring out answers to the same problem in different ways, and showing their work on paper. Can't wait until they get past that !!

Hmm...we should be getting a report card soon, and I'm expecting a low score in reading because DS8 simply cannot be bothered to fill out a reading report every week! I'm sure missing half the weekly reports will show up somewhere. I got tired of nagging him to death every day to write stuff down, and decided he'll just have to see some consequences.

On the other hand, he just brought home a "comprehension" test with a 100% score, the first ever for that type of test! He generally doesn't listen or read the questions enough to realize what they are asking, so the answers are way off base. He did an excellent job this time, yay!

We are on trimesters here so I have about a month before I get DS7's report card. For once I would love for him to get a decent grade in Displays Effort and Citizenship. Not sure that 3rd grade will be the year but I still hold out hope.

We get ours in a couple weeks. Our district is shifting to "standards based grading." It's supposedly more objective (exceeds, meets or working toward standard). We've been a pilot school for this mess. Teachers seem to implement this inconsistently. The kids still read the grades as "A, B or C."

This will be the first year DS8 will get a graded reprort card. Last year it was one of those proficiant kind of cards. The teachers cannot give exceeds or proficiant at the 1st part of the year because they have not taught the material yet. DS already knew the material, but we decided not to fight this battle, and placed no emphasis on report cards. We pushed more on turning in work asked for, getting along well, and participation. This year with grades, things may change.

We might be getting some slight surprises, ds has hit a new low with (not) remembering homework. The teachers are 'preparing' the kids for middle school by having them remember their own stuff. For ds, he's decided that means 'write nothing down'. Uh, ok.

Anyway, we now seem to have the 'flow' of the week figured out so that on monday there's always 'x' thing due, etc., etc, but I think there will be some bumps on this first report card.

I do kind of think a couple of b's might have some impact, but I not entirely sure if it will help him work out ways to remember more. I guess we'll see. I am not overly concerned since it is just a quarter report and every year end he's had all A's so that is what I look to in order to get some 'perspective'.

That is a big part of my dd's lack of turning in homework. After 2+ years of middle school & less than a year until high school, we have realized that she has got to figure out another method of remembering her homework as well as turning it in. The planner method is just not the ticket for her. To be honest, is never was for me, either. We are experimenting with various types of sticky notes right now (a suggestion from a co-worker). If anyone has any suggestions, please let me know. She is very tactile, artistic, musical, etc.