A lesson from my daughter to me.

The 5th grade has been a rough year.  The teaching staff is lackluster.  (That's putting it kindly.)  The grading has been inconsistent.  K's teacher has "student graders."  With such and even with his grading, it has left M and I to re-grade K's papers whenever that blessed day arrives maybe once or twice a month.

It is at this point that I should note that one of the 5th grade teachers sent home a construction paper "file" so that we could keep the papers and if there were grading issues, then we could check them.  I understand needing to keep an eye and it is probably admirable that the teacher is recognizing that she has grading deficits.  It, however, is not my job to have to re-grade every single paper that comes home because they are so poor at handling their organization of it all.  I shouldn't have to check each paper point by point to be certain that it was logged into the system properly.  It frustrates both M and I to no end.

We have found many grading errors.  One was a 25 point difference in the letter grade on the paper.  A little bit here and a little bit there with math has made a difference of a point here and a point there. Mr. H has told K, "It didn't make a difference in your grade."  But it has.  A point here and a point there in regard to letter grade for a report card made a final difference between one grade to the next.

K called and left a message on my voice mail yesterday. "Mom, the grade I got on my reading test wasn't what you told me."  I talked to her later and said we'd figure it out when I got home.  She checked it and sadly, she's right.  He graded out a test and logged it as 33 points higher than she scored.

"Mom, I have to take this back," she said without hesitation.  "I didn't earn this grade and I cannot take this.  It isn't fair to the kids who earned that grade."

:twinge of guilt:

There was a little part of me that wanted to keep it.  The faltering reading grades for all of our 5th graders is just insane.  When you have 73 out of 76 kids pass the first reading test and you KEEP IT, there is something horribly wrong.

I told K how proud I was of her.  I did tell her the percentage ramifications of such a choice.  "Mom, that just means that I need to work harder."

Bless her heart.

She doesn't want a grade not due her, just as we don't want her not to get the grade that she deserves.  She said that she'd speak to him about it and get it straightened around today.

My heart smiles because she's doing the right thing.  She's doing the right thing by choice.  I didn't have to talk her into it or to defend it.  That is the best of all.