What do you think of nit picky teachers? 6th grade

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here. You are right. I was upset because he came home so disappointed. He studied really hard for this test and the results didn't show his hard work.

Obviously I agree that he does need to learn how to read directions carefully and make sure he checks off each part one by one.

It's been an ongoing issue with him and a work in progress. He says he feels pressured and rushed because of the short amount of time given (though he is supposed to have time and a half).

He does have a 504 that supposedly accommodates these various issues which the teacher failed to take into consideration (help clarifying instructions, extra time, quiet testing location, etc.). She also doesn't have him sitting at the front of the classroom like she is supposed to. It sounds like she hasn't even read his 504 plan. I guess we will have to talk to her.

This is actually a big deal, OP. You could get her in a lot of trouble with the principal.

Schools are legally required to make these accommodations.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:6th grade wasn’t graded on coloring. He was graded on his border which he did not include per the directions.

which is dumb and arbitrary

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here. You are right. I was upset because he came home so disappointed. He studied really hard for this test and the results didn't show his hard work.

Obviously I agree that he does need to learn how to read directions carefully and make sure he checks off each part one by one.

It's been an ongoing issue with him and a work in progress. He says he feels pressured and rushed because of the short amount of time given (though he is supposed to have time and a half).

He does have a 504 that supposedly accommodates these various issues which the teacher failed to take into consideration (help clarifying instructions, extra time, quiet testing location, etc.). She also doesn't have him sitting at the front of the classroom like she is supposed to. It sounds like she hasn't even read his 504 plan. I guess we will have to talk to her.

Does he only have 1 teacher? Spanish, math, and English don’t have different teachers in 6th?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:6th grade wasn’t graded on coloring. He was graded on his border which he did not include per the directions.

which is dumb and arbitrary

It was part of the directions. Do you encourage your children to only follow directions they think are important?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:6th grade wasn’t graded on coloring. He was graded on his border which he did not include per the directions.

which is dumb and arbitrary

It was part of the directions. Do you encourage your children to only follow directions they think are important?

I do but I care more about them knowing the content material than I do about grades in elementary school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here. You are right. I was upset because he came home so disappointed. He studied really hard for this test and the results didn't show his hard work.

Obviously I agree that he does need to learn how to read directions carefully and make sure he checks off each part one by one.

It's been an ongoing issue with him and a work in progress. He says he feels pressured and rushed because of the short amount of time given (though he is supposed to have time and a half).

He does have a 504 that supposedly accommodates these various issues which the teacher failed to take into consideration (help clarifying instructions, extra time, quiet testing location, etc.). She also doesn't have him sitting at the front of the classroom like she is supposed to. It sounds like she hasn't even read his 504 plan. I guess we will have to talk to her.

This is actually a big deal, OP. You could get her in a lot of trouble with the principal.

Schools are legally required to make these accommodations.

I'm the PP who has a child with an IEP. Again, it might be time to contact the school and ask that they change the 504 to an IEP. Teachers take IEPs more seriously. My child's accommodations (sit at the front, 100% extra time, repeated directions, etc) have always been implemented.

[Anonymous]

I have to agree with the OP. The idea, that form is more important than substance, is crazy in an academic world, and this type of grading sends a completely wrong message. OP’s child will follow directions, I am sure, when those directions actually matter, because that child is clearly intelligent and focuses on what’s important in a given task.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:New Poster.

In OP's defense, I would be upset if my sixth grader was being graded on coloring too. That's bullshit.

Another NP in OP's defense. OP is also advocating for partial credit. We can argue the details (how much to take off for failing to indicate the unit, etc) but partial credit isn't a radical idea.

The colorful border on the English assignment is interesting. For some students the poem will be more challenging and for others, the colorful border will be more challenging. It's almost like the teacher was hedging her bets in terms of student outcomes by adding that piece to the assignment. In my experience (HS classroom) generally the colorful border will help more girls grade-wise than it will help boys.

[Anonymous]

OP - you should definitely follow up about your teacher failing to implement the IEP.

But, I have a kid with ADHD and one of the things we are really working on is following the directions. Its the main thing we discuss with him. Just imagine you are a boss and you ask your employee to do something - you want what you asked for, right? Not just what you think they wanted or what you think is right.

When he is doing homework, I constantly ask - go back to the rubric - what does it say? Did you do all the parts? Yesterday my DS had to re-do an entire science project because he was supposed to pick articles for the essay that were written in 2019, but he picked older ones and had to re-do it.

Whenever he has a test --- I remind him as he leaves for school --- read all the questions carefully, do all the parts, look on the back of the paper, etc.

I think it's great that 6th grade teachers do this---so that when your kid gets to high school when it counts, they will have learned the lesson. It's a hard lesson for ADHD kids but it's an important one.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So today my kid got a D on a Spanish test because he translated sentences instead of indicating whether they were greetings/farewells in English.

Clearly he did not follow the directions and so should not receive full marks. But to mark each one completely wrong and give no points at all when he obviously indicated that he understands the words? He did correctly translate the phrases.

A lot of his teachers do this. He got a bunch of points off for not putting a colorful border on his English assignment when the supposed purpose was to write a poem which rhymed? I admit that one annoyed me because as far as I can tell, there is no use to coloring in sixth grade and should not be part of the assignment. He only gets half credit when failing to indicate the unit in math.

He has ADHD-Inattentive so part of it is related to that.

I'm bummed for him because as hard as he studies at home, it's not enough because he is not detailed oriented and these kinds of things fly over his head.

Is it worth talking to his teachers about this or will they just be like "it's on him for not following directions."

OP: as an adult with ADHD I find I need to go through anything with directions and write each direction on its own line. When I complete a line, I cross it off. My last line is always reread the instructions and check off each item.

It is hard to keep track of everything. This method makes it easier for me in school.

Good luck to your son. ADHD is hard. Keep working with him and help him learn ways to compensate.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here. I'm not saying he shouldn't get points taken off for these things.

But rather, his teachers are marking them totally wrong and giving no points at all even though he did demonstrate learning.

He demonstrated learning, but not the learning that was being assessed. Imagine if Tom Brady showed up at the World Cup and played the best football he’s ever played —except the game was clearly soccer.

[Anonymous]

Better to learn to follow directions now.

I teach college and last year I had a student hand in an essay that completely missed the purpose of the assignments. She was a great student, had been doing very well in the course, was a lovely person but for whatever reason she just went completely off base on her final term paper. She wrote a great paper and obviously put a lot of work into it but it wasn't the paper that was assigned.

I graded using a rubric and there were parts of the rubric that I couldn't even apply to her paper. I gave her marks where I could and her final mark was around 40%.

She contacted me immediately asking to meet. She came to my office and she looked like she had been through something awful. She told me she couldn't sleep or eat, that she had never failed anything and she didn't know how to cope with this. She started sobbing in my office and it was a bit heart wrenching. I could see that she really didn't know how to cope with this. She pleaded and pleaded to let her rewrite it or to grade it differently or do a bonus assignment or anything because she couldn't accept a failing grade. I said no to all and she was honestly almost traumatized. I really think this was the most difficult thing that she had gone through (as a high achiever). I had to get her support from a friend to leave my office. Her mom called me a couple days later pleading with me to do something as her daughter was not coping well and this had impacted her mental health.

I met twice more with the student helping her to learn to cope and build resilience and never changed her mark. That would have been the easy out for me and made her happy but this was a life lesson she needed to learn and it was what was fair. She never fully understood. She did pull herself back together and did fine in my class (above the class average but lower than her usual marks). It would have been much much better for her to learn this when she was younger.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Better to learn to follow directions now.

I teach college and last year I had a student hand in an essay that completely missed the purpose of the assignments. She was a great student, had been doing very well in the course, was a lovely person but for whatever reason she just went completely off base on her final term paper. She wrote a great paper and obviously put a lot of work into it but it wasn't the paper that was assigned.

I graded using a rubric and there were parts of the rubric that I couldn't even apply to her paper. I gave her marks where I could and her final mark was around 40%.

She contacted me immediately asking to meet. She came to my office and she looked like she had been through something awful. She told me she couldn't sleep or eat, that she had never failed anything and she didn't know how to cope with this. She started sobbing in my office and it was a bit heart wrenching. I could see that she really didn't know how to cope with this. She pleaded and pleaded to let her rewrite it or to grade it differently or do a bonus assignment or anything because she couldn't accept a failing grade. I said no to all and she was honestly almost traumatized. I really think this was the most difficult thing that she had gone through (as a high achiever). I had to get her support from a friend to leave my office. Her mom called me a couple days later pleading with me to do something as her daughter was not coping well and this had impacted her mental health.

I met twice more with the student helping her to learn to cope and build resilience and never changed her mark. That would have been the easy out for me and made her happy but this was a life lesson she needed to learn and it was what was fair. She never fully understood. She did pull herself back together and did fine in my class (above the class average but lower than her usual marks). It would have been much much better for her to learn this when she was younger.

I am not a fan of this story. I also teach college students, and if a high-achieving student completely misunderstood my directions, I would start wondering if my directions were clear enough in the first place (regardless of whether the student could cope or not).

[Anonymous]

The reason for my child to take a foreign language class is to get proficiency in that language. What the OP’s child did reflected that goal and showed that proficiency.
The reason for my child to take English is to learn poetry and be able to compose one. The OP’s child did exactly the task needed, while drawing borders was completely irrelevant.
The teacher of OP’s child is grading compliance, not academic content, which is ridiculous.
If my main purpose for sending a child to school was to teach him to follow directions, I’ll give him a map of DC, directions, and ask to find some random addresses.
If compliance is so important, have a separate grade for it, but don’t confuse it with the academic grades.

[Anonymous]

I disagree with the previous poster. I have child with the same attention challenges, I wonder if PP does? Not reading directions correctly when driving, taking medicine and so many other situations is super important. Learn it now.