Reply to Teacher corrects kids' work and the entire class sees corrections

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[quote=Anonymous][quote]I'm the poster from another country. The idea of student privacy of their grades and effort etc is much less present outside the U.S. So it may not even occur to the teacher that that's expected here. If it's done right and without emphasis on the shame but with emphasis on what kinds of mistakes can and were made and how to learn from that it can be an effective technique. It's just hard to apply here especially in a competitive environment where the concept is that every kid is competing with all the other kids instead of every kid in the class working together to get the whole class to be better. In my country ES kids were all in the same class cohort for grades 1-8 so you knew those kids really well and you compete with the other same grade level classes for many years and it was class pride to get everyone to do well so peer pressure worked towards that. It definitely wasn't all pretty all the time and there were kids who were hurt by this but it made sense overall and made the bonds between students that much stronger. [/quote]

I haven't taught in a few years and I certainly do not love the idea that has been presented here.  However, the poster cited here has a point.  There is a balance that I think we should strive for in educating our kids.

When I taught first grade, I usually had three to five reading groups.  I tried to be tactful and sensitive--but I'm pretty sure that every child in my class knew who was at the top and who was at the bottom.  Now, it was not rubbed in their faces, but only the seriously disconnected kid would not be able to figure it out--no matter how hard the teacher tries.  As for editing each other's work, I don't like that idea.  Occasionally, maybe, but I just don't like it.  I don't like the idea of parent volunteers doing it either.  I always tried very hard to be sure that during conferences that I kept that type of thing out of the discussion.  You would be surprised at how many parents want to talk about someone else's child instead of their own.  They would frequently bring up the behavior of other kids, etc.  Now that I am a parent, I realize that it is human nature to want to know where your kid falls in the class, but as a teacher, I tried very hard to keep that private.
Today, there is a big push for "collaborative learning".  I suppose that encourages the editing of other kids' work. Frankly, I think there is way too much emphasis on group projects, etc.  This also lets other kids know who is capable and who is not.  It also allows the smart, lazy kid to skate through.

I just find it hard to believe that this is happening as OP describes.  But, I also think we are all naïve if we think we can keep the performance of kids a secret.[/quote]

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