Progress reports will be coming out soon. They used to be called report cards, but “progress reports” sound so much more optimistic, like there’s still hope. The sharpest minds in the field of education have tried for years to find some way to communicate human academic, social, emotional and intellectual growth with a time saving system employing only 5 letters or 4 numbers. Although we all know it’s not possible, the rest of the world needs a basis for comparison. A, B, F, 3, 1? Which letter would you chose to summarize progress in your slice of existence? You see the struggle…
Early childhood education requires we see children’s learning over time, in spans that are natural rather than manufactured by administrators, unions, or standardization requirements. Children in their first three years of school learn in series of ebbs and flows. When they begin first grade, all they want to do is learn how to read. They may spend much of the first semester working on that and little else. They focus on math when reading ability has been self-acknowledged. Along with this come all the other subject area requirements. Social Studies, Science, Math, P.E., Writing, Art, Music and Spanish. That’s a lot when you consider the children’s feet have only walked the earth independently for 5 or 6 years.
Do this. Think about having to learn how to lay on your back and roll a log on the bottoms of your feet while at the same time doing your own taxes, writing a story about your favorite condiment in rough draft and final form, disabling your car’s “check engine” light, beating a 15 year old boy at an electronic game, playing melody and harmony at the same time on a broken cello and learning Pig Latin well enough to say you like meatballs, cats and fat dogs. Giving individual grades for all those things every 12 weeks or so doesn’t tell us much that won‘t change, in some cases drastically, over the next few months. Things happen quickly in the learning life of little kids. So, look at the progress report as you would a photo taken with a disposable camera, not an oil painting. Older students are given grades. Few schools are brave enough to let those go. The argument is and always will be that this is to prepare them for the grades they are given in middle, high school and college (and then never used again as long as they live).
But whatever. We use them, you get them and because of that they have been given meaning. I had fun one year when I had the kids fill out report cards for their parents. That wasn’t really the best idea I’ve ever had. Some weren’t happy when children answered questions like:
1. Do your parents know all your teachers‘names?
2. Do your parents read with you every night?
3. Do you have a quiet place to work at home?
4. Do you have activities on more than 2 weeknights?
5. Do you think your parents let you watch too much TV or play too many video games?
6. Do your parents check over your homework before you return it?
(I don’t have kids do this anymore. As you read on, in the spirit of full disclosure, I want to be sure to state that in 34 years I’ve pretty much made every mistake in the book.)
Hopefully, if there are problems you’ve been told way before this point in the year. There should be no surprises on a report card if communication has been good, if you’ve been looking at work from school, if you’ve been checking over homework, if you’ve kept in touch with your child’s teachers and finally, if you’ve not believed it every time your child answered a question about school with “ fine“ or “nothing“.
The progress report is only one small look into how your child is doing. What do you learn from a letter or number about how your child best learns, what their academic fears and strengths are, what they feel passionate about, what their natural talent seems to be, why they seem don’t understand what they don’t understand, why their stories follow no logical sequence or even end? Describing a child from the inside out can’t be done in one shot, with one symbol and with a statement like, “It is a pleasure to have your child in my class.” Oh, try this. Next time you get a comment like that, follow it up with a sincere look in the eyes of the teacher and ask, “Why?”
