Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

To protect kids, don’t send report cards home on Fridays

news.ufl.edu

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

201–210 of 215 posts

Re: To protect kids, don’t send report cards home on Fridays

#201

Post by ddingus »

DanBC wrote: post #198
ddingus wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just added some clarity that should rebut the "low value" part of that contribution. Ugly truth isn't low value, it's ugly. There is a difference, and that difference was made clear. What happened was people saw that, went full stop. That's OK. I will rarely refrain, when I deem it necessary. I don't think I should as that is actually a disservice to me, and readers here.

Again, I didn't vote on that post and I was just guessing at the motivations of people who did downvote.

I know. Written in context, for passers by as much as anything.

Implying anything about you is not my intent.

Re: To protect kids, don’t send report cards home on Fridays

#202

Post by flyingfences »

c3534l wrote: post #81
ddebernardy wrote: post #75

> 19 states still allow schools to hit students As one living in a country that bans parents from hitting their own children, I find that number shocking. Do they actually hit the kids in practice, or is this some left-over regulation from the past (like the French ban on women wearing trousers in Paris that got formally repelled a few years ago)?

Public schools sure don't hit kids. Private schools might. I know Catholic schools were infamous for smacking the crap out of kids, but I don't know how much they've mellowed on that since my Dad and uncles went through Catholic school in the 70s. I think parents would be pretty irate if a public school administrator hit their kids, even if they themselves hit their kids. Edit: I looked at a map and the states that d…

I do think it's a bit misleading for you to say "all in the south" when that map stretches all the way to the Canadian border, but I digress...

One anecdote, not that it paints much of a picture, is that I have a much younger cousin in Catholic school right now (in one of the states on that map) and, from what I hear, it sounds like corporal punishment is completely off the table.

Re: To protect kids, don’t send report cards home on Fridays

#203

Post by ido »

YeGoblynQueenne wrote: post #185
xupybd wrote: post #9

>“It’s sad, but the good news is there's a simple intervention — don't give report cards on Friday.” Yeah that avoids the one instance of child abuse but that's not the big picture here. How is it that there are that many people that struggle to cope that this is common enough to show up in this research. I feel for both the parents and the children here. If something like grades are causing the parents to lash out a…

>> If something like grades are causing the parents to lash out at the kids it's a sign that the parents are struggling to cope. And they strike their children because they can't cope? If they can't cope without striking their children, well, then, maybe they shouldn't have any. That'd be best for their children, and for the parents also. The children won't grow up damaged (and having learned that this is the way to…

Sometimes you find out too late.

Re: To protect kids, don’t send report cards home on Fridays

#204

Post by munchbunny »

ceautery wrote: post #133
legionof7 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I'm in high school right now and they have this system. They also had the same in middle school. There's no way this instant feedback system is mentally healthy. Also, a lot of times, teachers push a 0 as a placeholder grade and parents aren't in the classroom, so they see that and flip out. Also, with the notification system, both parents and students see each assignment grade in a bubble, so it affects them a…

The system should prevent 0 from being pushed as a notification. Each teacher or school should be forced to deal with 0 in some other way, preferably erring on the side of helping students, rather than punishing them.

Or the system should allow "TBD" as a grade, or we should fix whatever reason the teacher was forced to put in a placeholder grade in the first place.

Re: To protect kids, don’t send report cards home on Fridays

#205

Post by b_tterc_p »

beatgammit wrote: post #40
b_tterc_p wrote: post #26

They had 2,000 data points... so they looked at the proportion of points on a given day when there was a report card released the previous day and when there wasn’t. Assuming Saturday’s accounted for, let’s say 20% of the population (blindly assuming) then they had about 400 data points and got a p value of 0.02. I’m assuming they did something to normalize for the number of days because there’s going to be far fewer…

Perhaps, but a report card is likely to get more attention on a Friday than another day of the week, and I could see consequences stretching into the weekend, which is supposed to be a time for a child to relax from the school week. That being said, I think we should put far less emphasis on grades and report cards in general, so I'd rather just not give out report cards on a regular basis. Grades and reports cause a…

Maybe, but, it’s not especially convincing evidence that this is a widespread problem. This is pure assumption, but if report cards effected rates regardless of day they probably would have mentioned this. We shouldn’t assume it is the case, and then even if it is the case, we should really take a hard look at whether is a meaningfully large number.

Re: To protect kids, don’t send report cards home on Fridays

#206

Post by alistairSH »

nathanlied wrote: post #165
alistairSH wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it because it's an "it could come at literally any time" thing, instead of being restricted to the class schedule? I think that's exactly the difference. With in-class grade reporting, you know it's coming inside a 6-7 hour block of time. Even more precise if the assignment was for a given class. With real-time grading, you could receive the grades at the breakfast table on a Saturday morning. And the real-time gr…

I suppose I understand your (and others', here) point of view. It's a different experience for me, grading-wise, not because receiving my grades is stress-free, but more because I'm never expecting it - so I don't think about it too much, just live my life, and when that e-mail comes, I check things, and it's done with. It's a superior experience than waiting for a specific day, or time of day. But, of course, that's…

Quick question... how old are you (college or HS)? And did you grow up in a super-competitive school district?

Watching my son and his peers go through high school (he finished about 5 years ago) in the DC suburbs and the stress level is insane. The good state schools have become increasingly selective since the 90s (when I attended UVA). And it shows in the kids mental health.

Re: To protect kids, don’t send report cards home on Fridays

#207

Post by mirimir »

educationdata wrote: post #179
mirimir wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course. And punishment tends to produce damaged people, who hate themselves because they're bad. Because, you know, they must be bad, because they've been punished. And because they're bad, and hate themselves, they take it out on others, whenever they can get away with it. So it's a recursive cycle of punishment.

"In a review of research on emotions and moral development, the psychologist Nancy Eisenberg suggests that shame emerges when parents express anger, withdraw their love, or try to assert their power through threats of punishment: Children may begin to believe that they are bad people. Fearing this effect, some parents fail to exercise discipline at all, which can hinder the development of strong moral standards." Her…

Yes, "no punishment" "no training re moral principals and values". And when you do that with love, without punishment, you get people who actually have moral principals and values, rather than just pretending, in order to avoid loss of love or punishment.

Re: To protect kids, don’t send report cards home on Fridays

#208

Post by mirimir »

geomark wrote: post #130
mirimir wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah. What about punishment resulting in emotional injury? All that corporal punishment teaches is that it's OK for the powerful to punish the weak.

There is actually another more important lesson, which is that there is always someone bigger and more powerful than you.

Well, yes. And so you need better weapons than they have.

Funny story. So I'm a little wiry guy. And back in the day, I used to carry a buck knife in my back pocket. As Logen says, you can never have enough knives ;) But anyway, a bunch of us were sitting around a fire, BSing, and I start cleaning my fingernails with the knife. And this big jolly dude says "It's always you little guys who pull a knife, when we're just having a friendly brawl!"

Funny, no?

Edit: But global nuclear war? Not so funny :(

Re: To protect kids, don’t send report cards home on Fridays

#209

Post by mirimir »

hopler wrote: post #143
mirimir wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah. What about punishment resulting in emotional injury? All that corporal punishment teaches is that it's OK for the powerful to punish the weak.

The weak clearly can't punish the powerful. If the powerful can't punish the weak, there is no check against criminal activity.

Criminal activity by the powerful is a far greater problem than criminal activity by the weak.

Re: To protect kids, don’t send report cards home on Fridays

#210

Post by nearbuy »

hopler wrote: post #148
nearbuy wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. Grades are a strong motivator for many students. 2. Grades help you gauge how well you did, which can be useful for self-improvement. 3. Grades in early years can help train you to gain the study habits to get good grades in later years. Suddenly being expected to study in grade 9 might be harder. In my university we were allowed to take some classes pass/fail instead of graded. I can tell you exactly how much eff…

Is it grades specifically that mattered? If the consequence for not learning algebra was to repeat lessons until you learned it, wouldn't you get bored and want to score well and move on? Isn't level of progress as motivating as a grade in terms of competitive motivation?

Yes, just like with the pass/fail courses at my university, students would want to pass. Also like those pass/fail courses, most students would put the minimum effort required to pass.

If you're proposing a system where each student gets to progress at their own pace, then:

1. I would have loved to have that in my school.

2. But it demands more resources from schools and creates logistical problems. Every student now graduates with different knowledge.

3. You've recreated the problems problems we were trying to solve by eliminating grades to begin with. Parents will still be angry if their kid has only completed 4 levels of progress when all the good students have completed 10. They'll say they aren't applying themselves. Kids will be under stress to complete as many levels as possible each year. And of course, if each level is pass/fail, it encourages superficial learning of each level. What have we accomplished by eliminating grades?

To answer your first question, grades are not the only possible motivator. Anything that can be measured could be used to motivate. But if you measure the wrong thing, you encourage the wrong behaviour.

Post reply on HN