Leaky Pens

There is a mistaken notion in some progressive education circles that young kids are wise and worthy of writing teacher evaluations that could cost a teacher his or her job. Having been questioned by an administrator about an incident in my class because a kid complained about it, I never did get the chance to talk to either the administrator or kid. Nor did I get “fired” from my volunteer job. The whole thing just kind of went away.

 

But had I talked to the administrator, I would have said, “Why are you giving so much power to what this 12-year-old says? Did you ever ask him what his part in that incident was? Did you talk to me before sending me an e-mail insinuating that I had violated some code of proper teacher conduct? Do you remember what you were like at 12?”

 

Thanks to rummaging through an old file, I do have some clear evidence of how my 12-year-old mind functioned— a letter written to my parents explaining why my report card wasn’t as good as it should be. What a treasure!!!

First off, the fact that I wrote it showed that I was trying to take a step, however awkward, towards a mature responsibility that owns my shortcomings instead of immediately blaming it on someone or something else. I begin by trying to give an honest overview—“My English papers have been quite well (which is not a well-constructed English sentence!),but mechanical English tests are lacking excellence.”

 

Then comes the 12-year old excuses. "Spelling was the fault of leaky pens!" Then back to owning up. "Arithmetic lacks accuracy." And then the most honest sentence of the whole letter. “Social studies and reading, I’m just not doing that well.” Love it!

 

 So there you have a 12-year-old mind edging toward a more mature sense of my role in my successes and failures. Thank goodness I didn’t grow up in a culture that encouraged me to blame it all on my bad teachers and get away scot-free from having to consider my role in the process. Here’s the whole letter. And note— my handwriting is pretty good!

 

PS I was wondering why I wrote this letter and just noticed the A- in the bottom left. Clearly, it was my teacher that made my write it! Again, a nod to the days when teachers held their students’ feet to the fire. But now I’m wondering, “Why did I only get an A-? Was it because of the leaky pens?”