Sugar Coated
There seems to be a honeymoon phase in many aspects of life
including friendships, relationships and jobs. That feeling that “nothing can
go wrong and this is the best thing that has ever happened to me” phase. This
phase doesn’t last long: especially in education. Once the honeymoon phase with
the students is over each student’s true colors begin to shine through. It’s at
this point when it’s easy to tell who really cares about school and who
doesn’t. As educators, I feel we naturally want to see everyone be successful
and will do anything to help someone achieve that goal. Do I want to build a
happy family of learners who value education, agriculture, and most of all,
each other? YES! Will that happen? NO! Unfortunately, no matter how good you
are, you can’t save them all.
A scary, but true
example
I teach an agriculture mechanic technology course second
semester. This course is designed as a block class during first and second
period. Because of the extra time, we can get through a lot of material; most
of which is large scale projects. I have 12 students enrolled: 17% female, 83%
male. We have met 28 days (approximately
43 hours and 24 minutes) since the start of the semester. I have a student who
has missed 16 of those 28 days. He/she has only been in my class 42% of the
time. This does not account for the 9 days he/she has shown up late. He/she has
been to my class on time only 11% since January 17th.
How do I teach that student let alone grade him/her? How do
I catch this student up on the one random day he/she decides to show up to
class? The work that I do in this class can’t be taken home. When he/she does
show up I literally have to sit with him/her the entire time because the rest
of the class is so far ahead.
This one student, who doesn’t care one bit, is holding back
the other 11. I have done nothing but try and help him/her with no prevail.
Grading
I work really hard to give timely and specific feedback to
my students. I do give zeros but am open minded. I realize giving a student a
zero can be detrimental to their self-esteem but how do I grade someone who is
never here? How do you grade a student who gave up before the semester even
started?
This has been a huge frustration for many teachers and I.
Recently, the students in the class have been commenting on his/her absence and
saying things like, “oh, he’ll/she’ll still get to graduate because the school
will just push him/her through”, “the school has graduated students who have
missed more”, “maybe we should start to skip more school if nothing is going to
happen”, “it’s not fair that he/she gets away with it”. I never knew that one
student, who is never in school, could negatively impact so many.
