As someone who writes exams, I’d say it depends on what’s being tested, in terms of what the primary goal of it is. If what’s being tested is simple knowledge, then writing a test that contains too many prompts (or prompts that are too involved to complete) aren’t helpful; on the other hand, if what’s being tested is recall or processing speed, then that’s one—and a very good—way to test it.
The good news @homerdog is , in my experience it tends to get easier for these kids to get things completed in a timely manner the more practice they get . I think confidence also plays a big factor.
@carolinamom2boys agreed. Practice helps. S19 just felt so good about his studying and then didn’t finish. But he knows his stuff so I guess that’s a good thing.
In general, I agree it’s a life skill and not just limited to critical life services like the medical fields.
Fast clip is subjective and honors classes and AP, by their very nature require kids to ramp up theirprocessing and prioritization abilities. They do not have the time to always ensure it is the perfect answer.
Many jobs require that ability and nimbleness. Mine does. I would like many things to be 100% correct, proofed to death and full consensus. I don’t have that luxury. Some times it has to be good enough. Sometimes I can’t complete it all and it slides to the next day. Choosing wisely is a skill I utilize daily.
It is true. Some kids will struggle with this more than others but this will not be limited to one class or high school and learning now how to adapt is actually a gift they will carry forward for the rest of their life. And truly truly help in college!
Hm. So I wonder how kids “ramp up” their processing speed. Just lots of practice? I think S19 just wants the answers to be correct and he’s a little bit of a perfectionist so it’s harder for him to move so fast.
I think it depends on the kid. For some, sure, it might be practice or changing how they study. For others it may mean having to let go of some of that perfectionist tendency. Sometimes having more mostly right, is a far better strategy than less 100% correct. It is a test taking strategy and part of what test prep is all about. It’s also math. Figure out how much stuff is worth, allocate your time accordingly, move on when you half to regardless of whether you are ready or not and go back and check work if you end up with the luxury of time.
D took a scholarship admission test yesterday for a private boarding school (that’s a whole ‘nother story - not worth getting into unless it actually goes somewhere) – anyway, there were 75 questions and an essay and they had 40 minutes to finish. Needless to say, she didn’t finish.
I think she came up with a great answer for the essay, though - it was to write about two songs that described your life. One of her choices was Veggie Tales’ “Oh Where Is My Hairbrush.” I was laughing so hard when she told me!
@Gatormama thank you for the coffee spewing moment reading her song choice? That’s priceless!
Always love sense of humor, much more valuable in life than processing speed 
@homerdog, I’d agree more with the Stanford Dean (who has used her role to lecture from a bully pulpit and then profited by this if 1) she weren’t already at Stanford and 2) the Stanford Admissions Office didn’t reward students who stayed on the “crazy train.” I am sorry to hear about your son’s experience, however. It sounds very frustrating, and maybe Honors Chem is not the class for speed tests. I do agree with @carolinamom2boys: quick thinking is often helpful.
How are all the 19ers? Our 1st quarter grades should be coming out in the next few days. Assuming no surprises, d19 is doing well.
I’m especially glad for her that she did drop down this year to nonhonors Spanish. She’s enjoying it more, feels more confident, and is more consistent in her skills. She’s planning to take more next year for sure (Spanish 4, college credit) and will consider continuing the following year. I am positive that ifnshe had stayed on the honors path she would have refused to continue after this year.
The other plus this year is that it’s really solidifying how much she loves math and science, especially compared to social studies and English. She does well in all of them, but you can see and feel how much more of a math/science person she is. Social studies and English have been good for helping her learn to find her voice and speak up. She tends to be a quiet introvert, so hearing her stand up for her ideas in those classes makes me happy.
I hope everyone has had a great fall so far! Most of mine has been wrapped up with S17’s applications, which S19 is definitely paying attention to.
We’ve had an interesting first quarter. New online systems so there is a bit of messiness associated with that and one teacher in particular has not been updating grades in anything resembling a timely fashion (or entering many at all). I “think” grades will be final in the system on thursday but that’s based on info from our rival HS who has the same new system, not anything published on ours. So, we shall see!
Overall it’s been good but full of change, as sophomore year tends to be for our kids. Grades are very solid, with the exception of French 4, the GPA killer. It was the GPA killer last year and at the time I really thought it was S, not the teacher but he’s dramatically improved everywhere else in the “turning things in on time” category and I am starting to think this one is more of a teacher issue. All A’s except a B+ in AP World and then the dreaded French. Quarter grades don’t show on our transcripts so all is fixable with tons of time, and I am really hoping to stay out of it but need to see movement. The combo of 2 “missing” (but not assignments) and 2 poor scores has really impacted that grade and the overall gpa as a result. But, overall we are really pleased. It’s a heavy load with a ton of homework. He’s navigating it well and we were really concerned about the schedule. Much more homework at this grade than any of his siblings had.
Of course we all have to manually calculate the GPA, the new system shows in % and letter grade by class, but no GPA lol! The important thing is, outside of French, he is really enjoying his classes and the work. He doesn’t dislike French, just isn’t as engaged. Which may be a huge part of the issue versus the teacher and really we’ve got to get to the bottom of it. It is a split class, half French 4 and hlf AP French and I am sure that doesn’t help. I figure I’ll give him till Thanksgiving before I jump in.
In other “changes” he has lost his scouting mojo. Which makes me sad. He feels (rightly) that the current troop leaderships is pretty much interested in goofing around and the same activities they have always done and so he isn’t evolving/learning anything. Unless he goes to summer camp, earning newer badges is difficult. He still loves all of the bigger things, NYLT was amazing for him, he plans to do the 50 miler this next summer and hopes to go to Philmont but is finding himself less and less engaged at the weekly meetings. He’s tried to play more of a leadership role and move the needle but hasn’t had much success so far. I don’t know if he will stick it out to Eagle or not. He has expressed some interest in Sea Scouts and being more involved in the Order of the Arrow but not really sure where any of that will land. He has one badge to complete to get Life and it’s a badge he could have completed last spring or this fall and hasn’t even bothered to do the paperwork. Which is telling. He has agreed to at least do that but I’m not sure where he goes from here. Torn with contacting leadership about it or not, will likely end up with an informal conversation when the opportunity presents itself. He’s also decided he does not want to do track. Which is not entirely surprising but I worry about inactivity. He still loves XC though, will do winter running club and plans to train for his first half marathon but moved the date of that from late Jan to probably March.
He is adding new things so I can’t complain, he is evolving as a kid which is fun to watch. He started a Philosophy Club at school and plans to try out for Drum Major in the spring (I didn’t see that one coming) and has really ramped up his trumpet activities with a small ensemble group that is meeting weekly right now. The drum major thing will be interesting. I have no idea for his class who else might try out. As a sophomore you try out for junior drum major and then take over senior year. I have zero clue what his chances may or may not be. It’s not a straight popularity contest and many of the kids who might want to do it, cannot if they are in drama or sports so…who knows. Glad he is going for it though. I can’t quite tell if he is on top of piano stuff or not. They are working on theory and writing and he tells me that just like you don’t need a calculator to do math…you don’t need the piano to write music. No complaints from his teacher though.
Hmmmn.
So for the near future it’s basically fix French, see what those PSAT scores look like in December and keep doing what he’s doing everywhere else. Enjoy being a kid. I like it. Relatively low maintenance!
@mom2twogirls that sounds like a great first quarter and a good move in Spanish!
Wow, isn’t French 4 pretty unusual for sophomores? Our middle school doesn’t offer foreign language so everyone starts with French or Spanish 1 in high school.
My older kids have both given up band in high school. But S is doing chorus now instead and enjoys it. D did tech for the drama club. They both did tennis just for fun.
It can be hard seeing them quit something they have done for a long time, and have come a long way in.
But it needs to be up to them. There is no sense in doing it if you don’t enjoy it.
@mommdc there are a fair amount of kids in 4th year languages at our school, as it is offered at the MS level. Far more in spanish than french but a large group in Japanese. In general most kids at our school stop around the 3rd year, which is why the French 4 and AP French class is shared, not enough of either to make a full class (at a school of 1200). Of our 4 kids though, he is the only one who took FL in MS. A lot of kids that do take it then, end up having to take it over and his grades aren’t grades that we will carry over to his transcript. We debated about it as to how needed that 4th year really was but given that 2 were at the MS level we all felt that he needed 2 officially in HS. Colleges will look at the level completed and I believe both MS years will show up as a “S” for satisfying a grad requirement, but the grade won’t impact the GPA. He will not do AP French. Not only b/c clearly he’s not into it but b/c there is another class he’d rather use that slot for. He has considered self studying for the AP french test at some point but I can’t see that going well as things stand right now.
I agree, they need to do what makes them happy. And as long as they are engaged, that’s all I care about. We’ve seen all the olders go through this kind of evolution and change and sometimes you can predict what is coming, other times not. He has almost 2 years to get Eagle done if he decides to do it. I’m not giving up complete hope but it definitely seems less likely at the moment.
Glad all is going well for everyone and that 1st quarter results are encouraging!
@eandesmom - I with you on the “loss of scouting” mojo - D is the middle of trying to complete her GS Gold Award and it is like pulling teeth! Her Silver Award project was easier because she actually made something so the steps and reward were tangible. Her Gold Award is much less tangible so all the steps and accomplishments are harder to see and keeping her motivated is difficult. Add to it a p/t job, homework, heavy involvement in theater, LOTS of girl drama and a brand-spankin’ new school administration, and we definitely are going at a snail’s pace. I would really love for this to be done by the end of the school year so we can concentrate on college visits, testing and the like junior year, but not sure it will happen. Fingers crossed!
@eandesmom I think I shared one time a total hack we learned regarding languages in HS. In our HS kids are allowed to “waive” or exempt one class from their GPA if they claim this at the beginning of the year. Many high stats kids waive a class like art, music, theatre etc because they are mostly regular level classes and the highest GPA you can earn for a regular class is 4.0. So a B in regular art class would be a 3.0 which would really drag down their overall GPA. So what we did for my younger son is exempt Spanish for the year. The grades still show up on the transcript but is not calculated into his GPA. He ended up getting an A in Spanish anyways, but it would’ve dragged his GPA down, because he’s in all honors classes right now and has a 4.5 average.
So, using the “expempt” is quite the hack at our school, but if you want to keep your kid up in the top percentile of students, and they only want to take regular level language classes, you kind of need to. My son has no interest in taking AP Spanish, but needs to keep taking a language, so this is a good work around. I wish we had figured this out for son17, his class rank would be higher.
DS19 is well into second quarter. Continues to have lots of homework. This week has been exceptionally busy because he leaves for the state Capitol tomorrow AM for Youth in Government until Sat. He put the finishing touches on his bill proposal , and completed all of his homework that is due while he is gone. This is the first time he is going away without my husband, his older brother or me. It will also be the first time husband and I will get practice as empty nesters . It will either be a very long or a very short few days . We’ll see.
First quarter grades range from good to pretty horrible for D19. I haven’t told D this, but I am beginning to wonder if college is the proper path. The stress level is worsening and I have internally thought about possibly having her drop out of high school once she is 16, or maybe explore homeschooling. On a good note, she is self-advocating based on the accommodations in her 504 plan.
Glad everyone else’s students are doing so incredibly well!
@Orangefish We are with you. While we are not considering him dropping out and homeschooling is not an option for us, S19 is also not doing well. Unweighted GPA for this past quarter is below 3.0, which consists of some good, some OK, and a couple really bad. I have already had discussions with the GC about what happens if he fails a required course. He doesn’t work as hard as he could but he does spend a couple hours a night doing homework so he’s not just phoning it in. In two of his classes he just seems to be unable to pass a test, even though he knows the material (and I’ve helped him study so I know he knows it). He says he just blanks out when he gets the test given to him and then remembers as soon as he leaves the room and goes to his next class. Its really frustrating and we are not sure what the future for this kid will be.
@OrangeFish and @me29034 HUGS! We’ve been there off and on with 3 out of our 4 kids and I know how scary, frustrating and bewildering it can be.
In both of your situations, are you able to move courses to P/F versus a letter grade? Or drop down to less challenging classes for 2nd semester? I know some kids that have had issues in the past (math in these cases) where they dropped the class after first semester and then retake the entire year either online or on a subsequent year. Sometimes after tutoring or dropping down. For some kids, DE has been better for them than the HS environment, or we know an extremely gifted boy who moved to more of an alternative HS that was a better fit for his learning style.
I would definitely be focused most on the stress level for your D @OrangeFish and seeing what can be done to bring it down. Is there one thing stressing her out more than others or is it overall? Any interaction with a counselor or your pediatrician for advice there?
I had a long chat with my S about his one horrible grade. In his case he needs to get over it, suck it up and do whatever it takes to turn it around. Being mad at the teacher for not updating grades, not checking to see why it’s showing missing or not getting full credit or being mad at a grade he received when it feels it should be higher will get him nowhere. Not just in this class but in life! Whether he really does anything about it or not, remains to be seen.
@carolinamom2boys enjoy the trial empty nester! 1st Q grades appear to have posted. They don’t quite match what the online daily gradebook has been saying. Which is good in one case, but not good in another. 5 A’s, one A- and one…D+.
UGH.