I was reading the NYC Educator's Blog when I came upon this post. He told this story about one of his students.
I looked at the kid's paper, and there wasn't a capital letter on it. This freaked me out a little, since I know for a fact they use them in his native language.
"Didn't your first-grade teacher tell you to use big letters when you start sentences?" I asked, pointing to the first letter of the first paragraph, a plainly lower-case "t."
"Yes, but I forget."
"Well, remember," I said.
15 minutes later I went back, and the kid had corrected only that first letter.
"You want me to do all of them?" he asked.
"Of course," I told him.
He resigned himself to the miserable task. When I came back, he had capitalized the first letter of every line, without regard to where the sentences had begun.
He probably didn't anticipate my being cruel enough to make him rewrite the whole thing. But goshdarn it, it's all part of the learning process.
As students finish up letters today, I wonder how many will turn in papers with simple mistakes, that they know how to correct?
Based on the grades that students have been earning on their weekly WTC (Words that Count) assignment, I imagine there will be some low grades due to lack of effort editing.
Maybe we should take a page from the NCY Educator, and just keep doing it until they are done correctly.
I looked at the kid's paper, and there wasn't a capital letter on it. This freaked me out a little, since I know for a fact they use them in his native language.
"Didn't your first-grade teacher tell you to use big letters when you start sentences?" I asked, pointing to the first letter of the first paragraph, a plainly lower-case "t."
"Yes, but I forget."
"Well, remember," I said.
15 minutes later I went back, and the kid had corrected only that first letter.
"You want me to do all of them?" he asked.
"Of course," I told him.
He resigned himself to the miserable task. When I came back, he had capitalized the first letter of every line, without regard to where the sentences had begun.
He probably didn't anticipate my being cruel enough to make him rewrite the whole thing. But goshdarn it, it's all part of the learning process.
As students finish up letters today, I wonder how many will turn in papers with simple mistakes, that they know how to correct?
Based on the grades that students have been earning on their weekly WTC (Words that Count) assignment, I imagine there will be some low grades due to lack of effort editing.
Maybe we should take a page from the NCY Educator, and just keep doing it until they are done correctly.
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