Teaching Days – Episode 4
It's midterm week again for junior high and high school students.
Next class, I'll need to log everyone's scores. That got me thinking— about something that happened a few years ago.
If you've ever been a teacher or a parent, you've probably asked a kid how they did on a test.One year, a new eighth grader joined my class. I asked him,
“How'd you do on your midterms?”
He replied, “Please don't ask.”
“Why not?” I asked, a bit confused.
“Just… really bad,” he muttered, avoiding eye contact.
He looked tense, and no matter how gently I tried to press, his lips were sealed.
I could tell he wasn't ready to talk.
So I tried a different approach.
“Hey,” I said, “what do you think your midterm score really means?”
He sighed. “It means I'm losing my allowance.”
Ah—so that was it.
A bad score meant no pocket money.
And just like that, I'd learned a little secret about him.
He didn't know me well yet.
That's why he didn't want to share.
I realized, before asking for honesty,
I had to show him where I was coming from.
So I told him,
“You know, I see midterms as just one way to understand ourselves better."
It's hard to truly know where we're at without some kind of feedback.
It's like a health check— if your numbers are off, you take a closer look at your diet, your lifestyle, and you make adjustments.
The goal isn't to feel bad, it's to improve.
Tests work the same way.
If your grades aren't great, ask yourself:
Am I studying often enough?
Am I using the right methods?
Do I understand the material but struggle with application?
Or am I totally lost from the start?
Maybe I haven't memorized the vocab well enough.
Maybe I don't really get the grammar structure.
Once we figure out what needs fixing,
we can tweak how we study, how we think, how we approach problems.
And when we do that,
our ability grows— and the grades will follow.”
After I said all that,
he finally looked up and said quietly,
“23.”
段考周
國高中生的段考周剛過，下次上課要登記學生段考成績
讓我想到......
這是幾年前的事了
相信只要當過老師或家長，都有問過小朋友成績的經驗
有一年，新入班一位國二生。當段考周結束，我問他
「段考成績多少？」
他說：「老師，你別問。」
「怎麼了？」我有點疑惑
「總之很爛啦。」他繃著一張臉，不願意說
「多少分都沒關係，你放心講。」即使我這麼說，這學生的嘴還是像石頭一樣
很硬，撬不開
我有點無奈了，問他
同學，你覺得 段考成績出來，是什麼意思？
「是扣我零用錢的意思。」學生回答
原來他考不好，會被扣零用錢，我想
又知道了一個同學小秘密
我的認知
看來
是因為他還不懂我，所以不願意跟我說
我好像，得先跟他講一下我的認知了
我開始跟他說
「段考，只是幫助我們認知自己的其中一種方式」
我們要自己理解自己其實挺難的，外力去幫助我們理解自己比較簡單
就像是去做健康檢查，如果有某些數值偏高
這時候我會檢驗自己的飲食習慣、運動習慣，做一些改變讓數值降到正常值
任何的評量方式或是檢查，其實都只是幫助你了解自己
我們要做的是，是去做調整，讓自己的數值在正常值的範圍以內
段考也是這樣，成績出來，沒有及格，要檢驗是不是我的讀書頻率不夠、讀書方法不對，還是哪裡思路出了問題？
是概念聽的懂，但應用題不會寫
還是概念聽不懂，題目也不會寫？
是單字沒背熟，還是句型結構不會？
當我們調整了自己的讀書方法、讀書習慣、解題思路，
自然而然的你的實力就會提升
接著，你的成績也會提升
他聽完這一段話
才跟我說
「23分」
