SL English Comp - anyone ever ask for a zero?

[cookderosa]

I have 2 sons finishing English Comp 2. They are both down to their last writing assignments. One son will finish easily next week, the other takes DAYS to write a paper.
My son who writes slowly does really well on his written assignments and has a solid A so far, and even with the grade of zero on his remaining papers, will have a high B in the class. I'm trying to figure out if he can just be done and not write his last 2 papers. Has anyone ever submitted a paper that was blank or sent SL a message asking for a ZERO on an assignment? He only has a month of school left, and I'd SO much rather he devote it to finishing his other subjects. Thoughts?

[Ancapman]

hmmmm from an educational perspective, I would feel this would be an Incomplete more than just a 0 on an assignment. It is also an opportunity to learn and teach a skill of completing what one has started and that all work matters. I totally get your desire, and likely his desire to just finish it, however that may not be in his best long term interests. He is young and has, presumably, the advantage of time resources that many of us older adults do not have. Also, you never know what opportunity for enlightment or Eureka moments he may potentially lose by not finishing the required assignments. There is also a possibility of creating the impression that work that is good enough is fine, even if it could have been done better.

With that said, I doubt straighterline will kick up much of a fuss. You could always contact your SL Academic Advisor for his opinion on what the outcome may be or if there already is a policy in place.

[Synicaal]

Have him finish them, just have him do "acceptable" work. My girlfriends sister is like your son. She does assignments slowly but always gets A's on them. This is why I don't completely agree with Ancap. That skill/attitude wouldn't just be unlearned. I wouldn't be worried about him getting lazy or whatever because he got to slide on an assignment one time.

[cookderosa]

hmmmm from an educational perspective, I would feel this would be an Incomplete more than just a 0 on an assignment. It is also an opportunity to learn and teach a skill of completing what one has started and that all work matters. I totally get your desire, and likely his desire to just finish it, however that may not be in his best long term interests. He is young and has, presumably, the advantage of time resources that many of us older adults do not have. Also, you never know what opportunity for enlightment or Eureka moments he may potentially lose by not finishing the required assignments. There is also a possibility of creating the impression that work that is good enough is fine, even if it could have been done better.

With that said, I doubt straighterline will kick up much of a fuss. You could always contact your SL Academic Advisor for his opinion on what the outcome may be or if there already is a policy in place.

His long term best interestes, you mean as in college credit, or is that parenting advice? I'd love to hear how only doing 7 instead of 9 essays circumvents some epic long term interest. Still, so your mind rests easy, you should know that he has 2 more years of high school English after English II at Straighterline. I wouldn't trust his entire composition education to an annomous grader at a non-college. He's there for one thing and one thing only: college credit.

[dfrecore]

His long term best interestes, you mean as in college credit, or is that parenting advice? I'd love to hear how only doing 7 instead of 9 essays circumvents some epic long term interest. Still, so your mind rests easy, you should know that he has 2 more years of high school English after English II at Straighterline. I wouldn't trust his entire composition education to an annomous grader at a non-college. He's there for one thing and one thing only: college credit.

I'm working with my daughter on this. She has a final English paper to turn into her teacher, and school is almost out. She has been agonizing over it for weeks. I finally said, "turn the dang thing into your teacher as a first draft, and ask her opinion on it. If she says it's good enough to get a decent grade on, that won't affect your overall grade, then just hand it in and get it over with!"

It's not that I'm teaching her to be lazy, it's also that I'm trying to teach her to prioritize. If she can get a "solid B" as her teacher said about the paper right now, and it keeps her A in the class, then she has time to finish up a couple of other things early and spend more time on math (where she's getting a B-). She has to learn that spending more time on something that's not super important is taking away from some things that are more important.

I think that's a better life lesson than "do your best work every second of every day" - for a kid that is a very hard worker already. I certainly am NOT saying that this is a lesson every kid needs to learn, they're all different and need to learn different skills for their personality type and all of that. It's just the lesson that SHE needs at this current time in her life.

I would have your kid do a quick rough draft of the essay, or maybe an outline or something. And then turn that in, and let it go. He's obviously needing the same lesson that my kid needs.

[Ancapman]

Not parenting advice.

Crazy enough, some schools will want to see the final grades from SL. For example... my AMCAS application has to have grades from Cuyamaca College, St. Leo, Straighterline, Study, CooperSmith, CCAC, and TESU they are especially interested in English Comp I and II and Science courses... but here is the other reason. They base their Cumulative GPA and Science GPA on all grades ever received at a college level. So Try to at least encourage him to get a B. If he has a desire to go to a top graduate school or MD, DO, DDS school they will want all transcripts. and those grades will be judged.

[TrailRunr]

Encouraging kids to take short cuts like this leads to bad habits later in life like doing a mediocre job at work since the paycheck is going to be the same with higher quality work. That's the exact same thing with SL since a pass is a pass. English Comp is not one of those subjects where you flush the knowledge from your brain five minutes after you disconnect from ProctorU or five minutes after you submit the last essay. Your SL transcript will always list the numerical grade and letter grade, which will not be an A.

[StoicJ]

I'm still pretty new here, but this is the younger son? Just curious, does he WANT to do a thorough job on the final papers or would he be glad to just get to the finish line? I ask because MY boys (ages 9 and 7) are "homeschooled" as well, and I like to know how others approach these things.

I don't have an answer to how SL handles asking for a zero.

[dfrecore]

Encouraging kids to take short cuts like this leads to bad habits later in life like doing a mediocre job at work since the paycheck is going to be the same with higher quality work. That's the exact same thing with SL since a pass is a pass. English Comp is not one of those subjects where you flush the knowledge from your brain five minutes after you disconnect from ProctorU or five minutes after you submit the last essay. Your SL transcript will always list the numerical grade and letter grade, which will not be an A.

This is a very broad statement. So EVERY time you take a shortcut on something, it will lead to you having bad habits later in life, for all people, in all circumstances? I doubt that very much.

And since you don't know MY kid, you cannot say this about her. My kid really does need to take shortcuts once in a while. Not everything is important. Yes, some things are - but trying to teach her WHICH things are important and need more time to be spent on them, and which things aren't, is a very important skill. She is already getting an A in English. Should she really prioritize trying to get an A on a paper, when she is ALREADY going to get an A in the class, at the expense of math, where she is struggling a little and needs to spend more time on that? She is getting a B- in that course. In my opinion, she should not worry so much about the class she's already earning an A in, and spend a lot more time on the course where she's getting a B-. That's just a smarter thing to do. Spending more time on the course she needs to spend more time in, and possibly getting her grade up to an A, is a wiser investment of her time.

I think your boss might have an issue if you spent too much time working on stupid crap (and did it really, really well) and didn't get a big project done. Prioritizing is a skill that is just as important as doing good work on things. And sometimes, good enough IS good enough.

But you can parent your kids however you'd like! I'm sure you'll do it perfectly.

[KenJ]

Maybe this forum could use a category for Homeschooling ?