"The Lie"

http://www.ictlounge.com/html/applications_in_school_management.htm

I'm not going to expound my philosophies on education and grades and what they mean and what society thinks they mean and what they should mean right now. That might take a VERY long time, and I would probably end up offending many people, and I'm trying to be positive today, so I'm going to keep my mouth mostly shut on that topic, although it does connect somewhat to today's story, Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.'s "The Lie."

I first encountered this story my initial year of teaching, and I used it every year I taught 8th graders. It was one of my favorite stories of the year, but most of the kids didn't seem to appreciate the subtle truths about society and grade inflation and entitlement and "privilege" that they lived every day. Unfortunately, students' lives are often controlled by outside forces that leave them more helpless than the generation before. Helicoptering, yet another topic for another time, results in learned helplessness. Learning sometimes comes from failure...and that's where I'll leave my comments today. If you want more, you'll either have to wait until I deem myself level-headed enough to do so, or you'll need to talk to me personally. If you haven't noticed, some of my narrative posts, and the lessons I learned from my experiences, come from precarious or plain at least unsupervised situations where I had to learn for myself. I witness that many kids still make it through life the same way I did, but others just don't know how to connect the dots.

For now, please excuse me. I need to go post my final grades for the term. Read the story while you wait.