Let's start at the beginning. Students won't know if they are successful until they can define success! Success will vary slightly as students age and as knowledge and skill increase. So, what shall success be? Happiness, friends, obedience, respect, social status, confidence, leadership, attendance, independence, work habits, marks - one class or all classes, life skills, awards, scholarships, top of the class, valedictorian, post secondary education or job entry? Let me argue that it is learning or even meta-learning (learning how to learn).
Let's discuss the first 10 items. I would argue these are attributes attained by focusing on the main goal. If students are doing poorly in school, they may gain one or all of these attributes but it will be difficult to maintain them in the long run. Students will attain these attributes through various courses; if one is not available, then an elective should be selected to gain that attribute. Obedience is a red-herring; of course we want students to show some obedience but students won't learn how to stand up for themselves if they are just obedient. Not all of these need to be attained in school; if the student is involved in after school activities that is an equally acceptable avenue.
Let's move on to life skills before tackling the more controversial items. It's easy to focus only on academics, athletics or arts. But we don't want people living with their parents until they are 40 because they lack the life skills to live on their own. It would benefit students to learn how to use basic tools (screwdriver, hammer, wrenches), make dinner, wash dishes, wash their clothes, shop for food and pay bills. So parents should either teach them at home or sign them up for shop and home economics classes.
Okay, let's tackle marks, awards, scholarships, top of the class and valedictorian as a group. I would argue that learning will achieve these objectives better than using these objective to achieve learning. If the parents and student value learning over the marks the student becomes an intrinsically motivated learner. Using objectives to achieve learning is usually done where parents rewards the student and the student becomes an extrinsically motivated learner. Or the student is simply motivated by marks; this is also extrinsic motivation. You will find books devoted to this subject alone, so this will be discussed in more detail in a later post. Digression: We live in a instant self-gratifying world of consumerism; IMO - this is partly due to students requiring too much extrinsic motivation; the other major part of consumerism is advertising but that's another discussion. IMO - we can raise a healthier society that can avoid consumerism if we rely more on intrinsic motivation.
There is another argument to not worry about marks too much. There is no guarantee that schools or teachers assess at the same level of difficulty (called standardized testing), so a B in one class might not be a B in another class. Even if the test is identical, there is no guarantee that marking will be similar or even identical. Additionally, standardized testing is also a controversial subject; it gives the teacher less leeway on teaching what the class needs or relevant. Again, this will be revisited in a later post.
Let's finish off with some anecdotal evidence (without divulging everything about my family's personal lives). Personally, my wife and I have never stressed marks with our kids. We have always stressed whether they are learning and whether they have been putting in the effort. They have had part-time jobs while at school. They have been pretty good at most of their classes, received some awards and scholarships but they were not elite academically. And we have all been happy with this because they turned out to be hard working successful adults. They have never felt overly anxious or stressed out at school or work.
I give you one more abbreviated anecdote. I had a parent-student-teacher interview where I told a parent her child had very high marks in my class but that he was coasting a bit to get his work done by taking the easy route. I said that the child could learn more by taking a risk in doing harder tasks. The parent started crying because she had been trying to convince the child of the same thing; she finally got someone to agree with her. So, the point is that high marks doesn't necessarily mean that a student is learning.
My final argument for learning as a measure of success is that we are in an ever changing world; learning is the way to succeed. Many people don't find a job in their field of study, or they change jobs because they are not happy in their field, or have to look for different job because of an accident or disability. The only way to adapt is to good at learning. Learning more is also a way to get a promotion. I consider myself a life-long learner; I love getting more skills (I recently took a welding course and trying to find a blacksmith course) which is why I'm on my third career. I hope this provokes some thought or confirms your beliefs. And THAT concludes this post!
