On Sunday Denise revealed this week’s Six Sentence Story prompt word: “CODE”. Come Thursday she will, via her blog, GirlieOntheEdge, open up the link for sharing stories told in six sentences, no more, no less. Here I pick up from a recent episode featuring a recurring character, Telling.
Cracking the Code
Sofie and Marlie played while their moms had coffee and got caught up, for they all saw less of each other since Marlie started home schooling with her dad.
“Maybe I should just leave Sofie off here mornings instead of school; she’s been having a tough time in second grade, I thought it was because she was missing Marlie even though Marlie’s in first grade, but after that conference I think it’s more. Her teacher was talking in code- ‘decodes with multiple strategies, strong comprehension, reads above grade level norms’- telling me what I’ve always known about Sofie and her love of reading, but then she went into all Sofie’s problems with encoding; ‘inconsistent application of phonetic strategies, resistant to employing graphic organizers, minimal and stilted prose with assigned tasks’- finally came out and just said it- Sofie sucks at writing.”
“She did not say that I hope, and my gosh, Sofie writes beautifully, always has.”
“Well, Sofie is now convinced that writing means perfect spelling and a set number of sentences forced into cookie cutter paragraphs, and she no longer comes home excited about her day at school and she hates to write.”
As the girls galloped by, expertly lassoing wild mustangs for the ranch they’d started in the living room, one mom told the other that she thought her work at home husband might have room for one more student.
I do hope that Sophie revisits her love of writing.
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Oh, I’m sure she will, with these adults and her friend to support her.
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Many are the ways the world tries to put people in boxes…(K)
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Yep. Too many and too bad when it happens in schools.
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My girls were lucky to have elementary school teachers that knew when to teach rules and when to let imagination take its course. Things have gotten much more rigid…the pendulum will swing back eventually. Education has fashions too. I’m actually surprised how rigid as parents our children who were not raised that way at all have become.
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A most interesting thought. All schools are a bit widget like in their attitudes as they can’t really cope with round pegs in their square holes.
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So schools still try to squeeze their students into neatly labelled packages. Nothing changes
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Well, some are ok, and many teachers, but this teacher is causing problems for sure.
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I remember those types.
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Yes, allow the creativity mustang to run free!
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YeeHaw!
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Each student learns differently…
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So true.
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I love that Marlie is being homeschooled and that Sophie is about to join her. It’s sad that some teachers can’t see beyond the boxes that need to be ticked to the children who want to learn. This is my type of story. 🙂
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I knew it was your kind of story and I truly enjoy these characters. Yet I despaired that Sofie should need to resort to homeschooling. Thanks Buddy.
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I agree, but we’ve got to do what’s best for the child. 🙂
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Students are always forced to conform to a set of ideas with little scope for creativity. so well-written
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Thanks. Marlie and her family have been fun to write. Sofie and her mother just showed up so who knows what they will write next.
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Often there’s a fine line between teaching and dream crushing
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Yep.
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Aww I like that she’s going to join the home school.
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It will be good for her.
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I, for one, totally remembered: the Palmer method, yellow pads with dotted line in-between the solid and blue Lindy pens.
Can’t say, unfortunately, that I recall any encounters with …writing writing.
Jargon, the favored bastion of those so insecure to require a professional bodyguard (or would that be, ‘leg-breaker’?)
Fun as always.
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I remember doing a lot of writing writing in second grade, but my teachers were not crippling like this one.
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This really struck a chord. I was in college when a creative writing instructor told me my “style” of writing (poetry) “was dead, no one writes like that anymore”. At Sophie,s age, children are most impressionable. The stupidity and ignorance of some teachers can have a lasting impact on a child. I’m not a fan of canned, meant to sound intelligent, industry catch phrases especially when talking about 2nd graders. (gee, is this the start of a rant? LOL) I’ll stop 🙂
Enjoyable story! I look forward to more installments 🙂
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So gratified to strike a chord and start a rant. I look forward to more installments too, but I am at the mercy of prompts and characters.
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Unfortunately, the only creative writing assignments I ever had in grades 1 – 12 were in writing poetry, and that was at a time when poetry was all supposed to rhyme. I suspect creative writing then was considered something one did in their free time, after school. The emphasis as far as writing was concerned was in writing legibly, spelling correctly, and using correct punctuation and sentence structure. Times have changed and a lot of it is for the better.
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Spelling, punctuation, etc are important, in my opinion, but are not the be all and end all, should not be confused with “writing”. Despite what I have written here, I do know that there is a lot of good stuff happening in classrooms, with children writing for a variety of purposes and finding their voice.
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Life, of course, is about both~creativity and rules~but not in a restrictive, stifling way. It gets me so plum loco when people give the impression that somehow the rules of orderly writing are bad. I hope, though, that Sophie gets a chance to learn about the rewards of both ingredients of writing
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And this is why so many homeschool. Children who are a little off the demanded path get labeled and it is just not right.
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Home schooling sounds great, to nurture creativity.
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Many teachers in public schools are also nurturing creativity. (Had to put that out there, this is just a made up story) There does need to be a balance of certain skills and conventions and creativity.
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Cookie cutter creativity. Often fostered by educators as it fits so neatly into the lesson planner. I am thrilled the teacher in your vignette voiced her concern, that says to me she is thinking outside the box, and I doubt I would remove my child from her classroom just yet.
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Yeah, we’ll have to see how Sofie’s mom handles the situation.
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As a single parent, I couldn’t home school, but I’ve often wished I could have. The school “system” to two of my three very bright boys and so destroyed their self confidence that they were lucky to graduate from high school.
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Thank you SO much for sharing this because it’s been really cathartically appealing to me. Seriously, in 6 sentences, you’ve summed up how the high school system is failing students no matter how much good it may do. The words to express my passion for this topic often seem to elude me; congrats to you skillfully doing exactly that.
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Wow. You are welcome, and thank you for your comments. I am gratified that my story resonates with you and at the same time sorry that it does. I wish schools could be a positive place for all students, certainly not a place where spirits and spark are crushed.
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