We have homeschooled our boys now for eight years. They are in the fifth and sixth grades and this year and it is our first year of grading.

The only things we graded prior to this year were spelling tests and math. However, those grades were not compiled anywhere nor kept. If they missed a spelling word it simply needed to be rewritten ten times. Anything wrong on math would be gone over again.

As they aged I have noticed a markedly increased lack of caring about how they perform in school. Again, they are boys in the fifth and sixth grades. Not surprising.

I had hoped that adding a grading system this year would help them to understand why effort in school is important. Give them a few years working with it before they hit high school.

I defined how each subject would be graded and what the grading breakdown would be. They had a system that showed what their effort (or lack there of) would look like in a grade.

Every so often I would add up their scores and let them know what grade they were at. They always seemed interested but not to the extent that it affected their work. A discussion with the principal was needed.

Nicholas’ report card.

Nicholas

Our boys are smart boys. That has never been the problem. Lack of effort is the problem. We believe that intelligence is something that you are born with. It can be improved upon. However, effort and persistence is probably more important. Maybe you were not born with a natural skill at math. With effort and persistence you can improve in that area.

Joshua’s report card.

Joshua

So, how to get them to apply their natural smarts and add to it by working hard, asking for help and persevering until it is learned/understood?

Our answer….money. We decided that since the real world rewards a job well done, success takes hard work, and advancement in a career is performance based, our boys needed some tangible “reward” for going above and beyond in their school work.

We decided that there would be no payment for any D or F. We would pay $1 for each C grade. For each B they would get $5. For each A…….$20! Michael is so great at stuff like this. I was thinking $10 for a B and $20 for an A. His idea was he wanted to teach them that with more effort their reward would be significantly increased.

Since we homeschool year round I broke the year into three semesters. Christmas break ended the first semester. I spent a significant amount of time on Sunday putting their report cards together. Can I just say to all my family and friends who are teachers…..Wow, report cards take a lot of work! Figuring out how to grade something….takes a lot of work! Let’s hear a round of applause for teachers. It’s isn’t an easy job and there is a lot of take home work.

We presented the boys with their report cards Sunday evening. I liked that they were not happy with any grade lower than a B. I also liked that without any extra effort they both came away with a very good GPA. Michael also announced that a GPA of 3.5 or higher will earn another $20.

Then we told them about the money. They were amazed at how much they were getting. So were we. Both of them are receiving around $100 each.

The result? They are motivated. I included the GPA for each grade showing them that with a little more effort a higher grade is not that far away.

Parenting is a lot of hard work. Recognizing what a specific problem is and then trying to find a solution for it. We pray. We seek advice, but a lot of parenting is simply trial and error. We are going to give this a try. If it doesn’t work then back to the drawing board. If their reaction to their first report cards and the reward is any clue then I think it will work nicely.

I will keep you updated as to whether this results in more effort and caring about their school work.

Have a very Merry Christmas,

Karen