The Report Card

This is an okay book written by Andrew Clements. Nora always gets average grades so she can forgo the pressure-cooker gifted program. But when Nora gets fed up over testing and the fuss everyone makes about grades, she brings home a terrible report card just to prove a point. Pretty soon her teachers, parents, and the principal are launching a massive effort to find out what’s wrong. But Nora tries to convince them that tests alone aren’t a good measure of intelligence.

There are some bad things associated with grades, such as being stressed out, or focusing too much on the scores rather than the content. However, a popular alternative has been to say that all kids are the same and they should only be judged based on participation and subjective matters like self esteem. This is a dangerous precedent to set for later life, and teaches kids that knowledge, intelligence, and performance aren’t very important.