Are we exasperating our students/children?

According to the report done by Education Commission (EC), the reformed education system would have no-losers in the classroom. However, teachers in Hong Kong tend to assess and reward their students based on their achievement. For example, teacher rank their students and the top 3 students are only ones who get the praise of the teacher, which may cause the other students to feel like failures. Therefore, to truly create an environment that produces no-losers we need to change the way teachers assess and reward their students. Jesus Christ was the greatest educator. He was able to take 12 ordinary people and changed their lives in such a way that they spent their lives spreading the teachings of Christ. If we, as educators, follow Jesus’ teaching method, we would not only be achieving what the Education commission has set out in its report but also impact our students’ lives the way Jesus impacted his disciples. Hence, an important question to answer is how did Christ create such a dramatic change in these people's lives?

The Parable of the Talents found in Matthew 25:14-30 gives a glimpse into what Christ did with His disciple to create such a drastic change. In this parable, there is a master who was going on a journey but before he left, he entrusted his three servants with 5 talents, 2 talents and 1 talent respectively. On his return each servant presented the investment and the money they had gain. The servants who receive 5 and 2 talents presented 10 and 4 talents whereas the other servant just present the talent he was given.  The servants, who double their master's money, were praised for being a good and faithful servant; however, the other servant was rebuked for being wicked and lazy.  The master did not care about how much he had gain but the attitudes of his servants.    I believe Jesus did the same thing with His disciples. He praised them for their attitude and not the results of their work. In Mark 6:7-32, Jesus sent His disciples to tell people they should repent and on their return they report what they had done.  However, Jesus didn’t praise them at all but ask them to go to a secluded place and rest for while since there were many people coming and going, and they did not even have time to eat.

The Hong Kong students are motivated to get the A. However, traditionally an A emphasized student’s achievement but if we change the meaning of A to represent student’s attitude then we can have the whole class receiving As. We could have a letter grade follow by a number where the letter grade represents the student’s attitude and the number represents student’s performance (A – great attitude; B – average attitude; C – poor attitude; 1 – knows 80% or more of the material; 2 – knows 70% or more of the material; 3 – knows 60% or more of the material; 4- knows 50% or more of the material and 5 – knows less than 50% of the material). For example, a bright student will a poor attitude would get a C1 and a low achieving student who has a great attitude would get an A4.

With this system of grading we would not only be creating a class with no-losers but also training students to have an important life skill, which is also part of EC’s report on how the new Hong Kong’s education system should bring.