caught cheating

It’s good that she got caught before it became a habit. I really don’t think it is terribly abormal to make this judgement error. I wouldn’t think that it defines her as a cheater unless she does it again. I think that for most kids the humiliation of being caught would be heart-breaking.
Terry

Time to de-emphasize grades as the be-all and end-all of schooling?

even if marks are not a huge pressure, the panic when anticipating possible failure can be crushing…leading us to do something without thinking it though. I agree it’s lucky you caught this…let her know that you understand her motivation, but that this is a choice that can cause WAY more pain than it is worth. The choice can be wrong, but we can still sympathize with the feelings that led to bad judgement, is what I am trying to say, I guess.

Don’t let her shame herself too much…she made a bad choice but that doesn’t make HER bad…sounds like teacher was wise and would not do this but some of us do it to ourselves…good luck!

Don’t feel too bad! I was talking with a mom the other day who has been studying to become a real estate appraiser and she confided that she failed one of the tests and then failed this same test two more times — and these last two times she cheated!!!!! I was kind of surprised she told me. She also said her children know she cheated, and although this upsets her, she is planning to take (and cheat!) on this test again.

The main thing I’ve always told my kids is I really don’t care how they do on tests. They just have to study and do their best. The main thing is not grades, but that they work towards learning the material. What you learn and what you get out it is what’s important. Cheating only cheats the student from learning.

If vocab is difficult for your daughter offer to help her with it. Try various learning methods to find out which might work best for her (visual, auditory, kinesthetic). For my son, who has difficulty with language and memory, we draw photos to help with this. For example: Geyser was a guy or “gey” standing over a hole in the groud and getting a “ser-prise” when the water shot up and hit him on the tush! Delta was a woman named delta holding a fan that had a stream running into it and decorated with silt and waterplants. We draw little pictures like these for all the words each week. And my son really enjoys this! Also, he went from getting every vocab word incorrect each week to getting practially all of them right! It has made a big difference.

Cheating is a result of not doing the work OR not being able to do the work(usually not beign able to). Can you identify which it is? Did she socialize instead of doing the homework or is doing the vocab work meanless because it doesn’t stick?

At 8th grade it might just be a “try it and see what happens situation”. I guess she found out!

The idea of help with vocab sounds like a winner. So does checking on her homework for awhile.

She’s always had a hard time in the beginning of each school year, transitions and all, but this blindsided me. I don’t understand what is going on with her.

Is the vocab list getting longer? It isn’t easy to memorize those lists and their lengthy definitions and some teachers also ask that the part of speech be memorized and the correct spelling. Not every brain can memorize that amount of information.

I always counsel parents not to be upset when something like this happens. If she didn’t care about school, she wouldn’t have bothered to do what she did - she cares enough about school and getting good grades to take a big risk.

but the risk didn’t work for her. I’d ask how I could help her with her vocab words - does she need a coach? flashcards? Someone to sit down with her and quiz her on the words?

And what class was her failing grade in? Sounds like that’s why she’s resorting to ‘cheating’ - she didn’t want more of those failing grades.

How do you know she isn’t doing her work? Students can work very hard these days and still fail. there’s often a lot of work to be done and sometimes more than they can get done. Ask her if she needs some support with her school work - if she’s starting to fail things, she might.

“I think these consequences will make an impact, but I need to know why she isn’t doing her work….and she is stonewalling me. I just don’t know what to do anymore.”

what other things are you referring to? One incident of cheating shouldn’t make you say “I just don’t know what to do anymore”.

Well gee, first she is threatened with being removed from an activity she likes and has some success in if she gets a single failing grade, and then she is threatened with a failing grade if she doesn’t do work that she finds difficult if not impossible — now why in the world would anyone in that situation ever think of cheating? I don’t find it hard to understand at all. What I do find hard to understand is people who claim to be professinal teachers thinking that constant threats are a way to motivate learning. Anybody there ever think of trying to make the work interesting and valuable to the student and encouraging her to try her best, work on her successes as well as her failures — exactly the opposite of the present system, where we take away her successes so she can spend more time failing — and develop internal motivation? Nah, we could never do anything that radical.