It’s report card time for MacKenzie. She did fabulous, with 3s and 4s across the board. (A 3 is “meets grade level” and a 4 is “above grade level.”) In the reading and writing, she pulled all 4s with nice comments like, “has sophisticated reading skills and is able to comprehend complex reading texts.”

All 3s and 4s. Except one. She got a 2 in “Respects the rights and feelings of others; cooperates.” After we praised for the great results, I asked her if she had any idea why DW would signify her as a 2 in that one area. She said, “well, probably because of the fights on the playground.”

Fights?

“Okay, just one,” she said. And she proceeded to tell me a story I had heard before about Emma wanting to play on the parallel bar, but Kenzie was there first. Emma got upset, called DW, and Kenzie felt like she got the short end of the stick. Having talked to her before about trying to see the other side, we talked about what Emma might have seen. I thought she got it. She said, “Emma always played on that bar and I could see why she didn’t want me on it.”

So, Cindy asked her, “what would you do differently next time?”

Kenzie said, “I’d say, ‘Oh, Emma, you can have the bar on the NEXT recess.’ There are two recesses every day.”

I do believe DW may have graded this one appropriately.

Although I might challenge the grading criteria. If they had one that was titled, “stands up for herself consistently” or “resists being pushed around,” I’m sure Kenzie would have gotten a 4.