A 7th grader recently shared his experience in a blog post, Dear Report Cards, You Suck, that exemplifies a major challenge with assessment procedures and reporting of what students know and can do. He says he realized that he is actually a B student, not a D student (which can make a huge difference in the trajectory of one’s life) because of how he got to show what he knew and how his work was assessed.

The only reason you can easily read this is because of my best friend, spell check. My spelling difficulties make my handwriting hard to read. In the past, I’ve done most of my writing in a textbook without revisions. So, of course I was going to get a D.
Having access to technology has changed my world. Being able to type my work and click on a red line to fix a wrong word has suddenly made my work correct. Feedback is another extremely helpful tool. When I was stuck or when I’m just finished, I used feedback to fix the things that were wrong or to add things that I may not have thought of. Feedback is an awesome tool!

Contrary to his profound learning experience, we have this notion that pervades many of our policies and procedures in education that “work” needs to be perfect when it’s turned in when sometimes it’s the first time that the teacher has seen it and there is no opportunity for feedback or revision but the assignment is graded, recorded, and we move on.

Is it the Quality of the Handwriting or the Ideas that Matter?

Not long ago I had a friend tell me that her son was struggling in school because he had poor handwriting.  I didn’t think much of it at the time until my son started having to write more and more and I watched him struggle because of his handwriting. He has always loved to “write books” but as the focus on spelling, grammar and penmanship increased, he began to fight writing anything. I struggle because I know that it’s important for his words to be legible, accurately spelled, and correctly punctuated to effectively communicate his ideas. I also know this these skills are only a small portion of what matters and that what he thinks and what he does with his ideas matter more.  
Because of this, I have been thinking a lot about how a focus on handwriting and spelling impacts how students are seen by their teachers and the connection to their own academic confidence and success. Since handwriting and spelling are what people see on the surface, it’s not uncommon for students to be judged by the quality of their by handwriting or what one can do in a first draft. Yet, when we organize classrooms and learning experiences this way, we communicate that intelligence is fixed and that you either know something or you don’t, not that we can improve with effort and time and feedback.
The Importance of Building Confidence
Strong skills are built by experience, success, feedback, support, and encouragement (just think of learning to walk and talk and pretty much everything else), which also builds confidence and identities as learners and communicators. Yet, I wonder how the focus on perfect grammar, spelling, and penmanship distract and discourage people from developing as writers and creative thinkers? 
In Culturize, Jimmy Casas shared his own struggle with writing that had held him back throughout his education and the impact it still has on his identity as a writer.

I lost confidence in my reading and writing way back in elementary school, and I still struggle to write today. In fact, struggle might be too soft a word to describe it. It’s more like agonize over it. I literally freeze up and can find myself spending hours sitting and producing nothing. Like many of our students whom we have identified as slow learners who continue to struggle in the areas of reading and writing, I often feel like giving up whenever I sit down to write. For years I lacked the necessary skills to read at high levels or write at proficient level due to my gaps in learning.

In spite of his “learning gaps”, he is an accomplished educator, leader, speaker AND author of multiple books. Jimmy’s lack of confidence in his own writing makes me wonder how many students have similar experiences and never have teachers or mentors that show them that good writing takes time, practice, revision and often lots of spell check and editing from other people. How many amazing ideas are we missing out on because people have lost their confidence in (or never developed ) their ability to write?
Technical skills are important but if they are prioritized over opportunities to build confidence, practice, and bring our own passions to what we write, what will they matter? The truth is the technical skills matter but you have to be able to do something with them- especially today where you can type (and spell check) anything you want. I’ll end with an amazing question and insight from this 7th grader, “Is it fair to say that a child’s writing is D worthy when the main problem with it is the spelling? When you get past that, it could be really good. So don’t judge a book by its cover.”