Ben Can Spell Relief with a B

Ben's first high school exam week starts tomorrow, so a few days ago we went onto the school website that allows students to check their progress.

We'd been meaning to do this for quite a while, but between Ben not having his password and me forgetting . . . here we were just a few days before final exams . . . finding out Ben was barely passing math with 53 percent.

Since Ben had told me several times that his math class was quite chaotic and that his teacher had some difficulty managing the group, I knew he might not have been at his usual "B," but I was kind of surprised to see such a low C-. He also had a C+ in English. Yikes!

It would not be exaggerating to say there was a bit of panic, not just on my part but on Ben's as well. Some kids might count on a final exam to help them squeak by in such situations, but I didn't think this would be the case with Ben. 

We made a plan for Ben to talk to his teachers the next morning, and I started looking up information about summer school. I also wrote his math teacher a note asking him to let me know if Ben had assignments he could catch up on or re-do. 

I spent a restless night worrying about all these things and hoping that things would turn out alright for my firstborn. I wondered if it had been a mistake to send him back to school, rather than keeping him at the virtual school where I could be more involved with his education. I questioned whether a chaotic arts school was the right fit for him. I thought about how neglectful I'd been with checking his progress online or asking about his assignments. I wondered why I hadn't done more to help earlier.

The next morning Ben and I reviewed the plan about talking to his teachers, and then I sent him into school. I asked him to call me if he could and told him I would come in after school to meet with both teachers if he thought it would help. I thought of little else all day. 

Finally I pulled up at the school, and Ben hopped in the car.

Me: "So . . . how did things go?"

Ben: "I actually have a B in math."

Me: "WHAT?!?"

Ben then explained that his teacher hadn't entered grades yet for some of his completed assignments. Ben had also retaken some quizzes throughout the semester, and his teacher had not updated his scores. 

We went home and double checked online. Sure enough, everything Ben had reported was true. With the new scores, he had a solid B, and his teacher told him that even if he got every question wrong on the test, he would still pass the course.

We had similar glad tidings concerning Ben's English grade. He'd missed an assignment while he'd been sick in November, so once his teacher removed that, he was doing even better in English than in math.

He's spent this weekend working on an art project, for another class where he is sitting at a solid B.

So, even though he's still a little stressed going into his first high school exam week, he is under nowhere near as much pressure as he thought he'd be, just a few days ago. Such a relief!