Liar Liar Pants on Fire

This blog is a day late, so just keep in mind that it should have been posted on Friday.

After two days off at staff development, it was hard to return to the chaos that is my class. I couldn't remember if it was Monday or Friday or ? I tried taking them to their normal Monday special, but I was wrong because it was Friday. Thank goodness they know where they are supposed to go.

But before specials, we had the Mini Metric Olympics. This was supposed to be a fun, hands-on, competitive event that had everyone active and practicing their measurement skills. What it actually did was show me how much my class can cheat and lie in order to win. The rules of the game were easy...estimate a measurement for the event (mass, distance, volume), complete the event, and then write the difference between their estimation and actual scores. Sounds simple enough, right? As I walk around checking on groups, I see many kids who have perfect guesses on multiple events. I wonder how in the world they managed one perfect guess, never mind multiple, especially when they've had such a problem understanding measurement in the past.
When I collected their score sheets in order to decide winners and those who would receive "medals", I noticed that a few students had a total difference of ZERO because they managed to guess correctly on EVERY event. I then say, "As I'm looking at these score cards, I'm noticing lots of estimations that were right one your actual score. When I tried these events, I know it was very difficult to estimate the exact answer, especially to the millimeter or centimeter. I feel it is near impossible to guess one correctly, never mind, all of them. I definitely know that that is IMPOSSIBLE. Because of this, I am going to set aside the score cards that had two or more perfect estimates and only consider the others for the medals." This caused lots of moans and groans but those who did complete the Olympics correctly thought it was a great idea. Those who knew they were wrong did not say anything, which was a good idea.

This has taught me that next year, I am going to work on my strategies in teaching this lesson in order to prevent cheating and lying in order to win a paper medal. But, for those who did win these medals were unimaginably happy..."I've never won anything before." (That's why I teach.)