by Judi Kesselman-Turkel and Franklynn Peterson
Some students are grade-wise. They get A's from the toughest teachers.
But few students know how to turn a 78 into a 91. Since no school offers a course in Creative Gradesmanship, some very smart students keep getting so-so marks.
We spoke to teachers around the country who had been called tough graders by former students. They gave us nearly a dozen easy ways to up your grades. Following through on one lone tip could raise your marks a few points. Doing all eleven could work wonders.
1. "Be there," said Cleveland Heights, Ohio, foreign language teacher Ariane Vardon. "It may seem obvious, but many top students think they can skip class. I can't reward rudeness with an A."
2. "Look alert," said Wilmington, Del., chemistry instructor Joseph Hansen. "I can actually name the A and F students within a week after the term starts. The A's look as if they know what's going on. The F's look like their minds are on something else."
3. "Don't be afraid to show your ignorance by guessing or asking questions," said math department chair Donald G. McCloskey of Madison, Wis. "If you look at the work of Descartes, Gauss, and all those smarties, we only know their successes. Nobody catalogued their wrong guesses, but I'll bet there were many."
But don't pull guesses out of a hat, he adds. "Grade A students build their hunches on a base of facts."
Philosophy and English teacher Laura A. Watkins (of Washington, D.C.) said her A students are the ones who point out the holes in theories. "It's not quantity that gets A's, not hack work like copying a lot of pages from somewhere. It's showing intellectual curiosity."
4. "Follow instructions," said Mrs. William S. Disbrow, a German teacher in Westfield, N.J. Turn in assignments the day they're due. If you're asked for five hundred words, don't write fifty -- or five thousand.
Why? Social studies teacher Robert Schlichter of Granada Hills, Cal., told us good teachers go to a lot of trouble devising techniques that'll help you learn. If you don't follow instructions, you won't learn as much as you could.
5. "Watch details," said Sister Mary Kathleen Stefani, a science and math teacher in Billings, Mont. "It's attention to details that separates A students from B's." In math, watch for careless errors in addition and subtraction. Check for transposed numbers and signs, like a plus where you meant to put a minus. In English, don't write there for their or it's for its.
6. "Always do more than the minimum," said English instructor Bill Heyde of St. Louis, Mo. Mrs. Disbrow agrees: "I might turn a 90 into an 88 if I don't see a student coming in with extra work. I'm trying to prepare young folks for living, not for maneuvering. Grade A students act responsibly and independently."
7. "Participate in class," suggests David Facini, a social studies teacher in Wilton, Conn. "If you sit in the back and look bored, your grade will certainly drop a little." But teachers expect more than a small show of interest. "A students listen attentively to others, offer comments and ask questions that generate participation from others."
8. "Write legibly," said Susan Schneider, a Farmingdale, N.Y. English instructor. "When I can't read what's written, I begin to assume it must be wrong, no matter how hard I try to keep attitudes out of the picture."
"If you can't write legibly, take a typing course," advises Charlotte Hess, instructor of government and journalism in Sycamore, Ill. "Teachers would like to be eternally consistent and fair, but they have good and bad days. Anything a student does to make life easier -- like turning in a typed paper -- is bound to result in a few extra grade points. With some teachers, it could raise a course mark an entire grade."
9. "Make good priorities," said mathematics teacher Patricia H. Tubbs of Bethesda, Md. "Don't try to study while watching TV."
10. "Increase your vocabulary," said William Currier, an English instructor in Duluth, Minn. "Some students miss A's because they don't understand words in textbooks and are too lazy to look them up." (The Vocabulary Builder, $6.95 from University of Wisconsin Press, teaches over 600 useful new words the practically painless way, using puzzles and quizzes.)
11. "Take better notes," advises history teacher Chet F. Guilmet of Birmingham, Mich. He checks notes for clarity, completeness, legibility -- and selectivity. "Too many students take down everything. The A kids know how to sift out the important points and disregard the trivia."
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Most of the preceding tips were taken from the Study Smart Series by Judi Kesselman-Turkel and Franklynn Peterson, which is used in schools and colleges through the U.S. and Europe. Published by the University of Wisconsin Press, each book of the eight-book series is sold through bookstores at $6.95. The series includes Secrets to Writing Great Papers, Test-Taking Strategies, Note-Taking Made Easy, Research Shortcuts, Spelling Simplified, The Grammar Crammer, The Vocabulary Builder and Study Smarts.