LittleMan has graduated. At age 6. Who knew it would happen so quickly? Okay, fine - it isn't a REAL graduation. He is going from Kindergarten to 1st grade.
I'm reminded of a quote from Mr. Incredible in "The Incredibles" - "They keep creating ways to celebrate mediocrity."
If it isn't bad enough to have the children don caps and march to "Pomp and Circumstance", they are also given awards. Now, I would love for these awards to mean something, but they don't really. You see, every child in Kindergarten graduates and receives at least one award. The only time you are allowed to have more than one award is if you won the coveted "Perfect Attendance" award.
So, the bottom line is that we don't care how well you are doing at school as long as you show up.
Every child received one of these four awards:
- Honors in English
- Honors in Math
- Excellent Citizenship
- Excellent Effort
LittleMan received "better than average" scores for both English and Math, but they can't give him more than one award. That would be... unfair - perhaps accurate, but unfair to those children who earned no award (but are given the catch-all-award, Excellent Effort). So, LittleMan received the Honors in English award. Yay.
I genuinely don't understand the point of this ceremony. Are we celebrating their attendance? Are we celebrating their progress? Are we celebrating their existence? Frankly, it all seems pointless. The kids don't seem to get the importance of it other than ceremonies are important.
Whatever.
I decided to shut up and enjoy the moment too.
The happy graduate.
Self-posed graduate.
BoopaLoop is such a great little sister. She handled the 1 1/2 hour ceremony (1 hour wait and then the ceremony) without a single complaint!
Grandma and BoopaLoop
LittleMan walks the aisle with pride.
The best part - hanging out at your favorite lunch spot with family. Congratulations, LittleMan... for something!
3 comments:
Oh man, they have kindergarten graduations?!? Nuts. One more thing I get to look forward to.
At least the pics are adorable. Especially the last one with the enourmouse grin. Was he saying cheese?
Congrats!? I missed the official kindergarten graduation with my little guy, the teachers at our school had given up doing them years ago. They just did a circle time, and got their official ""done with kindergarten certificate". So funny about the awards. It's this fine line that we walk in schools, where we want kids to feel good about themselves, but at the same time teach them about the rewards of hard work (or the truth, that sometimes some kids are just born with different talents). My sister (another teacher!) just got this book called- The Narcissism Epidemic Living in the Age of Entitlement- all about the generation of "too much self-esteem". Sounds riveting :). Phew, sorry for long comment. :)
We don't even have a kinder graduation here. Just a "learning celebration", where each K class sang a song about something they learned this year, and then we were handed a folder with all their work from the year. Over and done, no betters or worses or dubious awards.
So move here already. :)
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