«The »palmas” are the points that the teacher gives during a lesson. The maximum score you can get for a lesson is 2 points, and these two points are not interchangeable. That’s the most important thing to understand first.
The first point is awarded for the child arriving at the lesson prepared, with the homework completed, and present for the lesson. The second point is awarded for what happens after the lesson begins: teachers reward for additional questions, work in pairs or groups, and for completing additional tasks.
How the evaluation system works
1. The child who did everything correctly gets two points.
2. A child who completes half of the task receives one point; there are two completely different ways to complete this half.
There are four main situations that cover practically everything that can happen during a student’s time of study, and the differences between them form the essence of the reward system:
- If the homework is completed and the child works on the lesson, he/she gets two points.
- If homework is not completed, but the child is present in the class and participates in it, he/she receives one point.
- If the homework is completed and the child sits quietly in class from start to finish, he or she also receives one point.
- If the child does not fulfill any of the conditions, no points will be awarded.
Distribution of points
The left circle is homework, the right one is work during class.
There is another additional case that deserves to be known about, and parents are most often interested in it: a child who completed their homework but was unable to come to the lesson still receives one point for the homework. And this very point actually has more importance than it might seem at first glance.
A missed lesson does not cancel out the hard work a child has already put in, which means that a week in the hospital or a trip to grandma's or grandpa's house costs parents much less than they assume.
How points are awarded
«The Palms accumulate on the achievements map, and as the total count grows, the child moves from one league to the next; however, no one needs to be informed about this. Each move opens access to something new in the personal account; typically, it’s a set of puzzles, games, or logic exercises. The child sees the new item appear, and the gift is tied specifically to the move to the new league; it’s not given on a specific day, so they can choose when to receive it. With the collection of the first 10 Palms, a separate reward is provided that doesn’t measure the total number of points, but the effort put in: the child who reaches that level doesn’t lose any Palms.
All the palm trees that can be collected
What most families overlook
The points for each subject are added together!
Take, for example, Russian language, mathematics, and chess: in the personal account, there are not three separate calculations, which means that all results are recorded on one card, and therefore a child who behaves calmly in one subject and actively in another still steadily progresses. It turns out that when attending two or more courses, the transition to the next level happens twice as fast.
In fact, this is the most important thing to know about our reward system, and it’s the part that parents learn about last.
Upon completion of the course, a certificate of the appropriate level is issued, and it only indicates that the course was completed, not what happened during the learning process. In addition to awards and certificates, the school also gives out certificates for things that are difficult to put into a score sheet: diligent completion of homework over several months, good attendance, punctuality, and continued participation in classes. These are awarded to students whose achievements cannot be reflected through points; that is, a child may have a small number of points, but at the same time, for example, they never missed a class on Tuesdays.
For parents
The main goal of the reward system is to make the efforts made visible. In reality, it is much more complicated than it seems, because the specifics of online learning do not involve the personal interaction between the teacher and the parents, and therefore the latter cannot understand the teacher’s reaction to their child’s activity or passivity, as it happens in the familiar format of traditional education. The «palms» are a confirmation that your child asked questions in February or decided to complete a more challenging task in March. It is important to understand that points are measured precisely by activity, not by abilities or knowledge!
But there are two things that parents should avoid:
| What to avoid | Why |
|---|---|
| Asking about the number of points after each lesson | This turns the lesson into a competition, and the child starts to focus solely on the number, rather than on the work. |
| Comparing the final results between brothers and sisters | You are comparing two different subjects, two different teachers, and most importantly, two different temperaments, which will yield no benefit whatsoever. |
Instead, it’s best to ask about what happened in class and what you liked about it today: this way you can increase the child’s concentration during the lessons, and the number of points will be accumulated automatically without any supervision.
For children
Do your homework!
This half depends entirely on you; it is taken into account even on the week when you cannot attend the lesson, and it is never dependent on how you behaved in the classroom.
And there is another half that is somehow forgotten — it’s the classroom discussions where it’s easier to keep quiet, but for every week you stay quiet, you lose one point. Ask questions that you were going to keep to yourself, work in pairs, try to do a more complex exercise, and the teacher will add one more point to you for that. If you just sit quietly in the class you’ve prepared for, you’ll only get one point out of two.
Let’s stipulate that this is simply the most common case where you lose a point without even noticing it, but it is by no means a punishment for shyness.
Courses at Palme School
Russian for Bilinguals
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Materials
Handouts for home activities
Frequently Asked Questions
Two. One is for completing homework and attending classes, the other is for active participation in class.
If the homework was completed, the grade for it will still be counted. A missed lesson does not cancel out the work that has already been done.
No. They accumulate on the achievements map and help the child progress from one league to the next. Upon reaching a certain number of «Palms,» the child receives a separate reward that does not reduce the current total score.
Yes, and this surprises most families. The Russian language, drawing, and chess all contribute to the same overall score, so a child who attends two courses progresses about twice as fast.
Palme School: Conversation School · Russian Language for Bilingual Kids · Print and make
Lili Rozberg has been teaching for sixteen years: first English in Russia, now Russian to bilingual children in the USA and Canada. In the Palme School blog, she writes about the home language, reading, and what school grades don’t show.
