DD accused of cheating at school

[Grizzzly]

DD (11) is working on a school project with another girl in her class. The kids have been paired up by the teacher and the kids got no say on who they had to work with.

DD is quite academic and enjoys her school work and is very much enjoying this project. The other girl however is not on the same page, she isn’t interested in it and when the girls meet up after school to work on it the other girl just wants to watch YouTube videos or play games.

The bits the other girl has managed to do are (in DDs worse) “scruffy and incorrect”. DD has got frustrated and has redone the other girls work but still credited it to the other girl.

the teacher picked up on this and said she could tell DD had written what was meant to be written by the other girl. She questioned the girls, showed them the “suspicious work” and the other girl said “I didn’t do that”. DD then had to admit that she’d done it. She got into a lot of trouble and then told the teacher “well I don’t want to be held back by her, I want to win”. This got her into more trouble.

AIBU to side with DD on this? The best project wins a prize and will have their work displayed.

I would back my daughter on that one, but can't see why it would be classed as cheating anyway.

Were specific rules laid out to stop them doing this?

I can’t see why that’s classed as cheating. Working together didn’t go too well so your daughter proof read and edited the work.
Does make you think why the teacher put them together, intentional to get your daughter to inspire/encourage a less able/less motivated pupil? She’s not in school to do the teacher’s job. I’d back your daughter and have a word with the teacher.

Yes kind of, they had to each contribute to each section of the project and highlight who had wrote what. The idea was to show they had worked together.

My DD hated assigned group work in years 7-9... it felt like a poor strategy to ensure the weaker, lazier, poorly behaved kids were kept in line by those who wanted to produce good work / get good marks. She is so much happier in year 10 where its much more individual. While learning to work with other people is important, there are huge disadvantages to those who feel like they have to pick up the slack, especially if they are also introverts.

I think at 11, saying you ‘don’t want to be held back’ to another 11 year old is very harsh. If the other child has some SEN, then it makes it even worse. Whilst I can empathise with your dd slightly, I’d be pretty annoyed if a pupil in my class did this to another pupil. I’d expect her to come and talk to me first about any difficulties they’re having. In saying that, I’d never pair up pupils to do a project at home anyway.
Where did they do this work?

This is appalling teaching. I teach secondary and we would never base our assessments on group work, it’s outdated and unfair.

Slight caveat: GCSE Music students do an ensemble performance, but individual students’ marks are never affected by others’ mistakes (in fact, they get credit for adjustments they make).

I would have a strong word with the teacher.

'Cheating' is not how I would put it, but she hasn't followed the rules.

I don’t think it’s unreasonable for the teacher to raise it with them for discussion. Is it dd who has said she was in a ‘lot of trouble’ because I might take that with a pinch of salt if it was my dd and only getting her description of it. Her perception of being in trouble might be quite a low threshold if she is a well behaved child.

The point of the assignment seems to have been to learn how to work with others. In the work world, not everyone has the same skills, backgrounds, interest levels etc. The real skill your daughter was meant to learn was how to encourage a peer without doing the work herself. The skill her teammate was meant to learn was how to receive feedback and help from a peer. Both have failed to learn the key skill.

So your daughter is in trouble for doing more work? I'd 100% be backing her up here, especially if there's a prize. Of course she wants to win.

I think this really depends what instructions they were given at the outset.
Was it

A. Go and work on this project with your partner to produce X.
Or was it
B. divide up the work and each do part of the project?

Does your DD know which it was? Did the teacher make the instructions clear enough?

Everyone knows if it's A some people will just sit back and let the others do or fix everything so that's fine in this case. Happens in workplace all the time.
If it's B then your DD should have let the other child produce her own work and should not have "fixed" it.

I have DC1 in 1st yr at university and she's just handed in a group assignment. They had to draw up and submit a plan early on with who was doing what part. Although it's an overall mark for the group, each of the 4 is given feedback on their part.

Whatever the outcome this a lesson to your daughter that teachers can tell whether a piece of work has been completed by a particular child! Everyone has their own style and expected level of performance

The point of the assignment seems to have been to learn how to work with others.

exactly, the project was a paired work project. They are being assessed on how they worked together. Your dd removed the other girls work and handed in her own work only. That wont win no matter how good it is as it wasnt the assignment.

In the degree I am just finishing, group marks were lower if it appeared it was done by one or two, rather than the full group. Because we were meant to be working on it together.

I'd imagine she should have explained her issues to the teacher earlier, or encouraged her work partner more, rather than doing it all herself. It negates the point of a group project (which teaches more than just the project produced; it's comunication, motivation and working together too). I'm not sure I'd call it 'cheating', but nor has she actually done the task as asked.

In yr6 my DS was paired up with a very academic boy for a project. In parents evening his teacher disappointingly told me my DS had sat back and let the other boy do all the work. My DS justified this quite happily by other boy enjoying it and doing well so no point him trying 😂. So it's not really healthy , productive exercise for either party including less academic child.

At 11, if that's the case they need to be told that that's what they're being marked on. A child doing their first project where they're told there's a prize for the best project isn't going to know that.

It's also unfair to offer a prize if one party won't pull their weight.

Your DD showed that she couldn't work with the other girl, did she highlight the bits she rewrote as being written by the other girl? That's the only way it could have been thought of as cheating.

I don't think calling her a 'cheat' is helpful.

but she didn't follow the rules, which if the teacher hadn't noticed, could have given them a significant advantage. They were competing as a 'team' with work from both, it's not fair on the other teams that she did all the presentation work when they had to include the work of the least strong team member.

it's a bloody stupid basis for a prize.

id be taking it up with someone above the class teacher.

She did cheat though didnt she? The rules were clear and she put in work, lying saying the other person did it.

She is young and I understand her/your frustration, but instead of being upset at what she had rightly been accused of, talk to her about what she was supposed to learn from a project working with other people and why it was important. The working together piece was as important, if not more than, the project content.

It's ridiculous that tittle tattling is considered a better option than 'just getting on with it for the group hood' & she even had the decency to credit the other girl with the work.

at 11, not understanding that making the presentation of the other girls work (whilst crediting her for the content) should have got her an explanation, not been accused of cheating!

The problem here is that the teacher offered a prize for the best project. That was wrong. Even adults would struggle with missing out on a reward because their colleagues work wasn't to the same standard, but the teacher is expecting an 11 year old to have the maturity to be okay with it.

Learning to work together is important since this is a skill she will need in adult life, but the teacher ought to have made it clear that they will only be assessed on their own contributions, so there is no incentive to do more or less than their own share. And learning to work with others is a skill which isn't instantly acquired, so there should be some tolerance for that.

I do have some sympathy for the teacher here because these pairing are a nightmare. The kids do need to do group work but it's so hard to get the mix right. The teacher doesn't want all the 'clever' kids together because they won't learn co operation or how to cope with members whose skills are different. Otoh, the teacher won't want to make the hardworking kids responsible for dragging up those who won't participate. The teacher probably does lots of mixes and this time it hasn't worked out.

If this was the instruction before starting then she has cheated and if she claimed a section was written by someone it wasn’t then she has also lied.

Additionally the other child will also suffer as now has no work of her own to be marked and cannot receive feedback from the teacher to help her learn for future projects.

That said can totally empathise with your daughter’s frustration during the project and desire for success. I think a really useful learning opportunity for developing life skills here - don’t let her be bitter about it, help her to find ways of getting the best out of others for future projects!

Yes kind of, they had to each contribute to each section of the project and highlight who had wrote what. The idea was to show they had worked together. then yes she cheated. She would be thrown out of uni for that. If she had a problem with the person she was working with she should have spoken to the teacher for advice. I do absolutely hate these sort of things though as it's never all the kids that want to do well that are put together.

Step back from the work/assessment side - there's an honesty issue here. Your daughter has lied to the teacher "in order to win". I'd expect the response to be light touch/guidance - she's an 11 year old who wanted to do well - and needs it explaining what the right thing to do would be. And (if there is one "winner") it's probably not fair to make this assignment "win" when only one person has really contributed.

All of this could be put nicely, and it's hard to tell from the OP whether the DD has been berated and is in trouble, or has had her feelings hurt after this being pointed out to her after so much effort.

Your DD will go places in life! I wouldn't worry too much unless there are repercussions from this in school.

The teacher was rather silly was she not.
To pair a highly compeditive academically minded child with a child with no interest the project and then set a Prize.

If its a team building exercise don't give marks or prizes for the quality of the content.

Did the teacher expected the 11 year olds to learn how to work together. DD gave the other child credit for the work she did. How is your daughter's skill level at organiaing, negotiation and conflict resolution? Do these skills need work? If that was the objective the teacher picked the wrong method to achive that.

I would point out that your child will encounter forced teaming in the workplace. So you could approach this as if the teacher is her manager, but DD and teacher work for the organisation as a whole. How could DD organise delivery of another employee's work output when she has no ability to manage the other employee?
How should she deal with the other employee delivering work output that was sub par?
If your DD was looking to be recognised / promoted as a result of a sucessful project how should she deal with the manager's decisions (from the time of allocating the work to her and the other employee to when the project was delivered)?

She did the changes to submit a better project I would strongly object to her being punished for having ambition and pride in her work output but maybe her people (teacher and other student) managment skills needs a little help.