Home | How It Works | Stats Login | Register         Case: Thumbs Down I was observing a class of first graders a few years back and the teacher had the students all sitting on the floor around her. She had them come up to the board one at a time and answer a math question. She would then ask the class if they thought the answer was right or wrong and they were supposed to be indicate by giving the child a thumbs up or thumbs down signal. I was student teaching then and it just struck a nerve in me that a first grade teacher would have an entire class giving a child thumbs down if they were wrong. This seemed very emotionally disturbing to me. Does anyone do this or find a problem with this with students that are so young? Solution: (Rates are posted for this solution!) I can definitely seen how it would strike a nerve with you because I agree, that we never want the children to feel as if they are "wrong" as this will discourage them in the long run and make them feel "dumb" and "inadequate". The teacher should have positioned it with something like, "if you disagree with this answer, I want to hear a reason for why" or "I want to hear how someone got to a different answer." Wording it could make all the difference.