Here’s the snapshot I took of a board that a student worked on for close to an hour while testing on constant velocity. In the process, she worked out how to represent the good ideas she had about motion in a more mathematical form (graphs), and I think she saw that she can be successful by persisting in this class. It was really fun to work with her that afternoon.
Hooray for Standards-Based Grading—because she had more chances to master the material, she had the time (no homework) and the motivation (grade reflects final mastery, not an average of points) to keep working on these ideas until she really got them.