Chapter 1

When the driver brought my daughter, Holly Ramirez, home, I had just finished making stew. It was rare for me to have time to cook, and I thought she'd be pleased to come home to a hot meal. But when I called her name a few times, she didn't rush into my arms like she usually did. Instead, she headed straight for her bedroom.

"What's going on?" I opened the door, and she slowly lifted her head from the pillow. Her eyes were red and swollen. Before I could even blink, tears were already rolling down her cheeks.

"Mom, tell me the truth... Is my drawing really that bad?"

I froze for a moment, and immediately thought of her weekend assignment. The school had said the task was to help develop children's all-around abilities—moral, intellectual, physical, artistic, and labor skills. But for a child who barely knew how to write her letters, this type of assignment was less about helping them and more about giving parents extra work.

I worked in a field related to art, so drawing something like a hand-drawn poster came easily to me. But Holly had insisted on doing it all on her own.

"I can do it myself. I like drawing! I'm going to work hard and become a great artist like you when I grow up!"

Maybe because she had been surrounded by my artwork, Holly's drawing, though a bit rough, showed promise in its color choices, composition, and overall aesthetic. At her age, it was already impressive. So, I praised her honestly, offering constructive feedback. This gave her a huge boost of confidence. After carefully framing her artwork, she eagerly awaited Monday's arrival.

Like most kids, she was hoping for some praise from her teacher. But seeing her in this state now, I realized things may not have gone as she expected.

I patted her head gently. "What happened? Did the teacher criticize you, or did a classmate say something?" It didn't take much to get her to burst into tears, throwing herself into my arms.

"When Ms. Keller checked the assignments today, she said I wasn't being serious and threw my drawing into the trash! She even said if I keep doing assignments like this, she'll ask you to see her at school!"

My first instinct was to wonder if there had been some misunderstanding, since kids didn't always relay things accurately. After calming her down, I opened my phone, planning to speak with the teacher directly. But then, I saw a flurry of new messages in the parent group.

Ursula Keller wrote, [Here are the excellent assignments from this hand-drawn poster project!]

She attached a few snapshots.

[The following are careless assignments, and I hope parents of these students can help ensure their children take the task seriously!

[To avoid affecting other parents' perceptions, I won't post the full list here.]

As an example, she quickly added a few images. Then, she tagged the parents of the so-called careless students.

To my shock, Holly and I were both named in the list of students being criticized by Ursula! Among the many responses acknowledging receipt, I noticed the outstanding works were either drawn by parents or heavily assisted by them. In contrast, the works marked as "careless" were all done solely by the kids.

I couldn't sit still after reading this. I became the only parent to interrupt the flow with a message.

[Excuse me, what are the criteria for judging whether a work is excellent or not?

[Just because the assignment was done by the child themselves, does that mean it should be considered careless?]