1926 report card had absurd criteria like 'whispers too much.' Today's kids wouldn’t stand a chance.

Many things we take for granted today were vastly different decades ago, a fact made clear when someone shared a report card from 1926. The grading system from nearly a century ago was unlike anything seen today. The X account Fascinating (@fasc1nate) posted a photo of the vintage report card, which assessed students on behaviors that would seem both amusing and unusual in the modern world.

The report card had three segments that included "attitude toward school work," "recitations" and "conduct." The first segment had metrics for characteristics like "indolent, wastes time, work is carelessly done, copies, gets too much help, gives up too easily, shows improvement and very commendable." The recitations segment was all about aspects like "comes poorly prepared, appears not to try, seldom does well, inattentive, promotion in danger, capable of doing much better, work shows a falling off, work of grade too difficult, showing improvement and very satisfactory." The final segment had pointers like "restless" and "inattentive." There were other hilarious markers like "inclined to mischief and whispers too much." Other factors were if the person was rude or not and if they annoyed others.

The report card tracked performance from September to June, and the student consistently received marks for "indolent," "wastes time," and "work is carelessly done." They only had the "shows improvement" marking in the month of November, and that too in the first two categories. They were also marked for being "restless and inattentive" and "inclined to mischief." The report card also said that the person "whispers too much and annoys others." The post ended up receiving more than 232k views and over 1.6k likes. People took to the comments section of the thread to express their thoughts on the marking system of the report card.

@DannerFoundation wrote, "In 3rd grade, I once got a 'P' on a report card. My Dad said, 'What the h*** is a P, what does that mean?' 'It’s on the other side, Dad.' 'Below grade level, but progressing? You mean if you work real damned hard you might someday get an F! Well, then just stay home…this is a waste of time. The teacher might just as well just admit they’re a putz! Can’t even teach a kid well enough to give them an F! What is this in?' 'Plays well with others.' 'Go outside and play with someone!' 'No. I don’t want to.' 'Well, you get an F in that! See, you’re improving already. Just stay home.'"

@Significast commented, "Look at the emphasis on prosocial competence. Makes our digital report cards today look so impersonal." @steweroid remarked, "Report cards used to come with personality reviews too? Imagine getting grounded for 'whispers too much.'" @gagamon81 shared, "Interesting how each section only has one positive description. All the others are negatives." @JohnnyJ31458195 expressed, "Little Timmy was hard at work in November, must have been working for extra sweet potatoes and the neck at his turkey dinner." @UncleRickBurner pointed out, "If parents are finding out how their child is doing in school through a report card... they are failing as a parent."