Oh no!!!!! It's BMM!

I've recently been told, through the grapevine, that my 8th grade students think I'm a hard grader. This is coming from my STUDENT MENTORS who are turning in 5-sentence reflections rife with spelling and grammar errors. I told them that their new goal is to get rid of their bare-minimum mindset, and that has become my new mantra in their classes.

Well, it's late, and I've been grading for a few hours now while my pile doesn't seem to be getting much smaller. That's making me feel like I just might go crazy. So when I graded one students' barely legible 5-sentence reflection, I wrote the following letter to him:

Dear ______,

Oh no! I think you need to see a doctor quick because you seem to be suffering from BMM!! You know, "Bare-Minimum Mindset!" You'd better act fast so you can get rid of those nasty symptoms like not enough detail, or the ultimate side effect of BMG - "Bare-Minimum Grades!" AHHHHHHHHHHHH!

-Mrs. K


I thought telling him to "step it up" in a playful way might take the edge off, but there is also a good chance that he'll just think I'm the weirdest teacher ever. Any guesses on what his reaction will be to this random teacher note? lol