In online school, it can be a lot easier to miss a deadline. After all, you’re not going to a physical building where you’re constantly reminded of the homework you have to do.
Instead, the time between homework and leisure time somewhat blurs together, making it easy to forget about school assignments or classes
Luckily, making up for a deadline is easy.
All you have to do is contact your teacher and tell them you missed the deadline. See if you can get most (or all) of your points back. Chances are good that you won’t miss very many of your points if you explain what happened.
I’ve done this a few times and in all of them, I was either able to significantly reduce the points taken away for being late/missing it or completely eliminate the points taken away. I just explained the situation and it all worked out fine. All of the teachers I’ve met have been very understanding.
When it comes to missing a deadline, here are a few things to keep in mind:
Let Them Know Beforehand
If you know that you’re going to miss a deadline for whatever reason, it’s way better to ask your teacher to extend the deadline for you beforehand rather than after the fact. People like to know what to expect.
Asking your teacher for an extension is likely to go a lot better than asking them for the points back after you already missed the deadline. The same thing works when it comes to missing a class.
Some reasons you might miss the deadline and can let your teachers know beforehand could include:
- Traveling
- Sickness
- Getting busy with other things and running behind
- Prior commitments/appointments (weddings, funerals, doctors appointments, etc.)
There can be more, but those are usually the most common. If you know you’re going to miss something ahead of time, just let your teachers know. It’s better to be proactive than to have to play catch up.
Traveling and sickness are pretty obvious ones. If you’re going to be traveling, then it’s expected that you won’t be able to get much work done. The same if you’re sick.
Things like weddings, funerals, doctors appointments, etc. are also fairly common, but usually you don’t miss a deadline over them. Instead, it’s usually just a class that you miss.
Something like getting busy with other things and then just plain falling behind seems like it wouldn’t work, but a lot of times it does–so long as what you’ve been doing makes sense. If you’ve just plain been having an off week, the teachers will almost always understand: It happens to everyone. If you got distracted with work or something else important, then the teachers will also understand.
However, if the reason you’re behind is because you were playing video games instead of doing your homework, then that’s much less likely to go over well. In cases like those… just get your homework done.
After the Deadline
If you miss something and have to tell your teacher(s) after the deadline, then just explain the situation and ask to see if there’s something you can do to make up for the lost points or if you can get the points back. It’s that simple.
Some reasons that it makes sense to tell the teacher after-the-fact are for sudden occurrences. For instance:
- Technology issues
- Family emergency
- Regular emergency
Things that just pop up and need to be quickly taken care of–things like emergencies–are completely understandable. If you missed a deadline because of a malfunction with technology (maybe your internet went out), then it’s understandable that you missed the deadline or class.
If, however, you missed a deadline simply because you forgot or got busy with other things, those reasons can also work. It’s happened to me before: I forgot to submit an assignment, or I thought that I did and really didn’t, then asked the teacher if I could submit it anyway. In those cases, I either missed no points, or not enough to make a difference.
Ultimately, just explain the situation and then ask to be able to submit the assignment, get the points back, or redo the assignment–something to be able to earn at least some points. It’ll almost always go over well.
Missing a deadline’s nothing to get worked up over. It happens to us all. If you can tell your teacher you’re going to miss a deadline/class beforehand, let them know. If not, explain the situation and ask to get partial (or full) credit for the assignment. They’ll understand.
