Perspectives on Grading
I'm constantly thinking about why and how I grade, and I believe these considerations have led me to make positive changes in my own classroom. Check out the latest issue of NEA Today and my column What's In An 'A'?
In addition, why do traditional grading practices still persist as the dominant paradigm?
posted by Questions for Schools @ 3:06 PM
5 Comments
5 Comments:
Why does traditional grading persist? Because it works, that's why. When tied to a rubric, it works. It is an indicator of the level of performance of the student and their ability to withstand academic rigor.
I assess UCLA incoming applications for freshmen and the GPA is the best indicator of how that student will perform at the college level.
Students unwilling to put in effort and show pride in their work are unlikely to succeed whether they are going to be a welder or a doctor.
A little story for those of you who think grading is soooo terrible and will hurt the poor kiddies. My neighbor was fired/laid off from a big box store shortly after having thyroid surgery. She refused to lift heavy items to a top shelf due to her surgery. She was able to secure unemployment and the unemployment department sent her to retrain as a machinist, the last time they were going to pay for this 6 month course. My neighbor had a pretty solid academic background although she had left college in her third year.
She was able and willing to do the large amount of reading required. Yes, there were textbooks for this course and yes they had to answer questions and be able to keep up with the text. Even though the state was paying for the course and all the tools required, many dropped out. Why? According to my neighbor, it was because they didn't want to do the work. They didn't want to read, they didn't want to do homework. So they lost out on an opportunity for a fairly high paying job. My neighbor made it through the program because she knew she must do the work to pass. You see, she had done grades 1 through 3 in Mexico where they don't take any s#@* from students and it is all about reading and writing. No one misbehaves because the consequences are so great.
Grades are a gut check for students. Grades let them know if they are meeting academic benchmarks. Grades keep them on track, let them know if perhaps they are pursuing the wrong field, etc.
When teachers don't hold their students to high standards as many of the teachers in my school do not, they walk into my classroom and my colleagues' classrooms without knowing how to save onto a flash drive, not knowing what MLA or APA mean, having no idea how to format a paper, not knowing what pro or con means and having never done a PowerPoint- by the 11th grade. You can make learning enjoyable while using grades and having high standards. There must be a consequence when students do not turn in assignments. Virtually everything students do in my classroom is assessed and graded. If they complete an assignment I take the time and effort to fully examine it and yes- grade it. If they feel they can improve they may revise the assignment. This is how students improve. They must have feedback and it should be in the form of a grade so they can gauge their progress. I usually copy samples of excellent, moderate and needs improvement work (with no names of course) and show them to the students before an assignment so they get an idea about what quality work is all about.
Evelyn,
Grades aren't necessary to produce great student effort! It is hard to refute the fact that students too often focus on the end--the grade--rather than the process and learning objective in grade-heavy settings. I find that students produce lower quality work when they are obsessed with their grade.
It is my belief that when teachers focus too much on grading and student "accountability" with regards to grades, it can shift too much focus away from creating an innovative classroom where grades are secondary.
Plus, traditional grading obviously isn't a paradigm that consistently works for at-risk students.
I read with great interest your article "What's In An 'A'". I have been fighting for years the grading issue, both as a professional and as a parent.
One problem with grades that was not mentioned is the lack of consistency between different classrooms. An 'A' in one class is based on very different standards than an 'A' in another class. I can't tell you the number of times I questioned the grades given by a previous teacher after a student's performance didn't match up with my expectations based on those grades.
Related to this is the issue of how teachers compute grades in the first place. Evelyn in her comment mentioned rubrics, which are very useful, but not practical for every assignment as she suggests. Most teachers use some kind of point system (especially in high school) or based on percentage of answers right, but this makes little sense. In a time when standards-based assessment is becoming the norm in most states, the only thing on which to base grades is the state standards. Do they or don't they meet the criteria for passing those standards? How many standards for each subject did they meet out of how many were taught? These are the questions we should be asking ourselves when it's time to give grades.
When you're talking about individual assignments, first ask which standards do they address, then assess based on the criteria for those standards only. In my class, for example, a math test might address 5 or 6 different math standards. I grade the test on each individual standard, so a student might not pass 4 of the standards, but still know enough to have met 2 standards. This gives me more information about what each student can actually do that a single number or letter can't.
I think a movement must be started to first change the way we think about grading, and second to standardize how we grade so that the grades have meaning outside any particular classroom.
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