Skip to main content

Grading

There have been a few discussions on grading going around the ‘ole school building this month. A new idea (for us) being floated is changing our grading structure to ones that have been tried in other districts.

First, changing our grading system to a 1 thru 5 scale for everything. It sounds like a bit more work on some things – grading, converting to 100% scale and then converting to 1 thru 5 scale… but I suppose it would a somewhat easy switch for English teachers.

Second, no longer giving a grade lower than 50%, even if a student turned nothing in – not even a piece of paper with a name on it. I know there are many schools who have made this change and it always invokes controversy.

The theory behind these changes is that it severely punishes students who don’t turn in assignments, as opposed to those who turn something in… bad or good. Some would argue that if a student can pass an exam, but not bother to do any homework, should the grade be based upon their learning or their level of responsibility. For me, I haven’t had a student pass a test without doing the assignments first in a very long time, but then again, I don’t really use “tests.” I’m more of a do some sort of project/paper/presentation kind of person. Last year I gave one ‘test’ in each of my classes… so if the student gets at least a 50% on a paper that he/she didn’t turn in (and did only the minimal prep work while I was standing over him/her), is that fair?

If you’ve worked with this type of system, what is your experience?

Labels:

Comments

Clarice said…
I've been in this debate multiple times, and I always end up feeling that any class is about more than just a grade or passing a test. Good teachers don't assign things that do not have an educational value. Also, who is teaching responsibility if there's no real penalty for not doing something at all?
5:15 PM
The Science Goddess said…
I think one of the things you have to remember is that you are not assigning a 50% to work that is missing---you're assigning a 50. When your grading scale only goes between 50 and 100, 50% means the student earns a 75. If you don't communicate the difference between a 50 and a 50%, you're going to have a huge amount of trouble with parents and students. Be clear about the scale.

Also, if you are going to a 1 - 5 scale and just going to treat each value as 20%, you have basically created a lot of extra work for yourself and changed absolutely nothing about what the score represents. Until your school is ready to have that conversation, you might as well stick with what you have.

There are tons of great blogs out there by secondary teachers who have changed grading practices and are making it work.
7:34 PM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

“They Don’t Get It”

I hear that a lot these days. It used to be mostly from various teens trying to negotiate the drama unfolding in their lives as they wandered into that no-man’s land between adult and child. These days it’s from adults trying to navigate the education scene these days. So many people talking and no one listening. The other day I was reading a post by a blogger I’ve been following for several years. Before there was such a thing as “blogging.” We all know spring is IEP review season. This blogger wrote about his daughter’s. Among the various elements, there was the discussion about the state assessment tests. She did not pass. There was discussion about what this means… and why said student needed to pass this test. Would she be taking a modified test? While reading, all I could think about was what would happen to that child as she entered middle school and high school. A history of not passing the assessment test vs. teachers who will now be evaluated on how many students pass t...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Cruelest Month

I know T.S. Eliot favored April as the most cruel, but we teachers know that May is… even more so these days. Most importantly, it is the final testing month. National ‘assessments, state ‘assessments’, district ‘assessments’, school ‘assessments’… on and on. It’s impossible to actually get anything done. Toss in graduation activities, planning for the upcoming year and the 2011 bonus, lay-offs and transfers, and you have to wonder if it wouldn’t be better to save money by simply shutting down school entirely except for a few test proctors. Meanwhile, there seems an air of hopelessness permeating the education world. Plans to lay-off thousands are coming to fruition. Schools are being closed, despite protests. Charters are increasing where they can whether they should not. Unions have lost a lot ground and teachers are trying to decide if it’s even worth it any more to continue talking about education . ( not that I blame anyone for that, we all have lives to live ) For myself, I...
Post a Comment
Read more

Campaign Promises

While purusing the Sunday paper, I came across an article describing some local candidate forum held over the weekend. Apprently they either weren't able to say a lot or what they said was pretty boring because the article was skimpy on specifics. What caught my eye was a position of Randy Dutton. He wants "higher standards for teachers." My interest was piqued... what kind of standards? In looking at his website, apparently those standards will be raised by carrying a gun to school, finally; "full days of school"-whatever that means - personally I'd love to put in business hours. No more 5 am wake ups; increasing the number of k-8 schools - because those kindergartners don't swear enough; sending disruptive students to placed like Habit for Humanity - babysitting is what people volunteer for; and teaching more American History- too bad that with all the testing, no one ever gets past the Civil War... I'm not sure how any of these apply to teachers, ...
Post a Comment
Read more