What are the possibilities?
Alfie Kohn (2011) claims that as far as assessing students, we purely need to gather information about how students are doing and then report it to them and their parents -- nothing more. While I believe that he definitely is missing an important component (allowing that information to impact our teaching), I agree that putting a letter on that information is not necessary. What information on a student’s progress should we be sharing with them? I currently have a fancy Google Sheet for each student that is color-coded by the level of mastery for each objective, but I know that the first place parents look is to the letter grade in the top left-hand corner -- not that the objectives that need improvement.Without a serious grading revolution, can we truly change grades to feedback?
Simon (1970) claims the grading alienates the teacher and the student because instead of working together to grow, the teacher is labeling the student’s ability. Anything that disconnects the teacher and the student cannot be having a positive impact on our educational system
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Many teachers have abandoned grading all together, and now opt for narratives of student development throughout the semester. Joe Bower (2013) has his students collect evidence of their work, reflect on their work, and he provides commentary, instead of collecting points throughout the grading period. Since his school district requires a letter grade at the end of the quarter, he collects all of that information to make an informed decision along with the student to determine that letter. Many might argue that this is not nearly objective enough (Bishop, 1992), but Bower encourages teachers to rely on the fact that they are professionals with the knowledge and skill to identify what a student understands.
It is that final letter grade, the “crude letter of the alphabet” (Simon, 1970, p. 402) that must also be reimagined. I find two components to assessing imperative: information for the teacher to augment her instruction and student understanding of how they have -- and still can -- grow. What I suggest is this: First, that the teacher ought to maintain some sort of record of student’s growth by objective (such as in Standards-Based Grading). To truly inform instruction, teachers must keep consistent information on students. Second, students must maintain their own record with continuous self-assessment. Whether that be a portfolio or journal of the learning process, as Bower (2013) says, students must also monitor growth. Finally, we must escape the letter. At the end of the grading period -- a term which must be changed (“growth checkpoint,” perhaps?) -- student and teacher must meet together to discuss growth and together write a narrative explaining the student’s strength and areas for improvement. Think of the possible impact of such an authentic conversation between the student and the teacher; where letter grades alienate them, this could build a bond.
Clearly, many issues come with this idea: a teacher with 150 students just does not have the time for such meetings, district mandates suck the life out of feedback, and parents would not be used to it. However, if the goal of education is to create lifelong learners, this attempt to strengthen the feedback we give the learner must be addressed, and --ultimately, it must be transformed.
Tweet it: If my letter grades keep me from teaching my kids, keep me from the letter grades. #alienatetheA
Bishop, John H. (March 1992). Why U.S. students need incentives to learn. Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, 1. 1-5. doi: http://www.ascd.org/ASCD/pdf/journals/ed_lead/el_199203_bishop.pdf
Bower, J., & Thomas, P. L. (n.d.). Reduced to Numbers: From Concealing to Revealing Learning. In De-testing and de-grading schools: Authentic alternatives to accountability and standardization. Retrieved April 25, 2016, from http://www.youblisher.com/p/852611-Reduced-to-Numbers-by-Joe-Bower
Kohn, A. (2011). The Case Against GRADES. Educational Leadership, 69(3), 28-33.
Simon, S. B.. (1970). Grades Must Go. The School Review, 78(3), 397–402. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/1084161