GRADING AND REPORTING STUDENT LEARNING

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GRADING AND REPORTING STUDENT LEARNING

• Adapted from Dr. Thomas Guskey

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PURPOSES OF GRADING

• Communicate achievement status of students to
  parents
• Provide information to students for
  self-evaluation
• Select, identify or group students for
  educational purposes
• Provide incentives for students to learn
• Document students performance to evaluate
  instructional programs
• Provide evidence of students lack of effort

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Rule 1- Grading and Reporting are NOT Essential
to the Instructional Program

• Teachers can teach without grades
• Students can and do learn without grades.
• CHECKING IS ESSENTIALChecking is diagnostic-
  Teacher is an advocate.
• Grading is Evaluative- Teacher is a Judge.

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Rule 2- No one Method of Grading and Reporting
Serves ALL Purposes Well

• Purposes of Grading
• Multiple purposes require a Multi-faceted
  comprehensive reporting system.
• Critical Factors in Determining Purposes
• WHAT information do we want to communicate?
• WHO is the primary audience?
• HOW would we like that information to be used?

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LETTER GRADES

• Advantages
• Brief descriptions of adequacy
• Generally understood
• Disadvantages
• Require the abstraction of lots of information
• Cut-offs are arbitrary
• Easily misinterpreted

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PERCENTAGE GRADES

• Advantages
• Provide finer discrimination
• Increase variation of grades
• Disadvantages
• Require the abstraction of lots of information
• Increased number of arbitrary cut-offs
• Greater influence of subjectivity

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STANDARDS BASED

• Advantages
• Clear description of achievement
• Useful for diagnosis and prescription
• Disadvantages
• Often to complicated for parents to understand
• Seldom communicate the appropriateness of progress

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NARRATIVES

• Advantages
• Clear description of progress and achievement
• Useful for diagnosis and prescription
• Disadvantages
• Extremely time consuming for teachers
• May not communicate appropriateness of progress
• Comments often become standardized

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• Methods can be COMBINED to enhance their
  communicative value.

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Rule 3 Grading and Reporting ALWAYS involve
some degree of SUBJECTIVITY

• The more Detailed the reporting method.
• The more Analytic the reporting process.
• The more Effort is considered.
• The more Behavior influences judgments.

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Rule 4- Mathematic Precision Does NOT Yield
Fairer and More Objective Grading!

• Questionable practices.
• Averaging to get a course grade.
• Giving zeros for work missed or late work.
• Taking credit away from students for behavior.

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Alternatives to Averaging

• Give priority to the most recent evidence.
• Give priority to the most comprehensive evidence.
• Give priority to evidence related to the most
  important learning goals or standards.

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Alternatives to Giving Zeros

• Assign I or Incomplete grades
• Report behavioral aspects separately
• Change grading scales using integers instead of
  percentages
• A4
• B3
• C2
• D1

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• Grading requires THOUGHTFUL and INFORMED
  Professional Judgment.

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5- Grades have some Value as Rewards but NO
Value as Punishments!

• Do NOT use grades as a weapon.

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Rule 6- Grading and Reporting should ALWAYS
be done in reference to LEARNING CRITERIA Never
On the CurveThey shouldnt be competing with
each other.
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GRADING CRITERIA

• Product
• Process
• Progress

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Rule 7- Grade Distributions Reflect Both

• Students Level of Performance
• The Quality of the Teaching

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8- Report Cards are but ONE WAY of Communicating
with Parents!

• Dont open the grade book to start a
  parent-teacher conference- talk about the child
• Get Parents on Your Side- early and often
• Reporting to parents should include positive
  comments, describe specific learning goals,
  provide specific suggestions on what parents can
  do to help and stress the parents role as
  partners in the learning process.

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9- HIGH PERCENTAGES are NOT the same as HIGH
STANDARDS
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GUIDELINES FOR BETTER PRACTICES

• Begin with a clear statement of purpose
• Why grading is done?
• For Whom the information is intended
• What are the desired results?
• Provide accurate and understandable descriptions
  of student learning
• Use grading and reporting to ENHANCE teaching and
  learning.