What a Wonderful World It Would Be:

WHAT A WONDERFUL WORLD IT WOULD BE: LEARNING WITHOUT GRADES

At some point in history, someone came up with the brilliant idea of letter grades as an evaluation system for schools. Since then, school and grades have been essentially inseparable. Grades most likely originated with the purpose of reporting progress in learning. I would argue that, however, in their current form, letter grades fail miserably at that task. By now, you have probably realized that I am prone to making extreme statements, but that’s why you love me so much, right?

The reality of the matter is that students and their families invest heaps of time, energy, stress, and yes, tears into grades. We schedule our lives around grades, we fight over grades, we attach rewards and punishments to grades, and yes, we cry over grades. With seemingly so much at stakes when it comes to grades, it is certainly a topic worthy of closer inspection.

From my vantage point, at least part of the problem is rooted in the fact that from school to school, from class to class, and even from teacher to teacher, there is no consistent criteria on how a grade is to be composed. What categories might a teacher include in a student’s class grade? Practice, tests, quizzes, projects, participation, teamwork, notebook, warm-ups, class work, work habits, extra credit, your sense of humor, your hairstyle… Besides being able to choose any part of their class to incorporate into a student's grade, the teacher can also assign to each category any percentage they chooses. For example, homework could constitute anywhere from 0% to 99% of a student’s grade. If you need further proof, just compare your student's syllabi for all their classes and see the vast range of grading systems that your child is asked to abide by.

Given all this variability in the definition of a grade from class to class, what does a grade actually measure? Is it a measure of effort? Is it a measure of compliance to the teacher’s directions? Is it a measure of work habits? Is it a measure of ability? Is it a measure of test taking skills? Is it a combination of many different factors? To what degree? And how is it reasonable that all those factors can be summarized in a single letter grade and actually be useful in any way? Because of the lack of a clear, consistent definition of how grades are defined, the meaning of grades has become lost. Grades seem to boil down to students chasing after a rubric that each teacher has arbitrarily created.

So what am I trying to say? What is my solution? How do we fix the problem of “bad grades”? How do we transform grades so that they achieve their originally intended purpose: to provide to families a periodic snapshot of a student's progress in learning. One solution is to eliminate grades altogether and move to a written evaluation system. Check out this article by Jonathan Lash, president of Hampshire College, entitled “Why Do Schools Use Grades That Teach Nothing?” At Hampshire College, professors give students written evaluations instead of assigning traditional grades. In this fascinating read which I highly, highly recommend, Lash lays out the many drawbacks of letter grades and presents the reasons why written evaluations have led to a superior learning experience for students at Hampshire College.

For those who don’t have the time to read the article (which I absolutely recommend that you do), here are some highlights:

• “When we reduce students to numbers and grades, they and we focus on test-taking skills and grade requirements rather than on learning.”

• “Grades tell students the absolute minimum about their abilities; they tell them only whether they have earned enough points under a teacher’s rubric to get a good mark.”

• “Too many students use grades to figure out how to do only what’s required, asking their teachers questions like ‘What do I have to do to get an A?’”

• “Grading systems also risk pitting students and teachers against each other through arguments about a grade and create a counterproductive competition as students vie to outperform one another.”

• “Written evaluations enable teachers to diagnose weaknesses, reflect on growth, and present constructive ideas for improvement and intellectual development - and discuss it all with their students.”

• With written evaluations, students “focus on the quality of their work, with guidance from teachers who are often learning with them. Evaluations create closer relationships between teacher and student and enhance the teacher’s role as mentor.”

• “Grades become labels… these labels become engrained in children’s views of themselves, as well as in those of their teachers and the beliefs are too often self-perpetuating.”

• “Narrative evaluations suggest ways to keep building on student effort and success. Any student can improve. Intelligence isn’t fixed; it’s malleable. And education is about growth and improvement.”

• “Not being graded translates into deeper intellectual engagement and the courage to take more intellectual risks.”

• Students learn to “use self-evaluation to think across their work, see patterns, assess strengths and weaknesses, devise plans to improve, and establish how they want to move forward.”

OK, so it’s not realistic for me to say that we are going to eliminate letter grades in our school any time soon. However, if we must have grades, it would be wise to at least acknowledge that the way a grading system is structured reveals what student outcomes are valued in that class. That is, each grading system has its own agenda. For example, some grading systems promote/reward timely completion of work. Some grading systems promote effort. Some grading systems promote organization and good study habits. Some grading systems promote strict adherence to teacher directions. Some grading systems promote mastery of academic standards. In order to best help a child, families need to interpret what a particular grading system requires and then help their student to understand what is important in that system (i.e. how to play the game).

Our department believes that grades should be a measure of student progress towards grade-level specific learning goals. We strongly believe that in order for grades to be meaningful to students and their families, grades need to be a measure of a student's learning and nothing else (or little else). We believe that there are other ways to help students to develop good work and study habits aside from rewarding / punishing them with grades (and thus convoluting the meaning of a grade).

In our 8th grade math department, we have structured grades such that 95% of the grade is based on measured student performance / progress towards learning. The remainder of the grade is composed of 5% practice habits. The intent is that when someone sees a student’s grade from this class, the grade can relatively reasonably and accurately be interpreted as a score that represents the student's body of learning in the class. However, even this re-structuring solution is only a band-aid. After all, how does it help a student to know that they have learned 83% of the content standards. What would be most useful to students, families, and teachers is to have an ongoing report of students' progress towards achieving specific learning goals, a document that students can regularly consult and act upon to further their progress. Towards this end, our department devised a system for students to track their individual progress towards achieving mastery of the 8th grade essential math standards. Here’s how it works:

1. We have summarized the 8th grade math standards into 17 Essential Standards that students should master by the end of the year.

2. Each question on every Check-In is labeled with the Essential Standard that is being assessed.

3. When the teacher grades the Check-In, a score of 1-4 is assigned to each question/standard. A score of 3-4 indicates a demonstration of mastery of the standard whereas a score of 1-2 does not show mastery.

4. When students get their scored Check-In back, they record their result from each question on their Standards Tracking Sheet.

5. Throughout the year, students can refer to this Standards Tracking Sheet to monitor their progress towards mastery on each individual standard.

6. Students who aren't able to demonstrate mastery on a concept (score of 1-2) have a Fix-It option available to them, provided they meet the prerequisite requirements. Prior to the Fix-It, students who haven't achieved mastery YET take time to analyze their mistakes, review and practice the concept further, and then they have a second chance to prove that they have mastered the concept. Read more about the 8th grade Fix-It policy here.

7. The goal for student and teacher is for the student to reach mastery in all content standards by the end of the school year.

Here is the Standards Tracker that students fill in with their scores after a Check-In: