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problem of practice
The problem of practice selected by the group was the widespread use of a traditional grading system which is a collection of grading practices that can produce inequity and inaccurate grades. For example, Mr. Calcanas pointed out teachers who use traditional grading systems often use non-academic grading categories such as attendance or participation as part of the final grade. During the data drive, he identified this practice after seeing the pattern of students who have attendance issues to have a higher rate of failing classes. He also noted that he witnessed this practice in many classrooms of the teachers with whom he worked. Furthermore, Ms. Pryor added that teachers have different grading categories and “weight” them differently as well even though they may teach the same subject and grade level. As an assistant principal, she gained her knowledge of teacher’s grading practices from collecting their syllabuses at the beginning of the year. On the other hand, Ms. Honeycutt observed a design flaw of percentage grading, i.e., it is extremely difficult to raise your grade after you have received a few 0s for any assignments. She explained that the traditional grading system averages all the scores and the zeros have a tendency to pull down the final grade disproportionately. She speculated that one of the reasons there are so many students with Ds and Fs is because of this grading practice.
Consequently, this grading practice will harm students who cannot participate or attend school during remote learning because they do not have access to technology such as laptops or Wifi. As such, the grades given to these students are not only inaccurate--because they have not had the opportunity to demonstrate their academic performance, it also highlights the inequity that the most disadvantaged students experience in school.
The group’s rationale for selecting this problem of practice stemmed from the overwhelming evidence of the data. As a group, we have known about the disparity in teachers’ grading methods but did not have the data to validate our suspicion. Furthermore, the pandemic this year had raised red flags about the large number of students who are failing classes. For that reason, I curated the 5th week progress grade report and disaggregated them to facilitate the group’s data drive and eventual selection of the problem of practice. Once the data was shown, it became apparent the the problem of practice was the grading system that teachers use.
To work collaboratively as a community of practice, I first created a shareable Google document and submitted an agenda for the planning session to all group members. The agenda included discussion items to show the flow of the meeting. To build ownership, I asked group members to revise or edit the tentative agenda items and other details. For example, Ms. Pryor suggested that we include group norms to orient our mindset before engaging in the work. In addition, Ms. Honeycutt advised that the group should also include team roles to share the facilitation responsibility. Lastly, Mr. Calcanas proposed that the group should start the meeting with an interactive check-in question to build the morale and camaraderie for the group.
To collaboratively select a problem of practice, I first lead the group in a data drive. I wanted to make sure that the problem of practice is evidence-based and data-driven. During this step, I showed the disaggregated data of the 5th week progress report according to the content-department. Then I asked members to ponder on the open-ended question: What trend or pattern did you notice in the data? I asked this question to elicit each member’s viewpoint on what the data indicate. Then, for the follow up question I asked: What do you think are the factors that contributed to this data? Again, I wanted to leverage each member’s expertise to explain the conditions that led to patterns in the data. After analyzing the data, I asked the group to infer the problem of practice that produced the patterns in the data. I asked members this question: What problem of practice could have produced the data seen? Next, I asked members to brainstorm strategies that address the problem of practice before collaboratively choosing one for implementation. I used several strategies to promote collaboration. One of the strategies is taking notes of the verbal discussion by one of our members. Another one is to use discussion platforms like Padlet and Google Jamboard for members to show their ideas visually. By using these tools, I was able to show everyone’s contribution and collaboration in identifying and selecting the problem of practice.
action-based research
The evidence-based strategy the group collaboratively selected to address the problem of practice is to convince teachers not to give zeros to students. In other words, for failing assignments teachers should give a score that is equivalent to the highest failing grade: a 59%. This means that students will still receive an F letter grade for this assignment but this score will not pull down the overall grade disproportionately. When this F score of 59% is averaged with other higher scores, the final grade will seem more reasonable or fair. This strategy can potentially lead to improved well-being because students will not become so discouraged and demoralized by the average score even though they have received Fs in their assignment. In the same vein, this strategy can potentially lead to improved student learning because students would be more likely to adopt a growth mindset and continue to try to learn. They would believe that they have more opportunities to pull up their grades even though they might have failed on certain assignments. As a result, students’ grades should reflect this hope and optimism as they gain higher letter grades.
Upon identifying the problem of practice, our group brainstormed different strategies and programs to address this issue. One of the suggestions a member brought up was the adoption of standard-based grading or Mastery Learning and Grading (MLG) where students’ final grade is based on their mastery of the standards taught throughout the year. Even though it may look similar to traditional grading, standard-based grading uses proficiency scales to indicate a student’s learning trajectory. The proficiency scale includes these levels from bottom to the top: no yet, limited proficient, proficient, and mastery. In using these scales, teachers will grade students using descriptive rubric which aligns with the proficiency scales. The member elaborated that using this grading system will address the problem of practice because it takes away the 0s and the percentage grading which had caused many students to receive low grades. Another member of the group suggested that teachers should not take into consideration attendance and participation as part of the academic grade. He reasoned that attendance and participation is an equity issue and would adversely affect students who are especially vulnerable during the pandemic. The last idea that the group discussed was the strategy that the group collaboratively selected. After the brainstorming of strategies, I co-facilitated the group to make the selection by posing questions about the implementation of the strategy. The questions I asked included: What strategy works best given our time frame? and What strategy works best given our circumstance? During the discussion, the group recognized the fact that the selected strategy must fit the needs of the school and the resources available. For that reason, the group discounted the standard-based grading or MLG because it would require a much longer time frame to implement. In addition it would take much more of the school resource such as staffing to train and supervise the implementation. Finally, the group collaboratively agreed on the selected strategy because it would address the most common grading practice on campus. Moreover, it would not take much resources to train teachers and it would fit the implementation time frame.
The group learned about this strategy by actively researching the literature from online databases and educational websites. As collaboratively agreed upon, all group members searched for literature or media that instructs about this grading method. After the designated time, each member shared the summary of their resource to the group. Then, the group chose one to use as the main document to guide the implementation of the strategy. The reason one resource will be used was to make sure the group implements the strategy with consistency. After the group has collaboratively selected the best resource for the strategy, all group members agreed to work exclusively with that resource so that its implementation will be uniform and effective.
self-reflection
Strength
One of my strengths in co-facilitating a community of practice to address an instructional problem is my ability to use data to both identify the issue and measure the progress and success of the selected strategy. This is a strength because data-driven analysis validates the integrity of the work of the community of practice. As a group, we based all of our discussion on data because it gives us the best information about the nature of the problem of practice. As such, we are certain that our work meets the highest standards of productivity and professionalism. Even though the initial implementation result data [10th week grade report] posed a seeming challenge to our selected strategy, we were not deterred from using it. As a matter of fact, the challenging data helped us to learn about using a more appropriate timeline for the data to be collected. As a result, we shifted from using 10th week grade report to using 15th week grade report
Another of my strengths in co-facilitating a community of practice is my leadership and approach. In the evaluation, group members commended that “you knew when to push and you knew when to pull. When we were stuck or searching for understanding you offered your perspective and helped guide the conversation and bringing articles for discussion really helped.” Another member echoed the sentiment with this statement: “Mr. Ngo’s leadership was instrumental in facilitating the discourse in our community.”
Area for growth
One of my areas for growth in co-facilitating a community of practice to address an instructional problem is to be more inclusive of other stakeholders whose expertise or lived experience can help elevate the integrity of the group. Although each of the four current group members of the community of practice bring substantial knowledge and capacity to address the problem of practice, they still do not represent the entire community that the problem of practice affects. In the evaluation of this community of practice, all members seemed to share this view on the size and the make-up of the group. For example, a group member said “the disadvantage to having a small group was the last[sic] of more input from a wider range of stakeholders, and hearing the perspectives and ideas.” Another member added that “ a larger group could incorporate a larger perspective and dynamic to our community.” Another member was more specific in identifying the stakeholder that was missing. This member commented that “we didn’t have any classroom teachers on the committee that may have provided a perspective we were not able to consider.” Besides the classroom teachers, however, I should also include other stakeholders as well. I should include students and parents as well. Having these stakeholders would have given me the perspectives of the recipient of the current grading practices. Their points of view would not only shed light into the problem of practice that the community of practice addresses-- they could also serve as advocate for the selected strategy.
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