Chapters 11, 12, 13, 14 FIAE

            Chapter 11 in FIAE focuses on the impact of the grading scale.  The initial discussion is how to handle 0s in the grade book.  I thought this was the most significant part of the chapter because it tackles a highly disputed issue.  The single benefit of using zeros is to punish students who do not turn in homework.  And anyone in the psychology field knows that punishments will only get you so far in removing a behavior.  Some teachers use 0s as a “motivator” to get students to complete the homework or assignment.  I think the book highlights a perfect strategy to use when dealing with 0s when grading time comes around.  0s or other missing work should be given a 60.  This means a student can receive a more accurate grade without getting credit for doing no work.  The teacher should then come up with other strategies to get students motivated to complete the assigned work.

            The grading scale is discussed in chapter 12.  Rick Wormeli compares and contrasts percentage based grading with small scale grading.  Percentage based learning is often more mathematical in finding a student’s grade and is more “accurate.”  Small scale grading can often better reflect student mastery of a subject.  Wormeli highlights the fact that teachers will guestimate what a student should receive as a grade based on information like a student having mostly 5s and a few 4s gets an A.  I like the idea Wormeli presents throughout the chapter which involves using a combination of both scales.  The important thing to remember is students are learning to master the subject and more often than not come to class without mastery.  When determining a student’s grade that fact should be taken into consideration.

            Chapter 13 presented multiple ways to set up a grade book.  I felt that the key point to this section is being flexible with how you set up a grade book.  It is important to remember that different situations in the classroom could call for a different method of recording information.  In addition it is important for a teacher to record as much information as he/she can on a grade.  A plain C would not tell how well a student mastered a topic.  If the teacher would instead say that the student does well on this topic but struggles on this topic, more understanding of the student’s mastery is revealed.  Chapter 14 follows with a description on handling report cards.  I thought the best strategy listed was including multiple categories in one subject.  There have been multiple times throughout this course and readings that indicate a simple letter grade does not accurately reflect all that a student does in the classroom.  It is critical that students, parents and administrators understand the multi-dimensional aspects of learning.  Last time I checked a letter does not tell a student what they excelled at, what they struggled with, or what they could improve on.

Chapters 7,8,9,10 FIAE

Over several chapters now the issue of how ineffective (yet required) grades are in the classroom.  However, chapter 7 discussed grades in a unique way that I have not thought about before.  How does a single grade letter tell a parent, student or teacher how well a student understands a wide variety of topics in one particular class?  Often times I have received a paper back from a professor and all the feedback is a simple letter B.  I have absolutely no idea what I did wrong.  The grade does not describe to me all the flaws of the paper or tell me what I did correctly.  Chapter 7 goes on to explain how grades are opinionated.  Teachers often grade very differently from each other and can often be influenced by the student writing it.  As a teacher we need to understand a student’s background when working on it.  The chapter says to adjust grades based on student backgrounds while maintaining the integrity of the grade.

Chapter 8 discusses the reasons for why we grade.  The chapter immediately divides grading into two groups.  We grade because we want to document student and teacher progress, provide feedback, and inform instructional decisions.  The other side of grading is to motivate, punish and sort students.  The book favors the first three because it is the positive aspects of grading.  As a future teacher I hope to work towards these goals to provide meaning to my grades rather than one more way of manhandling students to do their work.

Chapter 9 discusses the appropriate time to grade students.  The critical point made by the chapter is that not all students are ready for grading or assessing what they know at the same time.  This makes timing of tests and what we expect on tests critical.  One example used in the reading is retaking a test but without the ability to get a 100.  This is done so students who did master the material “on time” do not lose out.  However, this can be punishing to students who had not been able to master the material at the appointed time despite working hard to do so.  Homework is also important.  Trying to teach through homework will only hurt students in the long run and may cause them to learn the material incorrectly.

Chapter 10 discussed policies for retaking tests or assignments and how to grade them.  I thought this chapter was interesting because of all the good and bad policies mentioned I have had at least once.  I particularly like the reason for not averaging retaking of tests with the original test.  As a future teacher I do not yet know what I will have for a test retake policy.  However, I will always pick the larger of two grades for a student’s test redo.  Another policy I will adapt is not allowing redoing of work close to grade closing.  The chapter reasons that it is important for teachers to be focused on getting the big grades in and not getting distracted by student requests.  I see it as a way to get students prepared for the closing weeks early so they can focus on other issues like the final test or other classes where they are struggling.

Chapter 6 FIAE

I thought it was an interesting point the book made about the value of multiple choice questions.  I have often second guessed some of the answers on the multiple-choice quiz the same way Raul did.  The chapter does a good job describing ways to remove the biased answers that can sometimes occur with multiple-choice such as asking students to apply the information they have learned rather than just repeating the information back.  This may have to do with the difference between a test and essay but some of the suggestions that the chapter gives include putting specific detail into a prompt with the hope that it will focus the test-taker’s attention and answer the prompt accordingly.  Some of what we talked about in class involves giving the clipboards clear directive prompts but allowing the beach balls free reign to be creative.  The chapter appears to go against that in the reading but it may be more of a case by case basis that the descriptive essay would be required.  Most of the rest of the chapter involves making a test efficient.  A test maker does not want to ask for more than is needed, what is not relevant, or to place too much of the grade on one big test.  This chapter will be a good one to keep around because it helps refine the test I would want to give future students.  The idea of using student names in questions a unique way of creating a test that I have not seen in a classroom.  Having students write the answers down two different times so they can look at their answers after the test was a strategy that I think is a good idea and have seen used before.

Chapter 5 FIAE

For chapter 5, tiering is discussed as a simple way of increasing complexity as well as managing student different levels of skill.  The author cautions that we do not always need to tier subjects and that it is critical to focus on only one aspect of the learning for each tier.  For me that puts in perspective the point of higher and lower tiers.  The lower tiers do not mean just “easy” or “basic” they are foundational work that can be advanced upon step by step.  The author brought up an interesting idea of including the students in what levels of the tier they want to work on and the parameters of that tier.  The teacher also has the possibility of providing multiple formats or choices along each tier to give the students more to work with.  This could be helpful in the classroom as student feedback would gage how quickly they are moving along the tiers or how the succession of tiers need to be slowed down for them to catch up.  Learning menus seemed like an amazing idea.  The teacher would give the students a number of potential tasks to be completed.  The students would then be able to pick and choose the projects or assignments they wanted to work on and complete by a certain date.  The learning menus seem like a great idea for students who like to know what work they need to complete in advance and can plan accordingly.  I am curious to see whether or not students who need continuous due dates would find the menus difficult to accomplish.

Chapter 4 FIAE

Chapter 4 discusses different ways of assigning or managing work in the classroom.  The portfolio is an option to use and has the benefit of getting students to look over their work a second (or greater) time.  In addition it provides the teacher with a bigger picture of a student’s productivity and learning.  The reading impacted me because it described the broad range of possibilities in using portfolios in the classroom.  I have only completed two portfolios in my life but both have provided a great representation of how I did in the class.  The portfolios also provide a detailed and quick way to look back or reference the information I learned throughout the year.  The chapter also details how to set up and use a rubric in the class.  I had not realized the detail required in creating a functional and helpful rubric.  I know in science the procedure section of my lab report was supposed to be a step by step process for people to accomplish the same exact experiment.  I see the rubric along similar lines but to explain to each student in no uncertain terms how to complete the assignment.  Similar to portfolio the student self-assessment seems like a great way to get students to look over their work again rather than just turn in and forget.  The wide variety of self-assessment makes integrating it into the classroom doable and easy.  The basic ones like self-checklist and reading notations are just several ways to get students to look over their work once it is given back to them.