Adopting Grade-Specific Standards

As a Curriculum Coach, I facilitate professional development for teachers based on the needs of our staff and students. After spending time observing classrooms and meeting with teachers, I realized that we needed to examine our current grading practices. Our current practices focus too much on grading effort and behaviors, and not enough on measuring understanding of specific learning targets. As a result, our students and teachers focus on turning in assignments, instead of learning. If ask why a student is failing, the most common response is “he is not turning in his work”. Teachers are unable to communicate which specific learning targets the students are missing, because the grades are distorted by student behaviors. When making decisions about placement in honors courses, it is difficult to determine which students have the knowledge necessary to move into an advanced course because their grades are clouded by effort and

Most schools use a traditional grading system that focuses on homework, class work, tests, and quizzes. Some schools have used alternate systems in which the students are to do a long-term assignment to show what they have learned. The marvelous idea of a long-term assignment would be very efficient. The logic behind forcing students to do graded work is unfathomable, because those grades will only matter for a given amount of time. Schools should more openly consider switching from a traditional grading system to a long-term project grading system. The idea of a long-term assignment is more logical given the fact that stress levels would be lower, creativity would flow, and students could acquire more skills. Adding a grade to every piece of paper is overall a waste of time.

There are 24 standards, under 8 headings. These are there to protect the welfare of children and the quality of their education. The National Minimum Standards

The standards establish guidelines for English language arts (ELA) as well as for literacy in history/social studies, science, and technical subjects. Because students must learn to read, write, speak, listen, and use language effectively in a variety of content areas, the standards promote the literacy skills and concepts required for college and career readiness in multiple disciplines (p.1)

What is the purpose of the standards and how do they impact that educational community?

“Failure is simply the opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently,” Henry Ford stated. Students need to learn to fail in life to eventually succeed. Standards Based Grading (SBG) was created by Thomas R. Guskey. The point of SBG is to focus on the most recent work the student displayed. Frankly, that concept is unrealistic. The reality is traditional grading provides a more effective means of showing student progress and engagement. Not only is traditional grading understood universally, but the system motivates students to try their best on every assignment. Standards Based Grading may make the learning environment more relaxed for students, but is that always positive? To put it differently, civilians who have the perception that SBG is better are not understanding the reality that traditional grading is a more superior method.

Even with this law, there is still a vast difference in the quality of the many different state standards. The educational standards were meant to set goals for teaching and learning. Standards include a set of competencies and the level of educational achievement that demonstrates when the child should gain appropriate knowledge. They include an extensive list of skills and sub-skills that coincides with the appropriate grade level.

The more beneficial way of learning is always the best for parents and kids. Standards based grading is one that is bringing kids and parents down. Standards based grading should be banned from all schools for letter grades, beneficial standards, and most of all, higher and better grade proficiency. A reason for this is that it’s affecting middle, high, and college grades, for when it’s time to move on. Another reason is it takes time to turn over to letter grades from SBG, and teachers don’t actually help you for one’s and two’s. Plus it’s easier to understand Letter Grades-(parents). These are all three reasons why standards based grading should be removed from all schools.

The large change for standardization began with the implementation of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) in 2001. According to professors of education Delilah David, Ingrid Haynes, Bernnell M. Peltier-Glaze, Summer Pannell, and head of Texas Marshall County school district, Carrie Skelton, the NCLB was responsible for a number of undesirable consequences in school administration. Districts became responsible for test scores from individual schools, creating pressures among administrative officials to perform well. The act also made it easier for the federal government to become more involved in education, primarily in its finances. Dr. Martin Wasserburg conducted an assessment of lower-income schools in an urban area and found that t

The standards are written by experienced educators. They teach not just what, but also how and why.

Language goals are what the children need to learn. They are developed through curriculum. Assessment will help determine each child strength and weakness. In light for those outcomes for each child, it is possible to develop different goals for each child. The standards assist teachers in assessing children through assessment because the standards establish what children need to learn. The standards impact teachers by providing them with consistent goals and benchmarks to guarantee that students are progressing to be successful in college, career, and life.

Though I understand that teachers believe they are helping children develop themselves into being active in their grading process, I am against the standardized grading process. I believe we need to go back to the standard percentage grades. The standardized grading process does not allow for fair and consistent grading. It does not allow for parents to easily follow their children’s success and short comings in their learning development. It also sets them up for failure when entering the standard percentage usage used in higher educations.

Many secondary schools throughout the county are trying to figure out the most effective grading policy. Schools have tried many different grading policies and learning philosophies. Some schools use a mix of projects based and formal pen and paper assessments, while other schools are competency based. The most effective grading policy is a mixed project based grading system because it accountable, is applied consistently, and promote positive student study values.

1.Pizza arrives to the table at the optimum temperature. The pizza must be only slightly cooled from the oven and still too hot to eat, to ensure that it was freshly made and all the ingredients have melded together to make them stay on the slice as it cools.

A lot of things need to be changed in the world of education, but the grading system is definitely not one of them. Some schools are tossing around the idea of changing the grading system from the standard A – F scale to a pass or fail scale. This is not a good idea because of several reasons. First of all, this would completely abolish the idea of a GPA which would, in turn, make it impossible for schools to pick a valedictorian or for students to have a rank in their class. Students love to know where they are ranked in their class. Another significant reason as to why we need to keep the grading scale the same is scholarship selection. How would colleges possibly select a student for their scholarships if there are no GPA’s or class rankings?