With Rick's permission, a conversation he initiated with me offline. I
invited him to join our list and he is interested.
Lori
Hi Lori -- It's fine with me for you to post any portion of our
conversation. I don't mind getting enrolled in the Mosaic listserv, but
I will probably only check in once a week. I belong to several other
listervs that take a lot of my time. If you get the chance, please find
out how I might join. Thanks.
Wow, I'd be very interested in how they guide teachers to grade the
student as a life-long learner. Do they suggest any evaluative criteria
you can share?
Preferably, there would be a separate column for such aspects of
learning as cooperation, habits of a life-long learner, etc. because if
those aspects are woven into the grades for knowledge and content of
fractions, anatomy, geography, writing, etc., then the grades for those
academic areas are diluted in accuracy, and thereby close to
meaningless. Sure there's a correlation between high achievement and
life-long learning habits, cooperation, etc., but they should be
reported separately in order for grades to be an accurate portrayal of
mastery.
One of the bottom-line indicators of a successful differentiated
classroom is that the curriculum is developmentally appropriate. If the
standards for the special education inclusion children are inappropriate
as indicated by the special education specialist advising the regular
classroom teacher, then the teacher should be allowed to indicate
somehow - usually in the cumulative folder -- that the student was
taught an adjusted or a modified curriculum. If the standards are
appropriate, however, the teacher has a responsibility to find the right
path for the student to learn it and to prove his mastery of it -- both
of which may be different than that of his classmates, but just as
legitmate.
I'll have to disagree with you on one point. I think we do a disservice
to spec. ed. inclusion students when we soften the grade's accuracy by
padding the academic grade with positive influencing factors like
working hard and other solid work habits. A better situation would be
what I alluded to above: an academic performance column and a work habit
column on the report card. If the student has low academics but great
work habits, that would be a red flag to teachers that something was
wrong and needed changing. This would also be the case if the child had
high academic performance and really low work habit grades -- the child
should be moved to something more developmentally appropriate.
The greater gift to the student and his family is an accurate portrayal
of mastery, not a distorted portrayal based on a subjective evaluation
of the student's efforts. We all do this, of course, but we need to
stop grading in light of a student's background or context if we are
truly standards-based. The standard is the standard and if it's
appropriate, students either don't yet achieve it, achieve it, or exceed
it. Many of us consider some students' learning situations -- LD, ESL,
gifted, impoverished, ADD, etc. when grading, but we don't do this with
other students. When we do it, however, grades become even more
relative and subjective.
-- Rick Wormeli
Rick Wormeli
Teacher/Author/Presenter
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
My phone number here in Herndon, VA, USA: (703) 620-2447
-----Original Message-----
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent: Sunday, October 01, 2006 9:09 PM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: [MOSAIC] Gina's reflections-grading
Rick,
Thank you for responding! Actually, we are required to teach to both
standards and outcomes. One of our outcomes is related to lifelong
learning. Oh, I know, what an outcome.
Believe me, I won't be attending any funerals to try put a grade on that
one! However, most of our teachers do include work habits as an element
of grading, as it has to be present in
lesson and unit plans. Granted, it still doesn't measure 'lifelong
reading' but it does at least satisify our requirements to address
habits of lifelong learning. Another outcome which
we must teach to is that cooperative learner, so that one element of
project rubrics that I included was simply the ability to work in
partnership.
However, at the primary level (K-5) our teachers are tied to the four
point NCLB rubric (basic, below basic,etc.) and many teachers, myself
included, find this probelmatic with special
needs children. If many were capable of obtaining proficiency and
advanced status with relationship to grade level status, they would not
need special education in the first place.
Having some rubric evidence of work habits and effort truly helps soften
the blow of thos negative report cards.
Your response is very helpful. I hope mine in someway makes an effort
to explain why effort is included in rubrics throughout our district.
With your permission, I would love to share our conversation with the
list. If you are interested in signing on, let me know and I will get
that info to you as well. The listserv is being
hosted on a new server, and I am not at all sure how to sign on. My
membership was transferred.
Lori
On Sun, 1 Oct 2006 20:40 , Rick Wormeli <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> sent:
>Hi Lori I came across your posting and its inquiry and thought I
would respond. I¹m not sure how to post a message to the Mosaic list,
but I thought I¹d respond to you at least
and let you decide if any of it was worth adding to the general
conversation thread. When it comes to rubric grades related to
anything, you¹ll have to make a distinction between
whether or not you¹re grading practice as students come to know
something or grading their summative performance of the actual standards
themselves. For example, your
categories: ³assignments consistently completed as assigned. Student
makes a consistent effort to complete assignments when absent for any
reason² are referencing work habits,
not performances against standards. At least this is the case in most
schools. If the description of your course and grade level actually
indicated standards for work habits, not just
content and skills, then you could grade them. For example, some
language arts courses may simply say, ³Understands how to write for a
variety of audiences.² We could grade
students¹ post-learning assessment on this topic, but it wouldn¹t be
appropriate to letter-grade their practice attempts, whether or not
assignments were turned in on time, whether
or not they had their folders and supplies each day, etc. The
bottom-line for grades in this situation is whether or not their work
meets the evaluative criteria set for writing
successfully for varied audiences. Those other aspects are extremely
important and warrant careful feedback, but collectively they should
make up no more than 10% influence on the
final grade. These are techniques to get to standards, but they are not
standards themselves. We can only grade against standards if we want
the grades to be useful in terms of
documenting progress, providing feedback, or informing our instructional
decisions. Does this help? IR17;m always eager to explore these ideas
with anyone. I donR17;t have all
the answers, and IR17;m willing to be corrected, but so far these
practices have served to stop grade inflation, make learning meaningful,
and motivate students and teachers. --
Rick Wormeli
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>Rick Wormeli
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>Teacher/Author/Presenter
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>[EMAIL PROTECTED]
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>My phone number here in Herndon, VA, USA: (703)
>620-2447
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