Grading: Providing Accurate Data to Support the Common Core to Create College & Career Ready Students
Format
Poster Presentation
Location
Harborside Center
Strand #1
Academic Achievement & School Leadership
Relevance
As educators prepare all students to be college and career ready, we look for ways to ensure that we are accurately assessing and reporting students’ efforts and achievements in the classroom, and in particular in the grade book. For so many, grades are just simply determined by the electronic grade book. Teachers need a foundational understanding of how a grade book works, and how their own grading is impacting their students. Grading: Providing Accurate Data to Support the Common Core to Create College & Career Ready Students directly addresses the conference strand “HEAD”: Academic Achievement & Leadership. Students need accurate grades to reflect their acquisition of knowledge (or the lack there of). Teachers at all levels need to continually assess their grading practices so that they align with the expectations of the Common Core and College and Career Readiness.
Brief Program Description
Deepen your understanding of your grading practices’ and how these grades provide accurate data reporting of student achievement as you create students that are college and career ready. Participants will engage in a self-evaluation, rich discussions, and hands-on activities designed to model research-based effective grading practices.
Summary
Participants will have the opportunity assess their grading practices so that they align with the expectations of the Common Core and College and Career Readiness. Session objectives include: 1) Participants will be able to explore their own grading practices and the implications these have on their students’ grades. 2) Participants will be able to determine best practices which lead to grades that accurately reflect students’ acquisition of knowledge and skills.
This session is designed to provide participants with a grading-focused, collaborative opportunity to deepen their own understanding of grading, their grading practices, and the mpact/implications of these practices. Participants will learn to identify positive and negative grading practices and as well as explore the impact these practices have on reporting of student achievement. Collaborative activities will allow participants to synthesize their understanding of grading practices and the applications of these to own content areas. These “real world” activities can be tailored to the needs of each participant and will provide a framework for designing appropriate grading practices within their own classrooms.
The flexible grouping in this session will allow participants to work with others in content or grade-level groups to explore and discuss grading practices. Opportunities to discuss county, school, department, and grade level grading policies and their direct impact on grading and assessment of students. All activities are teacher-focused and are designed to ensure that teachers support their students to reach their maximum potential via the exploration, understanding of alignment, and acquisition of research-based grading practices.
Evidence
Acquiring an understanding of teachers’ grading practices and assessment practices contributes to more reliable and valid grade reporting (Brooksher, 2009; DeBruyn, 2004; Gullickson, 2000; Guskey, 1994 & 2003; Wormelli, 2006). In turn, it provides effective ways to evaluate and communicate grading and assessment practices in a fair and effective manner across all grade levels (O’Connor, 2002 & Ornstein, 1994). Information needs to be provided that addresses the consistency and fairness in the practices of grading and assessment from teacher to teacher, school to school, and level to level (McMillan & Workman, 1999). There is an inherent need professional learning in the area of grading. It brings attention to a need for specific professional learning in the areas of grading and assessment. Professional learning needs to be made available to teachers so they can have an outlet for discussion, exposure to best practice, and to be able to establish grading and assessment policies (Brooksher, 2009; Jung & Guskey, 2010; McMillan & Workman, 1999). To improve practices, schools need to invest in high-quality professional learning for their teachers. Successful schools invest a great deal of time in planning, organizing, and implementing professional learning (Guskey, 2011). Therefore, this data may further support the vast body of research in the area of grading, and could aid in the planning of grading policies and procedures in school districts across the country, as well as addressing professional learning needs.
Brooksher, K. S. (2009). A comparison of elementary, middle, and high school teachers' perceptions regarding grading practices, assessment practices, and their professional learning needs. (Doctoral dissertation).
DeBruyn, R. L. (2004). Grading practices that get in the way of learning. Master Teacher, 36(7), 1-2.
Gullickson, A. R. (2000). The need for student evaluation standards. Retrieved from www.wmich.edu/evalctr/jc/SESNeed.html.
Guskey, T. R. (1994). Making the grade: What benefits students? Educational Leadership, 52(2), 14-20.
Guskey, T. R. (2003). An alternative view on grade inflation. Journal of xcellence in College Teaching and Learning, 1(1), 89-97.
Guskey, T. R. (2011). Five obstacles to grading reform. Educational Leadership, 63(3), 16-21.
Jung, L. A., & Guskey, T. R. (2010). Grading exceptional learners. Educational Leadership, 67(5), 31-35.
McMillan, J. H., & Workman, D. (1999). Teachers’ classroom assessment and grading practices: Phase I and II. Richmond, VA: Metropolitan Educational Research Consortium. (ERIC Document Reproduction Service No. ED442840)
O’Connor, K. (2002). How to grade for learning. Glenview, IL: Pearson Professional Development.
Ornstein, A. C. (1994). Grading practices and policies: An overview and some suggestions. NASSP Bulletin, 78(559), 55-64.
Wormeli, R. (2006a). Accountability: Teaching through assessment and feedback, not grading. American Secondary Education, 34(3), 14-27.
Wormeli, R. (2006b). Fair isn’t always equal: Assessing and grading in the differentiated classroom. Portland, ME: Stenhouse Publishers.
Biographical Sketch
Dr. Kelly Brooksher is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Childhood and Exceptional Student Education at Armstrong State University. Her diverse background includes K-8 experience in both regular and special education as well as leadership roles as a teacher and administrator. Her research interests includes: co-teaching, grading & assessment, and higher-order thinking strategies.
Keyword Descriptors
Teaching, learning, grading, and alignment
Presentation Year
2016
Start Date
3-8-2016 4:00 PM
End Date
3-8-2016 5:30 PM
Recommended Citation
Brooksher, Kelly, "Grading: Providing Accurate Data to Support the Common Core to Create College & Career Ready Students" (2016). National Youth Advocacy and Resilience Conference. 79.
https://digitalcommons.georgiasouthern.edu/nyar_savannah/2016/2016/79
Grading: Providing Accurate Data to Support the Common Core to Create College & Career Ready Students
Harborside Center
Deepen your understanding of your grading practices’ and how these grades provide accurate data reporting of student achievement as you create students that are college and career ready. Participants will engage in a self-evaluation, rich discussions, and hands-on activities designed to model research-based effective grading practices.
