Blowing Up the Grade Book

September 8, 2014

Blowing Up the Grade Book

In the above video, Dr. Haskell points out that school and coursework is basically a game that students are forced to play, and many of them do not play it well.  I’ll admit that as a K-12 student, I was really good at “doing school.”  The rules made sense to me, I enjoyed it, and I was rewarded with good grades.  I didn’t realize until I got to college that truly learning something involved more than memorizing facts, sticking to due dates, and spitting information back to the teachers when they asked for it.  Since a large part of my education had involved listening to lectures, taking notes, and answering questions on exams, I really struggled as a new teacher to break away from that “sage on a stage” mentality.  As an educator, it’s hard (and scary) to try something completely different than what you’ve experienced as a student, yet that is what this video is suggesting we all do.

There are so many things about this video that I love.  Giving students choice in assignments or even in the order in which they complete units; getting rid of due dates; providing multiple paths by which students can arrive at the end goal — these are great ideas.  I think that they work really well in an online setting, and I can see how they might work pretty well in a traditional, brick and mortar college setting.  As a high school teacher, though, I can see how the logistics of these ideas might get in the way.  And frankly, that’s sad.  How many of our educational practices have become the norm simply because they’re easy and not necessarily because they’re the best option for students?

Let me talk about due dates.  A fairly common practice among high school teachers is to detract points for late assignments; often a teacher will take off a certain percentage of points for each day an assignment is late until eventually, there’s really no reason for a student to submit the work.  Logistically, this works for the teacher.  But how does it help the students?  In reality, it doesn’t.  Sure, having a due date encourages the student to complete the assignment when the information and classroom-based lessons are most fresh in her mind.  But if the student submits the assignment after the due date, she receives a lower grade than the work technically deserves; it indicates that she did not meet the standard as well as she did.  And if the student never completes the assignment because she realizes that it is no longer worth any points, then she misses out on the learning that should have taken place.  Obviously, getting rid of due dates and late penalties has the potential to help students, both with their grades and with the actual learning process.  However, most high school teachers need the due dates.  It’s hard to go back a month later and grade a random, late assignment, frankly.  What about school or district mandated progress reports?  What about the weekly reporting of grades to determine eligibility to participate in athletics?  Especially now that grade books are online and accessible in real time by parents and school officials, there’s an emphasis not only on giving students due dates but also on the teachers entering grades on a very regular basis.

This is just one example of a very common educational practice that has become deeply ingrained in our schools to the point that it will be very difficult to do away with.  While the ideas presented in the video are really interesting and would most likely benefit students greatly (and improve academic achievement), it’s not as simple as some teachers deciding to do something differently.  To implement these ideas in schools would require a huge paradigm shift and buy-in from the teachers, administrators, parents, and…yes…the students themselves.  As I mentioned previously, trying something totally new like this would be hard and it would be scary.  But as Einstein said, “Insanity [is] doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”  If we want to improve our educational system (and it is in dire need of improvement), then we need to stop doing the same things we’ve always done and try something completely different.  We need to change the rules of the game; we need to reward our students for learning, not just for turning assignments in on time.

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