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In fact, prior to 1850, grading and reporting were virtually unknown in schools in the United States. Throughout much of the nineteenth century most schools grouped students of all ages and backgrounds together with one teacher in one-room schoolhouses, and few students went beyond elementary studies. The teacher reported students' learning progress orally to parents, usually during visits to students' homes.

Between 1870 and 1910 the number of public high schools in the United States increased from 500 to 10,000. As a result, subject area instruction in high schools became increasingly specific and student populations became more diverse. While elementary teachers continued to use written descriptions and narrative reports to document student learning, high school teachers began using percentages and other similar markings to certify students' accomplishments in different subject areas. This was the beginning of the grading and reporting systems that exist today.

Letter Grades Deserve an 'F' The adoption of the Common Core could usher in a new era of standards-based grading. Jessica Lahey

When a child earns a ‘B’ in Algebra I, what does that ‘B’ represent? That ‘B’ may represent hundreds of points-based assignments, arranged and calculated in categories of varying weights and relative significance depending on the a teacher’s training or habit. But that ‘B’ says nothing about the specific skills John has (or has not) learned in a given class, or if he can apply that learning to other contexts. Even when paired with a narrative comment such as, “John is a pleasure to have in class,” parents, students, and even colleges are left to guess at precisely which Algebra I skills John has learned and will be able to apply to Algebra II. 

As Alfie Kohn has written, “what grades offer is spurious precision—a subjective rating masquerading as an objective evaluation.”

When schools or school districts begin discussing grading practices, they usually have an agenda. A team of administrators may have decided that district grading practices and policies should move from conventional to standards-based, learning-focused practices. Or the push for grading reform may come from teachers who see a disconnect between standards-based instruction and conventional grading practices (Brookhart, 2011).

Some think about the motivational aspect of grades:

he problem is that it’s a shorthand form of communication used by people who do not agree (or even discuss) what the symbols mean.

hat’s grading about? Why do we give grades, and how can we make grades more consistent and more effective communications?

The primary purpose of grading is a measure of “quality” (cf. Socrates, Pirsig), specifically the quality of a student’s performance.

The first task in grading reform is to reach consensus on purpose and foundational issues.

Are grades about what students earn or are they about what students learn?

First and foremost, what is the purpose of grades, what message do we want them to communicate, and who is our audience? 

"The goal is to give students more feedback," and to give parents a more complete picture of what their child knows, said Kelly Sirginnis, administrative dean at Tates Creek Middle.

The new report cards address how students are faring against the standards they have to meet and provides description about what a student knows and can do.

Traditional report cards aren't that helpful to parents because they provide a single grade for achievement, homework, punctuality and other factors, without explaining what the student knows, Guskey said. In a traditional grading system, students might not be able show mastery of the standards in the course but might get a good grade because a teacher might factor in a student turning in homework, school officials say.

Teachers sometimes think that reporting multiple grades will increase their grading workload. But those who use the procedure claim that it actually makes grading easier and less work (Guskey, Swan, & Jung, 2011a). Teachers gather the same evidence on student learning that they did before, but they no longer worry about how to weigh or combine that evidence in calculating an overall grade. As a result, they avoid irresolvable arguments about the appropriateness or fairness of various weighting strategies.

Teachers also indicate that students take homework more seriously when it's reported separately. Parents favor the practice because it provides a more comprehensive profile of their child's performance in school (Guskey, Swan, & Jung, 2011b).

At the same time, no research supports the idea that low grades prompt students to try harder. More often, low grades prompt students to withdraw from learning. To protect their self-images, many students regard t

“If you had the choice for your next grade, would you choose an 88 that you really worked hard for and learned something to earn or 95 where you won’t remember anything after the grade and didn’t learn throughout the process?”

Two students asked pointed questions about how a no grades classroom would work with eligibility for sports and extracurriculars.

“Why don’t teachers do this?”

1800 AD. Then came William Farish

William Farish was a tutor at Cambridge University in England in 1792, and, other than his single contribution to the subsequent devastation of generations of schoolchildren, is otherwise undistinguished and unknown by most people.

Grades didn't give students deeper insights into their topics of study. Instead, grades forced children to memorize by rote only those details necessary to pass the tests, without regard to true comprehension of the subject matter.

The ability to be able to “dig deeper” into what a final grade represents and how it can be used to report learning not only intrigued the admissions officers, but it generated an entire discussion around what else a competency-based grading and reporting system could do for students.

A “competency” is the ability of a student to apply content knowledge and skills in and/or across the content area(s).

In contrast, O’Connor (2009) defines a formative assessment as “an assessment for learning and can broadly be described as a “snapshot” or a “dipstick” measure that captures a student’s progress through the learning process.

And yet, no dancer, no musician and no athlete gains credit for their practice except through their actual performance in the event. We do not applaud the dancer or musician during practice. We do not add statistics from practice to the athlete’s record.

he assessment should actually be of the effectiveness of the teacher’s instruction and in what areas the teacher should continue to provide instruction to assist student mastery.

Homework allows both the student and teacher to determine if there is understanding of the subject and/or where problems

« Twitter, Simply Complicated. The Homework Option Plan May 22, 2011 by tomwhitby I was recently asked, along with several other educators, to comment on a post dealing with grading homework. The premise on which we were asked to comment involved a teacher grading homework and giving a zero as a grade to those students who did not do the assignment. This is not an uncommon practice amongst educators. I employed this strategy myself for many years. It was and probably still is an accepted strategy, but after decades of teaching, I have grown to a point where i am not a big believer in giving homework. I stated my homework philosophy in this post, Hmwk: Less Value or Valueless? If homework is to be given by a teacher, students need to believe that the teacher will value their efforts in completing it. Homework requires a sacrifice of personal time on the part of the student. If students observe that the teacher is not at least checking homework, they will not spend time, which is important to them, doing the assignments that are not valued. A mistake often made however, is that rather than assess the work, the teacher records a zero, or a failing homework grade for the student. This would also apply to a project prepared outside of the class that was to be presented at a specific time, a deadline. I see assessment having two functions. The formative assessment is to tell me how much the s

he zero seems more like retribution for not finding value in what the teacher values, or has been told to value. It’s more of a control thing, and not an assessment thing. If a student consistently performs well in class, how is it that when assessed on the same skills performed outside the class in the form of homework, the work gets a zero? It is a power issue.

If the grade is an assessment of the work, and the student’s understanding, but it was not done, how can it be assessed?

Grading is easier and generally less time consuming

Student grades reflect what they know and are not artificially padded with extra points.

Students could reasonably bring up their grade - there wasn't as much "hopelessness" about their grades and I think that kept students willing to try, especially when we changed concept areas.

The focus of Carter’s meeting and many other students like him are a result of a fundamental redesign that the school underwent over these last three years when it adopted a competency-based grading and reporting system

Today, each teacher assesses students on a set of course-based and school-wide competencies using a common set of grading guidelines that promote the use of formative and summative assessments, the use of reassessments, and the understanding that students cannot opt to “take a zero” for choosing not to complete an assignment. At Sanborn Regional High School, progress toward meeting these competencies and course grades are all reported on competency-based report cards and transcripts. All of these new philosophies have helped to change IEP meetings like the one I attended for Carter.

Our grading philosophy stipulates a clear distinction between “academic grades” and “behavior grades.” In IEP meetings, this shift in philosophy has allowed our professionals to better address the most fundamental principles of school:  Identifying what we want kids to learn, how we will assess them on this learning, and what we will do when they didn’t learn or already know it

Moreover, grading causes students to be risk-prone. Research finds that students of all ages who have been led to concentrate on getting a good grade are likely to pick the easiest possible assignment if given a choice. Folks, ‘F’ is really the new ‘A.’

1) students waited too long to do it. I put an approximate 2-week limit (after returning tests) to re-assess. Students waited until almost the last day just to notify me of their intent to re-assess. The longer they waited the worse they did.

The good news this year, though, was that re-assessment didn’t take over all of my time like I thought it would. It took extra time, sure, but it was manageable. One of my projects this summer is to make a bank of more questions for assessment.

As for re-assessing, my biggest surprise was that many students chose NOT to re-assess! (this is honors, too!). I think back, even last year when I had a lazy group and grades were low. There I was agonizing about why, why, why, and what could I do to improve the grades….what I discovered is that I agonized over it far more than they did. The ones who didn’t re-assess accepted their grades. The ball was in their court, and they didn’t play. And I didn’t have to agonize over anything this year. So I guess it balances out — more time for me to do re-assessment, less time I spend agonizing over grades. I’ll take it.