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Blair Peterson

Zeros for missed work unfairly skew grades, say education authorities - 0 views

  • Teachers are responsible for the accurate interpretation of the students’ learning. That wasn’t an accurate representation at all. It was mathematically calculated by using marks which skewed the results.”
  • A zero indicates the student knows nothing about a topic when they might actually know plenty, Rogers said. The mark of incomplete is more honest, he said
  • Students who don’t turn in key assignments or tests cannot get their course credit, Schmidt said.
Blair Peterson

The Homework Option Plan « My Island View - 1 views

  • « 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?
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  • We could give control to the students, by giving them a homework opt-out option.
  • Students, with parents’ permission, could opt out of a homework grade for the year.
  • There is a very good possibility that homework may make no difference at all in the students’ learning. In that case, those who have opted out, have not been harmed at all.
Blair Peterson

http://www.nassp.org/portals/0/content/56791.pdf - 0 views

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    Article on the negative aspects of zeros.
Blair Peterson

Giving Out Zeros on Assignments - YouTube - 1 views

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    Professor discussing the Ontario Board of Education decision to allow for zeros.
Blair Peterson

Brent's Blog: Supporting No Zeroes - 0 views

  • Keep the answer book open in the back of the room.  The practice isn't graded anyways.  This sends a message that the homework is for learning, not grading.
  • But why would a student do the work if it isn't graded?  Because your homework is directly aligned to what will be on your assessments.  
  • Our goal with both programs is to get completed work, not punish kids.
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  • By the way, the students that are actually motivated by grades are not the students we are talking about with these homework programs anyways.
Blair Peterson

http://mathematicalberry.wikispaces.com/file/view/Are_zeros_your_ultimate_weapon.pdf/34... - 0 views

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    Why Zeros Don't Work by Tom Guskey
Blair Peterson

SMARTER TEACHER: Homework: Graded or Ungraded - 1 views

  • 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
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  • Students do not have equal resources for completing homework. (computer or internet, time, study space, privacy etc…) Homework that is busy work is often copied just for completion. If homework is summative then it must be graded. Often homework is merely checked off. Student homework assignments are the most likely to receive zeroes which can negatively skew the total grade that may be indicated by summative assessments. Homework should never be assigned over holidays thereby interfering with family plans. Kids do need a break. Many students have nights with hours of homework. Could students more out of 15 or 20 minutes of well planned practice rather than an hour of busy work? If homework is based on course standards then not doing the homework should naturally affect their grades on summative assessments. For this reason no separate grade should be necessary. Zeroes in homework followed by zeroes on summative assessments is punishing the student twice for that content. Failure to complete homework is a responsibility issue, and, as such, should be treated just as inattentiveness, not bringing materials, disruptiveness and similar issues. Many home help sites have blossomed in the past decade, casting doubt on how much work the student is actually completing.
Blair Peterson

Assessment of Learning with a Competency-Based System: How to Start | Connected Principals - 0 views

  • 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.
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  • At Sanborn Regional High School, summative assignments must account for at least 90% of a final course grade.
  • e do not make use of averaging by quarters or trimesters to compute a student’s final course grade. Instead, our students know that their grade will be calculated based on all of their work for the entire course.
  • At Sanborn, any student who does not obtain an 80% or higher on a summative assessment has the option to reassess, provided they complete a reassessment plan with their teacher which may include a deadline for completion of the reassessment as well as the completion of several formative assessments at a proficient level prior to taking a reassessment.
  • Rather, a zero skews a student’s final grade in such a way that it no longer accurately represents what a student knows and is able to do. Giving a student a zero is akin to giving them the option to fail. In the Sanborn model, failure is not an option for any student. Teachers will do whatever it takes to get student’s to complete an assignment.
  • One of our next hurtles to address as a school community is moving this to something higher, possibly as high as an 80%)
  • Completion of an online course or competency module at a proficient level Completion of a teacher-directed project or recovery plan at a proficient level. The plan may include reassessments of key summative assignments or the completion of an alternative project Completion of an appropriate extended learning opportunity that is connected with the skill or competency that must be recovered
Blair Peterson

Our Competency-Based System Has Changed the Face of IEP Meetings | Connected Principals - 0 views

  • 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
Blair Peterson

The Boys at the Back - NYTimes.com - 0 views

  • Teachers of classes as early as kindergarten factor good behavior into grades — and girls, as a rule, comport themselves far better than boys.
  • No previous study, to my knowledge, has demonstrated that the well-known gender gap in school grades begins so early and is almost entirely attributable to differences in behavior
  • If the teachers had not accounted for classroom behavior, the boys’ grades, like the girls’, would have matched their test scores.
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  • If they are inattentive, obstreperous and distracting to their teachers and peers, that’s their problem. After all, the ability to regulate one’s impulses, delay gratification, sit still and pay close attention are the cornerstones of success in school and in the work force
    • Blair Peterson
       
      This seems very funny to me. So, why not use the carrot and stick approach with grades for these behaviors.
  • I emphasized boy-averse trends like the decline of recess, zero-tolerance disciplinary policies, the tendency to criminalize minor juvenile misconduct and the turn away from single-sex schooling. As our schools have become more feelings-centered, risk-averse, collaboration-oriented and sedentary, they have moved further and further from boys’ characteristic sensibilities.
  • Black women are nearly twice as likely to earn a college degree as black men.
Blair Peterson

Should I Stop Assigning Homework? - Jessica Lahey - The Atlantic - 0 views

  • tudents who don’t complete homework receive zeroes, but they learn a valuable lesson about responsibility, many teachers argue, even though there’s no legitimate research connecting responsibility to homework. 
  • One, students, teachers, parents, and administrators expect me to, and when I don’t I am labeled an “easy” teacher, viewed as less serious or rigorous than my colleagues. Parents may rage about the veritable avalanche of homework that threatens to suffocate their children, but in my experience, parents also view that avalanche as a badge of honor, evidence of academic rigor.
  • I tried to picture a school year in which I shoehorn all of this work in to class time. I hardly complete a year’s worth of material as it is; a year without any homework at all seemed like a disaster in the making.
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  • Barnes spent that summer immersed in research on learning and homework, and returned in the 14th year of his teaching career determined to do away with homework and create what he calls a “results-only learning environment.”
  • Contrary to my first concern, Barnes found that most parents were in favor of his doing away with homework, particularly once he outlined the research for them.
  • Barnes points out that a no-homework policy does not mean that his students never work outside of class; indeed, they often do, because they enjoy the learning and want it to continue outside of class.
  • His class was a project-based classroom, so many students did choose to prepare for their projects outside of class. Barnes eliminated all work that required rote memory, and leaned more on context clues and word roots instead. “The result of eliminating traditional, mostly rote memory, homework was one of the most rewarding experiences of my teaching career,” Barnes wrote.
  • Above all else, my students enjoyed class and become intrinsically motivated independent learners.
  • I would add for the no-homework skeptics, and they are legion, you have to keep in mind that any research that supports homework is based almost universally on test results.
Blair Peterson

My thoughts on homework… | Connected Principals - 1 views

  • - More times than not homework adds little value when it comes to student learning… - There is pressure from society to continue giving homework because that is the way it has always been done… - Homework that is assigned rarely has any true relevancy or purpose for students, thus completion rates are negatively effected…
  • - When a student receives a zero for not completing homework, he/she is NOT learning about responsibility and “the real world.”
  • - Grading homework on completion typically inflates grades and ultimately distorts overall content mastery…
Blair Peterson

Figuring It Out: Grading failure is Not an option - 1 views

  • From my perspective (others can add their thoughts) what this book has completely reaffirmed in my mind is that, as teachers, we need to stop grading failure. Learning is about trial and error, taking chances and making mistakes until we get it right.
  • We don’t let students who might be stuck in the “fixed mindset” take a zero on an assignment for fear of being labeled “stupid”. We want to teach students that they are accountable for their work.  We want them to fully understand that true learning is about doing, making mistakes and redoing.
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