Grading is the most time consuming part of our job. Without grading, we wouldn't "formally know" where each child was in the academic adventure, how "proficient" they are, or if they are even aware of the fact there is a teacher in the room.
Grading is a time honored tradition in our profession that has not changed much over the years. We all went to school and were taught the basics of teaching and grading, but what did that really prepare us for in the real classroom? They mentioned that not everyone does what they are suppose to do and how to help the kids through this. That, they told, us was going to be the toughest part of grading. The other tough part (that wasn't mentioned) is teachers all grade differently, even in each grade level. There are a few of us that are honestly looking at the process and how to fix/improve this time honored tradition.
We aren't following the same tradition the Bison Football team is currently using with their system. We are falling short of the National Championship. I see us starting to turn this over though and its going to be a long road to that National Championship, but I see that we are going in the right direction. The best question we can ask to get moving in the right direction is HOW are we going to get everyone in the same ship? country? maybe even planet? when it comes to improving the grading process.
I keep looking at each assignment and looking at how to fix it. I am still baffled at how to change this in my grade book. How do I not grade on the average? How do I keep everything fair, balanced and easy for each parent to understand? I am a person who needs to see it, ask the questions and then learn. I keep asking questions that I need someone who has done this new standards based grading to answer. I want to start this ASAP I am a jump in and lets get busy doing this. I know we need to make this ours, but why not get out there and see what others are doing and learn from them? I'm at a stand still right now with where we need to go. I want to start using this informally, but I don't know how or where to start. I think that would make the rest of this easier to "finish".
I know this is a little "off topic" from our book, but this is where I am with my current classroom. I am not sure of the next steps. I was hoping this book would help me with that but it has only caused more questions. I really want to jump in and start standards based grading because I see that its going to be the best solution to our education system in Rugby. We can really start to see where each student is, and how to help them. I wish we were 2 years into this especially with the common core standards now jumping into play. It all fits together in the end but trying to do both at the same time is an absolute nightmare in my eyes. We are now trying to figure out which are the best standards to teach (yet they are expected to know them all), how we are going to teach them so everyone reaches proficiency, and how are we supposed to grade them all "fairly".
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