Yesterday I wrote about getting into an umpire's mindset when grading. You're not paralyzed or prejudiced by considering what your students might be thinking - you're simply grading what is on the page, according to the rubric. No pity, no remorse, no exceptions.
I don't write comments on any student work! I mean, we all know darned well that students don't read those comments anyway, except with the attitude of a defense attorney trying to find a legal loophole. Writing comments takes an enormous amount of time, time that is usually wasted - and time that doesn't prevent complaints, but perversely encourages arguments.
Greg, that's easy to say in principle. In practice, aren't all your tough calls mercilessly nitpicked by students, and then by their parents and your colleagues? Isn't a student going to argue about every little point they lose, especially if that point was lost on a judgment call?
No one can argue if you don't give a marked-up test back right away.
Rather than write comments, I merely indicate which parts are not fully correct, and I make notes for myself for the purpose of tallying points. I print out a blank copy of the test for each student, on the front page of which I indicate which parts of which problems were incorrect. (Not how many points were lost or gained - just which parts weren't entirely correct.)
I return the blank copies to the class ASAP after a test. The next assignment is test corrections, which are done collaboratively.
So, no one can argue points! If someone does ask - as they do early on in the year - why they got the problem wrong, I don't engage. I just ask them just to do the correction. Once they've done all the corrections and I've checked each one off as correct, the students can have their original test back.
(I write everyone's name on the board when the test is returned. Then, when a student finishes all corrections, that student is asked to erase their name. Between the opportunity to erase their name AND the opportunity to see their original graded test, that's some powerful not-grade-based motivation for getting corrections done!)
It's amazing the difference in response when a student gets their test back this way, compared to getting their test back immediately. In the olden days, I'd give back a graded test and watch the whining, sour-grapes justifications of poor performance, arguing, and performative embarrassment* commence. No one who didn't get a top score was ever satisfied. A "bad" grade would send a student into conniptions (and then into even more conniptions when they saw that no one was paying attention to their first conniptions).
*Like when we got our school pictures in middle school. Every last student turned the picture upside down so no one could see, while telling everyone loudly how terrible they looked, hoping that their crush would ask to see and say how they looked great, really. It was all just dumb performance art.
Not any more. Now, students look at the grade, and a gritty determination sets in. They rationalize up rather than down! Not "man, it's not fair, teacher shouldn't have taken off points here." But rather, "dangit, of these points I missed, most were simple mistakes. I knew how to do these, next time I'm not going to screw up the easy questions!"
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