Grading Only for Mastery Takes Away an Important Feedback Tool
In this video, Dr. Justin Baeder discusses why standards-based grading that excludes effort and participation removes a critical mechanism for communicating with students about their learning process.
Key Takeaways
- Mastery-only grading is incomplete - Students need feedback on their process, not just their end results
- Effort grades motivate engagement - When effort counts, students are more likely to do the work that leads to learning
- Don't throw out useful tools - The push for pure SBG has eliminated grading practices that actually helped students improve
Transcript
When we're grading, is it okay to give students credit for their effort, or should we only grade for mastery?
Now, I think most educators would say we need a mix, right?
We have some things that are completion grades, sometimes we're grading for effort or participation, and sometimes we're grading for accuracy or for mastery.
We need a mix.
But in recent years, it's become popular to say that, well, oh, grades should be standards-based and we should only grade learning itself.
We should be accurately communicating and reporting actual learning not effort or behavior or compliance or participation or anything like that.
And I would not go that far.
I do not agree that we should avoid all attempts to grade effort because students need to know whether their efforts are on track, right?
It is an important form of feedback to the student if they are trying hard enough.
So if you get a completion grade, that is important feedback to you as a student and it is an accurate report that you did what you were supposed to do.
Now, does that mean it's an accurate report of your learning according to the standards?
No, because it's not time for that yet.
That comes later.
And I think part of the confusion among standards-based grading advocates is that they think that grades should be the same as assessments.
And I have to ask, why would we need both if they were supposed to do exactly the same thing?
If we make them converge and say, okay, your class grades need to line up perfectly with, say, a standardized test or your final exam, then why do we need both?
No, they do different jobs.
And one of the main jobs that grades do is give students feedback that keeps them on track and motivates them to actually do the work.
See, as adults, we can think, well, of course you have to do your work if you want to learn.
You have to put in the work now if you want your final paper to be good.
Kids don't necessarily see it that way, and grades are a tool that we use to teach them, this is how you apply effort now to get the result down the road that you want to have.
And if we take away that tool from teachers and we tell teachers, no, you can't grade effort, you can't grade for completion, you can't just give out points for trying or any kind of behavior, then we're taking away an essential tool that communicates the value of specific types of hard work to students.
Let me know what you think.