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After two semesters, here are the results of 4 tests and 1 quiz.
29/35 = 83% - A rubric grade of 3
39/45 = 87% - A rubric grade of 3
11/12 = 92% - A rubric grade of 4
31/33 = 94% - A rubric grade of 4
41/42 = 98% - A rubric grade of 5
All of the questions were simple problems that were either right or wrong. There was no partial credit.
The teachers say that a 3 is supposed to be "Meeting Expectations", as defined by the state, but clearly, an 87% is much better than that. Many kids think a 3 is a 'C'. A 4 is clearly an A, and a 5 is an A+, although one teacher said that a 5 is really more than an A+. You have to show "critical thinking" that goes beyond the assignment definition. So, to get a 5, you have to do more than what they tell you to do, but they won't tell you what that is. They added the 5 in the last few years. I guess that's their solution to giving more to the capable students ... but it's up to them to figure out what that is. The other benefit of this is that if students don't get 5's, then it's not the school's fault, and parents can't complain that they aren't doing enough. Adding 5's didn't mean that teachers had to do an ounce more work.
If kids don't master the material when they are young, then it's a developmentally appropriate issue. When kids do poorly when they get older, then they aren't taking responsibility for their own learning. It's a no-lose situation for them. That's why they like Everyday Math. No expectations of mastery when they are young and then flunk them when they struggle with the Math Boxes in sixth grade.
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8 comments:
So, to get a 5, you have to do more than what they tell you to do, but they won't tell you what that is.
At the middle school we have this issue in every class but math.
Grading of written assignments is harsh and opaque.
C. now says he doesn't like to write.
Fortunately he is regaining some enjoyment of math, so I guess we'll come out even.
For what it's worth, my older son's high school uses the the following schedule for grading:
A+ 100%
A 95-99.9%
A- 93-94.9%
B+ 91-92.9%
B 87-90.9%
B- 85-86.9%
C+ 83-84.9%
C 79-82.9%
C- 77-78.9%
D+ 75-76.9%
D 71-74.9%
D- 69-70.9%
F 0-68.9%
This would be somewhat in keeping with the rubric results you reported.
I have no idea why the "curve" is upped from what we used to call "straight" grading. Maybe others here have ideas?
I do want my kids to get good grades (I always got A's and it's hard to let go of that) but it's clear to all of us that grades (esp. in my younger son's middle school) no longer reflect individual effort, so we're all trying to re-align our expectations to: how much did you learn?--which doesn't necessarily correlate with the grade.
I know this is not going to play well with colleges, but for this moment, I don't really care. I just want my kids to know stuff and whatever I can do to edge them in that direction, that's what I do!
So, your grade range is:
A - 7 percentage points
B - 8 percentage points
C - 8 percentage points
D = 8 percentage points
But within each grade, it looks like they define a crude bell curve with the plusses and minuses?!? Outside of math, I'm not sure how you could grade that accurately; to fit someone into the two point B+ grade, for example.
With our school's rubric, they just use 1 - 5 and nobody gets a 1 and few get a 2, which is like a grade of D. The 5 is used like an A++. That leaves most people in the 3 - 4 range. This is a very crude distinction of learning or class participation.
Their claim is that rubrics (for grading) provides more information, but it doesn't. This claim is based on the fact that they give two rubric grades for each class; one for the tests and homework, and one for class participation or effort. The rubrics don't tell me very much.
Like you, I want my son to get good grades, but most importantly, I want to know what and how much he learned. His pre-algebra class has a textbook, so I can follow that, but for all of his other courses, I really don't know what they are doing. I see homework, but that's only a piece of the puzzle.
In seventh and eighth grades, his grades will be more important, but the big question is how he is being prepared for the top classes in high school. Then, in high school, grading will matter a lot more.
Our high school web site has a section on guidance. They say that parents (not schools) have to start preparing their kids for college by seventh grade. They aren't weird about it, but they talk about being prepared in math, a foreign language, and writing. Our lower school never says a word about this.
I have heard many complaints by parents about the transition from 8th grade to high school. They use words like "shock". I think that's why our teachers in 7th and 8th grades have started to put the screws to the kids in the last few years. This doesn't mean that they are teaching better. The onus is completely on the kids.
I teach an after-school SSAT class and the kids don't know why they are there. Their parents told them to come. Most of the kids will not be going to a private high school, so these parents know something that the school isn't teling them; that these tests are important.
I get the feeling that the K-8 schools don't want to emphasize what is needed (effort, content, and skills) to get into the top courses in high school because that would focus attention on the differences in ability between kids and on their lack of proper preparation. However, since many kids do well, they would probably believe that it's not their fault.
I saw this attitude at my son's (previous) private school. Some kids do very well, so there is nothing wrong. They still use Everyday Math.
Boy, I'm really confused about Steve's school's use of the word "rubric." A rubric per se has nothing to do with using a crude scale of 0-5 to report a grade for a particular assignment, much less the "grade" for a whole class (or part of one).
Here is an example of how I understand the use of rubrics in education (taken from an article on about.com; you can probably find this stuff almost anywhere):
1. Make a list of what you want the students to accomplish through your assignment.
2. Organize your list from most important to least important.
3. Decide on an overall point value for the assignment.
4. Assign each item on your ranked list a percentage value out of 100 percent.
5. Multiply your total point value from step 3 by each item's assigned percentage to arrive at the point value for that item.
6. On a fresh sheet of paper, write the name for each item on your list in order from most to least important. Make sure to leave room in between each category.
7. Assign specific grading criteria for each main category from step six.
8. Distribute or display the rubric to the students when you are explaining the assignment.
9. Attach a copy of the rubric filled in with the student's scores to his/her graded work once it is completed.
Now I personally don't like rubrics. I think they take the thinking out of the assignment; by paying close attention to the grading criteria set forth in step 7, the kid can just "dial in" the score they want to receive.
I know others here like rubrics because they allow kids to know what the expectations are. I don't disagree with that, I just think it's better for the kids if the expectations themselves require a little critical thinking to understand!
In any event...I cannot understand how the word "rubric" can be used, as it seems to be in Steve's school, to refer to some artificial condensing of grades (for an assignment or for a whole class) into some gross 1-5 scale, the resolution of which is even lower since only 3s and 4s are typically handed out. This really has nothing to do with "rubric"--why is this called a grading rubric?? Truly, a 3 or a 4 on some collapsed scale tells you nothing. A true grading rubric will tell you a lot.
Using a true rubric is easier for the teacher, more objective b/c the criteria for grading are stated on the rubric itself, etc. The total score reported for the assignment could be scaled on a 0-100 point scale, say; it's not limited to a 1-5 scale by any means.
Am I missing something in the translation?
If I'm not, if you really only can get a grade of essentially 3 or 4 in these middle school classes, then it's pretty clear to me that this is just another example of the "equal outcome" approach taken in "middle school model" middle schools. Heaven forbid we separate or reward kids based on ability or achievement (no meritocracy here). I remember a middle school teacher whose constant refrain was "thanks for your effort". My kid was making no effort; he didn't have to. But because he was performing satisfactorily (not saying much there) he was assumed to have been putting in the requisite effort... and that was all that was expected.
As to the transition between 8th grade and high school, it depends on your how your middle school and high school are configured. If you go from a "middle school model" middle school into a rigorous, more old-fashioned high school, I'm sure it's quite a shock.
But I'm worried that disconnect between middle & high school isn't going to be resolved by beefing up the middle schools; forces are at work to resolve it by "middlefying" the high schools, ala Bill Gates.
A positive note, though, to end with. My older son was in a very touchy-feely middle school, learning little except for the efforts of a couple of awesome English teachers, and then I homeschooled him for grade 7/8. I didn't push him at all (I just let him recover!). I was really worried he'd be snowed by high school. Instead, he magically matured and was ready for 9th grade and all its rigors (and he goes to a rigorous high school). I would warn him, though, that he was living the life of Riley and that expectations would be high in 9th grade. Maybe he was just mentally ready for it? Maybe kids who are in 7th and 8th in regular middle schools are sort of lulled into a false sense of complacency?
"... this is just another example of the "equal outcome" approach taken in "middle school model" middle schools.."
Yes.
My opinion is that they really wanted to get rid of the A,B,C,D, grading. Rubrics were a way to do that so that they could pretend that they were doing more, not less. A few years ago (when it went from 1 - 4), they ran into the problem that too many were getting 3's. A 4 was obtained by doing a lot more work; not advanced work, but more. Kids didn't try hard because they knew that it was too much work. This has changed a little now that they have added a grade of 5, but it seems that a 5 now requires both more work plus something else that is not described on the rubric definition.
At my son's school, they don't give out rubrics for everything, and many rubrics are vague at best. Many assignments get (1 - 5) grades even when there were no rubrics. You could say that this is not about rubrics, but about changing from a more explicit evaluation of content and skills to one where fuzzier, more subjective interpretations of learning are applied.
I guess my complaint is that our K-8 schools can't have a philosophy of education which is quite different from the one used by the high school. At the very least, they have to do more than turn up the pressure in 7th and 8th grades and leave it up to the parents to figure it out help kids make the transition. Some kids do fine, so they think that everything is OK.
Actually, it was just last year that our school decided to get rid of CMP and offer the same algebra course used at the high school. Before that, there was a huge curriculum gap if you wanted your child to get onto the honors math track in high school. They didn't care.
Vicky S - when you say I just think it's better for the kids if the expectations themselves require a little critical thinking to understand!, what do you mean?
Rubrics & critical thinking. Maybe I can better articulate my thoughts about this.
Let me start by saying the my concern about (true) rubrics developed as I watched the outcome of their overuse. Kids use them as an instruction booklet, the way a non-carpenter like myself would assemble a bookcase from a kit. But I want my kid to be the carpenter, the one who *knows* how to assemble that bookcase without anyone telling him.
So, judicious use of rubrics or other explicit materials to teach the steps of building the bookcase are fine, but at some point the kid needs to be able to build the bookcase without the rubric, or build a bookcase with different dimensions, etc.
What I've seen is kids (and employees, in my other life) who become dependent on rubrics. Without a rubric, they don't know what to do. They don't think about past rubrics, and what they were supposed to learn from them. It's just here and now: what is expected in this assignment? If it's not on the list, it doesn't have to be done.
I also see rubrics as antithetical to initiative and creativity. If you can get your A by meeting the highest set of expectations explicitly set forth on the rubric, you will just "dial in" your A by doing exactly what was asked. Following instructions is a good skill to have if you are going to be a factory worker. It is not going to help you much if you are going to be a pilot, an office manager, or a teacher for that matter.
So I am not against rubrics per se, just against their overuse and also against them being used in place of the harder work of (really) teaching kids to think critically. For example, if in 5th grade you emphasized proofreading, your sixth grade rubrics should omit proofreading, as that should be an expectation and something the kids think of doing themselves. If the kids turn in sloppy work, the solution isn't necessarily to add proofreading to the rubric, but to take the kid aside and tell him/her why they are being expected to do this each and every time they turn something in.
Finally, I think it would be very difficult to condense an outstanding academic effort into something that can be adequately described in a rubric. In this I sympathasize with Steve's son's teachers; perhaps what they are trying to do is encourage the kids to think: what would make this a better paper, project, etc., and then do it. There is merit to that, and it should be rewarded. Perhaps the teacher should provide samples of work that is considered "above and beyond" the rubric expectations but it might indeed be difficult to lay out all the ways a child could excel in a project over and above the stated expectations.
I hope that sheds some light on my rubric-aversion.
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