It seems counterintuitive that America’s education system is based off of earning grades rather than learning. In the A-F letter grade system used in most schools in America, the focus of most students is to earn a high grade. Memorizing material for a test simply to get a good grade, and then forgetting the material right after the test is not a good way to learn. Long-term learning has to be a priority. The focus should be creating a society where education brings out creativity, and teaches us to become critical thinkers and innovators. In other words, America’s education system should teach the importance of learning instead of performing.
Teachers have different preferences when it comes to grading. Some prefer to have grading system that includes behavior and participation. It focuses on more areas than a standards-based grading system, which only focuses on academics. Although it focuses on more areas, this system can be seen as unpredictable since it takes away from students academic achievements in different subjects. Other teachers prefer to use the standards- based grading system, since they believe it’s more predictable and expectations are more clear. They also think this system is better because colleges accept students mostly on their academic achievements, so they think its important to not have grades affected by things other than academics.
When teachers and school districts discuss which grading methods to use, the first important step is decide the purpose grades. Decide on what grades should mean, and what message they should convey to students. Questions like which grading scale to use, how often to report grades, how many grades to combine, and how to combine them will ineffective to discuss first. First ask every member what grading practices they believe in. For example, the standards-based grading system focuses on “what students learn, not what earn,” while other practices are the other way around. After a conclusion is decided on, then secondary issues can be talked about.
The implementation of minimum grading can have many positive affects on students. Minimum grading in some school systems is not submitting any grades below a 50. For students who are inconsistent struggle in some areas, but thrive in others, this system works best for. This increases motivation and self worth in students. For example, if a student gets a zero on an assignment they forgot to turn in, and had one very low test grade in the beginning of the year, they won’t lose all hope in still achieving a good grade for the class. They will be motivated to still try to get a good grade, as opposed to giving up and not caring about the class anymore.
Current grading systems in place are not affective. Having a letter or number scale grading system takes the focus of students off of learning, and more on what grades they’re receiving in a certain class. Grades also create the problem that students will choose the easiest way out when projects are assigned to get a good grade. For example, students will pick a topic they know the most on when choosing so it is easier to earn a better grade. Student-teacher conferences and narrative assessments could be a possible replacement for the grading system. These would provide summaries of student progress in writing or in person. This way, the progress of students can still be measured, just not through a number or letter grade system.
The standards-based grading system is a system in which only mastery in course subjects is measured. This method encourages students to move from learning simple concepts to understanding complex concepts. The standards-based grading system does that because it only measures academic success. The system works by providing an overall grade for each class, but also provides a grade for how well the student mastered the course based on its standards. Supporters of this system say that the traditional system is unreliable since its criteria is vague. They also say that this system is better since grades cannot be affected by other factors that don’t including mastering the subject.