What is grading?, What should grade reflect?

What is grading?, What should grade reflect?, How are guidelines for selecting grading criteria? , How to calculating grades?, What do letter grades mean?, What is alternative to letter grading?

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

A.    Background

In learning procees, we always are controlled by test, and also in our educational lives are certaintly governed by the grades that are greatly determined by those tests. perhaps even more ironic is that the standards for assigning grades are extraordinary variable across teachers, subject matter, courses, programs, institutions, school systems, and even cultures. Every institution from high school on up has its “easy” teachera and “tough” techers who differ in their grading standards.

Every countries have different way in giving grading, certain institutions are “known” by transcript evaluators to be stingy with high grades, and therefore a B in those places is equivalent to an A in others. American grading system are demonstrably different from some systems in Europe annd Asia; a course grade of 85 percent may be considered noteworhy in some countries, while in the united states the same percentage score is a B or possibly a B-.

Grading here, not only focus about the letter but also the criteria in determining a final grade in a course. so that way  in this paper addresses topics like this: what is grading, philosophy of grading; what should grades reflect, guidelines for selecting grading criteria, calculating grades: absolute and relative grading, what do letter grades “mean”?, and alternatives to letter grading.

B.    Formulation of the problem

1.    What is grading?

2.    What should grade reflect?

3.    How are guidelines for selecting grading criteria?

4.    How to calculating grades?

5.    What do letter grades mean?

6.    What is alternative to letter grading?

C.    The purpose

1.    To know what is grading?

2.    To know what should grade reflect?

3.    To know how are guidelines for selecting grading criteria?

4.    To know how to calculating grades?

5.    To knowwhat do letter grades mean?

6.    To know what is alternative to letter grading?

CHAPTER II

DISCUSSION

Grading And Student Evaluation

A.    Definition of grading

    Grading is a way for educators to evaluate each individual student’s performance and learning. Grading can include letter grades, percentages and even a simple pass/fail. Grades can be attached to physical activities like writing assignments, lab work, projects, reports and tests. They can also be assigned to more nebulous activities that a teacher feels are important to the learning experience. These can include participation, attendance, classroom behavior and even effort. evaluating students’ performance by grading them on standized, hierchical scale has become a universal feature of teaching learning process. in grading their students, teachers combine different equitarian considerations: talent, actual performance, invested effort, class learning behavior, and many also apply the principle of need (students’ need of encouragement) in their considerations.

B.    Philosophy of grading: what should grades reflect?

Grading questionnaire:

a.    Language performance of the student as formally demonstrated on tests, quizzes, and other explicitly scored procedures

b.    Your intuitive, informal observation of the student;s language performance

c.    Oral parcipation in class

d.    Improvement (over the entire period)

e.    Behavior in class such being cooperative, polite, disruptive, etc

f.    Effort

g.    Motivation

h.    Punctually and attendance

In a recent administration of this questionnaire to teachers at the american language institute at san francisco state univercity, the item on which al most of  teacher agree item (a), which received percentage allocations from 50 percent to 75 percent, it is safe to assert that formal test, quizzes, exercizes, homework, essay, report, presentation, which are usually marked in some way ( with a grade, a check sytem, and a score ) are universally accepted as primary criteria for determining grades.

Items b and c, also drew relatively strong support to give grading in teaching and learning activities.Intuitive and informal observation if the teacher figure into the final grade, it is very important to inform the students in advance how those observations and impressions will be recorded throughout the semester. And then, for oral parcipationis listed as one of the objectives of cource and is listed as a fantor in final grade.

On items d through h, some educational assessment experts state definitively that none of these items should ever be factor in grading. Gronlund (1998), a widely respected educational assessment specialist, gave the following advice:

Base grades on student achievement, achievement only. Grades should represent the extent to which the intended learning outcomes were achieved by students. They should not be contaminated by student effort, tardiness, misbehavior, and other extraneous factors... If they are permitted to become part of the grade, the meaning of the grade as an indicator of achievent is lost.

Not every one agrees with gronlund. For example, grove (1998), power (1998) and progosh (1998) all recomended considering other factors in assessing and grading. So looking this issue, the important triangualtion:

a.    All abilities of a students may not be apparent on achievement tests and measured performances.

b.    We may not be able to capture the totally of students’ competence through formal tests; other observations are also significant indicator of ability.

c.    Tell us that improvement, behaviour, effort, motivation, and attedance might justifiably belong to a set of components that add up to a final grade.   

C.    Guidelines for selecting grading criteria

There are several factor that should be considered in grading:

1.    It is essential for all components of grading to be consistent with an institutional philosophy and regulation.

2.    All of the components of a final grade need to be explicitly stated in writing to students at the beginning of a term of study, with a designation of percentages or weighting figures for each component.

3.    Chellenge yourself to create checklist, charts and note-taking systems that allow you to convey to the student the basis for your conclusions.

4.    Consider allocating relatively small weights to items

   

D.    Calculating grades: absolute and relative grading

1.    Absolute

    Absolute is pre-specify standars of performance on a numerical point system. And absolute system is also to try expression how nearly a learner’s performance approaches an ideal performance. Below table about absolute grading scale:

midterm        final exam        other performance    total#of points

(50 points)        (100 points)        (50 points)         (200)

A  45-50            90-100            45-50            180-200   

B  40-44            80-89            40-44            160-179

C  35-39            70-79            35-39            140-159

D  30-34            60-69            30-34            120-139

F  below 30        below 60        below 30        below 120

    The key to make an absolute grading system work is to be painstakingly clear on competencies and objectives, and on tests, tasks, and other assessment techniques that will figure into the formula for assigning a grade.

2.    Relative grading

    Relative grading is more commonly used than absolute grading. It has the advantage of allowing your own interpretation and of adjusting for unpredicted ease or difficulty of a test. Relative grading system is also to try expression how nearly a performance compares with the performance of peers. This is usualy accomplished by ranking students in order of performance and assigning cut off points for grades. Common letter grades assigned to students performance include:

A: outstanding performance

B: above average performance

C: average performance

D: below average performance

F: failur

One major difficulty with this relative grading is the lack of a standardized achievement level which is typicalnof the peer group. This results in the possibly of rating an individual high when his performance is not outstanding or above average. For example: in a class with very poor scholars, a “top” score might be only 15 out of a possible 100. Under a relative system, students with scores of 15 would be “a” students.

   

Below the table about hypothetical rank-order grade dostributions

percentage of students

    institution X        institution Y        institution Z

A    15 %            30 %            60 %

B    30 %            40 %            30 %

C    40 %            20 %            10 %

D    10 %            9 %

F    5 %            1 %

Based on the table above, in institution X, the expectation, as a curve that is slighly skewed to the right, compared to a normal bell curve. The expectation in institution Y is for virtually no one to fail a course and for a large majority of students to achieve AS nd Bs; here the skewness is more marked.And then, the institutuin Z may represent the expectations of a university postgraduate program. A much more common method of calculating grades is what might be called a psoteriori relative grading, in which a teacher exercises the atitude to determine grade distributions after the performances have been observed.

E.    What do letter grades “mean”?

Typically, institutional manuals for teachers and students will list the following descriptors of letter grades:

A: excellent

B: good

C: adquate

D: inadequate/unsatisfactory

F: failing/unacceptable

The overgeneralization implicit in letter grading underscores the meaninglessness of the objectives typically cited as descriptors of those letters. And yet, those letters have come to mean almost everything in their gate-keeping role in admissions decisions and employment acceptance. There are solution to this semantic conundrum, they are:

1.    Every teacher that uses latter grades or a percentage score to provide an evaluation, whether a summative, end-of-course assessment or on a formal assessment procedure, should:

a)    Use a carefully contructed system of grading

b)    Assign grades on the basis of explicitly stated criteris

c)    Base the criteria on objectives of a coursenor assessment procedures

2.    Educator must work to persuade the gatekeepers of the world that letter evaluation are simply one side of a complex representation of a student’s ability.

F.    Alternatives to letter grading

The argumennt for alternatives to letter grading can be stated eith the same line of reasoning used to support the importance of alternatives in assessment. Letter grades and along with them numerical scores are only one form of student evaluation. For assessmennt of a test, paper, report, extra class execise, or other formal scored task, the primary objective of which is to offer formative feedback, the possibilities beyond a simple number or letter include:

a)    A teacher’s marginal and end comments

b)    A teacher’s writtem reaction to a student’s self-assessment of performane

c)    A teacher’s review of the test in the next class period

d)    Peer-assessment of performance

e)    Peer-assessment of performace

f)    A teacher’s conference with the student

For summative assessment of a student at the end of a course, those same additional assessment can be made, perhaps in modified form:

a)    A teacher’s marginal and and of exam/paper/project comments

b)    A teacher’s summative written evaluative remarks on a journal, portfolio or other tangible product

c)    A teacher written reaction to a student’s self-assessment of performance in a course.

d)    A completed summative checklist of competencies with comments

e)    Narrative evaluations of general performance on key objectives

f)    A teacher’s conference with the student

A more detailed look it now appropriate for a few of the summative alternatives to grading, particularly self-assessment, narrative evaluations, checklist and conferencces.

1.    Self-assessment, the most important implication of reflective self-assessmnent is the potential for setting goals for future learning and development.

2.    Narrative evaluation,

3.    Checklist evaluations,

4.    Conference

G.    Some principles of grading

Experts agree that a grading plan must be based on the principles of grading, these principles include the following:

1.    Grades are important.

2.    Grades should be based on course objectives and content.

3.    Grades should be assigned fairly

4.    Grades should be based on credible assessment

5.    Grades must be confidential

6.    Grading policies should be clearly written and presentedon the first of class

7.    Grades influence students’ incentive to learn.

CHAPTER III

CLOSING

Conclusion

Grading is a way for educators to evaluate each individual student’s performance and learning. Then, we should know grading is necessary based on a universaaly accepted scale, grading is sometimes subjective and context-dependent, grading of tests is often done on the curve, letter grades may not “mean” the same thing to all people, alternatives to letter grades or numerical scores are highly desirable as additional indicators of achievement, and etc.

With those characteristics of grading and evaluation in mind, the following principled guidelines can help us to be an effective grader and evaluator in students’ performence or activities in learning proces. When we give assign a letter of grade to our students, the letters should be symbolic of our approach to teching.

As a teacher, we should be one of those teachers who feel and grades are a necessary nuisance and that substantive evaluation takes place through the daily work of optimizing washback in classroom.

Share this post