Feather Ruffling, Pt. II: Implementing Standards-based Grading

What do your students need to know?

If you have an answer for that, you're almost entirely set up for standards-based grading.

Standards-based grading is incredibly simple, but the concept is always addressed in really difficult, confusing terms. People make it seem like you need to weave elaborate webs of assessment, always be thinking 9,000 steps ahead, and you can only do it if you're the type of teacher who can actually see the top of their desk all the time.

Source: https://vignette1.wikia.nocookie.net/degrassi/images/d/dd/Liz-lemon-eye-roll.gif/revision/latest?cb=20140704003938

Before I jump too far ahead of myself, let's clarify a few terms associated with standards-based grading.

Standards-based grading: a grading system in which you give students scores for skills, not assignments, multiple times throughout a course

Proficiency-based grading: a grading system that reports student growth with tiered achievement levels, typically between three and five levels that are labeled to identify a student's mastery for a specific skill

Both those terms are thrown around like they are the same thing, but there is a subtle distinction that I wanted to clarify. Most systems of standards-based grading incorporate proficiency-based grading.

If you've read part I already and are reading this post, I'm assuming you are interested in trying out standards-based grading, so let's jump in with the foundation of what you'll need to get started.

1. Identify your power standards or targets.

When you add up all the targets you're supposed to cover in ELA (reading informational, reading literary, writing, speaking and listening, and language), you end up with 42. I could assess one every day and still not make it through two rounds by the end of a trimester. If you try to use all the standards in one course, you're going to feel like this: 

Source: https://media.tenor.co/images/f3508f10c364772b9452a4696ff74131/tenor.gif

Select the most important standards. Condense the overlapping standards into one. Don't even count the "use technology" standards because...well, because that's just silly to assess in a digital age. 

Make it easy for yourself. Identify a small number of standards so that you can focus your class and allow students to see growth.

2. Set up a grade book that allows you to record standards separately.

I went into this in much more detail in a previous post, but the biggest visual change for most educators is how they record scores in their grade book. Your scores no longer will be recorded as "The Great Gatsby Essay," but they will be recorded as things like "Organization of Writing" and "Use of Evidence." While you could just record those scores all together, I found that it is much more valuable to have a grade book that is broken into headings for each target that have five or six different spots to record scores. This allows you to record scores for each standards throughout the course to see growth.

I'll post the template I use for my grade book here so that you can see what I mean. By all means, make a copy of it and use it for yourself if you like it.

Grade book template: Click here to view

Grade book template: Click here to make a copy

3. Backwards plan your units.

If backwards planning is a concept you aren't familiar with, I encourage you to look more into it. The premise is that you start your planning by identifying what you want students to know (standards), then how they are going to show that they know it (assessments), and then how students will learn it (activities/strategies). This ensures that the units you teach align with the standards you assess.

Here's a helpful resource on this: Why Backwards Design Is Best

What I imagine my brain doing when I backwards plan.

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4. Develop assessment blueprints.

I have found this concept absolutely valuable in helping me develop standards-based assessments. I start by listing out the standards I want to assess on a document. Underneath each standard will look a little different depending on the assignment, but this is where you create the methods by which you will gather this data. For a quiz, you would build your questions here. For a project, you'll identify certain requirements or components for the project that will allow you to assess that standard. 

5. Determine how you will create final grades.

This isn't an easy answer, but I will tell you how I do it. I have two categories in my grade book: formative and summative. I record everything as formative throughout the trimester. At the end of the trimester, I evaluate the students' scores for each learning target and derive a summative score. I have found that this piece is absolutely crucial in a successful standards-based system. It truly focuses their grade on the student's achievement in the course, not just an average of their scores. How you do this can vary, but find some way to report out a score for each target in a manner that takes both data and growth into consideration.

At this point, you will have the foundation you need for a standards-based classroom. It's honestly that easy to get started, four components. 

From this point forward, I'm just going to share a few things that I've found (through much, much trial and error) that have made considerable improvements in my standards-based system. 

Tip 1: Communicate, communicate, communicate.

I communicated...but not when I should have. I would very strongly recommend that you do three things when you make the switch: 

• Write a proposal/explanation to your administration with an explanation of how and why you are changing your grading. 
• Write a letter to send home to parents. It's not uncommon for the A-for-effort student to get a lower grade in your class because they are held accountable for learning, not just doing. An explanation sent home beforehand can avoid some confrontations later.

• I would argue that most importantly your students need a long explanation of how things will change. You can't just tell them you are changing your grading system. They need to know the reasons behind why you are changing. They will need to see what their grade will look like. For standards-based grading to be as effective as it can be, students need to understand the ins and outs of it. 

In all of these situations, emphasize that you're doing it because you care about the students, their learning, and their future. Hopefully it's true, but either way, who could argue with that?

Tip 2: Develop behavioral consequences.

If you are being honest with what your grade is supposed to be, an accurate record of a student's learning, you can't lump behavioral consequences in with that grade. I've seen some people include a small behavioral category in the grade book where they give students behavior scores. To each their own. I don't do that, but I'm not saying you shouldn't. 

Instead, I have behavioral consequences that I assign to students. While I generally don't accept late work on smaller assignments, for large ones, I allow students to turn in an assessment for full credit (yep, you read that right) but only after they've completed a consequence (one that has a purpose aside from punishment), had a parent sign off acknowledging the missing work, and met with me.

Source: https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/originals/27/c4/90/27c49071a2072f548d6996f13299e880.png

However you do it, just think of ways to hold students accountable without affecting their grade because, let's face it, most of the students we punish with grades really don't care. 

Tip 3: Drop scores.

By the end of the trimester, I drop between 1/3 and 1/2 of the student's formative scores from the grade book. Why? Reason #1: Because I want to send a clear message that I value growth. Reason #2: They don't really matter that much in the grand scheme of things because I still use the data to do a summative evaluation, which really is the part that matters. Reason #3: It allows students room to try things. I love getting to tell a student who wants to experiment with an idea or concept, "Go for it, and if it blows up in your face, we'll drop the score and move forward." 

I used to always think teachers were just being too easy when they would drop the lowest scores, but with a standards-based system, I definitely see the value in it.

Tip 4: Find a mentor.

Things blew up in my face a lot when I first was trying things. Sadly, I didn't really have anyone to turn to who had experience with standards-based grading. If you can, find a mentor, someone with experience in it. If you can't find anyone in your building, get on Twitter or other social networking sites, and if that doesn't work just bombard me with your questions. I will absolutely get back to you because I think this is incredibly important in the future of our education system. 

Tip 5: Always remember that what you do every single day is one of the most amazing things on earth.

For those of you who are always looking to improve, I'm talking directly to you. Not only are you wrangling a bunch of brains who often don't want to learn crammed into hormone-driven bodies of teenagers, pre-teens, and children with all sorts of emotional baggage – not only are you doing that, but you are pressing yourself to do it better every single day. It's exhausting. Most people would give up, but you – you haven't. Through the days where you don't know why you're there and the days where everything just goes perfectly, you are always trying to improve. You are a miracle in the lives of the students you interact with because you change their future. 

Yes, the way we assess students is crucial in how we help students learn, but that will always be secondary to how we make students feel. Being there in the classroom every day, showing them that you are trying to grow as an educator, showing them that you are willing to make mistakes and struggle for them – that's what matters. Trying to become a better teacher is just another way you show your students you care, and for that, I have the utmost respect.

Questions, comments, ideas? Post them below. 

(And I was serious about that whole emailing me questions thing. Here's my email: tyler.rablin@sunnysideschools.org )