It's Time to Ruffle Some Feathers: Standards-based Grading

I anticipate that this post won't be well liked. In a sense, I hope that's the case.

If we are just constantly reading things that affirm what we already believe or practice, we aren't learning. We will never grow if we're never willing to be upset and then reflective.

Some of you may feel like this after reading this post.

Source: https://media.giphy.com/media/f5BXFIPVO1Mas/giphy.gif

Please know that I was at this point when I first was confronted by standards-based grading.

I am intentionally using that word, confronted, because any attempt to change how we assess students feels like an attack on our pedagogical philosophy as a whole. When I first heard all the benefits of standards-based grading and the research behind it, I felt like all I was hearing was, "You just aren't doing a good job with the way you're currently assessing students." It took me some time to get past that. I wanted to cling to what I knew partially because I was afraid of what I thought it would take to change, but I also didn't want to admit to myself that I wasn't assessing students as well as I could be. 

Fast forward to today, and I can't imagine teaching without standards-based assessment practices. I have grown to see the true value in what I used to view as an attack. I honestly believe that, while there is no silver bullet to revitalize our education system, standards-based assessment could be the most profound change our educational system has been exposed to in a long, long time. It's not just a shift in grading; it's a shift in learning, classroom culture, and our ability to use data effectively.

And the best news is that it's way easier than I thought it was going to be to make the change.

For the skeptics out there, let's start with the why. 

Why standards-based grading?

It increases our ability to engage students through voice and choice.

It's no secret that choice increases student willingness to work hard on something. I know I'm guilty of this, too. If I'm forced to do something, I generally won't want to do it. If I get to decide what I'm going to do though, I often will go above what I am expected to do. However, our grading practices determine how much choice is available to students. If our grade book is based on specific activities, we are limiting ourselves in how much choice we can give students. 

For example, if we have "Essay 1" as an assignment in the grade book, every student must write that essay. However, if we approach it from a standards-based perspective, now we can record scores for "Ability to Use Evidence," "Organization of Ideas," and "Purpose/focus of Communication." Think about how many different possibilities this opens up. Now you really can give students a choice in what they are going to do because our grade book no longer ties us down. Instead, it frees us. 

It increases our own and our student's ability to reflect.

I'm going to give you some data to reflect on: 

• Unit 1 Quiz: 83%
• Unit 1 Test: 67%
• Unit 1 Project: 0%
• Unit 2 Quiz: 74%
• Unit 2 Test: 60%
• Unit 2 Project: 100%

Go ahead and reflect on it. Now what did you learn? More importantly, what would a student learn? The most likely thing they'll learn is that they're not good at taking a test, and the most important thing you'll notice is that the student didn't turn in a project. 

What if you changed it to this, though:

• Using Order of Operations: Proficient
• Simplifying Algebraic Equations: Developing
• Graphing Basic Points: Mastery
• Calculating and Graphing Slope: Developing

(Okay, if those are terrible examples of learning targets in math, just remember I teach ELA, but hopefully you get the idea.)

Now, think about the value in reflection on this data. It's specific. The student can identify their strengths and weaknesses right away. As the teacher, you can quickly identify not only the student's strength and weaknesses, but you can very quickly see what you need to reteach with the whole class.

Research: Self-monitoring helps students believe that they have control over their own learning, and it also helps them internalize their learning more clearly (Source). Having students track and reflect on their own progress on average results in a 32 percentile-point gain in their achievement (Source).

It increases our ability to differentiate.

Differentiation is tough, and data that doesn't allow for reflection makes it nearly impossible. If you have students writing an essay, but the only data you have available to you is an overall score for their previous essay, how can you differentiate? However, if your grade book shows you how they did in specific areas on their previous essay, you can break students into groups to have them practice those different skills depending on their previous results. How this can happen will vary, but the important part is that you have to have data that allows you to form those groups and see individual student's needs. Standards-based grading allows you to do that. 

Research: A three-year study in Canada showed that differentiation in mixed-ability classrooms has a positive effect on the achievement of all students (Source). For a very detailed and scientific explanation of why differentiation is essentially in the modern classroom, read this article.

It allows students to see growth.

While improving from a 70% on a quiz to an 80% on the test does allow students to see growth, what is the emphasis of that observation? Most students will just focus on the fact that their grade went up, not on the learning itself. The more we can constantly refocus students on the learning, the more they will begin to care about it. If they see their growth connected to specific skills, not specific assignments, they will begin to understand that they are learning and growing in meaningful ways. If a student sees that their ability to use the order of operations goes from beginning to proficient over the course of a trimester, they can see that they learned, not just improved their grade.

Research: Standards-based grading gives students concrete evidence to document growth, which helps foster a growth mindset in students (Source). For a good snapshot of how showing growth through data engages students, browse this source.

It allows you to create room for students to make mistakes and learn from them.

We love telling students that it's okay to make mistakes, but the reality is that it's typically not okay according to our grade books. If we have three distinct assignments in the grade book (eg. Quiz 1, Test 1, and Project 1), it makes it difficult to drop any scores. However, if those three assignments cover the same skills, look at what happens when you record the skills. 

• Using Order of Operations: Developing
• Using Order of Operations: Proficient
• Using Order of Operations: Proficient

Looking at this, what is the student's overall performance in that target? It's clearly proficient, so why would we mark them down for being below proficient when they started? If you drop one of the three scores, the grade then becomes more accurate (if you define a grade as being an indicator of performance at that moment in time), but it also tells students that mistakes are okay as long as you grow from them. 

Research: If students are able to approach their mistakes rationally instead of emotionally (which can often only be done if they are not penalized for them long-term), only then will they learn from them (Source). For a snapshot of what this looks like in a school, read this article. 

It allows you to emphasize behavior in meaningful ways.

The most common complaint I hear from teachers is that standards-based grading de-emphasizes behavioral consequences for things like late work or attendance. Every time I hear it my response is, "Is your current consequence teaching students to be more responsible? Does it change the behavior?" I used to mark students down for late work. It produced no meaningful change, except for the over-achiever who would cry and obsessively focus on all the assignments (read, assignments, not learning) for the rest of the course. With standards-based grading, I can refuse late work, teach students meaningful lessons, and still provide an accurate report of a student's learning later on.

Final Thoughts

Imagine a doctor who knows there is a better way to perform a surgery, but they just don't do it because it's too much work to learn a new strategy. Imagine a scientist who has all sorts of research and data to support one theory, but they continue to hold to another, even though they know it to be false. Now imagine an education system where, despite an increasing amount of evidence – both research-based, anecdotal, and...well, common-sensical (?) – it refuses to change from its traditions simply because it's what we've always done. 

All three of these are absurd situations.

Two of them would never happen.

One has been happening for years.

It's time that changed. 

Now that you have the why for standards-based grading, in my next post I'll talk about the how – how I switched from a traditional grading system to a standards-based system. For those of you overwhelmed by the seemingly insurmountable challenge of that change, I want to encourage you.

It was much easier than I thought.