Post by Amanda Halfman: Amanda is in her 7th year of teaching Family Consumer Science and her first year teaching at Bettendorf High School. You can follow Amanda on Twitter @MsHalfman
I hate jargon, theories without practicality, and educational
bandwagons. Like many of you I have sat through professional development or a
conference and rolled my eyes thinking, “and how does this apply to me?” or
“Yeah right, like that would work in my world.” Therefore I am promising you
now; I am not trying to sell you anything. Really, that is not my thing. Instead, this blog posting is about my own
endeavor in implementing Standards Based Grading (SBG) into my curriculum, what
I have observed in student achievement, and my future goals. As I like to say to my chiropractor, let’s
get crack’n.
Now I know that in many circles of education, SBG is a dirty
word, at times viewed derisively and others with confusion. I myself felt this way in regards to SBG when
I was first introduced to the concept. Here is the deal. Three years ago in my former school district,
the article “Seven Reasons for Standards-Based Grading” by Patricia Scriffiny was shoved in our mailboxes with an
attachment that said read it and be prepared to discuss in our next late-start
meeting. The intent was good, the
delivery not so much. What occurred was
a brief statement by the admin about SBG, no logistics, and a follow-up
statement stating, “SBG is taking over and as a school district we wish to
switch over. Thoughts anyone?” Instantly, hands were raised, snarky side
conversations buzzed, and the line to the coffee pot grew. As teachers, we were concerned about losing
the power of the F. We did not see the difference between a 1-4 in a grade book
or any other point value. And what college accepts Proficient on a high school transcript?
As luck would have it, I was assigned to the SBG data team.
Like many of my Career and Technology Education comrades, I was looking for a
way to balance assessing students by what they know, what they can do, and what
they understand, while not overloading the grade book. (Sorry, but it doesn't
make sense to have so many points by the end of the quarter that any project or
test must be worth hundreds of points to make a difference in a student’s
grade. Doing this simply devalues the work.) In addition, the skills and
concepts we work with require continual training and, with enough practice and
feedback, mastery. Skill attainment is
not a one and done deal when students are required to demonstrate evolving
concepts. Although my team was a
fantastic group, we had no established goals, were lacking direction, and
needed assistance from someone other than Google. Although we did try to
implement SBG into our curriculum, it ended up looking like a modified point
system without any real meaning. So, I
headed back to the drawing board.
My first “Hallelujah” came from participating in the
co-district EdCamp with Bettendorf and my previous school last year. After attending a session led by Kim Rojas (@krojas711),
the discussion led me to reflect on my own pedagogy. This included my lesson
delivery, assessments, and the levels of academic achievement in my classroom. More importantly, I was able to see SBG in
action with concrete materials. Kim’s methods made sense. The syllabus and
rubrics were well detailed, and verbally justified the spectrum of her grading.
Kim’s grade book was simple to follow and evolved with each student as he/she
developed their skills under user-friendly standards. This omitted any
possibility of assigning arbitrary points. And hello, no more silly extra
credit.
The hallelujah grew into a choir of baby angels after I was
hired on to the Bettendorf team and made contact with Kim about her work on
SBG. At this time, I was wrapping up my
Master’s degree and needed an action research project. I decided to give SBG
another shot and made that the focus of my research. After condensing down hours of research in
Marzano-land and harassing specialists on the phone, I realized that for me to
really make this work I had to throw all of my previous years of teaching out
and start over. I needed to forget many former habits and beliefs and instead
establish new ones. For example, I needed to believe all students can achieve
mastery. Everyone can master something, but it may come down to a matter of
when it happens. Not only is this a positive and optimistic teaching
philosophy, but this also holds me responsible to all of my students.
My next steps were to analyze my curriculum standards and
rewrite them in student-friendly language, identify learning targets (“I can”
statements) for each unit, establish levels of proficiency, and create rubrics
for the different ways I would evaluate what my students know, understand, and
can do. These tools have become essential in my classes in assisting my
students with goal setting and more focused skill attainment. In my observations
and record keeping over the past three quarters, I have found students’ scores
to be stabilized with fewer failing range and higher proficiency. I attribute
much of this to students engaging in the relearning and reassessment process so
they can show a higher level of proficiency. In regards to attitude and
motivation, my students have oriented themselves towards an optimistic
self-fulfilling prophecy. My at-risk students stay engaged in learning - they
have hope because their grades now represent what students actually know and
can do, not how compliant they are with arbitrary rules. It’s no longer focused
on students “playing the game of school”, but rather on their own individual
skill attainment.
For myself, these same tools helped me to hone my lesson
plans to each target, critically analyze my use of in-class time, and create
equitable methods of assessment, which have all made me a much more pleasant
and optimistic teacher. It gives me the
time to focus on the relationships with students. And I am not caught up in the
minutiae of grading excessive paperwork. If you decide to take the plunge into
SBG, realize this is an educational philosophy abiding by key concepts that are
not fixed, but silhouette a vision for practical learning. Feel free to make it
your own. What works for one teacher may
not work exactly the same for another.
Passing on this advice about SBG, go in willing to try anything and
accept the need to constantly evolve your craft for the ever-changing needs of
our students. I am confident you won’t
be sorry you took the plunge.