I know it can be helpful to see how others identify topics for standards based grading. I typed mine up tonight and thought I'd share.
Click here for the direct link
Showing posts with label SBG. Show all posts
Showing posts with label SBG. Show all posts
Thursday, February 26, 2015
Saturday, February 22, 2014
Grading
I know as a new teacher I like to see how other teachers grade and break down their grades, so I thought I would share what is currently working for me.
Grading Policy:
40% Tests
20% Quizzes
20% Classwork/Notebook
20% Homework\
Tests
I grade tests using Standards Based Grading, read about it here. I'm loving it for many reasons, but one I haven't mentioned yet is that I'm much less likely to put off grading. I don't know about you, but I spend a ridiculous amount of time deliberating over how many points to count off for this and SBG has really helped that.
Policies: Students can study and prove they have practiced using my resource website and then I will give them new problems. I am still working on the mechanics of this and would love suggestions on what you do!
Quizzes
Every regular schedule day with no tests we do a daily quiz. I get all my quizzes from Math-Aids. This makes it fast for me and I can also link to the quizzes for my students to practice at home since the problems are randomly generated and they provide answer keys. This is when I can focus on remedial skills like operations with fractions, changing percents to decimals, and operations with decimals that are assumed to be known by our kids but are often forgotten. They are usually 10 questions, 10 points each out of a 100. Sometimes I'll do half credit, but usually it is all or nothing.
These, like test, can be studied and retested. I also will requiz as a class certain quizzes that everyone did poorly.
Once I am in the second half of the course, these quizzes will shift to being review from the previous quarter.
Classwork/Notebook
I have a place on the back of their TOC to record classwork. It is my first time trying this and I am still ironing out the kinks. The last two units I have ended up going around and stamping the classwork the day before a test. I would really like to be more consistent in doing it every day.
Notebooks I am grading at unit tests using a quick rubric of 1 to 4 on 5 items:
- TOC is updated
- Page numbers present
- Pages are titled
- Homework has been corrected
- Everything is attached
I only spend a couple minutes on each notebook. I am already seeing a big change with only the second notebook check with students keeping up with it. My goal is for this to become and awesome resource for them, and I know for some of them it just isn't going to happen unless there is a grade attached. My principal says we "incent what we value". So I am incentivizing keeping the notebook in order.
So far I only have a couple students who aren't keeping up with it well. And now the others are pretty much on autopilot and that can just be a nice grade to help their classwork average.
Homework
I've decided to not accept any late homework this semester and it is making things so much easier. I wrote a post about my homework process here.
I'm also trying to incorporate one project per unit this year. Projects will be worth two homework grades. Mostly they are going to be on matching multiple representations of the functions we are studying, since that is a huge emphasis in CCSS.
Do you have any grading policies or tips that have really paid off? Share in the comments!
Grading Policy:
40% Tests
20% Quizzes
20% Classwork/Notebook
20% Homework\
Tests
I grade tests using Standards Based Grading, read about it here. I'm loving it for many reasons, but one I haven't mentioned yet is that I'm much less likely to put off grading. I don't know about you, but I spend a ridiculous amount of time deliberating over how many points to count off for this and SBG has really helped that.
Policies: Students can study and prove they have practiced using my resource website and then I will give them new problems. I am still working on the mechanics of this and would love suggestions on what you do!
Quizzes
Every regular schedule day with no tests we do a daily quiz. I get all my quizzes from Math-Aids. This makes it fast for me and I can also link to the quizzes for my students to practice at home since the problems are randomly generated and they provide answer keys. This is when I can focus on remedial skills like operations with fractions, changing percents to decimals, and operations with decimals that are assumed to be known by our kids but are often forgotten. They are usually 10 questions, 10 points each out of a 100. Sometimes I'll do half credit, but usually it is all or nothing.
These, like test, can be studied and retested. I also will requiz as a class certain quizzes that everyone did poorly.
Once I am in the second half of the course, these quizzes will shift to being review from the previous quarter.
Classwork/Notebook
I have a place on the back of their TOC to record classwork. It is my first time trying this and I am still ironing out the kinks. The last two units I have ended up going around and stamping the classwork the day before a test. I would really like to be more consistent in doing it every day.
Notebooks I am grading at unit tests using a quick rubric of 1 to 4 on 5 items:
- TOC is updated
- Page numbers present
- Pages are titled
- Homework has been corrected
- Everything is attached
I only spend a couple minutes on each notebook. I am already seeing a big change with only the second notebook check with students keeping up with it. My goal is for this to become and awesome resource for them, and I know for some of them it just isn't going to happen unless there is a grade attached. My principal says we "incent what we value". So I am incentivizing keeping the notebook in order.
So far I only have a couple students who aren't keeping up with it well. And now the others are pretty much on autopilot and that can just be a nice grade to help their classwork average.
Homework
I've decided to not accept any late homework this semester and it is making things so much easier. I wrote a post about my homework process here.
I'm also trying to incorporate one project per unit this year. Projects will be worth two homework grades. Mostly they are going to be on matching multiple representations of the functions we are studying, since that is a huge emphasis in CCSS.
Do you have any grading policies or tips that have really paid off? Share in the comments!
Standards Based Grading - Mechanics
In this post I'd like to show you how I am currently assessing using SBG and then how I'm having the students record it.
Scores
I'm using a scale from 5 to 10 to record, since I feel like those scores translate in a gradebook to the typical letter grade I think each level deserves. I do use half points if I feel like they are squarely between two levels.
To me:
10 - Perfect performance
9 - Making minor errors either in mechanics or notation
8 - Making a significant mistake repeatedly that shows a gap in knowledge
7 - Making progress, but has many gaps
6- At least knows how to start a problem
5 - Blank or unrelated answers
What I really like about scoring this way is that my lower students can see that they are making progress in some areas, instead of just marking things wrong or doing partial credit - I can summarize what their main errors are and work with them to fix it. But, I also love what it does for my higher students. I teach 9th graders and a lot of them are used to coasting in middle school and always getting A's on tests because they were at the top of the curve and got extra credit. However, this method of grading forces them to see where they need to improve (and that these areas do exist - they aren't perfect!). And, many of them are committed to getting the higher score they are used to - so I think this challenges and helps all levels of students.
Test Structure and Grade Reporting
Usually my tests have around 5 objectives I am assessing. At the top of the test I have a place to record all of the scores for each section. I also indicate the score for the section at the top of the page with the respective problems
This is my first semester doing the whole course's tests with SBG so I am definitely still in the experimenting stage!
Scores
I'm using a scale from 5 to 10 to record, since I feel like those scores translate in a gradebook to the typical letter grade I think each level deserves. I do use half points if I feel like they are squarely between two levels.
To me:
10 - Perfect performance
9 - Making minor errors either in mechanics or notation
8 - Making a significant mistake repeatedly that shows a gap in knowledge
7 - Making progress, but has many gaps
6- At least knows how to start a problem
5 - Blank or unrelated answers
What I really like about scoring this way is that my lower students can see that they are making progress in some areas, instead of just marking things wrong or doing partial credit - I can summarize what their main errors are and work with them to fix it. But, I also love what it does for my higher students. I teach 9th graders and a lot of them are used to coasting in middle school and always getting A's on tests because they were at the top of the curve and got extra credit. However, this method of grading forces them to see where they need to improve (and that these areas do exist - they aren't perfect!). And, many of them are committed to getting the higher score they are used to - so I think this challenges and helps all levels of students.
Test Structure and Grade Reporting
Usually my tests have around 5 objectives I am assessing. At the top of the test I have a place to record all of the scores for each section. I also indicate the score for the section at the top of the page with the respective problems
Recording Scores in the INB
When I return the tests to students, I've created a recording sheet in excel. I have them color in red from a 5-7.5, yellow from 7.5-8.5 and green from 8.5-10.
Students then graph their results as a line. There is room for them to graph at least three assessments of each objective. I'm hoping this will be a tool for them to see how they are improving. I like the colors since it helps them know if they really need to kick it into gear or if they are doing ok both overall and for each objective.
Remediation
Check out my post on how I re-mediate students and provide them with targeted practice.
Sunday, February 2, 2014
Spring Semester Professional Goal
Background: Midway through last semester in the middle of my unit on factoring, I realized that my grading system was not working. I had been thinking about it for a while, and finally just made up my mind to try standards based grading (SBG) for my tests and see what happened.
I loved it. I think it was a hard transition for the kids in the middle of the semester, so my goal this semester is to be more organized about how things are graded and presented. Enter: my resource website.
Over the Christmas break I went through and decided on objectives for each of my units, usually 4-6 and made a webpage just for that unit. My goal now is to link to resources for each of the objectives so students have specific places to go to read practice problems, watch a video or two, and do practice that gives them feedback.
Many of these links are to the typical sites: Khan Academy, cool math, purple math, Regents, etc. But, I'm trying to eliminate that extra need to search and evaluate what is helpful so that my students can get the help they need quickly when they need it most. I think it will also help the parents know where to direct their kids.
Also, I'm not using the district website for this endeavor since we all know how quickly they will change platforms and then all my beautiful work would be gone. I'm using the free web-service: www. weebly.com which I find to be very intuitive and easy to change.
My main website: mrs-hester.weebly.com
View of Unit 1: http://mrs-hester.weebly.com/unit-1-one-variable-equations-and-inequalities.html
I loved it. I think it was a hard transition for the kids in the middle of the semester, so my goal this semester is to be more organized about how things are graded and presented. Enter: my resource website.
Over the Christmas break I went through and decided on objectives for each of my units, usually 4-6 and made a webpage just for that unit. My goal now is to link to resources for each of the objectives so students have specific places to go to read practice problems, watch a video or two, and do practice that gives them feedback.
Many of these links are to the typical sites: Khan Academy, cool math, purple math, Regents, etc. But, I'm trying to eliminate that extra need to search and evaluate what is helpful so that my students can get the help they need quickly when they need it most. I think it will also help the parents know where to direct their kids.
Also, I'm not using the district website for this endeavor since we all know how quickly they will change platforms and then all my beautiful work would be gone. I'm using the free web-service: www. weebly.com which I find to be very intuitive and easy to change.
My main website: mrs-hester.weebly.com
View of Unit 1: http://mrs-hester.weebly.com/unit-1-one-variable-equations-and-inequalities.html
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