In this chapter I was struck mostly by the debate about how much emphasis participation should be given in assigning grades. It seems that there are no easy answers. There are good arguments for both sides of the issue. One thing that the book didn’t mention was the fact that for many students school is a mandatory experience and they are just trying to get through without getting an F so the can get out of there faster. Learning for its own sake is not in the equation. Regardless of how prepared a dynamic a teacher is, if a student doesn’t want to participate, they won’t listen. I think that a participation grade recorded separately from the academic grade may provide the impetus a student needs to become more engaged in the learning process this make it possible to teach them more and more accurately assess their mastery. I also propose breaking it down into specific categories, rather than just assigning a 1, 2, or 3 to the effort or participation category. This would provide more specific information to parents and the students to understand the causes for the grade. These categories could include: homework completion, engaged learning, and organization.
No comments:
Post a Comment