Innovation Summit: Grading

This post is a supplemental resource for a presentation at CCSD15’s Innovation Summit 2017.

A. Gathering Activity: In the comment section below, write

• the title of a book/movie you appreciated/found interesting this summer;
• the author/director’s name (if you know); and
• choose one or more of the sentences stems below (or make your own):
  • One big questions this book/movie seems to be asking about human beings is…
  • The part of the story that helped me make sense of my own life was when…
  • The part of the story that helped me understand another life, place, time, possibility was when…One of the following statements:

B.  Planning Calendar:

A guide/template to start planning your quarter to make time for portfolio development, reflection, and final grade conferring. I’ve included a sample writing week and a sample reading week to show how, in each segment of learning, students are creating artifacts with self-peer-teacher feedback.

C. Sample mid-term letter to parents (written by a student):

Students wrote letters about what their learning and emailed them to parents; some translated the letters into their home language. Here is how the letter about reading class is organized:  1) books read independently; 2) discussion comparing shared reading character (Ponyboy) to independent reading character; 3) blogging reflection of claims, evidence, examples, growth: 4) partner poem reflection on collaborative meaning making; 5) book group reflection, 6) overall reflection on purpose and progress.

D. Sample end-of-term screencast:

When you meet with the student, you will ask follow-up questions about this evidence. The free version of screencast allows 10 minutes; students can do multiple screencasts and post them on the blog or attach them to Classroom. (Click here for a video on how to set up Screencastify in Chrome.)

E. “5 Routines for a Meaningful Final Grade Conference“

F. Questions?

Write questions in the comments below or email me if you’d like 1)any additional material or 2) to schedule a time to meet to discuss any of these documents or processes further: donovans@ccsd15.net.

G. Follow-up Session:

Complete this survey if you’d like to meet in late September to talk more about grading less.

H. Resources:

• Assessment 3.0: Throw Out Your Gradebook and Inspire Learning by Mark Barnes
• Fair Isn’t Always Equal: Assessing & Grading in the Differentiated Classroom by Rick Wormeli
• A Repair Kit for Grading: 15 Fixes for Broken Grades by Ken O’Connor
• Alfie Kohn’s books
• Minimize Grades in ELA: My Nerdy Lecture by Sarah J. Donovan
• Posts about feedback and portfolio in reading and writing.
• Facebook Groups: Teachers Throwing Out Grades, Teachers Going Gradeless
• Twitter Chat: #TG2Chat, Sundays @9PM EST
• Add Screencastify extension