What the heck is this blog all about anyway?

A major focus of my professional development in the last ten years or so has been the role of evaluation in the education of high school students. Hi. I'm a high school math teacher. Want more? I am a math teacher at a prep school. At an intense college preparatory secondary school. So, kids are sent here to go to college. Or so it would seem. And I am part of that.

Now, I want my part at my school to not be just as a tool that students use to get to the next place. No teacher wants that. So, I question everything I do, and the biggest question that looms over me, especially at the end of each quarter is what the heck am I doing assigning a grade to these kids. I mean, how does giving a student a grade really benefit that student?

I wholeheartedly (yes, I mean that, with every ounce of my heart) reject the "positive reinforcement" idea. Quickly, if you think negative reinforcement is bad, then why should positive reinforcement be any better? Both are used as a means of obtaining compliance. Don't do this, or you will go to your room. Do well on this test and I will give you a token that helps you get into college. Same thing. Don't trust me, trust Alfie Kohn who exhaustively researches his writing. Check out this article first.

But, I am obligated to pursue this practice given where I currently teach. Really, this would be the case at the vast majority of secondary schools, so it's hardly surprising.

At the end of each quarter, at the end of each project, at the end of each test, and so on, I assign a letter grade to evaluate the quality of the student's work. This simple letter grade only conveys how one has done compared to one's peers. It does not offer any suggestions as to what is "good" or what "needs improvement" or if a student has improved or regressed or been stagnant. And, given the high stakes involved - Yale? Carleton? UC Santa Barbara? - students learn that these tokens are what they need so that is all they pay attention to. Yes, I am generalizing, but it is a valid generalization.

My proposal: Eliminate with great haste and with great contempt the letter grade. Evolve as a teacher, evolve as a school, and evolve as a student. Who knows, maybe evolve as a society?