"This year was the first year that I had a chance to talk and discuss my grade.  I found this very useful because sometimes the grades you get on a test don’t really show how much you know.  For example I tend to make careless mistakes, but I knew the answer and being able to go back and discuss this error helps."    - Jonathan H.

One of the most important opportunities to talk seriously with my students happens at the end of every marking period.  I have created a process of determining a grade together with each student that causes both of us to look very closely at the successes and problems he’s faced over the past couple of months.  Today, I’m introducing the form that we use to document the process.

“I’m about to hand out your first quarter self-evaluation sheet.  This form, along with all the material you’ve been accumulating in your portfolio, is what is going to guide our conversation during your grade conference.”

I hand out the forms.  

“Take a look at the front of the sheet,” I say.  “You’ll see that the contract work you’ve done will be about 40% of your quarter grade;  that represents how well you’ve done the process of learning.  Right under that it says that the “evidence of learning” is another 40%.  This includes all the test grades, test resubmittals and retests you’ve taken, and learning summaries, if you’ve done any of those.  For both of those categories, you’ll see that there is already a grade, because they’re already been evaluated - I’m just reporting what is in my gradebook.

“You’ll notice there’s another part of the grade under the title “personal outcomes” that represents roughly 20% of the grade.  This section is about how well you did the job of being a student in this class.  This section is completely blank because I want to know how you see your performance as a student before I weigh in on my point of view.

“Under personal outcomes, I want you to determine how self-directed you were in your learning, how well you participated, how well organized you have been, and what you have contributed in your classroom job.  In order to help you decide on these grades, I have created a set of questions for you to answer. 

“Look on the back of the sheet.  Under “self-directedness”, there are three questions. “Did you use class time effectively?”,  “Did you push yourself to learn as intensely as you were able?”, and “Did you use time in the Science Study Center when needed?”.  Answer each question by considering how consistently you did that task.  If you think you did it consistently, put down an “A”.  If you usually did it, call it a “B”.  Sometimes is a “C”.  Rarely, a “D”, and never an “F”.”

“When you are done with all these questions, summarize what you put down on the front of the sheet, and decide, given everything that is on the sheet, what you believe a fair grade for the quarter should be.

“Some of you noticed that I said ‘about 40%’ a while ago.  That’s because these percentages are guidelines;  they are there to help us start the conversation.  Think about it - since we don’t have points, it doesn’t make sense to try to be precise about how much your journal work should weigh.  What we want to do in our conferences is come up with a grade that seems fair and appropriate to both of us.

I have them fill in the forms and turn them in before we move on to the next activity.

When I have some time to look at what they’ve written, I can see whether I agree with their assessments or not.  If I disagree significantly for any reason, I mark it so that it becomes a part of our conversation.  Honest and accurate self-assessment is an important skill in and of itself.  It is also essential for the smooth running of this type of classroom.

"I liked how you as a teacher gave us the opportunity to be as adults and treat us as adults because throughout all four quarters we were able to grade ourselves and have you give us feedback on what we really deserve.  Every time when we did the self evaluation I always gave myself a lower grade, but you proved me wrong because you saw the potential I had and how well I could do in the class."    —  Jennifer C., student