The benefits of getting rid of grading

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Before and after the recent release of international assessment results (PISA 2022), Free Press readers have seen calls for discussion about how public education is meeting students’ needs and preparing them for their futures, and for systemic changes to aspects of schooling (A Modest Proposal, Oct. 28: Let’s talk about children and education, Jan. 4; Focus on improving math education, Jan. 6, among them).

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Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 13/01/2024 (636 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Before and after the recent release of international assessment results (PISA 2022), Free Press readers have seen calls for discussion about how public education is meeting students’ needs and preparing them for their futures, and for systemic changes to aspects of schooling (A Modest Proposal, Oct. 28: Let’s talk about children and education, Jan. 4; Focus on improving math education, Jan. 6, among them).

These, and two government-led processes of reflection with public input — the Manitoba Summit on Literacy and Numeracy (January 2018) and the more recent Manitoba Commission on Kindergarten to Grade 12 Education (reports from both are available at the latter’s website) — have left untouched one particular, everyday aspect of schooling that may be detrimental to student achievement and, in cases, wellbeing.

I suggest the elimination of marks and grading for children prior to Grade 10. In its place would be the tracking of progress along learning pathways formed from clusters of existing curricular learning outcomes. Clusters may centre around curriculum-coherent goals such as creating music, riding a bike safely, evaluating the credibility of information, making environmentally conscious choices, using number skills and patterns to understand and predict, and building community though appreciation for historical, cultural and individual narratives and differences.

In a no-grades classroom, day-to-day teacher-student interaction would entail feedback and discussion to support learning, without judgment, marks or grades. Reporting to parents would indicate where along the paths the student is, and next steps for learning. The idea of “de-grading” is counterculture and may be disturbing to some.

And it’s more than just a tweak to practice, policy and procedures. Is it worth it?

Some issues with grading are baked into the scales. The traditional A+, A, A-…D+, D, D-, with its 12 levels of passing, is unsupportable with distinct, distinguishable descriptions of each level.

It panders to an appetite for seeing who is best, third-best, ninth-best, etc., that whether accurate or not, satisfies a small minority of students and their parents, and disaffects others. A common alternative scale Emerging-Developing-Proficient-Extending is an oil-water mix of three processes and one achievement level: a scale must measure just one thing.

Furthermore, the processes are part of learning at any level. Its well-meaning attempt to be gentle results in an anodyne that obscures communication about attainment. Even a scale that clearly communicates achievement relative to the grade-specific learning targets fails to address a more serious issue, however.

In The Case Against Grades, (online), de-grading proponent Alfie Kohn (who has presented in Manitoba) summarizes research showing how a grading-centric approach to communicating about learning detracts from interest in and motivation for learning, in favour of the easiest route to marks.

In Keeping Learning on Track: Formative Assessment and the Regulation of Learning (online), expert Dylan Wiliam describes how students’ reactions to and hunger for marks overrides interest in learning, like an addiction (my take), further hampering struggling students in particular. Regarding struggling students, in In Leading to Change/Effective Grading Practices (online), expert Douglas Reeves wrote “If you wanted to make just one change that would immediately reduce student failure rates, (it would be) challenging prevailing grading practices.” In an April 14, 2014 Globe and Mail article Why some schools are giving letter grades a fail, Surrey, BC teacher Leah Sampson reflected that “Once grades are removed, students are learning for themselves rather than learning for their teacher.”

Research is assailable and can be cherry-picked, particularly for a brief essay; serious interrogation of it and of my sampling and interpretation is important. Evidently, as startling an idea as de-grading may be, it is not novel and it has a basis that is other than strictly philosophical, ethical (there’s a case), or ideological.

If grading practices undermine learning and engagement with school, and may harm vulnerable, struggling students in particular, then de-grading is, indeed, worth it. The province’s recent Framework for Learning (online) guides and lets us follow “New or renewed curriculum, pedagogical practices, and beliefs or understanding about learning.”

Combined with the intention to update the provincially mandated student report card and an openness for dialogue, this may be the opportunity for just such a transformation.

Ken Clark writes from Winnipeg. Most of his time in education focused on assessment, including a role in the collaborative development of the Manitoba student report card policy.

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