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CREATIVE GRADING
or
HOW I DECIDED TO STOP WORRYING AND LOVE MY GRADEBOOK

Most of us give grades for the same reason we go to the dentist—we fear the repercussions if we don’t.
Grades have become a form of self-protection. We use them to hide behind if an irate student storms into our
office or if a curious administrator wonders what we're doing here. But can grades play a constructive role in
the thinking/learning, process?

On one hand, | must say no. When we attempt to grade a student's work, whether it be an essay exam or a
mathematical process leading to an answer, we are forced into the position of making a judgment about the
quality of another person’s mind, his perceptions and understanding. To me, this notion of the teacher as judge
is alien to the mutual learning environment I want to create. No matter how much we explain our grading
policy and apologize for having to have one, grades are perceived by students much as we see our merit
raises—as statements about our worth as productive human beings. This perception naturally creates barriers

- and forces the people on both sides into playing roles that, often, are antithetical to the community-of-learners

ideal most of us want to encourage.

However, the unfortunate reality is that we have to give grades; so the problem is how we can make grades a
constructive part of the course. During the past ten or so years that I have been teaching, I've tried ways to
make grading as humane a process as possible. I’ve tried having students grade themselves and each other; I've
tried avoiding giving grades until the end of the term; I’ve tried writing pages of comments rather than an actual
grade; I’ve tried using various symbols and phrases to identify grade ranges rather than actual letter or number
grades. But I’ve found that most of these approaches do more to increase grade anxiety than to decrease it. The
question "How am I doing in this class" continues throughout the term; and my favorite reply, "You're asking
the wrong person when you ask me," may please the Zen master, but not the student asking the question.

I've come to accept the unfortunate reality of grades. Since students see me as their evaluator (and since I am
their evaluator) | now accept this role, and I include a grade—sometimes cleverly concealed in a paragraph or
two of human response—whenever I read something that I assigned, be it an early draft of a paper or a final
revision, an essay exam or a few-sentence response to the day’s discussion or the previous night’s homework.
Different assignments bear differing credit, to be sure, but everything is graded.

Surprisingly, with this new approach the determination of a grade for a particular piece of work has become
easier. I no longer agonize over whether a paper is a C+ or a B-, or how much credit to give a poorly written
essay on a difficult or original topic when another paper, on a fairly simplistic issue, is written well. Since | now
give so many grades on so many different drafts, | realize a particular grade just doesn’t matter very much
(although I don’t dare say this to the student). In a sense, by giving so many different grades, I’m liberated
from worrying about "standards" and whether or not a particular grade is fair when compared to other grades.
| am free to use grades more creatively.

My new approach is based on the concept of grades as therapy. I can now give students the grade | think
they need on a particular assignment to inspire more active involvement in the course. If I think a student
needs a pat on the back, I feel free to give that student a higher grade than is "deserved" in order to build
confidence. Sometimes I even ask a student who has not had much success to write a short summary of
something he or she said in class in order to show an A for that student in my gradebook.

However, tempting though it is, I try not to use a lowered grade to shock a student who needs a kick rather
than a pat. Students, like most of us, tend to work better in a positive, comfortable environment. If a student
feels picked on or penalized by grades, he will stop learning out of spite; and out of the same spite, the
instructor will enjoy playing judge and sentence the student to a lifetime with an F on his transcript.

Grades are potentially dangerous weapons. But since we have to use them, we need to find ways to make

grades, if not helpful to the teaching/learning process, at least not harmful to it. ee
DOUGLAS COLLEGE

 

Wayne Scheer
Atlanta Junior College ARCHIVES

For further information, contact the author at Atlanta Junior College, 1630 Stewart Avenue, S.W., Atlanta;
30310. .

Suanne 2 Rouechie, Editor
January 24, 1986, Vol Wail, ING |
INNOVATION ABSTRACTS is a publication of the National Institute for Staff and Organizational Development, EDB 348, The University of Texas at Austin,

Austin, Texas 78712, (512) 471-7545. Subscriptions are available to nonconsortium members for $35 per year. Funding in part by the W. K. Kellogg
Foundation and Sid W. Richardson Foundation. Issued weekly when classes are in session during fall and spring terms and monthly during the summer.

© The University of Texas at Austin, 1986
Further duplication is permitted only by MEMBER institutions for their own personnel. ISSN 0199-106X