At this point I have given my first four standards quizzes. I have a surprisingly low failure rate right now but I feel like it truly represents what my students know and are able to do. I love that I can look at my gradebook and know *exactly* what skill each kid needs to reinforce or refine.
Other things I like:
- The kids are starting to really buy into the system. I still get the "are you grading this?" type of question, but I no longer have to answer it. It never fails. When a student dares to ask that question, another student (un-prompted) says "Yes, she will grade it and give us feedback on it. This is evidence." Score in my column!
- The students really know what they know and what they don't know. If you ask almost any kid in my classes why their grade is what it is...they could tell you which standard (in their own words) that they need to improve. Score again!
- Keeping a better paper trail of the formative formal/informal assessments than I do. At this point I grade them and give them back to the students. Occasionally (if I have used clickers or some other technology) I have kept records of the scores. Most of the time I just return the quizzes marked up with feedback to the students and move on. My plan is to devise some type of paper gradebook system that I can keep up with easily, but so far all my attempts have failed.
- Giving more timely feedback. Ideally I would like to give students their "evidence" back within day. Currently it is taking me a couple days. The more immediate the feedback is, the more meaningful it will be for the students.
