As the semester comes to a close, my takeaways from the course will have lasting effect on my teaching career. Assessments and grading are vital to teaching and I have been questioning these two areas for several years. I know I want to make changes to my assessments and grading practices but I am still not sure what those changes will be. My first takeaway from this semester is backward design. This was very difficult for me to do in my EDU 52000 class. I am completely for starting with the standards and having a strong understanding of what is being taught. I will continue to play with it and see if it becomes any easier but I feel like I am missing something with this concept. Another possibility is I am overthinking it and making it harder than it is.
My second takeaway is to write the assessments first. This one really has me switching my mindset. When I went to college in the late 80’s, early 90’s, the concept of writing the assessment before you had taught your unit would had been wrong. I do agree with having a clear understanding of what I want the students to learn in this unit. My final takeaway is that there has to be a better way to grade. Especially in an English class. I was not pleased with our book; I felt it did a poor job of guiding us to a better grading system. Maybe the grading system I am looking for does not exists. This might be true. Now I know I want to really research and try to find out what I can on my own. There has to be a better way. I have to find it. I cannot walk away with talking about this book for just a minute. This book really frustrated me. On multiple occasions, I would be reading and the book would stop talking about a topic and say, “Well, we are going to refer you to these other books and you will have to read them if you are interested about them.” You read the others books, tell me what you found. I need answers, not 20 more doors I have to jump through. I also do not know if I have ever used the word “Fair” to describe my grading before. Life is not fair. My dad always said, “Fair is where you show the hogs.” Today everyone wants everything to be fair. This theme of fairness is going to keep reoccurring as long as society keeps trying to make education fit into a box that will benefit only a select few. I will differentiate and try to individualize each student’s needs. Lastly, I will walk away knowing I need to learn more and be better. I will strive to write better assessments and find that golden grading practice I so desperately desire. I am looking forward to the summertime when I may find more time to research these areas for next year.
0 Comments
|
AuthorMy name is Lisa and I teach English Language Arts at Forsyth, MO. Archives
May 2017
Categories |