Standards-Based-Grading and Learning
Participating in our recent #EdCampMadWI (Madison, Wisconsin), I had the opportunity to engage in several conversations about genuine learning, standards-based grading and learning and the need to differentiate instruction, assessments and support to empower all students to learn. I’m realizing that offering a standards-based learning environment enables more students to engage in genuine learning and retention for the sole purpose of learning compared to the traditional environment where students are prompted to “play school” and “earn points” through a variety of ways that do not tend to contribute to their education. When students learn to “play school” well, them become compliant and cooperative, but the focus in not necessarily on learning for application and retention. I have noticed a huge shift in how and why our students are learning via our standards-based approach. Students are focused on understanding and relating concepts rather than just doing them to get them done for a grade. Most students have realized that our standards-based learning environment fosters real understanding through questions and reflection. Students are provided choice and several opportunities to prove their proficiency. Thanks to several enlightening conversations with Garnet Hillman (@garnet_hillman) and Jasper Fox Sr (@jsprfox), I’m now differentiating instruction, assessments and support for the benefit of many learners. During a single class, students can be working on a variety of related concepts that are tailored to their needs as opposed to providing a “one-size-fits-all” classroom. After an EdCampMadWI session where educators conversed about how to design learning environments to empower challenged and high achievers, I’m now facilitating better learning environments rather than teaching to the “average student”. After watching a recent TED talk about the fact that there are no “average students”, I’ve learned to offer more meaningful and relevant learning where fast and slow learners are encouraged and challenged.
Open Communication with Students
In addition to facilitating a standards-based learning environment, I’ve learned that keeping communication open between students and teachers fosters more tailored learning, more opportunities for meaningful feedback and opportunities for reassessment. After providing relevant feedback to several students, we have engaged in useful conversations around learning and proving proficiency through face-to-face conversations, additional practice opportunities and reassessment. I’m still stunned by the progress that several of our students are making purely based on having an aggressive desire to learn, a willingness to provide more practice to get needed feedback and a reflective mindset that is enabling them to ask pointed questions resulting in regular “ah-ha” moments. More and more students that are unsure about new concepts are willing to facilitate our learning by leading the class through a thoughtful reasoning process to arrive at a meaningful solution. Several of our students are using divergent thinking to arrive at the same solution and discussing why the varied approaches converged. Toward the end of the first semester, I had several students approach me with the desire to prove a higher level of proficiency. They have recently received feedback from me that suggested they might want to make some adjustments in their thinking. We then discussed additional practice opportunities and follow-up times where they could prove higher levels of proficiency. Every one of these students was willing to learn to a higher level, engage in relevant and meaningful additional practice and re-assess to proficiency!
I am so proud of how dedicated our students have become based on our standards-based learning environment, suggested practice opportunities and willingness to reassess until they achieve proficiency.
