James continues:
A few people have expressed concerns about how to keep a standards-based gradebook, especially if there is a school-wide policy of so many entries per week. Here’s my take.
I wrote a detailed post on the practicalities of my standards-based gradebook a little while ago: http://jameshosler.blogspot.com/2012/11/making-powerschool-do-standards-based.html. What follows is my attempt to explain it again for those interested, but I recommend looking there too.
First, it is assumed that letter grades are calculated using the “conjunctive” system I described earlier (http://jameshosler.blogspot.com/2013/03/standards-based-grading-letter-grade.html). In this system the overall letter grade is figured based on the combination of ranks which the individual students have earned. In Latin 1, for example, student work toward five ranks, one each in 1) Hearing, 2) Reading, 3) Writing, 4) Interpersonal, and 5) Vocabulary. The final letter grade is then determined with whatever “overall letter grade rubric” the teacher wants. I define an A in Latin 1, for example, as a 4 in any one standard and a 3 in the rest. A B in my Latin 1 classes is three ranks at level 3 and nothing else lower than a 2. A C is EITHER 1) nothing lower than a 2 OR 2) any one standard at a 1. And so on. (More on how this gives jGR even sharper teeth later.)
So, your gradebook will have three sections.
I) The first section is for all of the individual assessments. These are assignments, tests, whatever you give your kids that shows you what they know and are able to do against the standards. For us these need to be tasks that show us that our students have understood L2. jGR is a good example. For another example, level 2 of my Writing standard for Latin 1 is “able to complete a 40 word free write in five minutes,” and level 3 is “able to complete an essential sentences activity.” Assessments are added on a daily and weekly basis to this section. However, the teacher marks “not included in final grade” for each assignment, because although a 3/4 is 75% mathematically, in our system of conjunctive grading it means something totally different.
II) The second section lists the different standards. For my Latin 1s there are five of them. The individual assessments in section 1 tell me what their overall ranks are for each standard. If a student consistently does well on the reading assessments, the reading rank will be high. If a student does consistently poorly on hearing assessments, the overall hearing rank would be low, based on what hearing tasks (the specific descriptors for levels 1-4) the student has been able to complete. Note that a student might start off badly but improve. In my classes a student might struggle with writing for the first part of a grading period. Perhaps he just can’t get to 40 words on his freewrites and so his writing rank stays at a 1 and his overall letter grade is a C (remember, a 1 in anything is a C). But let’s say that by the end of the grading period he does a glowing freewrite of 100 words. In that case his overall writing rank would go up to a 2 (or even a 3 if he has done the essential sentences satisfactorily) because he has shown me that now he has the ability to do a good freewrite. His earlier poor attempts do not weigh him down. I don’t average the 2 he finally got with all those crappy 1s from the beginning of the grading period. Why do those matter now? Now he is at a solid 2 (or 3, again, depending on how well he does on that level 3 task) and his overall letter grade can rise to a B (if he has earned a 3 in three other standards as per the overall letter grade rubric) with NO PENALTY for taking a little longer than other students to get to a good freewrite. THIS SECTION IS ALSO NOT INCLUDED IN THE FINAL GRADE.
III) The last section will be the “overall letter grade.” This is where you enter a score out of 100 based on what overall letter grade the combination of ranks justifies. This is the only entry in the entire gradebook that is “included in the overall grade.” If I enter an 85 here, the student’s report card says B. If I change it to a 92, the student’s letter grade changes immediately to an A-. This gives you absolute control over what the letter says. No more worrying about percentages and averages. Just look at what evidence the student has given you over the course of the grading period and give a single number based on the overall letter grade rubric. If a student complains about his grade, just say, “I can literally change it with the click of a button if you are able to show me that you can complete these tasks satisfactorily.” And just like that the ball is in his court and he must act. James