Anastassia Williams EPSY 485 Final Part I: Developing a Grading Plan 1) Grading Policy a) I am creating this grading policy

for an 8th grade English classroom. The overarching themes I want to focus on in each of my units are diversity throughout the world and writing for real-world purposes and audiences. The approximate number of units there will be in one school year will be six. My main goal will be to prepare them for high school and give them the tools to succeed in that environment. b) I intend to follow all the golden rules of grading in my course. i. I will ensure that all my assessments are fair by formatting each one carefully and making sure there are no biases intended making it fairer for a certain group of students. I will not use vocabulary they will not understand and I will have covered all the material that is on the assessment. ii. I will ensure that all my assessments are accurate by basing them entirely of the material covered in class. If it is a good assessment, is should show accuracy of the material being covered in the class. iii. I will ensure that all my assessments are consistent by always looking at the grading over the course of the unit. There should be a trend over the course of the unit and students performance should be relatively consistent throughout. iv. I will ensure that all my assessments are valid by always formatting my assessments around the standards that I have presented prior to the unit or that particular lesson. The students responses should reflect what the standards seek to measure therefore constituting it as valid. v. I will ensure that all my assessments are transparent by informing students how I arrived at a certain grade. They will always receive individual feedback, either informally in a simple conversation, or more formally with notes on their paper. For papers and projects, I will also provide rubrics so students know exactly what to expect out of my grading expectations. c) The purpose of this grading policy is to see how well my students are performing in conjunction with my teaching. I can make adjustments with my teaching strategies based on the criteria and standards set up for each assessment. This grading policy will act as a tool to indicate the trouble areas that my students are having while also providing a reliable scale to measure their progress. 2) Grading Components a) Assessment Methods i. There would be various types of assessments that will contribute to my grades. Grades such as homework and participation will just be graded

on the basis of completion. If students do their homework and participate (discussion and activities) in class they will get full credit. Since I am an English teacher, I plan on focusing my assessments on projects and essays. Tests are not that helpful in assessing my goals and standards so that will not be a main part in my classroom. Quizzes will be given also as a formative assessment to see progress of students throughout the unit. ii. I dont believe that attendance or tardiness should directly affect any students grade. If they are excessively absent or tardy and are not turning in assignments, then that goes against participation and completion, which will in fact, affect their grade. I think all of those affective factors directly relate to how students perform on more formative and summative assessments. If they have a good attitude, are putting forth effort, and showing improvement that will reflect in their assignments, papers, projects, and quizzes. You dont need to specifically define those characteristics in a grading policy in my opinion. iii. Each part of my grading policy will be extremely important to student learning and they will definitely be indicative of their accomplishment of the target learning objectives. I want all of my assessments to be more applied, so students are showing what they have learned instead of just picking the correct answers. I want my students to be able to draw from background knowledge and grow over the course of the year. My projects and papers will be a direct reflection of that. They will allow my students the space to explore the content in the way that is most meaningful for them. They will still be instructed to complete certain requirements for these major assessments, which is how I will know that the target objectives will be covered. My other assessments such as daily assignments, quizzes and participation will allow me to see that my students understand the basis of the material and are capable of exploring further possibilities. I will target the learning objectives with this assessment by gauging the effects of my instruction and modifying if necessary in order to ensure I am hitting those target objectives. b) Percentage of the grade for each component Papers 25% Projects 25% Tests 20% Quizzes 10% Homework 10% Participation 10% i. I want the main focus to be on the papers and projects, because I believe that is what is going to be the main indicator of my students grasp and knowledge of the material. Tests are still important which is why I have allotted 20% of the grade to them. If students are not good test takers, it will not be a huge detriment to their final grade. Quizzes, homework, and participation all received the same amount of weight because I all think they are equally important in the stages of learning the material. One quality is

not more significant than the other and they are all used to have students consistently interact with the material and to gain a clearer understanding of the material. 3) Grading Approach a) My grading approach will be reflective of a standard-based, criterion-referenced method. I do not want to grade my students based on the performance of the other students in the classroom because I do not believe that is fair. All of my students deserve the right to an A if they worked hard to get it. How well the students do on the assessments and affects their grade directly correlates to the difficulty of the assessment, which give the grades meaning. I want my students to feel like they have earned their grade and that they deserve it. Part II: Motivation and Academic Performance There are many reasons by the idea of a pay-for-performance rewards program deeply worries me. I do not think it will have a lasting and deep effect on the test scores of our students. This program that is being discussed would model an extrinsic motivation system, which means students are driven by the performance aspect of the assessment. They solely interested in obtaining that physical reward whether it is a grade or high status among peers, and in this case a monetary reward. Intrinsic motivation is just the opposite. This type of motivation focuses on the interest and enjoyment that a student feels when interacting with the material. They are motivated by simply learning more about the subject matter and become a master of the content. This program does have its advantages however. For one, students will be extremely motivated to do well on the test and try even harder to understand the material in order to receive that reward. They will also feel a sense of ownership and power if they in fact do get paid for earning good grades. The disadvantages definitely outweigh the advantages in this situation unfortunately. If students are only rewarded on test scores, they will lose motivation to work at anything else in relation to school, including homework and participation. They may feel resentment for not getting money for all grades at school, which could cause major problems down the road. With intrinsic motivation, students will be willing to engage in the material and develop more positive attitudes in the school environment. This will they will actually learn more information. There are some other methods that can be implemented in order to boost morale and overall test scores. To improve intrinsic motivation, we can present our students with the long-term results of doing well on these tests and what that means for their future. If they see the long-term effects, they will be able to work towards a goal they want to attain instead of receiving a disposable reward. We could also implement a reward system that the whole school needs to work towards in order to receive it. We could set a goal, and if we reach that goal as a collective unit we can reward the students with some sort of rally or party during school. This will eliminate the competition factor and everyone would be on the same level. They would also not receive a personal reward so they would not expect a party every time they received a good grade.

Part III: Communicating Student Performance to Parents Margaret is excelling tremendously in Science. On her report card you can tell that she has gotten over 100% on all of her tests and has earned the respectable grade of an A-. This definitely translates to her tremendous ISAT scores as well. She was above average in her performance of the multiple-choice questions in comparison to the school, the state, and the nation in each of the sub-categories of science. Based on her scores in Science, she also exceeds the standards, which tells us that she really understands the material. She is also doing very well in Math in school, getting full points for almost all of her problem sets and really putting forth effort in the class. In relation to the ISAT, she meets the standards for the all the categories, showing us she is exactly where she needs to be for Science content. Now English seems to be a trouble area for Margaret, so lets take a look at that. In school, she started off the year a little shaky with the journals and what my expectations were, but as the semester continued, she began to understand the requirements and really improved her scores by the end which I am so proud of her for. She is always giving 100% effort in whatever she does and is really a great student to have in class. I believe the problem lies in her test taking abilities, specifically her reading comprehension. Again, she has shown major improvement in retrospect to my class. On her ISAT, she received an overall score of below standard level in English, which means she is performing below the average student at her level. However, she did receive a 4 on her extended response, which only 4% of students have accomplished, so you should be very proud of Margaret for that. The reason for such severe discrepancies between the report card and her ISAT scores could be for a number of reasons. For one, test anxiety when it comes to English could be a major factor, and the pressure of taking the ISAT with such strict time constrictions could have been troublesome for her, since English is already a difficult subject for her. Writing seems to be something she has really improved in over the course of the semester telling by her English and Science extended responses on the ISAT. We just need to focus on boosting her reading comprehension and finding good reading strategies to use. Overall, Margaret is doing a great job in all of her subjects and really trying her best in whatever she does.