Grading with points: The determination of report card grades by high school science teachers

School Science and Mathematics, Mar 1998 by Feldman, Allan, Alibrandi, Marsha, Kropf, Aaron

When asked how students could get points, the teachers responded that they could be accumulated by completing assignments, by studying, and by completing extra credit assignments. For the most part, the teachers claimed that no points were associated with behavior, and that tying points to all assignments, in and out of class, told the students that "everything is important."

In the interviews, attempts were made to determine whether the teachers saw any direct link between points and classroom behavior. While all the teachers interviewed denied that points were a reward for proper behavior, they did acknowledge explicitly that points were a reward for the completion of assignments. One teacher acknowledged that the students "are aware...that what they do translates into grades." A second teacher stated, "You build up these points; it's inevitable that you'll get a good grade." A third described the situation with students that are hard to motivate: "When I don't use points, especially with a hard-to-motivate group, I don't get anywhere near the level of class participation." Finally, and probably most telling,

Grades are the currency that we use. The medium of exchange by which they feel good about [and can say] "I did this work, I did this test, I did this lab, and I got paid 50 points." And that's a natural part of human behavior. We all like to receive something for what we do. And I think grading is a piece of that.

The interview data also suggests, and concurs with the responses to Section 4 of the survey, that there is some link between the use of point systems and the use of computer grading software (i.e., software used to keep track of students' grades on individual assignments and then to calculate report card grades). While neither the survey nor the interview were specifically designed to identify that link, teachers mentioned their use of the software in relation to point systems in their responses to the survey and to the interview questions.

Discussion and Educational Significance

There are three significant outcomes of this study. First, it appears that there has been little or no effect of recent reform efforts on the assessment practices of the high school science teachers surveyed in this study. They continue to base their students' report card grades primarily on traditional assessment techniques. Second, there is some indication that science teachers appear to be enthusiastic about the use of computer software to aid in keeping their grading records and for calculating report card grades. The use of this software is affecting the ways in which they relate to their students and encourages the adoption of point systems for grading. Third, it appears that a substantial fraction of the teachers surveyed use point systems for grading. Each of these findings will be discussed in turn in the remainder of this paper.

A look at Table 2 shows clearly that the science teachers who responded to the survey used traditional forms of assessment for determining report card grades. Only five forms of assessment-written tests and quizzes, laboratory activities, and regularly assigned classwork and homework-have mean values indicating that they are being used in more than a small way by the teachers. Portfolios and journals, two of the assessment techniques most encouraged in the reform efforts, effectively do not appear in these teachers' classrooms. Performance assessments, another recommendation of the reforms, have a slightly higher mean, indicating they are used by some teachers. However, biology and earth science teachers more often reported using them for assessment purposes, maybe due to the traditional use of "lab practicals" in these subjects. Again, there is an apparent indication that secondary school science teachers have been little affected by attempts to move them toward the use of authentic or alternative assessments. The results here may be due to the nature of the sample, but given the variety of schools, subjects, and contexts, the likelihood exists that these results are representative for the state, if not for the nation.