- Sometimes students do not read before class because they learn better by coming to class first, hearing the lecture, and then do the readings to make it easier to understand the information.
- Give the students a list of things to look for as they read. The day the reading is due, the teacher can walk around and check whether the students did this in their notebooks and give a grade.
Now for this week's readings. I have been waiting for helpful information regarding grading because it is something I had not done before until grading the first round of speeches my students gave. Sure, I have corrected a few multiple choice assignments or exams before, but never such a subjective assignment like a speech. Here are a few tips regarding grading and combating cheating that I found most helpful this week.
Grade Books:
- In First Day to Final Grade, it is suggested to arrange your grade book by grouping different assignment types together, and even have an area to write notes about participation. Group tests together, quizzes together, in-class assignments, other assignments, and attendance in their own sections.
- I think this would be useful because it would be so much easier to stay organized! If you or a student ever have questions about a grade, you can easily find that group of scores and use the information you need.
- I did not organize my grade book this way this semester. I wish I would have thought of this before the semester started. I already have quite a few items in my grade book, so it would take quite a bit of time to start new records for both of my classes. I also do not want to rearrange my grade book at this time in case of errors in transferring scores. Something I will implement still this semester is having a blank sheet of paper clipped into my grade book that I can write down who contributed well or not so well in class for the day. I am not giving a grade specifically for participation, but it will be nice at the end of the semester to remember who participated nicely. I can also write down what I did during class that really got the class to interact and participate so I can do those things when I teach the class again next semester. Group arrangement of a grade book would be helpful in many communication classes because there are often many different types of assignments along with tests in communication classes. In comparison, many other college classes have only 4 tests for the semester and this tip would not be as useful for those professors. Even though it might be too late to arrange my grade book this way this semester, I can try this tip still if I implement my next idea, an electronic grade book.
Electronic Grade Books
- First Day to Final Grade suggests creating an electronic grade book. It is important to keep your grade book records in a few ways in case one method fails. It is wise to have grades written down, in an electronic version, and in our case at NDSU, posted on Blackboard. Electronic grade books made with a program such as Excel can be time consuming to set up, but makes record keeping much easier at calculating final grades at the end of the semester a snap!
- I think a system like this would be useful because it was be very easy to stay organized. I would like to do this because it is so much easier to move records around without having to erase and start over like I do in my paper grade book. I could move an entire column in seconds. The computer would also accurately calculate final grades with a simple formula compared to me having to add each individual score together. However, if I do implement this, I am going to wait until next semester and try to get it done before the semester starts or definitely before the first graded assignment comes up. Over semester break I think I will begin setting the files up so all I will have to do is enter in the names when I get my class rosters. I am not an excel whiz, so I will have to review my skills. I will still keep a paper copy of my grades however, because I have had technology fail on me before. Electronic grade books could be a negative idea however because the file could potentially land in the wrong hands. I will probably keep the file on a flash drive, so I will also learn how to work the password feature on my flash drive in case I ever leave my flash drive in the library or lose it on campus.
- I think electronic grade books are widely implemented in many fields already. Again, many communication classes have multiple assignments over a semester, so the computer doing the computing of adding in many trivial 5-point in-class assignments can save a lot of time.
Now that I have tips on keeping efficient records of student exams and assignments, it is time to write, give, and correct some exams! Here are some tips I found helpful regarding exams.
Grading Exams:
- First Day to Final Grade suggests to take a look at the scores when you are done grading and see if there were any questions that were missed multiple times. These questions might be bad questions, so you should re-evaluate and decide if it was a fair question. Was it something you did not cover in class? Was it written poorly? Or, was it simply just a challenging question and the students were not prepared?
- I find this useful because I have taken a few exams where questions were written poorly or, there were multiple answers that could have been correct. I usually chose the answer the teacher was not accepting and became frustrated. In turn, as a teacher I would like to be understanding and take a look at what went wrong to benefit my students. A student will not learn anything from poorly written questions that frustrate them and not allow them to display what they know.
- This tip can be implemented in the communication field because many questions are written subjectively. Often, questions are not like a math problem where there is clearly one solution. Communication teachers should be open to listening to student concerns and arguments over why they think an answer applies. Sometimes when one word is forgotten in the question or it is written unclear, the concept you are testing on can become completely different. An example of this is in true and false questions or when the word "not" is used. The answer can quickly change if words are omitted.
A final tip taken from First Day to Final Grade is a grading tip for assignments. - Comment on each assignment without writing a score, and arrange the papers best to worst. Arranging the papers best to worst can give you an idea of how you think each ranks in comparison to others. This can help in grading fairly across the board. After arranging, give a score and mix the papers up again so students do not notice a pattern when the papers are returned.
- I find this tip useful because it is helpful to look at the big picture of the class. I do not like this idea as a means to compare students and find grades this way, but as a way to keep myself in check to fairly and consistently grade. If I think one student's speech was better than another, I will look at what I commented and gave or took away points for and make sure I am doing this consistently for all of the speeches.
- I think this tip will be useful in the communication field because many assignments require feedback along with a grade. By doing this, teachers can make their comments on what students did well and what they need to work on. Based on the comments, the papers can be arranged and graded accordingly.
Lastly, I would like to touch on a tip found in McKeachie's Teaching Tips. I do not always find the most helpful tips from this text, but always learn things about topics I did not think about in the ways he presents before. McKeachie's experience in teaching made the definitions of what grades mean to students, professors and employers very interesting. His information about cheating students makes it seem like he has seen every trick in the book. I have never thought of cheating in the ways he describes. Here is what I found most useful.
Cheating
- Reduce the pressure put on grades in your classroom by having many different types of assignments for students to earn points on rather than just one or two exams. When students do not have so much pressure put on one exam that will determine their final grade, they will hopefully be less likely to use the many tactics McKeachie mentioned to cheat on this exam.
- I think this is useful because students learn in many different ways. Some students just are not good test takers and may feel the need to cheat to succeed. When you give students assignments, they can do them at their own pace. Whether students put in the effort of doing the other assignments well is up to them. Some students may do their best on papers because they are good at researching and writing. Others might get great marks on participation because they are prepared for class and contribute.
- The communication field can use this tip because teachers can see the skills of students by giving a wide variety of assignments instead of a test that asks students to recite what they know by answering one hundred multiple choice questions.
Some helpful links I found relating to this week's reading:
Plagiarism Checker
This plagiarism check is called SafeAssign. It is a component of Blackboard. I have not quite learned all I need about it, but I hope we have access to it since we use Blackboard at NDSU. Just yesterday, my mentor observed me teach COMM 110. She sat in the back of the room next to a group of students. These students were friends previously to my class and are upperclassmen. During an activity, she heard them talking about looking at speech textbooks from other universities and taking a speech from there and I won't notice. She could not believe they said this, especially with her being a stranger in the room sitting next to them. I was very clear on the fact that I have a zero tolerance policy on plagiarism and will follow school policy accordingly, even though McKeachie suggests instilling a learning policy rather than just lowering grades.
Create a Grade Book in Excel
This is a simple tutorial on how to make a grade book using Excel. It is pretty basic, but a good starting place for someone like myself that has not used Excel very much.
The following video is of a girl cheating. She writes the answers to the test very tiny on a piece of paper and tucks it into her ring. I have never heard of this and many of the other ways McKeachie mentioned that students cheat today. I went to YouTube originally searching for videos that showed students getting caught for cheating and was shocked to see how many videos were giving tips on how to cheat! The number of views were in the thousands!
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