FYC and Community Based Assessment

I appreciate and respect Inoue’s community-based assessment pedagogy. Like he said in the essay, this pedagogy is a feminist practice, because it decentralizes the focus of power from the teacher and gives it to the students. That’s something I’ve always wished I could do. However, while I can see where he’s coming from and admire what he’s doing, it would be a stretch for me to ever apply this in my own First Year Composition (FYC) classroom. I say this not only because I like having some power and I don’t have the skills to put this pedagogy into practice, but because the context in which this pedagogy worked for him is so different from the context of the FYC classroom. The Nancy Drew in me did a little research and found out that the class he has used community based assessment pedagogy in is a 3000 level required English course for students in the “Rhetoric and Professional Writing” track and students seeking a Professional writing certificate. I imagine that the students in his class are toward the end of their education, and since they’re focused on rhetoric and professional writing, they might become professors and writers themselves. Therefore, knowing how to assess themselves will be of the utmost importance, and soon. So, it’s not that I disagree with Inoue’s pedagogy—I think he’s doing something wonderfully innovative for the students in his class. Instead, it’s that I don’t see how this pedagogy could translate into FYC. Fortunately, that’s ok—Composition is much more than FYC.

---[Included because I can't not talk about Elbow]---

As for Elbow and Danielewicz's article on grading contracts, I felt inspired. My grading and assessment practices have been evolving over the years, and I’m finding myself inching closer to contract grading every semester. So, it was nice to read an in-depth analysis of how contract grading works for these professors. More specifically, I was intrigued by the overview of their contract in which they list all of the criteria students need to meet in order to earn a B (246). What I like about this is that it’s so complex. And, in most classes, if you do these things anyway, you’ll get a B—why not just make it public knowledge? It seems like a transition to contract grading could be very freeing for a teacher. I’m going to keep an open mind about this, and I look forward to hearing what Shelli has to say tomorrow.

In response to “Good Enough Evaluation,” I just have a few questions about the differences between the following items: holistic scoring, norm based assessment, criterion based evaluation, rubrics. How are all of these similar and different? How do they all relate? I know I use a rubric, and I think it' s a criterion based one, but I’m not entirely sure what kind of evaluation I’m doing, and I’m interested in learning that. Anyone have any helpful articles or links to help me understand all the different ways of assessing student papers?

Grappling with Elbow

I thought Elbow’s contract idea, though controversial and obviously provocative, at its base a mere calling to do what it is that we already tell our students. Emphasizing that there is no way that one can pass the class if they do not come and do not do the work is essentially suggesting that attendance and complete work are the key to passing. I’m not sure I would go so far as the suggested contract to agree on a “B” in a writing class merely for showing up and turning in a piece of writing, but it does look like an interesting place to start. Maybe attendance and complete work is a “C”, but peer review, conferences, drafts, and revisions of your writing are what earn you the “B” or the “A”. More work, not just good work. Because it is more work to get a B or an A, even if you are a good writer.

As much this model would strive to help move us and our students away from the obsession with grades, and “put more energy into figuring out which activities most reliably produce learning and less energy into figuring out a numerical grade for a piece of writing,” students are motivated by grades-- and not necessarily because of any selfish, obsession with a letter on a page. These students are here on scholarship, and accepting awards with GPA requirements. Until we are teaching writing in a situation where assessment is no longer on a point value system, but rather holistically examining how much a student has learned over the course of a semester, we can never remove ourselves from the grade point system or our students’ need for “good grades.”

I feel that we can’t go about using this model, or even “fixing” this problem of how to instate a more holistic system until the problems that Elbow finds for this model are addressed first. Until students are not put under so much pressure to preform (get an “A”), until the students who feel alienated from writing are being taught strong, useful writing tools before they get to college, we can’t pull one of the only stable things they have (reliance/understanding of grading) out from under them. And, that being the case, what is it that we should be telling them instead of “come to class, do the work, and you will pass”?

On Inoue

My initial thought about student involvement in assessment, as presented by Inoue, is that it has the potential to create a kind of chaos in the classroom. On the one hand, it’s a great idea to allow students to participate in creating a grading rubric, to determine values both on an individual and group/community level. However, what I find troubling about this idea is that’s a bit too subjective. Personally, and I know I’m not alone, I don’t like that most students are grade motivated. And yes, educational institutions are setting up students to replace their desire for learning, with a desire to meet work specifications only up to the point of a good grade. Meaning, not many students find themselves in the position to further engage with material, practices, etc. beyond what is absolutely required of them to earn their desired grade.

Perhaps having a teacher led/created assessment is not completely ideal, however, it does seem necessary, simply because some students, without grades, have no desire to engage with text, discussions, and so forth. That being said, I’m always hoping to find ways to engage all my students, despite the rather stringent lines of a grading rubric. For instance, I require my students to select a few of my comments from their graded papers, and in a written response, discuss their understanding, confusion, disagreement etc. of those comments. Depending on the class, I also allow students (on only one written assignment), to read over my comments, respond to them directly on the draft, and then assign themselves the grade they believe the deserve. Additionally, they must justify/defend their grade. Obviously, I don’t expect students to actually assign themselves a fair grade—let’s face it, they always grade high—however, by engaging with the comments in this fashion, I can only hope that they will fully engage with their own text and are motivated to improve upon it.

Grades and the Real World

I find myself very skeptical of Inoue's notion of allowing students to assess and grade themselves. While being able to revise and improve on one's writing through revision is an essential ability to learn, I have to wonder whether the methods Inoue uses properly prepares her students. While the notion of deconstructing the concept of “correct” writing might be interesting in theory, the fact remains that the larger community—and here I mean other classes, the workplace, and other areas outside of this single class—does not judge writing based upon democratic notions but on very standardized conventions of discourse. So again I must ask if pursuing such an experimental course is of benefit to our students or whether it is actually hobbling them with misconstrued ideas.

On the other hand, I think it is very useful to discuss the criteria by which good writing is judged. Asking students what they think makes a good paragraph or paper can be very useful in the learning process. The difference that I would emphasize is that the instructor should remain in the position of final arbitrator. I disagree with Inoue that this demotes such discussions to “busy work,” since it serves a pedagogical purpose, and can be used as an alternative to other methods of instruction.

As a final note, I think it must be said that instructor standards and evaluation are still present in such a system—and this goes for Elbow's contract method as well. If it were not, could not students simply vote to allow themselves to get an A for doing virtually nothing? Yet I would imagine that both of these instructors would halt such an excessive plan, as well they should. But doesn't this then mean that the idea of power distribution is really only a facade? Students, at the end of the day, want a good grade. And really, this is understandable, since this is the criterion by which they are often judged, whether it be for scholarships, for parental approval, for graduate school applications...one could go on and on. Ideas such as these that seek to diminish the importance of a letter grade simply do not synch with the reality that the students have to deal with outside of the writing classroom.

Community Based Assessment and TAs

For today’s post, I wanted to center on Asao Inoue’s article on Community-Based Assessment and to what extent we, as graduate student can and are able to incorporate these practices into the classroom. By in large, I respect what Inoue is advocating and, while I have several practical critiques, I do believe there are elements we can work with in the classroom.

However, before I jump into a series of modifications, I would first like to put forth some concerns. Community-based assessment is designed to provide students with the opportunity to have more say in the evaluation process, where the class as a collective participates in the construction of rubrics and distinct letters grades are not assigned by the instructor but derived by dialogue. It ultimately aims to transfer some of the burden we, instructors, bear as we agonize over assigning a fair grade. Where I begin to have concerns is in relation to the struggle TAs, especially new TAs who have little to no teaching experience, face when establishing authority in the classroom. Now I don’t mean to refer to authority with a capital A; more so, I am talking about ongoing challenge to establish confidence in the classroom. Oftentimes, while we may see ourselves as older than our students, there are a few students who will challenge your authority as a teaching assistant rather than a tenure-track faculty. (Note: I think there is extra room, here, to address this same issue across genders—but will not be my focus here). Therefore, as I take into consideration this concept of community based assessment, I find myself to be reluctant to the idea. I have been teaching three years and I still find it difficult to engage topics and generate depth in our discussion. I am not sure whether I would be able negotiate a collectively-designed rubric. Part of me feels that Inoue is writing with the assumption that all composition instructors have a detailed background and knowledge of rhetoric and composition. Had I been in the classroom for a greater number of years I may feel more willing to try such activity.

Having said that, I do believe that there are ways that we can bring students into the discussion. As we discussed today (in the other section of 8010), reviewing the grading criteria throughout the writing process (i.e., right before a peer review workshop) rather than only at the beginning seems to be a reasonable request. I was a big fan of the idea of asking student to give draft a grade and explain why that came to this conclusion. Not only are they forced to engage the revision process they also enter into a dialogue with the very criteria we utilize as standards of writing. I also have students write a brief “Talk Back” after they receive their grade. This piece of reflective writing allows them to respond to my feedback (not the grade) so that 1.) I know that they read my comments, 2.) I can see they understood what my comments, and 3.) I allow them the chance to voice their own concerns. In other words, it helps to continue the discussion. I have some more thoughts, but maybe I will save those for class.

Just some thoughts to consider…looking forward to your ideas as well.

Not so fast, Elbow!

The worst class I took in college was English 1000, taught by a masters student who explained her evaluation philosophy this way: because C is an average grade, every classroom should contain 1-3 A’s or B’s, 1-3 D’s or F’s, and 12-15 C’s. I got a C in her class the same semester I was nominated for a writing award from the Honors College.

That’s an extreme example of terrible assessment, but I think it highlights the driving sentiment behind the readings—that holistic grading is arbitrary, subjective, flawed. That said, I’m not sure contract grading isn’t an equally flawed system, despite its best intentions. In the contract Elbow laid out, participation is given the same value as the final portfolio. Peer feedback is equal to a student’s personal revisions. I appreciate emphasizing process over product, but every individual step of the process does not equal the total value of the finished product—a student’s completed draft.

What Elbow calls “going through the motions” looks to me, and I would think a lot of college freshmen, like busywork. That’s not to say peer review, readings and in-class writing aren’t important—they are—but I can’t think they’re as integral as generating questions for a thesis, writing and revising a rough draft, or completing a final draft.

Obviously, holistic evaluation needs replacing. But throwing out traditional assessment for contract grading that rewards “going through the motions” is, in my mind, replacing one bad system with a different bad system.

Welcome!

Welcome to the class blog for the teaching group of English 8010! I look forward to reading your reflections here over the course of the semester and sharing in conversations with you all.