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.
I, too, find Elbow's contract philosophy a difficult concept to swallow. I am concerned that it would inspire a sense of mediocracy in the class. In each of the many variations of English 1000 I have taught I always begin the semester with a similar message: the idea of taking charge of your writing and being purposeful in your decisions. With many students coming out of the 5 paragraph essay frame of mind, it find it is important to allow them have a moment to realize they are able to and should take ownership and pride in their writing. Elbow's contract theory, it would seem, to be counterproductive. In other words, I guess is not the message or tone I would want to strike with my students. Not to mention, I, like Beth, strive to avoid "busywork" in the classroom, as students to have an aversion to it (and, honestly, who doesn't). And, while I undoubtedly want my students to feel that their efforts--all of their efforts--are being taken into consideration, I also hope that they are striving for something more and gaining the tools necessary to make it possible.
ReplyDeleteWhile attempting to avoid getting into theory, I nonetheless must say that it again all comes down to the process vs. product argument. While I certainly am in favor of giving great weight to the process of writing, I think that as composition teachers we can make the mistake of heading too far in the other direction and dismissing the product.
ReplyDeleteAs I asked in my own post, I think we really have to ask what we are teaching, what the goals are, and what type of activity we are preparing students for. In the "real world" (and I use that term with an awareness of self-irony) it is the product that is judged, not the rough drafts. I will continue to argue that we must keep this in mind and that while we should seek to expand our students' minds, we must also prepare them for what lies ahead.
I agree that it should come down to process vs. product, but it is the product that we can use to accurately assess their progress. If we struggle to even find the right way to grade their final submitted writing, what would be the system to grade their process? Especially as each student would have a slightly different one?
ReplyDeleteAnd, given Beth's example from her own English 1000 experience, what should we do about this pitting students' grades against one another? I guess the real question is which is the goal of English 1000: 1. to get all of the students that you are handed on the same writing level or 2. to get all of those students to a place where English 1000 has made them a better writer than they were coming into it?
Megan, you ask the million dollar question: what is the goal of English 1000? I so wish I could answer that without writing a novel...
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