I think that all grades should be based on the Program of Studies, and on students’ participation and effort. To me the bell curve is ineffective in a regular classroom, and the only place for it is on an extremely large scale, with hundreds to thousands of competitors involved. My students will never be placed on a bell curve unless it is required that I do so, because students should be graded on meeting the objectives and outcomes that are listed in the Program of Studies. Another reason students should be graded on the Program of Studies is because a bell curve doesn’t account for effort and improvement. The teacher knows each student individually, and can see how much they have improved and tried over the term, and can grade accordingly if necessary. A student obviously shouldn’t be given a good grade simply because they have improved, they still need to meet the curriculum requirements, but the teacher can account for the improvement in other ways, whereas a bell curve cannot.
By using the Program of Studies as a requirement to meet when grading it will be difficult to be completely reliable and valid, but I still have trouble seeing how the bell curve does this. The teacher still needs to give students their marks, which has room for subjectivity, the students are still marked based on the Program of Studies, which has subjectivity, and the students still can only work to the very best of their ability, no matter how they are being graded and what criteria they are being held against. I, as a teacher, don’t know how I will avoid errors in my grading, but I do know that it won’t be by using a bell curve.
No comments:
Post a Comment