I love Google Forms, so it’s gonna be another one of those. They should focus on “Listen.” Then, they self-assess every other week. For example, really outgoing students tend to talk to their classmates, not listen, and then feel like they get behind (because they do, not receiving as much input as their classmates). So again, I’ll ask students to start with the one process/rule that seems most challenging. What have you been doing that helps you?”). Since they’re part of daily class expectations, the practice is more aligned with the course grade at a 1-1 level, with more student ownership (e.g. Even if not explicitly stated as “rules,” these processes are at play during language learning, and they’re certainly not too much to ask. However, there’s not one example of someone learning a second language who either hasn’t received input, or is confused about the input they do receive. I agree that forcing a student to make eye-contact is neither necessary nor culturally responsive. These processes/rules have been in place because they lead to learning and acquisition, period. Students will focus on a different process/rule each of the first three quarters, leaving all three for the fourth quarter, like more of a summative self-assessment. Even though all three of these are an expectation of every class, I’m asking students to choose just one at first to focus and grade themselves on, alternating weekly with that “What Did You Read?” Google Form. Although I’ve mentioned this to students merely in passing at the start of the year, I’m now making that their sole focus of self-assessment the entire first quarter. Undoubtedly, each student will find one of the three processes/rules will be more difficult to follow. However, I’m coming around full circle to the idea of grading the three processes/rules once again, though from a completely different perspective: the student’s own. Back then, they were part of a larger system I ended up finding too difficult to manage, and involved too much policing of student behavior. The processes/rules aren’t graded, although they used to be in my first years teaching. It turns out that I already have three processes called “class rules” that I find essential for building confidence in a new language, and enjoying the class experience-my only true realistic goals for every student. every single day for every single class-so this needs to be unobtrusive. Now, I absolutely hate metacognicide-the overloading of asking kids to regurgitate learning objectives, targets, set goals, etc. For this, I turn to what’s worked well: self-assessment. Seriously, anything done every single week is sure to get old and lose meaning, so I need something else to toss into the gradebook. A simple Google Form follow-up (“What Did You Read?”) is evidence for the gradebook. This update is more equitable, and maintains a focus on reading. Also, it doesn’t matter if a kid goes home to a peaceful room and naps, then spends hours reading for school, if they go directly to a part-time job, or if they take care of family members. I like “Free Reading Fridays” and then “Read Whatever Wednesdays” when it really gets rolling. This is different from FVR (Free Voluntary Reading), which lasts 15-20 on one to two days a week. This is BIG! However, I’m still maintaining the expectation of reading something old and something new, every day which means the adjustment is to build this into class time for about 5-10 minutes. Admittedly, there’s no way to know if the students who did WERE reading, and we gotta take that on faith, but the majority weren’t even accessing the document! So, effective immediately, I’m removing all expectations of students reading at home. To my disappointment, though not to my surprise, very few students were spending any time at all in the Google Doc. At some point, though, I noticed that students weren’t reading daily from the digital class library-a major course expectation-so I replaced that weekly notebook pic with checking the digital library (Google Doc) and reporting how many days students accessed it. Otherwise, the typical evidence I collected was fairly simple: upload/share a picture of the day’s “work” done in the notebook. The best solution I used was called My Time, the form students filled out to get equal credit by reading on their own and showing their understanding. In this most-unusual of teaching years, one problem we ran into was how to get evidence of learning, especially when students weren’t in class. It also adds more varied gradebook evidence. This new idea just complements the rubric by aligning more of what is expected during class with arriving at the course grade. Don’t get me wrong, my expectations-based grading rubric has worked wonders in terms of flexibility, equity, and efficiency. On my path towards simplifying everything I possibly can about teaching, this next grading idea is quite promising.
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