Grading Efficiently: Finding the Time to Grade Fairly

1. Grading Efficiently: Finding the Time to Grade Fairly Killian Quigley John Martin Vanderbilt Center for Teaching GradSTEP January 26, 2013

2. Challenges • The “What” and “Why” of Grading • Time Management • Rubrics • “Subjective” Grading (?) • STEM Disciplines • Group Work and Projects • Discussion/Brainstorming

3. Why Talk About Grading? Why Are We Here?

4. Let’s take a step back….Why do we grade in the first place?

5. Goal #1: Accuracy

6. Goal #2: Consistency

7. Goal #3: Student Learning

8. Time Management

9. grading ≠ procrastination

10. grading = deliberate act

12. Establish a Space and a Ritual for Grading

13. reflect on how things go!

14. Using Rubrics

15. Kinds of Rubrics • Rubrics given to students with your expectations for how they complete their assignments • Stylistic, less detailed • Rubrics for yourself on how you grade these assignments • “Answer keys” • Using both these will save you time and effort!

16. Why do we use grading rubrics? • Keeps grading fair and consistent • Directly aligns grades with learning goals • Saving time – less thinking in giving credit Grading rubrics are applicable to all disciplines!

17. Grading Outside the Rubric • Assignments without a set rubric or unexpected student responses • One way to deal with these situations: real-time rubric making • Record your grading as you go – apply the same standards to all students

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19. Killian’s section on humanities assignments

21. Technologies • Speed • Clarity • Archive-building

22. Myth: “Students’ writing will improve in direct proportion to the amount of time their teachers spend on their papers.” (Hairston 2002)

23. Instead: “…all the drudgery and sacrifice on the part of writing teachers might be justified if it helped students to learn to write; unfortunately, we have no evidence that it does.” (Hairston 2002) Maxine Hairston

24. Don’t grade “with error at the front of our minds” • Never assess an assignment without having first read/watched it once. • What is the student attempting to do? • How can we tailor our feedback to help our students achieve their unique goals? • Note the things a student has done well, and suggest a small number of major changes. • Avoid creating “cognitive overload” • (Hairston 2002)

25. Specific comments • Students will not take heed of generalities, like “Pay attention to your reader” • (Nancy Sommers 1999) • Solving problems, not discussing broad conceptual issues. • Focus on only a few things. • Suggest concrete strategies for improvement – reverse outlines, concept maps, etc. • (Mark Gelly 2002)

26. STEM Discipline Assignments

27. Problem Sets & Short Answer Responses • Pros: • Systematic problems = systematic answers • Usually come with well laid-out grading rubrics and answer keys • Broken up into digestible segments • Cons • Backtracking to find mistakes

28. How to Handle Problem Sets & Short Answer • Grade horizontally • Easier to pick out trends in answers • Real-time rubric • Record what you take off/give points for so you can apply across the board • Broadly respond to common errors • Use “minimal marking” while grading for common errors • Emphasize point in teaching exercise or send an email to the class to explain

29. Lab Reports • Pros: • Usually have big emphasis on stylistic elements – easy to spot • Established rubric by professor overseeing lab • Lots of other graders • Cons: • Can be dense • Lots of other graders • Factoring in-class effort and performance

30. Handling Lab Reports • Make sure students know format before making their first report • Draw from past TA’s experiences in grading and doing the actual labs • Skim reports before grading horizontally • Reports are segmented but flow is also important • Don’t waste time fixing every stylistic mistake, send out message to the entire class about persistent issues

31. Group Work/Projects • Pros: • Multiple people working = less gradable stuff • Teaches alternative lessons outside normal curriculum • Cons: • Grading multiple people for one assignment

32. Handling Group Work/Projects • Accentuate main group assignment/project with individual assignments • Make individual members responsible for drafts of sections • Give feedback chances for group members • Grin and bear it....

33. Why are you here? What is your experience? What else might we discuss?

34. THANK YOU! CFT: • Certificate in College Teaching • SoTL Scholars Program • Small Group Analysis • Teaching Observations • Technology Consultation • Conversations on Teaching • MUCH MORE! http://cft.vanderbilt.edu

35. Picture Credits • http://www.optionetics.com/market/articles/2001/07/24/technical-toolbox-assessing-market-extremes-using-bollinger-bands • http://kellylakecmp.files.wordpress.com/2007/11/grading.gif?w=500 • http://www.psmag.com/blogs/when-grading-papers-red-ink-may-mean-lower-scores-15809/ • http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Curveball_topspin.svg • http://syosseths.com/z/math.html • http://www.bodrum-hotels.com/math-problems/math-problems-for-tenth-grade.html • http://shop.atozteacherstuff.com/downloads/scientific-method-lab-report-booklet-use-w-any-experiment.html • http://laisogata.wordpress.com/ • http://www.samstoybox.com/toys/FrustrationBall.html • http://www.ideachampions.com/weblogs/archives/2011/06/post_3.shtml