The grade-less journey, week 2

Yesterday, after free writing, I asked my students if they had any comments or questions about the syllabus, my expectations, or policies. There were two comments: the first a comment that the student felt his writing was freer than if he knew it was going to be graded; the second comment from another student was to say that he wished his other professors were doing the same.

A couple of the students (out of five) did not complete the assignment for class, which was to watch the Frontline documentary "Digital Nation". One student said he had internet issues with his router and I asked if he had gone to the library and logged in there. He said he did not and quickly realized that he could have watched the video that way. A lightbulb moment of 'oh, I could have solved this problem on my own'. The other student did the wrong assignment. We talked about the calendar, which has all of the assigned readings and videos due for each class and this was followed by "what will you do differently next time?" In both cases, these students are freshmen.

In my grade-less class, there is no real penalty for making these mistakes, other than that you can't really participate in the discussion about the video. From our candid discussions, we talked about ways to keep ourselves organized. I showed them my planner and shared my life-long struggle with forgetfulness.

For the rest of class, I had already planned to make the discussion about the larger issues presented in "Digital Nation". After a focused free write about what they remember from the video and a sharing of those ideas,  we moved on to five articles about multitasking vs task switching, which was one of the central ideas presented in the video and which several students addressed in their writing. Each student read their article silently and then we discussed them as a group, often reflecting on these issues in our own lives. One of the articles used the analogy of animal foraging as way to describe our habits of multitasking. I really liked this article because the authors of the first book we are reading, Distracted Mind, talk about how now that we no longer have to forage for food like our ancestors, we have shifted this instinctual behavior to foraging for information. This was a good primer for that longer next conversation on Monday.

The students will be given a more formal writing assignment on Monday, a technological autobiography. I think that enough time has passed for them to have some deeper ideas about their history with and use of technology. Also, it will give me an opportunity to see some of their writing and give them feedback on it.

Going Gradeless at GMC

This semester, I am doing an experiment of going gradeless in my F2F class at GMC, and going grade-less in my online courses at the University at Albany. This is naked teaching at its finest!

What does this mean? For my GMC students:

"Instead of percentages or points, below are my expectations of a 'B' student. At the end of the semester, you will write a self-reflection of how you met these criteria, the learning/ELA outcomes for the course, and your own course goals, and we will have a conference to mutually determine a grade for you.

1. attend class regularly and on time—not missing more than a week's worth of classes (that means two). Being on time means arriving several minutes early. I will start class promptly at 2:30.
2. meet learning outcomes
3. take risks
4. engage/participate with texts/videos & classmates
5. write often, revise often, and develop engaging, cogent arguments based on evidence
6. encourage classmates in their ideas and writing
7. meet due dates

8. complete 90% of assignments, including a longer piece of writing (topic and genre to be determined by you.)

9. attend conferences with me to discuss writing and course progress

Grades higher than B, however, do rest on my judgment of writing quality. To earn higher grades you must produce writing that I judge to be exceptionally high quality."


Yup. This is it. This is what is important to me as an educator for student behavior and effort. I've realized that I can't really ask them to take risks without giving them some room for failure. This list of expectations is not predicated on their writing ability, though they do need to produce a longer piece of writing during the semester.

And what do I mean by 'longer'? I guess we will figure that out together. I want to get away from 8-10 pages, or 2-3 pages, double-spaced....etc., or anything that prescribes their final product. I want them to own it and work on it throughout the semester. Really embrace and develop a piece of writing that is deep, thoughtfully constructed, tangible, and evidence-based. I believe that this can be done in a number of ways beyond "the research paper."

This dream I have may fail, but I cannot help but hope for the best. One positive is that this class has only five students. It will have a seminar feel, with time spent writing (as thinking) and reading and writing (as thinking) and discussing writing and reading. We are in this together.

I leave you with this link about students as expert graders...