Chapter 9: Ten Approaches to Avoid When Differentiating Assessment and Grading

Some advice given in this chapter is to avoid grading on a curve as well as giving students zeros. Zeros do not indicate anything aside from a day’s struggle for a student. Instead, students should be given the opportunity to make up work and build mastery. In addition, homework should not be graded as this is merely a formative assessment. Students do homework to work towards mastery, thus it is not complete work but only a step along the way. Students should be given the opportunity to work through homework then use assignments in an attempt to judge mastery.

Chapter 8: Why Do We Grade, and What About Effort, Attendance, and Behavior?

The next chapter focuses upon the actual grading of work and the time it takes to complete the process. Grading should be done in order to assess not only the student, but also the teacher in an effort to ensure that the teacher is working toward the student’s growth. In assessing, teachers must always take into account the struggles a student may be facing at home. It is advised that teachers avoid grading the behavior of students, but instead work to assess actual student work, and work directly through behavioral problems if they occur with a student.

Chapter 7: The Relative Nature of Grades and Their Definitions

This chapter focuses on grading and upon breaking away from the traditional A,B,C, etc. We should instead focus upon constant formative assessment in order to ensure mastery of all subjects covered. If we do not focus on formative rather than summative students may lose interest or become discouraged with the constant flow of information. Students will struggle to accommodate each teacher’s grading habits, and grading will become a guessing game between teachers.

Chapter 12: MI and Cognitive Skills

This chapter emphasizes encouraging students to embrace and develop their strong intelligences, while at the same time working to heighten their intelligences which may have once seemed weaker. In understanding the strengths and weaker areas of my students, I will be able to help them in their studying habits, whether encouraging already strong areas or helping students to overcome worries of weaker areas. It is possible to enhance each student’s primary intelligence through positive methods of teaching regardless of what the intelligence may be. Rather than encouraging memorization, teachers should work toward mastery in all areas. While memory is essential, memorization should not be the primary focus.

Chapter 11: MI and Special Education

This chapter was very interesting to me as I am very interested in special education as well as how to incorporate special education students into my mainstreamed classroom. Rather than looking at students with special needs as different, the teacher should instead focus upon incorporating them into the classroom and focusing upon their strongest intelligences. A big portion of beginning this process is to focus on positive aspects of student learning rather than negative, then working from this point. Along these lines, students who generally have strengths in certain areas generally have a difficult time in other areas. If these weak areas are focused upon, they can be developed into areas of great strength and students will be able to use them in the future.

Chapter 8: MI and Classroom Management

This chapter discusses methods of grasping and holding the attention of students who have various strong traits in multiple intelligences. In addition, the teacher can use knowledge of student intelligence throughout the course of the class as well as in creating groups and understand student behavior. Using this chapter, I can consider methods of classroom management. This was a nice reminder that not all students respond to the same courses of classroom management, but that the traditional response of speaking to the class in an effort to regain attention will work the most effectively with verbal learners, yet other methods should be used to obtain the interest of other students. Another great aspect of this chapter was the idea of transition cues so automatically recognize when they should change activities, without the classroom becoming chaotic. For example, to capture the attention of a musical learner, playing music to signal a transition is an excellent method of showing students that it is time to change what they are doing. While this is primarily focused upon musical learners, all will understand the expectation when the music begins.

Chatper 8: Grading and Reporting Achievement

This chapter focused on grading in a differentiated classroom and ways of ensuring fair assessment. A major focus of this chapter is upon breaking away from a single grade to represent a student’s achievement. While this may seem easier for the teacher, this does not determine student growth. Instead, assessment must occur at all times throughout the course of the semester, with grading occurring after students have worked through a lesson. While it is necessary to provide a final grade, I would like to include an attachment explaining student progress as well as a folder showing work along the way.