Grading on averages sucks. Averages should never used as a measure of progress. -Never-. Here's why.
Let's say you don't "get it" in the beginning of a class, but by the end of the class you've worked extra hard, study groups, office hours, sheer panic, and learned everything that the class could possibly teach you really really well. Call this Situation A.
Let's say you "get it" in the beginning of a class, but due to laziness, personal issues, and too fast a pace, you don't do so well near the end. You didn't learn as much as you wanted, and by the end of the class you could have learned a lot more. Call this Situation B.
The person in Situation A will have a worse grade than the person in Situation B.
Say you have a "C" average for the first half of the class, a "B" average for the third fourth of the class and an "A" average for the last fourth. On a 4 point scale, that's '2/2 + 3/4 + 4/4' or 2.75. A C+, not bad. That's situation A.
Say you have an "A" average for the first half of the class, a "B" average for the third fourth and a "D" average for the last fourth. On a 4 point scale, that's '4/2 + 3/4 + 1/4', or 3.0. That's situation B.
The person who learned everything gets a _lower_ grade? Sadly, yes. If graded on an average, your performance in the beginning will have more effect than your performance in the end. It might be worthy to note that 80% of human nature favors situation A more than situation B.
It becomes even worse when you look at individual assignments. Imagine the student, knowing they have a 3.7 average for the last 5 assignments. If they get an 'A' on their next paper, the average is '(3.7 * 5 + 4) / 6' or 3.72. The student improves their average by 0.54%. Now let's say they have a 3.7 average and they get a single 'B'. The average is now '(3.7 * 5 + 3) / 6' or 3.56. The student's average goes down by 3.9%.
That means they get punished more for doing worse than they get rewarded for doing better. It's a lose-lose situation. No matter how good you do, no matter how perfect your skills, get but one single mark off and you can never have a 100% average. Marks down count more than marks up when it comes to averages.
Of course, you might say "Hey, this only applies for grades above the average!" It's true, the exact opposite effect happens for people who get lousy grades. They get rewarded more for doing well and punished less for doing bad. But consider this, in a system of averages the best people and the worst people are both pulled towards ... you guessed it, the average. Given an infinite amount of grades, and a finite amount of students, everyone would have a C. Now tell me that's a good way to judge someone's skill, with a number that forces them towards the average regardless of skill?
I had an English teacher once who said, "I decide the final grade by graphing the grades over the semester. If they peak near the end, I give a little bonus because the student obviously learned more than the one who peaks in the beginning." Of course something as vital as grades should not depend on the teacher themself being objective, but his words do pose an interesting solution.
I propose that grades are calculated on a total instead of an average. The teacher sets a certain number of points required to get an "A", a "B", a "C" and so forth. If you get that many points, you earn the grade. Period. Just like saving up money, the points accumulate as a result of successful work. Of course in the end things have to be averaged out, but here's where I diverge.
The maximum amount of points you can get should be greater than the number of points required for an 'A'. That means there should be more assignments, more work, more projects than is necessary to complete the course. This extra course load should not be required, or even scheduled. Most teacher sneer and call that "Extra Credit," but I say it's no less valid than a scheduled assignment. If someone wants to work their tail off and go above and beyond the call of duty, they should be allowed to do so, and they should be allowed to get credit as a result.
If someone gets all 'A's, they should probably be working somewhere else, at their own level. By no means should learning be discouraged by plummeting averages and impossible goals. What impossible goals? Why, getting 100% of course. After that one slip, you could be Blaise Pascal and still not get the best possible grade in your math class.
It's time we stopped rewarding perfection and started rewarding success, and persistence. The world does not work like a clock. What we need are hard workers, creative minds, devotion, not walking calculators, automatons and rules lawyers. It's important /not/ to get things right the first time. It's important to be in an environment where you do have to struggle, where your skills are tested and improved. Because if you do it right the first time, then you haven't learned anything. That's not what school is about.
Comment
Index
Previous
(Filtering With Procmail)
Next
(It is Okay to "Dump" Radioactive Waste Into Deep Space)