The movement toward standards-based learning has been underway for more than 30 years, but there is still widespread confusion about why this model is so valuable.
During a recent roundtable webinar on technology and learning sponsored by Otus, a panel of K-12 leaders addressed the most pressing questions about standards-based learning and grading, and shared how to prepare to address it in the new school year.
Watch the full webinar on demand here.
Panelists included:
- Eddie Oakley, Learning Acceleration Specialist, Ohio Valley Education Cooperative, Kentucky
- Kelly Ronnebeck, Associate Superintendent of Student Achievement, East Moline School District 37, Illinois
- Jay Meadows, CEO of Exemplars
- Barbara Geibel, First Grade Teacher, Lead Mentor, Salem School District, Wisconsin
What are the core principles of your district's standards-based grading and how do you implement them and provide feedback to support them?
Kelly Ronnebeck“We found that grading on standards-based systems really focuses on student learning of the core content, not student engagement or effort. We really liked that and were able to show parents how their students were doing relative to the standard. It really aligns more closely with what we are doing in the classroom with our teaching practices and gives a more specific, accurate, and more understandable description of what students are doing.”
Barbara Geibel“Last year was when we started meeting by grade level and going through all of our standards, picking out our essential standards and the ones we thought were the most important, and then we started aligning our assessments and developing our report cards around that.”
Jay Meadows“Looking at it from a math teacher’s perspective, I realized that our grading practices weren’t really asking our students to think about real-world, 21st-century problems and how to solve them while developing 21st-century skills… The traditional report card wasn’t really reflecting those skills. I was giving students A’s and B’s on procedural fluency tests that my phone can now do. So what should we be asking kids to do in our math classrooms? When we think about math a little bit bigger, beyond procedures and algorithms, and encourage problem-solving and critical thinking, it’s more engaging and in line with 21st-century needs.”
Eddie Oakley“Focusing on priority standards and not thinking about ‘efforts’ or extra credits allows us to really know where students are and what they can and cannot do.”
What steps have you taken to align curriculum, assessments, and instruction with standards-based grading?
Geibel“We worked together to make sure our assessments were aligned to state standards, and we used Otus to put all of that into practice to ensure accountability and consistency so we’re all on the same page… There are some people who are apprehensive about it at first; it’s a different thing, right?”
Ronnebeck“Standards-based grading really helped us paint a true picture for parents, teachers, and students, especially since we have such a diverse population. It was a big change, but our teachers were really excited about it because they felt like there was a disconnect between what we were doing with instruction and corresponding to a letter grade… We started the learning as a group, doing several book studies that looked at standards-based grading, what it is, etc. And then from there, we had several curriculum committees working together, that had representation from all the different grade levels, so we were hearing all the voices across the district, which helped with buy-in.”
Oakley sunglasses“We started with the end in mind. We created our summative assessments first, and then we moved forward to the standards… Our district has created a portrait of a graduate, which tells every parent what a student should be able to do at the end of each grade level before moving on to the next grade level. It was hard work across the district and involved a large committee made up of staff, teachers, community members, and parents. The profile consists of six elements: global citizen, lifelong learner, inspired innovator, critical thinker, responsible collaborator, effective communicator. Every student in grades 5, 8, and 12 has to make a case for their learning to see if they can move on to the next grade level.”
Meadows:“When you start with your assessments, you can work backwards. You can say, ‘If these are the expectations, the big ideas, how can we learn to do these in my classrooms?’ And that sparks a lot of conversations in your PLCs and PD… So when you ask students to think about math beyond procedural fluency, you really increase student engagement levels. When students are given the freedom to solve an interesting problem any way they want, it increases student engagement and freedom in the math classroom… So when you do that, you create a consistent set of expectations from kindergarten through high school that certain big ideas are going to be covered every year. And it can take three years for everyone to buy into and view math the same way, and that consistency is the key to standards-based learning. It takes time, but it’s a powerful journey.”
Oakley sunglasses“Both the assessments and the instruction must be rigorous. And I told my students and teachers that practice will be harder than play. So taking difficult assessments gives them confidence when it comes time to take state tests.”
How do you communicate with parents? Learning expectations, grading policies, etc.
Oakley sunglasses“I started with staff involvement and then moved to families. I wrote letters to parents and said, ‘When you were in school, the grades were 70%, 80%, etc.,’ and asked them to tell me what that meant. And they couldn’t tell me what it meant. Now, with standards-based grading, their students can tell them what that means because they’ve mastered the standard… Now we’re using social media to get things out to students and parents.”
Geibel“We are just getting started, so we have had to communicate a lot in the beginning. We will start with the early grades. It will be a breath of fresh air because it can show parents exactly what their student knows and what they don’t know… Starting with K-2, they will move through the grades to help with adoption/change.”
Ronnebeck“It’s a very slow rollout. We started with our K-4 buildings, which are self-contained classrooms. We had a soft start with traditional grades, but we changed a few other parts. We worked with the high school mindset the first year, but we’re also doing town hall meetings, sending notes home, flyers, social media, etc. We also had a short video at each event that would scroll over and over, giving the highlights of standards-based grading… A lot of the communication has really happened through conversations, but with students talking to their parents, but also discussed at teacher conferences, what goes into instruction. So, having those direct conversations with parents was really the game-changer. Change is scary!”
