Thread by @Mr_Rablin

I've given a survey to now thousands of kids in multiple districts that have asked me to work with them around assessment and grading.

Here are the questions:
1. Do grades help you learn?
2. How do grades make you feel?
3. Why do teachers give grades?

A thread...

1/

"Do grades help you learn?"

The most common answer is, unsurprisingly, no. Students are very aware that "grades are just there to show all the work you've been doing." They get it, and they sadly get it more often than teachers do. They know it's about compliance.

2/

The second most common answer is also no, but for a different reason. Students say grades "make you lose motivation when you see an F" or "bring your confidence wayyyy down" or "super stress me out to the point that I give up."

Want to focus on mental health? Fix grading.

3/

Probably most illuminating are the students who say yes to this question. They then go on to say, "If you have a bad grade it means you're not doing your work," or "If I have bad grades it makes me do more work to keep them up."

Think about what they are revealing.

4/

When asked if grades help them learn, they simply say yes because the grades force them to do the work. They have lost the understanding that doing work and learning aren't necessarily the same thing. Are they connected? Sometimes, but the student never mentions learning.

5/

"How do grades make you feel?"

Buckle up, friends.

The most common answer: dumb.

How is this alone not the biggest of big red flags for our system?

In many places, schools actively protect and preserve a system of practices that make kids feel dumb.

In schools.

6/

The second most common answer is a collection of concerns: "pressured," "stressed," "every time I look at them I get discouraged," or "kind of anxious because you never know if it will go down or not."

HOW. IS. THIS. NOT. CHANGING?!

7/

We talk about the student mental health crisis, change surface-level elements as if a bandaid will cure a cancer, and then wonder why it's not getting any better.

In part, it's not getting any better because we refuse to change something we have complete control over.

8/

"Why do teachers use grades?"

Funniest answer to me (from a really honest kid): "To be honest idk."

Kid, you're not alone. I think a lot of teachers might have the same answer as you if they were being honest.

9/

The most common answer, though, is this: "To make sure we do our work" or "Just to show what you have completed and have not."

They get it. They know the reality.

10/

If you want to feel a dagger or two, a number of students put things like "to judge us" or "to teach us a lesson when we screw up."

Many kids see grades as a weaponized element of the classroom, and it's often accurate.

Many teachers wield grades like weapons.

11/

However, and this is what always surprises me after reading the responses of the first two questions. There are a number of kids who understand the ideal. Many kids say that grades are "to show how much we've learned" or "to help you see what you need to learn more."

12/

The disconnect here always baffles me. It's like kids understand and want to teach us an important lesson:

"Grades are broken. We get what you say they're supposed to do, but that's not how we end up experiencing them."

13/

When a tool's intended function doesn't work, we stop using it.

When we learn that something we once thought was good is actually causing harm, we question it.

Why then, when kids themselves are telling us grades are broken, do we cling to them so desperately?

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