Assessment & Grading & MGMT

Tiny Fluency Writes

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Q. What’s worse than thinking you can’t write a lot of Spanish?

A. Feeling bad about it because you’re given a ton of writing space.

Here’s new Fluency Write paper for Timed Writes, Free Writes, Speed Writes, etc., with Novice language learners in mind, particularly those in middle school. There’s still enough space for a fast processor to flip the page and write up to 110 words, but no so much that a slow processor leaves class with a crummy sense of low self-efficacy. Plus, you get 2 Fluency Write papers from every 8.5 x 11 double-sided sheet.

(Front)

fluency 1

(Back)fluency 2

Proficiency Grading FAQs, and New Rubric Option

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**Updated Expectations Rubric**

I’ve had many questions when it comes to implementing my complete grading system, or proficiency rubrics independently from DEA. As a result, you’ll find minor adjustments in their appearance, as well as a few changes that highlight the FAQs.

Proficiency Goal Rubrics
Independent Rubrics (when NOT used in complete grading system along with DEA)
Simplified Rubrics (for exploratory, middle school, or less-prescribed high school programs)

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Discipulus Illustris: Those Quizzes

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**Read about DISCIPVLVS ILLVSTRIS, and Sabrina’s variation for some context**

Should we assess what students remember about their classmates, or should we assess whether students understand Latin?

Although the former has social benefits, let’s face it…we use student details as our understandable messages in Latin. It’s great to know that Johnny’s birthday is in April, but it’s better to be able to read and understand all of the Latin used to express that detail. Inspired by a brilliant new tweak to Ben Slavic’s Quick Quizzes, I’ll be making the following changes:

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Grade [Spin]Doctors: Playing by our School’s Rules

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A colleague (let’s just say that there are some who call him……Tim?) asked about using my Grading & Assessment materials and how to make them work for him. I’ve written about a complete overhaul, as well as what to do when you have certain grading categories imposed, but Tim’s situation was different. He was prepared to go full-MagisterP-Grading of only Proficiency and DEA, but had a grading weight scheme imposed upon him of 70/30 (i.e. 70% Summative, and 30% Formative). I won’t discuss how arbitrary these numbers are, or even use the word asinine to criticize such a policy (especially when it comes to language acquisition), but it is what it is for Tim. Let’s look at an option I presented to him…

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CI Flow: Participation & DEA

/ magisterp / 4 Comments

Scott Benedict just blogged about his current Pagame system, which is essential for a CI class to flow. If class doesn’t flow, we begin to consciously learn. If we do too much conscious learning, we don’t acquire as much. In place of a participation system, I use an adapted version of Bob Patrick’s DEA. I agree with Scott and the grading experts (e.g. Marzano, O’Connor, etc.) that traditional participation scores should be reported, but never included in an academic grade, especially when using proficiency-based grading systems. There is, however, one distinction that I, Bob Patrick, and other teachers using DEA make, that justifies including it in the grade.

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Proficiency Grading: The last rubrics you’ll ever need

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**Updated Expectations Rubric**

OK, so maybe you’re not ready for a complete grading overhaul, or it might be that you are, but someone else isn’t. In this new post, I offer an example of how to use Proficiency goal rubrics independently within a traditional department-defined system using common grading categories. A simple process would be to keep the categories your department has, and use the Proficiency goal rubrics to grade work. A more complete process requires renaming grading categories for the sake of consistency, and communicating CI principles, but otherwise keeping the weights intact. I describe the more complete process in this post.

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Complete Standards Based Grading (SBG) Systems: Why not in a language course?

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You may have read that my new “one grading system to rule them all” essentially has a single standard, Proficiency. This is because I am no longer convinced that students need to practice anything in order to acquire a language. If you believe students need to practice, SBG will work for you, but I don’t buy it, and neither does VanPatten. This concept is so utterly counterintuitive to traditional language teachers, you probably need to spend some time thinking things over before developing your teaching philosophy.

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A New Grading System: The last one you’ll ever need (once you’re ready)

/ magisterp / 33 Comments

**Updated Expectations Rubric**

This grading system is the result of my experience combining common weighted grading categories (e.g. Homework, Unit Tests, Quizzes, etc.) with Standards Based Grading (SBG), and a Classroom Management (adaptation of Robert Patrick’s D.E.A.). Despite overall positive outcomes, the combination had its drawbacks. Besides, the longer I teach, 1) the less explicit instruction I give, and 2) the more streamlined/simple my practices become. From what I’ve learned from veteran teachers, this is a normal progression for a teacher, but I seem to have skipped about 10 years of trial and error. This new grading system is extremely easy to use as a teacher and extremely clear to understand as a student.

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