Effectiveness of the Grading System

Its interesting to think about how the United States is around 17th on the list of the most effective education systems in the world. Most people and countries consider the United States to be one of the most powerful countries in the world. Is this going to change with all these countries better educating their children? Tough to say, but today I wanted to look at one of the highest ranked education systems and what makes it so successful. The education system in Finland is very unique, and has some very interesting parts to it. Part #1- They don't start school until the age of 7- Finland allows kids to have a actual childhood. The children learn from growing up in the world. They learn very similarly to when a kid touches a stove and learns what hot is. The process of allowing these kids to have more of a childhood also allows them to be a little more mature and ready for sitting in class for long periods of time. Contrast that to the United States which starts their kids in s...

Article Response             In an article by Joesph Holtgreive titled Too Smart to Fail, Holtgreive talks about students focusing too much on grades. Holtgreive starts off the essay by sharing an experience he had as a professor at Northwestern University. He had a student come in asking if she could drop the class after the drop date. After some discussion, he found out that she wanted to drop the class, because she had done poorly on the midterm exam. She was expecting that the class would be easy enough, where she could get an A without effort. Holtgreive points out that although she really liked the material discussed in class, she was not willing to learn it for a bad grade. He discusses that this is becoming widespread problem, and names two potential causes. Firstly, he talks about how students who breezed their way through high school creates a “inverse relationship between grades and effort.” He states that this means...

Derek Schetselaar Dr. Smith English 2010 26 July 2017 Five Summaries Van Etten, Shawn, et al. "College Seniors' Theory of Their Academic Motivation." Journal of Educational Psychology, vol. 100, no. 4, 01 Nov. 2008, pp. 812-828. EBSCOhost, ezproxy.uvu.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=eric&AN=EJ823714&site=eds-live.             In the Journal of Educational Psychology, Shawn Etten, Michael Pressley, Dennis McInerney, and Arif Liem published an article titled “ College Seniors’ Theory of Their Academic Motivation . The purpose of the article was to enlighten the world to their study that they conducted about college students. The authors felt like in the past studies were created to prove a predetermined point that the study creators wanted to prove. This caused some bias in past surveys. The authors wanted this study to be more “Qualitative and inductive.” The study was condu...

Grades have a powerful effect on many students. Grades affect a variety of things including scholarships, GPA's, college admission, and future opportunities. It is natural for students to feel some stress about getting good grades in college. Additionally, grades help to influence students to study the material, prepare for tests, and strive for excellence in their assignments. There are however many issues that have come about because of the grading structure, which have caused many educators to look for other solutions. A major issue that has been noticed by educators in the United States is how students are focusing less on learning the material and more on getting good grades. Dropping Classes A determinant to the learning process of college aged students has been the fear of failure. The fear of messing up or getting a bad grade in a class can prevent a student from pursuing a major or class. An Engineering professor named Joseph Holtgreive at Northwestern University menti...

School seems like it has been around for forever. At least that's what millennials think, ever since they were turned Preschool age they have been going to school. Day in and Day out students go through the same routine. They wake up and go to school, come home and repeat the process the next day. Additionally, the letter grading system has become ingrained into our very culture. Its common knowledge to know that an "A" is good and and "F" is bad. How did letter grades start? Why don't we have an E? Some things become such common knowledge that they are never given a second thought to why they work the way that they do. Well here's to changing that---What is the history of letter grades. In the beginning of the 1800's education was starting in the newly formed United States of America. The education at this time period was very limited, most classes had one teacher and a mix of all ages and backgrounds for the students. The education was focused o...

Introduction Education is critical to the development of a society. It could be seen as the building blocks of a great society. Look at the Ancient Greeks with Aristotle or Plato, or the early revolutionaries of the early American empire. The importance of education seems to be recognized by most individuals. We put our kids in schools starting at a very young age, we encourage further education in our high schools, and we emphasis the importance of education is getting future employment. Although generally as a culture we emphasis the importance of education, we rarely evaluate the way we educate and how it accomplishes the objectives it strives to accomplish. Setting the Stage There are various opinions on how the education system should run. The most common methods include the pass/fail method, the traditional style, mastery-based learning, and grading on a curve. There are various pros and cons to the many different styles, and there are passionate and effective educators ...

Education is the key to society. The way we educate the future generation will impact the direction that the United States future economy goes. A story about a boy named Ted will illustrate some of the problems with the current education system and how it can be improved. Although the story about Ted is a fake story, it has a lot of factual experiences that are experienced on a yearly basis by young students in the United States. Ted's life began in a small town named Draper, Utah to his parents Ron and Joyce Smith. He was blessed with very good parents who treated him like he was the smartest kid in the world. They constantly told him how smart he was, and how he could accomplish anything that he set his mind too. He started school just like any other kid, he enjoyed learning and loved recess. He always told his parent's friends that he loved going to school. They would always say things like "I wish my high school kid felt the same way," or "How did you hel...

It's key to understand how teachers have varying grading styles in the United States today. This is critical before we begin to compare and contrast what styles work the best. Education is a huge part of the success of a society. Franklin D. Roosevelt once said "We cannot always build the future for our youth, but we can build our youth for the future." The world as we know it is becoming increasingly competitive and complicated. The best way we can build our youth for the future is by making sure we educate successfully today. What styles work the best? What types of grading are being used today? In this post we will specifically look at traditional grading, grading on a curve, standard-based grading and pass/fail systems. We will look at how each one of these systems work, and will get into the pros and cons of each in a later blog post. Traditional Grading- This style of grading is very common all across America today. It includes tests, assignments, extra credit...

Derek Schetselaar Topic Proposal I chose to write about how grades are an insufficient way to measure a student’s learning, and, how we should instead focus in schools be on mastery of the topic. I will explain in detail throughout the course of the blog why and how this can be done. Additionally I will strive to focus on various examples of this style throughout history, and analyze the pros and the cons of teaching towards grades vs teaching towards mastery. The topic of grades is obviously important to me as a current college student at Utah Valley University. However, there are several additional reasons why I decided to study this topic. Firstly, I chose to study this topic because I have seen the trap that grades put upon students. What do I mean by this trap? While I have been studying here at school I have noticed many students whose primarily concern is on memorizing or cramming material into their head to achieve and “A” in their class. If you were to ask them about...

Hey my name is Derek Schetselaar. I'm a full time student at Utah Valley University going into my sophomore year. I am passionate about teaching, and I teach tennis on the side. I love learning the best and most productive ways to learn. The purpose of this blog is to analyze whether grades work or if we should try another method.