http://www.wowt.com/home/headlines/86029717.html
This article talks about Omaha Public Schools (OPS) making the change to a 'no-zero' grading policy. Attempt the assignment but fail, not to worry, you'll get a 65% jusf for the effort. This article doesn't lay out the specifics of what an attempt is but I'm guessing your name on the paper and a half-assed effort at a title is their definition of attempting. Why do I say this? Because, that's right, a student who doesn't even attempt to turn anything in still gets a 50%. No more "my dog ate my homework" excuses in Omaha, they can now say "screw it, gimme the 50%."
An elementary curriculum consultant says that it's not a free pass for the students and the teachers are on the students to get things done.
Really? It's not a free pass? Not doing anything and getting credit for it is okay? I'd like a career like that. "Boss, I didn't do anything this week so you only have to give me half my paycheck."
I looked up the definition of self-motivation on wiki (hey, I'm at the library and forgot my Reeve book at home. I still get 65% under Omaha grading policies for coming to the library, right?) and it states "self motivation is the ability to motivate oneself, to find a reason and the necessary strength to do something, without the need of being influenced to do so by another person. Working in a careful and consistent manner without giving up."
I wonder if the next push from the OPS will be to redefine self-motivation so they can let their students know they don't need to find the necessary strength to do something and only work at something until it gets too hard, then just give up.
I tend to be on the critics side of the argument where 'no-zeros' doesn't hold the student accountable and I feel this will lead to the students being less responsible as adults.
What's your take?
I think this is pretty insane to say the least. Although the actual grades of the children included in this new rule were not discussed, I can't see this being benificial to self-motivate anyone. I know when I was in high school if I could have not handed in a paper and gotten 50% I would have done so in a hearbeat. School-aged children need a consistent structure and letting them skip assignments won't benifit them.
The elementary teacher quoted in the article says "If a child is already struggling, and I give that child two or three zeros for not completing work, they're going to give up. Because it will take almost all year to bring that grade up." If that child is having trouble completing school work, than it is up to the teacher to get creative and figure out new ways to motivate the child into learning the material. Getting a couple bad grades could be detremental to the child's morale, I agree. But letting them do no work what so ever, while still getting over 50% teaches them nothing but laziness is "almost passing."
Agreed! Perhaps the most alarming feature of this article is the fact that it is being so nonchalantly implemented as a means of really "helping" students learn. I read the short story and decided that taking a gander at the 170 comments left on the subject would be worth my time. One of these comments was written by a teacher in the OPS system, and it mentions that the only reason OPS is implementing this policy is to help raise the graduation rates to insure a continuance of federal funding and avoidance of penalization under the provisions of "No Child Left Behind" laws. In addition to all of this, teachers will be paid based on the percentage of students that pass their class. Can you see another issue developing with this policy? "Failure rates" left on teaching evaluations would soon become an extrinsic motivator in moving up the pay scale. Doesn't all of this undermine the purpose of education itself? Students being rewarded for doing what they are expected to do in the first place (show up for class), and also being rewarded for not doing what they are there to do is completely outrageous--does it even make sense? Meanwhile, teachers are being paid to perform a job that lacks an essential nutrient in developing much needed life skills in their students--mainly responsibility and initiative. It seems to me a difficult environment for facilitating intrinsic motivation, achievement motivation, and high competence expectancies. Even those top performers will see a drop in performance as they witness less competent others being evaluated in an unjust manner. Goal adoption may become completely obsolete under a system such as this. Perhaps varying levels of diplomas should be implemented as this teacher suggests (The Honors/AP diploma, the standard diploma, and the I-showed-up-every-now-and-then-and-breathed-air diploma). How does this policy change support autonomy in America's classrooms?
Am I down with OPS? Maybe. I agree that there are some obvious flaws with this system. Personally, I don't think we should even be giving elementary students grades. It seems pointless to me, and I don't remember having grades in my elementary school. They are a measure of progress and success, but they are essentially meaningless and don't reflect real learning (in my opinion). So, now we have kids who are essentially unmotivated to complete their assignments going from getting 0 on the assignment to 50% automatically. Obviously the way it used to be set up wasn't working was it? I think part of it is that kids who (as it is mentioned in the article) get zero after zero feel like they can't catch up (assuming they want to). I think it comes down to an extrinsic motivation problem. I am assuming that kids who don't do their homework have low intrinsic motivation related to school work. What it seems like people have a problem with is that this 50% policy seems to be taking away any extrinsic motivation that was present in the first place. People assume that students will study/write only if they have some type of potential evaluation coming up (external regulation). Basically do homework-to get a grade. Even though this might work, it is likely to lead to poor performance itself. Its likely that a lot of kids fit in the next group of 'introjected regulation' where they feel they have to do good in school otherwise they will feel guilty as a result of failure to meet external expectations. Students in this group will probably do better than students with external regulation. This might be part of the 50% program where they say the teacher is on the kids to do better. However, I think the ideal of what they are trying to get to with the 50% policy is to somehow get the 'zeros' to adopt an identified regulation type of extrinsic motivation. They get an automatic 50% no matter what, but should they so choose to engage in their homework on their own, it becomes a more self-determined behavior rather than externally imposed. Now, because they decided to start doing homework it might become more important to them, and they might accept the goals (goal acceptance) that were once only the goals of teachers and parents. That was my interpretation of the general purpose of the program (I hope it wasn't just so they could give kids better grades to get funding).