Do you grade participation and attendance in your classroom? Should you do it? What are the advantages? How about the disadvantages? What are some recommendations for getting it right?
 |
Download a Transcript |
I am on the fence with this one. Primarily, I teach online classes so participation and attendance are slightly different. I also believe that the more one is involved in a course, the better they will do. But I also believe in treating adults like adults. That means, they get to make their own decisions and must accept responsibility for the decisions they make. All I can do is create the conditions that they will want to participate and succeed.
The reason I am approaching this topic right now is that I have been helping faculty work on their courses and participation and attendance have been elements we have had to work out. Additionally, I had just read a couple of articles by James Lang in the Chronicle of Higher Education on the topic. I thought the articles made a lot of sense.
The reason why we grade participation is that we recognize that engagement in the classroom leads to greater success. Students also understand this basic fact. Learning is about dialogue. The grade should not be the reason to participate.
In this episode, we will look at grading participation and attendance to include the pros and cons. We will also discuss strategies for grading participation and attendance in your classroom.
Additional Reading
- Should We Stop Grading Class Participation?
- 2 Ways to Fairly Grade Class Participation
- Participation Points: Making Student Engagement Visible
- The Contamination of Student Assessment
- Professors need to reconsider grade-based attendance policies
- Debate: Attendance-based grades are fair to students
- Grading Class Participation
- Participation Penalizes Quiet Learners
- Including Participation in Student Grades
- Grading Class Discussion
- In-class participation: To grade or not to grade
- Grading Class Participation
- Impact of attendance policies on course attendance among college students (PDF)
- Grading Classroom Participation (PDF)
This episode of the podcast was put together with the assistance of:
-
- Join me on Facebook
- Other podcast episodes
- Music credit: Purple Planet
- Sponsored product: Text Expander
- Sponsored product: Read to Succeed: The Power of Books to Transform Your Life and to Put You on the Path to Success
In the spirit of full disclosure, this is an affiliate link, which means that if you purchase this item through my link, I will earn a commission. You will not pay more when buying a product through my link. I only recommend products & systems that I use and love myself, so I know you’ll be in good hands.
Plus, when you order through my link, it helps me to continue to offer you lots of free stuff. 🙂 Thank you in advance for your support!
