The bonepile

The idea behind grading assignments in school is to show what a person has made in comparison with others.  Ideally, grading happens to show progress to the individual, but that was only true in the beginning of grading.  It's really never been true since the 1800s, however, in America.  And I'm not sure it was true before then.  I just don't have any grading examples from that far back.

Oh, you thought grading was to show mastery?  Well, now, that is a laughable notion.  No one can really determine what mastery is.  I guess in today's terms, it is the minimum score required to show "Y" for scoring at least the minimum "scale score."   But the formula to derive a scale score is only in comparison to all the other scores in the state.  In a classroom, mastery is really a "soft" idea because teachers count off points differently, weight questions on tests differently (therefore, what is deemed important for a subject is different), and give "participation" grades differently and for different types of assignments.  With national standardized tests, the tests are normed, usually for each year it is given separate from the year before and the year after.  The norms are usually in percentiles or stanines.  So, does a student master a standardized test when scoring the 51st percentile, the 75th percentile, or the 98th percentile?  Is the 7th stanine ranking as good as the 8th stanine ranking when both rankings are above the idea of "passing?"

Perhaps if people could agree on what mastery is, then measuring it would be easier, but the definition eludes those who would try to capture it.  Knowing information definitely comes into the mastery picture, but how much information should be known?  And, for how long should people know the information?  Should mastery include knowledge that has been regurgitated in the amount of a particular percentage?  Should knowledge be tested immediately following its presentation and 6 months later?  Perhaps the average of retention of information is a better measure of mastery.  Perhaps mastery should include some real world application of knowledge or some problem in which manipulation of knowledge takes place.  Maybe mastery should not be a term used at all.  Only experience with knowledge can yield mastery.

If an idea exists, it can be defined.  If it can be defined, then it can be measured.  And if it can be measured, then we can talk intelligently about the various divisions and portions of its measurement.  On the other hand, we cannot talk intelligently about the various divisions and portions of mastery if there is no standard method of measuring it.  And, we cannot measure mastery if we cannot define it.  And, what makes us think mastery even exists in schools if we cannot define it.

And all of this gets back to grading somehow.  Everyone expects it.  Somehow teachers are not worth their salt if they are not telling students what they think of their work in some quantitative way.  And somehow students don't feel the need to turn anything in to a teacher unless they can expect a comparison to other people (so they can feel ashamed, average, or esteemed).  And somehow parents and students earn bragging rights for the number 70 or higher even if that number is mainly for participation or the number is against the backdrop of a field of 50 points rather than 100 points, or the number represents 60 points by the student and 10 points as a gift from the teacher.

Grading should have seen its last day.  It has certainly outlived its usefulness.  It has no consistency of meaning.  It needs to be placed in the bonepile alongside the sun dial, the gyroscope, the slide rule, the Polaroid camera, the black and white TV, and silent films.  If we ever come to an understanding of mastery, then maybe we can resurrect grading from the bonepile.  Then again, bonepile items are there because what is new, modern, and meaningful has replaced them for good.