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Shannon Maree Teaching

Self-Grading Quizzes & Assignments

Are you ready to check grading off your to-do list? I won’t lie, my first few months back in the classroom post-maternity leave were rough . The exhaustion, frustration over lack of time, not being the mom or teacher I wanted to be, all left me feeling crushed under a weight that I just couldn’t escape. Can you relate? Check out this amazing #teacherhack, a self-grading quiz, that changed everything…

Are you ready to check grading off your to-do list? As a new mom, I needed a way to gather valuable data for my students, and still, have the energy to be “ mama ” when I picked my baby up from daycare. Self-grading quizzes made all that possible, and I can’t wait to share what I’ve learned with you.

Self-Grading Resources Save Time

Grading took a significant amount of time, and giving less work to my students wasn’t an option as our district has strict requirements for assessing. Unless I took action, it was clear that nothing was going to change. Tired and defeated, I poured over teaching strategies and productivity hacks to find ways to be even more efficient.

The exhaustion, frustration over lack of time, not being the mom or teacher I wanted to be, left me feeling crushed under a weight I couldn’t escape. Can you relate?

Teaching is tough, grading doesn’t have to be.

This led me to the biggest game-changing #teacherhack of all time. It felt too good to be true, but time and time again, I was able to use this new strategy to access immediate student data without lifting my favorite purple flair pen.

Does any of this resonate with you? If so, I’ve got your simple solution: Self-Grading Assignments and Quizzes .

Self-Grading Quizzes Provide Immediate and Organized Data

D igital activities (or quizzes) that grade themselves the instant a student hits the “submit” button are called self-grading assignments . All scores will appear in an organized spreadsheet ready for you to use. You can even see a breakdown of which questions were correct/incorrect. This breakdown is incredibly helpful when forming strategy small groups and pulling students for review.

Benefits of Immediate Feedback

Student scores began increasing because I was able to meet with kids the same day they took they took their self-grading assessment. This allowed me to give meaningful and timely feedback to each student. Somedays we even met 1-1. ( My class size was 29. I can’t tell you the last time I actually had the time to meet 1-1 with every student in a day). Relationships with my students were better than ever because I could actually invest the time I wanted to help them flourish.

Bonus: with grading off my plate I had extra time to invest in my family too. (… and I sure as heck wasn’t dragging a stack of papers back and forth anymore .)

So, forget the piles of paper. Forget tossing a stack of ungraded assignments in your teacher bestie’s recycling the day before report cards are due. Forget the long hours of grading. Last but not least, definitely forget taking your students’ work on a joy ride to and from school multiple times before getting it all graded.

Self-grading assignments can eliminate all of that for you with just the click of a button.

Assignments and quizzes that actually grade themselves are REAL and they will change your year.

Interested in learning more? I’ve put together a FREE guide just for you to get started with self-grading quizzes. Click the button below to grab your FREE copy of “A Teacher’s Guide to Self-Grading Assignments.” Start saving time today by saying goodbye to grading!

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Creating self-grading student assignments

Creating assignments that are both engaging and informative is an essential part of your job as a teacher. However, grading can be a time-consuming and tedious process, taking away from the time you could be spending on other important tasks. Luckily, with advancements in technology, it is now possible to create assignments that are self-grading. In this blog, we will explore the steps teachers can take to create student assignments that are self-grading, helping to save time while still providing students with meaningful feedback.

Step 1: Choose the right platform

The first step in creating self-grading assignments is to choose the right platform. There are many tools available online that allow teachers to create and share self-grading assignments with students. Some popular platforms include Google Forms and Kahoot . When choosing a platform, it’s essential to consider the specific needs of your students and the subject matter you are teaching.

For example, if you are teaching a language class, you may want to use a platform that allows for audio and video recordings, such as Flipgrid . If you are teaching a math class, you may want to use a platform that allows for the creation of graphs and equations, such as Desmos . Additionally, it’s essential to choose a platform that is user-friendly and easy to navigate for both you and your students.

Step 2: Create the assignment

Once you have selected the appropriate platform, it’s time to create the assignment. When creating self-grading assignments, it’s important to consider the following:

• Choose the appropriate question type: Most self-grading platforms offer a variety of question types, including multiple choice, true/false, short answer, and essay. Choose the appropriate question type based on the subject matter and the learning objective.
• Add detailed instructions: Be sure to provide clear and concise instructions for each question. Students should know exactly what is expected of them and how to respond.
• Include feedback: Providing feedback is an essential part of the learning process. Consider adding feedback to each question, so students know where they stand and how they can improve.
• Use multimedia: To create engaging assignments, consider using multimedia such as images, videos, and audio recordings. This will help to keep students interested and motivated.

Step 3: Set up the grading system

Once the assignment is created, it’s time to set up the grading system. Most self-grading platforms offer a variety of grading options, including point-based and percentage-based grading. When setting up the grading system, consider the following:

• Determine the weight of each question: Assign a weight to each question based on its importance and relevance to the learning objective.
• Set the passing grade: Determine the passing grade for the assignment. This will vary depending on the subject matter and the level of difficulty of the assignment.
• Consider partial credit: Some platforms allow for partial credit to be awarded for certain types of questions. Consider whether this is appropriate for the assignment.
• Test the assignment: Before sharing the assignment with students, be sure to test it thoroughly to ensure that the grading system is working correctly.

Step 4: Share the assignment with students

Once the assignment is created and graded, it’s time to share it with students. When sharing self-grading assignments with students, consider the following:

• Provide clear instructions: Be sure to provide students with clear instructions on how to access the assignment and how to submit their responses.
• Set a deadline: Set a deadline for the assignment and communicate this clearly to students.
• Provide feedback: Once the assignment is submitted, provide feedback to students as soon as possible. This will help them to understand their strengths and weaknesses and identify areas for improvement.

Step 5: Analyze the results and provide feedback

The final step in creating self-grading assignments is to provide feedback to your students. This is an essential part of the learning process, as it helps students understand where they went wrong and how they can improve.

If you’re using Google Forms or Microsoft Forms, you can provide feedback by adding feedback for correct and incorrect answers.

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How to Shift to Self-Grading in English Classes

By articulating clearer expectations about what’s being evaluated, teachers can help students become more fluent in improving and assessing their own work.

Grading English papers isn’t a straightforward task—and neither is writing them. Students are often asked to showcase too many skills within an assignment—or not given specific, actionable guidance and feedback—which can make the entire process bewildering. “I thought I’d clarified that grades on papers came from students demonstrating their skills in a number of areas,” says middle school teacher Stephanie Farley in a piece for MiddleWeb . “As it turned out, the students couldn’t figure out how facility in those areas translated into points or a letter grade.”

Having concluded that she was assessing too many skills at one time, and hadn’t clearly articulated the skills she wanted students to learn, Farley invested a lot of time in refining a grading strategy that would change the way her students are graded: they would grade themselves.

“ Student-centered assessment is the most transformative change I’ve made in my English teaching practice within the past five years,” Farley says. It began with her asking students to try grading just one paper themselves, and soon enough “there was no stopping the kids [and] I had successfully transitioned my class to student-centered assessment.”

Here are three steps Farley used to help kids evaluate their own work, with consistent oversight from herself:

Create Kid-Friendly Standards

Good writing encompasses mastering many skills all at once, and for kids who are starting out, breaking it down into smaller, concrete goals as they work towards fluency can make progress seem more feasible.

Farley concluded that rewriting all of her learning targets in “kid language” and only focusing on one skill at a time helps her students better understand what they’re aiming for. Teaching what a “big idea” or a “supporting detail” looks like in a written piece of work, for example, helps students get familiar with the language used for assessments.

She also recommends replacing more formally worded statements like “Develops a big idea that is well supported by details within the story” with simpler sentences such as “I can write a story or essay with a purpose – or big idea – in mind,” and “I can use details in my story that support – or give examples of – the big idea.”

Beside providing a rubric for all written assignments, Farley encourages students to evaluate each other’s work based on learning targets. “It’s hard to be objective about your own work, but practicing on others’ work trains your brain to take a step back and look for the learning targets ,” she adds.

Teach the Basics of Self-Evaluation

Assessing one’s own learning requires a solid grasp on what skills are being evaluated, and Farley gives her students plenty of written feedback—using language clearly tied to the learning objectives—and time to make revisions before asking students to evaluate their own writing. “In this way, they already knew which areas of the work needed improvement and what was strong, so if they edited successfully, they’d have a fair understanding of where the work stood in terms of the rubric,” she writes.

To make the evaluation more specific, Farley asks her students to pinpoint an example of how they fulfill a learning target, like highlighting where a “big idea” is in their story—which corresponds to the goal of “writing a story with a big idea in mind.” This visual connection not only helps students see how well big ideas are expressed in their writing, but also means that the teacher doesn’t need to do as much work to explain problems in the future.

Hold Individual Conferences

Once students have completed a self-evaluation and it’s time for grading, Farley sits down and talks through what they’ve come up with to help fill in any gaps in their own assessment. “I was quick to point out when students didn’t give themselves enough credit or underrated their achievement,” Farley writes. “If needed, I’d also mention where their work didn’t quite align with their evaluation of it.”

During these one-on-ones, Farley’s students would explain their revisions using examples that correspond to the different criteria in the rubric, and eventually arrive at a conclusion of what grade they merit. She adds that it’s rare for her to disagree with her students’ evaluations, but when it does happen, she “explained how the work could improve and invited the student to revise again.” Finally, the agreed-upon grade is recorded in the gradebook.

Farley notices that self-grading has led students to internalize some of the language of good writing; they now know how to articulate in very specific terms where they’re succeeding and where they have room to grow. “In this class, I learned how to write using descriptive language like metaphors and sense imagery. But most of all, I felt like I got better at and more confident about writing,” according to one of Farley’s students. Witnessing her students feel “safe and confident in the classroom” is one of the greatest rewards to Farley as an educator, she writes.

The Feedback Loop

Search this blog, self grading, self grading   .

How to make it work

Virtual self grading, post a comment, popular posts from this blog, back-to-school: consider your feedback system, not grading system, a culture of iteration: policies and practices for a revision-focusedclassroom, part 2 - tools for an equitable feedback system: engaging with criteria.

• Online Assessment, Grading, and Feedback

Empowering Learners through Online Discussion Self-Grading

• September 9, 2022
• Laura M. Schwarz and Nancyruth Leibold

This article first appeared in the  Teaching Professor   on October 26, 2017. © Magna Publications. All rights reserved. 

Have you ever thought, “There has to be a better way!” while grading your online learners’ discussions? It is no secret that grading student discussions is time consuming, laborious, and tedious, considering the disproportionate amount of time required to give solid, quality feedback on a large volume of discussion. On the learner side, students often do not use the rubric to craft their discussions or read and use feedback to improve. This adds to the frustration and can make grading learners’ discussions feel like a waste of time. Fortunately, a better way exists: engage and empower your students by having them grade their own discussions!

Discussion self-grading is an innovative, unconventional, and creative learning method. It empowers learners to improve by employing adult learning principles outlined in the theory of andragogy and reflective learning. These principles encourage learners to be self-directed and responsible for their own learning (Knowles, Holston, & Swanson, 2015), and that serves to motivate the learner. Learners engage in their own learning process with internal motivation and are allowed to maintain control.

Discussion self-grading also requires reflection on experiences, beliefs, knowledge, one’s self, and practices with the goal of improving (Kember, McKay, Sinclair, & Wong, 2008). Reflection is an important lifelong skill for life, career, learning, and problem solving. It helps people improve both performance and practice in all facets of life. In the case of discussion self-grading, as learners engage in grading their own discussions, they reflect upon their discussion performance. Learners discover their mistakes and accomplishments, learn what they can improve and how, and are motivated to do better in the future.

Learners may also reflect on the posting’s topic and content and here, too, engage in reflective learning as they revisit their writings. As for the traditional problem of learners not using the rubric, learners must employ the rubric to grade their discussions and thus become both more familiar with the rubric and the importance of following the rubric’s criteria. With this comes improved discussion performance.

Implementing discussion self-grading is fairly straightforward and consists of three basic steps:  

Step 1: Create a discussion self-grading rubric

The first step in implementing discussion self-grading is to create a rubric. A discussion self-grading rubric serves as a measuring tool by which learners evaluate their performance. Evaluation criteria should reflect the performance areas that the instructor deems important and necessary, as well as a breakdown for quality with a score for each level of performance. For example, the rubric could contain items for content of initial posting; content of responses to others’ postings; discussion timeliness and interaction such as number of responses to others; spelling, grammar, sentence format; and correct APA format. The rubric can then break down each criterion into definitions for each performance level with accompanying points for each as a scoring strategy. For instance, the criterion for timeliness and interaction could break down into one point for making posts on two different days, with the initial response and responses to others’ postings completed by the due date: .75 point for a late first post and/or for posting everything on one day only with responses to at least two peers’ postings, .5 points for responding to only one peer’s posting, and zero points for not replying to or providing minimal comments or information to other participants.  

Step 2: Create a discussion self-grading quiz

After creating a rubric, you must provide a means for learners to score themselves on each of the rubric criteria. A self-grading quiz works well for this purpose. Start by creating one question for each criterion. If for example there are five criteria, there should be five questions. The criterion forms the stem of the question, and each of criteria can be used for each of the performance levels (see example below).

Which of the following best reflects your participation, timeliness and interaction in discussion according to the discussion Rubric?

• Makes postings on at least two different days (Wed initial post due by 11:59PM). Responds to at least 2 peers’ postings and reads all posts in assigned group (1 point)
• Late first post and/or posts everything 1 day only. Responds to at least 2 peers’ posting and reads all posts in assigned group (.75 point)
• Responds to only 1 peer posting (.5 point)
• Does not reply to or provides minimal comments and information to other participants (0 points)

You should create one quiz for each discussion: for instance, you would create one quiz for each unit or week. Setting the quiz to automatically export to grades is helpful in automatically populating the grade area with scores. Providing several days for learners to complete the discussion helps provide adult learners with flexibility. For example, you can set up the discussion self-grading quizzes to start after the discussion begins and end a few days after the last discussion responses are due with the due date shown in the calendar as a reminder. Not setting a time limit and allowing multiple attempts in case of “mistakes” is also an adult-learner-friendly practice.

Step 3: Create instructions for learners

Last, creating and communicating a set of clear instructions for learners is paramount to understanding and success. Instructions can be both written and explained in a live or recorded video. Adult learners need to know the why, what, and how (Knowles, Holston, & Swanson, 2015). An explanation of adult learning (andragogy) and the importance of developing skills of reflection for reflective learning and self-growth can serve as the “why.” Explaining the rubric and its importance serves as the “what,” and explaining the quiz serves as the “how.” Providing a practice discussion self-grading quiz and demonstration are likewise helpful. Furthermore, informing learners regarding the expectation of honesty—including instructor audits and consequences for dishonesty—is also important.

Faculty and student feedback on discussion self-grading have been extremely positive. This article’s authors have used discussion self-grading with hundreds of students to date and have found that learners were largely honest and accurate. Moreover, they found that discussion quality improved significantly over instructor grading, particularly after the first week. Faculty also found that discussion self-grading encourages reflective learning skills and empowers students. Learner frustration decreased, and satisfaction increased. Learners paid increased attention to detail in both discussions and assignments—in other words, the attention paid to the rubric through discussion self-grading appeared to have carried through to other assignments. Most learners completed the self-grading quiz on time, and the need to reopen the quiz for students who forgot to complete it was infrequent. Another positive was that discussion self-grading allowed faculty to have more time for other course needs such as grading major assignments and developing and refining course materials and structure. Unsolicited learner feedback was likewise positive; students said that it was a great way to learn.

For more articles like this, check out a  Teaching Professor  yearly membership for $159 or a monthly membership for $19.

Laura M. Schwarz is an associate professor of nursing at Minnesota State University, Mankato, and Nancyruth Leibold is an assistant professor of nursing at Southwest Minnesota State University.

References:

Kember, D., McKay, J., Sinclair, K., & Wong, F. K. Y. (2008). A four-category scheme for coding and assessing the level of reflection in written work.  Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, 33 (4), 363–379. doi: 10.1080/02602930701293355

Knowles, M. S., Holton, E. F., & Swanson, R. A. (2015).  The adult learner: The definitive class in adult education and human resource development.  (8th ed.). New York, NY: Routledge.  

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Ungrading: an FAQ

This piece was revised and expanded for my new book, Undoing the Grade: Why We Grade, and How to Stop , available now in paperback and Kindle editions.

When I lead workshops on ungrading and radical assessment, I often start with the question, "why do we grade?" The most common answer from the teachers I work with is, "because we have to." Grades are the bureaucratic ouroboros of education. They are baked into our practices and reinforced by all our ( technological and administrative) systems. Teachers continue to grade because so much of education is built around grades.

I'm increasingly struck by the degree to which we approach grades and grading as inevitable. If we can’t “imagine the world as though it might be otherwise,” as Maxine Greene would say, we are stuck with the bizarre customs and habits our institutions have adopted.

I don't grade student work, and I haven't for 20 years. This practice continues to feel like an act of personal, professional, and political resistance. I’m still required to turn in final grades, by all of the institutions where I've worked, so I have students write self-reflections. The bulk of my “grading” time is spent reading these and adapting our course on the fly as I get to know the students. Over the years, I've gotten lots of questions about the what, why, and how of my approach. These are some of those questions and my answers.

Wait, you don't put grades on individual assignments? How do students get As, Bs, or Cs in your class?

My assessment approach centers around self-evaluation and metacognition. I ask students to write process letters about their work, and I ask them to reflect frequently on their own progress and learning. The most authentic assessment approaches, in my view, are ones that engage students directly as experts in their own learning.

I offer feedback with words and sentences and paragraphs, or by just talking to students, rather than using a crude system for quantitative evaluation. I also encourage students to see their peers as a primary audience for their work, rather than just me.

Students in my classes give themselves a grade at the end of the term. I say, “I reserve the right to change grades as appropriate,” but over 20 years, I’ve seen students grade themselves incredibly fairly. The students in my courses get As, Bs, Cs, and even Fs.

Can you share specific examples of the kinds of prompts you use for the self-reflections you have students do?

In an introductory course, like Digital Studies 101 or freshman composition, I begin with more frequent self-reflections and more directive prompts. In advanced courses, I might have students do a midterm self-reflection with directive prompts and an open-ended final self-reflection. I've also experimented with asking students to blog their way through a course, reflecting constantly (but less formally) on their process.

A midterm self-reflection might begin with questions like, "what aspects of the course have been most successful for you so far? What thing that you've learned are you most excited about? What challenges have you encountered?" I usually ask students to quote from or link to examples of their work right within the self-reflection. I don't necessarily respond to every self-reflection (especially in a large class), so one of the last questions invites students to ask for particular kinds of feedback.

A final self-reflection will either include a shorter series of questions that build upon the midterm self-reflection, or it might have a single open-ended prompt, such as: "Write me a short letter that reflects on your work in this class. Consider the work you did on the final project, your work earlier in the term, the feedback you offered your peers on their work, and how you met your own goals. Include links to examples of your work. Did you miss any significant work? Is there anything you are particularly proud of? What letter grade would you give yourself?"

(Feel free to borrow any of the examples here as a jumping off point to hone your own approach).

Why don't you grade?

I wrote a longer piece that answers this question in detail, "Why I Don't Grade." In short, the act of grading does harm to students and causes teachers unnecessary stress. Research shows grades don’t help learning and actually distract from other feedback/assessment. Alfie Kohn writes , "when students from elementary school to college who are led to focus on grades are compared with those who aren’t, the results support three robust conclusions: Grades tend to diminish students’ interest in whatever they’re learning [...]; Grades create a preference for the easiest possible task [...]; Grades tend to reduce the quality of students’ thinking [...]."

Grades frustrate intrinsic motivation. In an educational system that increasingly centers grades and quantifiable outcomes, students work to the grade rather than doing work for the sake of learning. Students ask questions like, "what are you looking for," "how many points is this worth," not "what will I do," but "what should I do, and how will it be graded?"

Taking grades at least partly off the table means I can have a whole different set of conversations with students. With all of us focused on grades, not enough of our work together is tuned toward genuine curiosity or wondering at what we each (tentatively) think about the stuff of the course. In Education for Critical Consciousness , Paulo Freire describes “an education of ‘I wonder,’ instead of merely ‘I do.’” Grades frustrate those conversations.

Learning is not linear, and meaningful learning resists being quantified. Our assessment approaches should create space for learning not arbitrarily delimit it. How, for example, can we “test” whether a student has had an epiphany? What standardized mechanism can account for a student learning experience we (and they) couldn’t have anticipated? How can we evaluate (with a percentile) the significance of a student changing their mind about something? How can a letter grade account for the complexity of failure, struggle, or even success? These kinds of questions call for a pedagogy that is less algorithmic and more human, more subjective, more compassionate. Too often teachers fail to ask students how, where, and when learning happens for them.

Grading is so ingrained in our educational systems that small acts of pedagogical disobedience can't do enough to change the larger (and hostile) culture of grading and assessment. What I hope for is that my courses at least help students (and teachers) see behind the curtain of this system. My goal is not to create a learning environment entirely free of grades and quantitative assessment (which would be futile), but rather to create a safe space for students to ask critical questions about grades, about how school works, and about their own learning.

Have you ever felt pressure from above to grade? If so, how did you overcome this pressure? What if I'm [contingent, precarious, sessional, adjunct]?

The work of teaching is increasingly precarious and the ability of teachers to carve our own paths through the work is under threat. Academic freedom (like the ability to make critical decisions about our teaching practices) must extend to precarious teachers.

Each institution where I've worked has had a different set of rules, structures, and norms. Navigating those hurdles (and institutional cultures) has been a challenge. I've been contingent for most of my teaching career, 11 of 20 years. During that time, I never put grades on student work, but it took me over a decade to start talking as openly as I am here about my approach. Some coping strategies that have worked for me: (1) I make sure my pedagogy is well-researched; (2) I bring students into the conversation about my approach; (3) I figure out what the firm rules are and follow them. We usually internalize way more restrictions than there actually are.

In fact, conventional approaches to grading are usually at direct odds with our institutional missions. So I look to those missions when advocating for teachers to have autonomy in their decisions about how, when, and whether to grade.

I haven’t seen a college mission statement with any of these:

• Pit students and teachers against one another • Rank students competitively • Reduce the humanity of students to a single low-resolution standardized metric • Frustrate learning with approaches that discourage intrinsic motivation • Reinforce bias against marginalized students • Fail to trust students’ knowledge of their own learning

Most assessment mechanisms in higher education simply do not assess what we say we value most.

Does ungrading make students anxious?

Students sometimes start from a place of anxiety about the removal of grades (because they’ve been conditioned to see them as markers of success, even if other things actually work better as markers of learning), but that anxiety usually gives way pretty quickly.

The key, I think, is making sure students believe us, that they aren’t worried a rug will be pulled out from under them. This means teachers have to start by cultivating a sense of trust in the classroom . And building trust is hard.

When it comes to talking to students about not grading, I usually follow their lead. If they need the conversation, individually or as a group, we have it. Sometimes, they don’t. As long as I've been teaching, I still tweak my approach every single time. And the approach has to emerge from conversation with students about their specific contexts.

Does ungrading affect the scores students give you on course evaluations?

Generally, I think my pedagogical approach has helped my course evaluations (particularly my emphasis on compassionate and flexible pedagogies).

My scores on course evaluation questions specifically about grading have depended on how well the questions were phrased to allow for my approach. At my current institution, for example, the specific wording is: "The instructor provided clear criteria for grading" and "the instructor returned graded materials within a reasonable amount of time, considering the nature of the assignment." The words "criteria" and "returned graded materials" are out of sync with my approach. Much of the "criteria" in my courses is determined by students, and I neither "grade" materials, nor "return" them in any conventional way. So, it's unsurprising to me that I often score below department and college averages for these questions, even though my scores for all other questions is above department and college averages.

This is a perfect example of how pedagogical decisions can be baked into administrative structures at an institution. This is, in my view, a direct threat to academic freedom. And as we critically examine how we're grading students, we must also take a hard look at institutional assessment mechanisms for courses and instructors. Ultimately the problem is the way course evaluations are designed, not ungrading as an approach. But it's important to acknowledge that, as problematic as they are, course evaluations have a direct impact on the livelihood of teachers, particularly those who are already marginalized or working precariously. So, we can't teach (or talk about teaching) as though course evaluations don't exist.

Do you know if ungrading is sometimes used for STEM courses?

Ungrading seems to work well across disciplines, age groups, and at all levels of education. Certainly, lots of modifications are necessary depending on the specific context.

I know quite a few STEM folks who ungrade in various ways. Some specific stuff I’ve seen work in STEM classes: project-based learning with self-assessment, process notebooks (like a lab notebook but with an emphasis on metacognition), and collaborative exams. Exams, in particular, are at their best when they are formative tools for learning, not just standardized mechanisms for summative (or end-of-learning) assessment. Collaborative exams allow students the opportunities to learn from and teach each other. Open-book and self-graded exams are not as good at sorting or ranking students, but they are often just as good (if not better) tools for learning.

Clarissa Sorensen-Unruh has written quite a bit about her experiments with ungrading in her Chemistry courses. What I find so refreshing about her accounts is how she narrates both the successes and failures on her journey. She writes, "My students, many of whom are from underserved populations (i.e.  particularly Latinx and/or Native American), deserve to be included in the discussion of their own grades. I hope by increasing their agency by using ungrading, my students increase their motivation to learn and their mastery of the material."

I teach a class of [50, 100, 400] in a large lecture hall. How can ungrading work in a course like that?

For several years, I taught up to 9 classes each term at as many as 4 institutions. I’ve taught traditional college classes with over 100 students. What I’ve found is that compassion scales. And allowing space for student agency scales.

Teaching metacognition and having students self-evaluate is just as effective (and more necessary) in large classes, where I can't possibly see inside the brain/process of each student. Reading students' self-reflection letters is what helps me "see" student learning and know when they need support or feedback.

A few things that work well when ungrading with large groups:

• Have students read about metacognition and invite open discussion about grading • Several self-evaluations throughout the term asking students to reflect on their work • One letter to class offering general feedback, noting trends, and responding to common questions • Invite students to make individual appointments and reach out to those who are struggling • Share (with permission) anonymized highlights from self-reflections, including data re: grade distribution, and invite conversation • Adjust grades as needed but generally give students the grades they give themselves

With a group of 50, 100, or 400, I can’t give the same amount of feedback that I would with a smaller group, so I do more talking and writing to the class as a whole. Ultimately, not grading saves time. It doesn’t mean I do less work. I just put my energy into other work that better supports student learning.

Would you describe ungrading as a [decolonizing, radical, progressive, feminist, critical] pedagogical practice?

Ungrading is a key part of my critical pedagogical approach, but it only works as a radical, decolonizing, feminist practice, if it’s done carefully and alongside other critical pedagogical practices.

Grades reinforce teacher/student hierarchies (and institution/teacher hierarchies) while exacerbating other problematic power relationships. Women, POC, disabled people, neurodiverse people are all ill-served by a destructive culture of grading and assessment.

In removing grades, though, we have to be sure we aren't just shifting the goalposts for students, replacing clear policies with "hidden curriculum." Ungrading can unsettle power dynamics in productive ways, but it can also reinforce structural biases if those biases aren't explicitly acknowledged and accounted for. Toward this end, I share and discuss data about bias in grading with students. I also have a responsibility to spend time actively challenging my biases and reflecting on my own privilege/marginalization. I believe an actively anti-racist, anti-misogynist, anti-ableist approach is more effective than supposedly “objective” approaches like blind grading (which just maintain the status quo, rather than accounting for privilege or marginalization).

The biggest problems arise, in my view, when we devise learning outcomes, determine policies, and craft assessments before we’ve even met the specific students we’re working with. Too many of our approaches treat students like they’re interchangeable and fail to recognize their complexity. Not every student begins at the same place, nor is it even reasonable to imagine every student can, or should, end up at the same place. Ultimately, critical pedagogical practice has to acknowledge the background, context, and embodied experience that both teachers and students bring to the classroom. Any predetermined standardized metric will almost necessarily fail at that.

Different students learn in different ways at different times.

Without grades, how do you motivate students to complete their work? If you aren't grading, but your colleagues are, won't students de-prioritize the work for your classes?

Students do sometimes prioritize other graded courses over mine (although it is much rarer than people are often worried it would be). And I’m okay with that. Honestly, it seems like good time management for students to prioritize work with a hard deadline.

I’m trying to encourage intrinsic motivation, and it’s difficult for that to compete with extrinsic motivators (for me too). But when students clear the decks of other work and turn to work for my classes, they can do so with a gusto. And it is common for students in my classes to work harder for those classes than any others (but in their own time), because they have a reason better than points.

I can push students harder, because I’m not regularly grading them. When we trust each other, we can challenge each other more.

How Should I Start Ungrading?

Ungrading works best when it's part of a more holistic pedagogical practice – when we also rethink due dates, policies, syllabi, and assignments – when we ask students to do work that has intrinsic value and authentic audiences. However, it starts with teachers just talking to students about grades. None of the techniques described here are necessary beyond that one. Demystifying grades (and the culture around them) helps give students a sense of ownership over their own education. There are lots more suggestions on ways to begin in my previous post, "How to Ungrade," but I say start simply with a single conversation with students and let your approach evolve from there.

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Jesse Stommel

Jesse Stommel is faculty at University of Denver and founder of Hybrid Pedagogy. He teaches pedagogy, digital studies, and composition. He spends most of his time with his badass daughter, Hazel.

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What is a Grade?

Grading is used to evaluate and provide feedback on student work. In this way, instructors communicate to students how they are performing in the course and where they need more help to achieve the course’s goals. For instructors, grades help to assess what information, concepts, and skills students have successfully understood and which ones they have not. This kind of information helps you know what you may need to reiterate in class and what may require reworking in the course design. Grades also provide a standardized way of communicating student performance to third parties, including the departments in which students are enrolled, and students themselves.

To ensure that grades are fair and to motivate students to improve their performance, instructors should think about the alignment of their assignments to the course’s overarching goals and communicate their expectations and grading practices in a transparent manner. Students are generally highly motivated to improve their work when the instructions of an assignment are clear and achievable, when the standards the instructor uses for grading are clear and fair, and when the feedback is timely and well aligned with the assignment in question. This kind of transparency will also enable students to understand what skills and content they have learned and what they are still struggling with in the course.

It helps to consider grading as a process. It is not simply a matter of assigning number or letter grades. As a process, grading may involve some or all of these activities:

• Setting expectations with students through a grading policy
• Designing assignments and exams that promote the course objectives
• Establishing standards and criteria
• Calibrating the application of a grading standard for consistency and fairness
• Making decisions about effort and improvement
• Deciding which comments would be the most useful in guiding each student’s learning
• Returning assignments and helping students understand their grades

What Purpose Do Grades Serve?

Grades are essentially a way to measure or quantify learning and intellectual progress using objective criteria. They can serve many purposes:

• As an evaluation of student work, effort, understanding of course content, skill development, and progress;
• As a source of self-motivation to students for continued learning and improvement;
• As a means of communicating feedback to students on their performance;
• As a means of communicating to students, parents, graduate schools, professional schools, and future employers about a student’s potential in college and predictor for further success;
• As a means of organizing a lesson, a unit, or a semester in that grades mark transitions in a course and bring closure to it (i.e. a summative assessment).

As feedback, grades can also inform:

• Students as to their own learning, clarifying for them what they understand, what they don’t understand, and where they can improve.
• Instructors on their students’ learning to help inform future teaching decisions.

Grades vs. Learning Assessment

Grades on assignments, tests, and activities communicate feedback to students.  How do grades differ from assessment?  Essentially grades are symbols of relative achievement among students in a class section and reflect teacher’s pedagogy and their class’s unique array of student abilities. Whereas, the fundamental purpose of assessment is to determine how effective a course’s assignments and tests are in meeting specific learning goals to understand and improve student learning, the quality of knowledge, skills, attitudes, and beliefs that students have acquired, most often as the result of learning in their courses. While assessment is at certain levels a process that involves goal setting and evidence gathering (at an institution-, college-, or department-level), when viewed in a separate context it can also mean actions undertaken by teachers and students to document student learning in a given course.

Differences Between Grades and Assessment

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