In many ways I enjoy the end of the quarter. I get some extra time during planning days to work on new lessons or just tie up loose ends that have been hanging on for the past several weeks. My students get a couple of days to relax (which is more beneficial for your teachers than you know). Mid-terms help me assess how specific units went, who is learning what, and how I can improve.
But then there are the negatives of the end of the quarter - grades. In education grades are both wonderful and awful. As much as we would love for our students to forget about grades and focus on real learning, we as teachers make this hard when we complain about low grades and how detrimental they can be. Unfortunately, I don't know a better alternative to grades. I have been trying to come up with one for years, but few options seem feasible.
So at the end of the quarter I am innudated with grade questions and issues. I try to look on the bright side - a new quarter, a new beginning - but it often becomes overshadowed with the complaints and the frantic quest for last minute improvements to grades.
I will be happy to begin next week - out with the old, in with the new!
28 comments:
Grades are a double-edged sword. They lift up those who do well and sink those who do not. Unfortunately, for the shear fact that it would be impossible to do otherwise from a numbers perspective, our society is set up to compare each individual to the group. You can't create individual "grades" based on each person unless you have enough teachers to do so...and you'd need a lot of teachers for that. Sometimes you have to just take the lesser in order to make the majority progress. Think of it as a tax.
Unlike you Mrs. Stoklosa, I don't have anything negative to say about the end of the quarter. For me it means that we are closer to the end of the semester. Not that I dont't like English class because I think it's an opportunity for new knowledge for me every single day. But it's still school and I get tired of it sometimes because of the pressure it puts on me. The beginning of a new quarter it's a way to alliviate that pressure and to start fresh. I don't worry about my grades at all because I just have to maintain the good ones and I still have plenty of time to change the bad ones. In addition we get a day off that obviuosly no one complains about. I just have to do the midterms and then start off again without pressure...yet
The end of the quarter, a time for me to look back at all my mistakes and fix them. I am ready and my goal is to get an A in your class and I will.
I hate grades, I think they are actually keeping us from learning as much as we can. I think this because we get so focused on getting good grades that we don't even care about the actual learning. I have all A's and a B this semester (in English) and I am extremely upset about this considering I tried so hard. In my opinion, grades are so pointless.
I've also done much thinking about a better alternative to grades. I've come to a conclusion that there is only one substitution for them, a verbal student assessment. At the end of each activity the student needs to reflect on what is emphasized on what they have just learned, the main focus if you will. The teacher will gather responses through written paragraphs (I'd prefer grades) or verbally. The teacher would use the collection of responses at the end of the quarter to give the student a score between one through five. In most cases, this does replace the long term idea of grades.
I think that i had a good quarter, I got a B which is ok, but i think that grades arent a good way of learning. For example we study for a quiz but after we get the grade we just forget what we learned, but your vocab quizes are different because we have to know every word every week
I see the end of the quarter as a good and bad thing also. I like the end of the quarter because it means it is closer to the summer. However, there is also a bad side of the end of the quarter. It is the time when grades close and mid-terms are waiting. To some the end of the quarter is nothing because by then one has a solid grade and they don'y really need to worry about much. For others it is an "OH Crap!!" moment where they need to really kick in gear to raise their grade. Fortunately I always stay on task and don't have a wondering mind, so I usually don't think too much about the end of the quarter.
Believe me Mrs. Stoklosa, you aren't the only one who enjoys the end of the quarter. I really enjoyed this first one, but I always feel that the broken up school year is actually really refreshing, not just in the fact that we get days off, but as you said, we turn over a new leaf.
As for the grades, I don't mind them. Ideally, teachers would evaluate each individual student themselves and then assign a grade. Really, everyone is on a different level, so making one standard for grading isn't really fair. But nevertheless, there is no better option so it is a neccessary evil.
The end of the quarter for me is great.It is a great opportunity to start over, especially with those grades taht get me really down.What you said is very true, even though we try not to think about grades and just concentrate on learning, is extremely hard.In my case I worry too much about my grades and I do feel pressure about getting straight A's. This new semester is my opportunity to get an A in every subject especially in your class, which is the most challenging one.
You know how people say age is just a number; well I say that grades are just a letter. You said it yourself the first day we walked into your classroom, you spoke of education and how you believe that learning comes in different shapes and sizes, well here I'm repeating what your saying but adding the fact that you cant judge a students knowledge by their grades. There are different types of learning and while one student weakness might be the others strong point there shouldn’t be a letter that determines the student’s capacity to learn.
Grades are a necessary evil in a capitalistic world. They are what separate people into rankings for businesses to pick and choose from. School is indirectly a system designed to sort out the future job-holders for businesses. It is the responsibility of the student to excel and 'show-off' one's skills by doing the best one can do. If grades didn't exist, then what would we be? A variation of communism?
Wow I am so happy about the end of the Quarter. It is finally over. Tell you the truth Mrs. Stoklosa I never thought it would end. Now I am one step closer to ending the year. I am so tired of school. So now I can relax for a few days and recharge my batteries. I think though since I had an 89 you should give me the 90.
Now that the quarter is over I can finally relax for a little bit. This quarter went by so slow. I like your class though I have seemed to improved on a lot of things. I am glad I stayed in your class. You could change my 89 to a 90 if you want. I won't mind at all.
At the end of the quater is a time for you to relax, throw away all the bad grades and just forget about them. It's time for a fresh new set of grades and for you to show that you better than last quater. Fore me it's always better because now I know what I'm capable of doing and things I wasn't I will correct them. It's just like starting a new school year.
I personally HATE grades. I do understand though that without grades, there would be no real way for teachers or parents to see how well we have progressed or how well we given up. The negative side of having grades is the fact that most students get so stressed out on if they have an "A" or if that assignment is in or if we failed that test. Students are so worried about their grades that they don't worry as much about their work and studying.
I do have the same opinion as you on the end of the quarter. It's a time to start all over fresh. Maybe you didnt do too well the first quarter, but now you know you need to try harder and work harder to achieve those higher grades for the second quarter.
The end of the quarter is a time for you to relax, throw away and forget about all the bad grades. Now the begining of the quarter is a start of new fresh grades. Now you know what you are capable of doing and the things you aren't sure of you can fix them. It's just like starting a new school year.
I am happy this quarter ended, and in my eyes grades are overrated. Some teachers are more lenient and some are more challenging. So a smarter student might have gotten a worse grade than another student with an easier teacher. Either way I still got an A in your class
Unfortunately if we didn't have grades there would be no dicipline. No one would be learning in my opinion because they wouldn't care, they would be like hey im not getting graded who cares! Grades make the students learn because they have to if they want to pass the class, Im not saying all students would be like this but we need grades to keep us in order.
I agree with you because its true how the teachers focus more on getting good grades rather than teaching essential lessons. i love how you teach though, you try to focus on both. It is important to me to learn things that will help on later in life and in the future.
I too enjoy the end of the quarter, and no its not just about the long weekend. Grades aren't always good for me especially since homework isn't really my thing. Mid-terms are definitely a way for me to pull those grades up since I'm a fairly good test taker. I myself dont really agree with the grading system. It puts way too much emphasis on the completion of a task rather than on applying what we've learned, but unfortunately there really isn't any other plausible way to measure how much someone has learned.
I love the end the quarter. I just look forward to new things to learn and new things to analyze. It is also a fresh start. However, grades do put a lot of pressure on me at the end of the quarter because of midterms. You can have a B in a clas and just because of one test it can go down to a C. It get's really stressful. I probably looked at pinnacle 5 times yesterday because I was so worried about how my grade would turn out because of midterms. I am really excited to see what happens this new quarter.
Well, it is nice to see that we students are not the only ones who stress about the end of the quarter grades. Yes, grades can be important, but often it does overshadow the importance of a lesson. I am so relieved that these few days are given to relax, as I can focus on just SAT's and finishing "Their Eyes Were Watching God". I can look forward to the new quarter, as I can shoot higher, and make it even better!
The end of the quarters are the most stressful part of the school year. At the end of the quarter everyone tries to get last minute grade improvements and/or make sure they kept their grade in the class. Having to study for midterms or finals, make things worse because it's a cram to get every subject in before the real test. Then, also, there are stupid report cards that get sent home with the students, which end up getting people grounded and/or a pat on the back.
The ends of the quarters are the most stressful part of the school year. At the end of the quarter everyone tries to get last minute grade improvements and/or make sure they kept their grade in the class. Having to study for midterms or finals, make things worse because it's a cram to get every subject in before the real test. Then, also, there are stupid report cards that get sent home with the students, which end up getting people grounded and/or a pat on the back
I also think that the way that we see grades help some people and don't help other people in some way. Parents stress a lot on getting good "grades" and that stress really wears down some people. I don't think people should see grades as something that measures someone's intelligence, at least in my opinion. Not so much pressure should be put into grades, and I actually believe that if we release some of that pressure on grades, grades will actually go up.
I recently found out I did very well this semester, so grades are a big plus in my eyes. There's nothing like seeing the fruit of your school labor at the end of the semester.
Speaking of the end of the semester, it took me forever to find a wifi hotspot in Orlando, Florida. I am currently sitting in City Walk and using their signal to post my blog. Oh well, time to enjoy the weekend.
The end of the quarter is always a stressful time for students. Its comforting to know that teachers feel this way also. Studying for midterms and trying to make last minute improvements in grades can require more work than is actually necessary. Although last quarter has come to a close, its a new one now which means starting over. With this comes another chance to achieve the goals we have set for ourselves.
Grades, even though many people might debate on this, are basically a reflection of how well you actually paid attention in class and how well a student kept on task during the quarter. If for some reason you get an F, you could imply that the student did horribly on his assignments, didn't turn in assignments, or simply didn't care about whatever he/she had to do. Nevertheless, the grade reflects how much that person actually stayed attentive during class. So in a way, I can't complain much about grades, and I think it to be ridiculous by a student's part to do so, simply because of that. We might be able to fool someone else, but in the end we have to be aware of the effort we put and whether we should have put more into the class.
About midterms, I think they're about one of the more stressful tests we have to take during the quarter, but unfortunately we have to deal with them, and fortunately for us once this passes we get to "start over" in a sense.
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