Teachers and HS graded assignments

[Anonymous]

Why do some teachers wait until the very end to assess students instead of doing it all quarter long? DC has one very good teacher who has had assessment grades throughout the quarter with no one grade worth too much. It's been very helpful for DC knowing how much they are mastering the content and adjusting their studying on the go.

DC has many more teachers who have had only had 1-2 small assessments and are having 1 last one huge one this week or next week so DC has no idea how they are doing and whether they are understanding the information. I thought no one assignment could comprise more than a certain percentage of the grade but here it is. Some are getting around it by breaking up these assessments into two parts so they are like a final exam that ends up counting 80% of the grade. How are they getting away with this?

[Anonymous]

Because there is no accountability in mcps

[Anonymous]

If I'm understanding correctly this is prohibited.

"Assigning any single task/assessment that counts for more than 25
percent of the marking period grade."

https://ww2.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/departments/policy/pdf/ika-ra%20master.pdf

[Anonymous]

Also this

All Tasks/Assessments: All assignments in the All
Tasks/Assessments category should add up to no fewer than nine
assignments, with feedback, each marking period.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why do some teachers wait until the very end to assess students instead of doing it all quarter long? DC has one very good teacher who has had assessment grades throughout the quarter with no one grade worth too much. It's been very helpful for DC knowing how much they are mastering the content and adjusting their studying on the go.

DC has many more teachers who have had only had 1-2 small assessments and are having 1 last one huge one this week or next week so DC has no idea how they are doing and whether they are understanding the information. I thought no one assignment could comprise more than a certain percentage of the grade but here it is. Some are getting around it by breaking up these assessments into two parts so they are like a final exam that ends up counting 80% of the grade. How are they getting away with this?

Because this is how college works and sooner or later someone needs to help them experience higher-stakes grading. As a college professor, I have students all the time wanting to know "what their grade is today" - but the answer is that it's the same as it was last week and the week before because we haven't had any new assignments. Not all teaching necessarily can be incremental (it works better in some fields that in others), and I'm glad when students know that. They have to learn how to plan and spread out preparation and work on their own.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why do some teachers wait until the very end to assess students instead of doing it all quarter long? DC has one very good teacher who has had assessment grades throughout the quarter with no one grade worth too much. It's been very helpful for DC knowing how much they are mastering the content and adjusting their studying on the go.

DC has many more teachers who have had only had 1-2 small assessments and are having 1 last one huge one this week or next week so DC has no idea how they are doing and whether they are understanding the information. I thought no one assignment could comprise more than a certain percentage of the grade but here it is. Some are getting around it by breaking up these assessments into two parts so they are like a final exam that ends up counting 80% of the grade. How are they getting away with this?

Because this is how college works and sooner or later someone needs to help them experience higher-stakes grading. As a college professor, I have students all the time wanting to know "what their grade is today" - but the answer is that it's the same as it was last week and the week before because we haven't had any new assignments. Not all teaching necessarily can be incremental (it works better in some fields that in others), and I'm glad when students know that. They have to learn how to plan and spread out preparation and work on their own.

Teaching and learning by their very nature are incremental. You don’t choose a new topic and then instantly know everything about it. Just like you don’t start the term telling students here is all the information I expect you to have learned this year, good luck and see you at finals. If that were the case no one would pay the extremely high price for college because they could just use the library. What they pay for is the teaching, assessment/feedback, experience along the way.

I agree that students need to learn to plan and prepare, but one of the key ways they learn that in HS is to be given assignments/assessments/feedback along the way that help them see if they’ve in fact mastered enough material. Especially since most HS courses don’t provide a detailed enough syllabus such that students could plan or even determine if they are on pace. Most MS/HS students have almost no idea what they are going to be learning from one week to the next until the teacher announces it. Looking at my HSer’s course syllabi, only three list which topics will be covered in a unit or over the semester. Which means for more than half, they are finding out week by week. So the only preparing is reviewing already covered material and playing catchup when they get the next topic and then realize they didn’t learn enough about x topic.

[Anonymous]

Teachers are burned out. I can’t repeat this enough.

High school teachers are in front of 140-150 teenagers each day, dealing with unimaginable behaviors. When their planning period comes, they are now covering classes since we have a shortage of subs. I didn’t even get to eat lunch twice last week.

Planning lessons and grading work doesn’t happen at school anymore. There’s no time. It happens after we cook our family’s dinner. It happens after we put our own kids to bed. It happens all weekend, and sometimes we have to use our own leave to catch up.

It is unfortunate that students have to wait for feedback, or not get any at all. But it is equally unfortunate that we demand that our teachers sacrifice their own families to get work done.

[Anonymous]

Then when we sacrifice so much of our lives and time we get pressured to do unethical things and then hacked with little to no protection from our expensive union

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why do some teachers wait until the very end to assess students instead of doing it all quarter long? DC has one very good teacher who has had assessment grades throughout the quarter with no one grade worth too much. It's been very helpful for DC knowing how much they are mastering the content and adjusting their studying on the go.

DC has many more teachers who have had only had 1-2 small assessments and are having 1 last one huge one this week or next week so DC has no idea how they are doing and whether they are understanding the information. I thought no one assignment could comprise more than a certain percentage of the grade but here it is. Some are getting around it by breaking up these assessments into two parts so they are like a final exam that ends up counting 80% of the grade. How are they getting away with this?

Because this is how college works and sooner or later someone needs to help them experience higher-stakes grading. As a college professor, I have students all the time wanting to know "what their grade is today" - but the answer is that it's the same as it was last week and the week before because we haven't had any new assignments. Not all teaching necessarily can be incremental (it works better in some fields that in others), and I'm glad when students know that. They have to learn how to plan and spread out preparation and work on their own.

NP. These are high school kids, not college kids. And having 2 assessments count toward 80% of the grade violates MCPS’s own policy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Teachers are burned out. I can’t repeat this enough.

High school teachers are in front of 140-150 teenagers each day, dealing with unimaginable behaviors. When their planning period comes, they are now covering classes since we have a shortage of subs. I didn’t even get to eat lunch twice last week.

Planning lessons and grading work doesn’t happen at school anymore. There’s no time. It happens after we cook our family’s dinner. It happens after we put our own kids to bed. It happens all weekend, and sometimes we have to use our own leave to catch up.

It is unfortunate that students have to wait for feedback, or not get any at all. But it is equally unfortunate that we demand that our teachers sacrifice their own families to get work done.

There's no excuse for not letting teachers have a lunch period or taking over their planning periods regularly. No excuse. I don't know how MCPS allows this.

But I'm not sure why you are complaning about after hours work. My parents were teachers and they always were grading at home and on weekends. This is not new. This is how salaried jobs work. Everyone I know who has a salaried job does some amount of work after hours and on weekends no matter what that job is. If you don't want to take work home with you you you should choose a different profession.

[Anonymous]

You’d complain if it was the opposite. I went to a Catholic HS and we had pop quizzes DLL of the time in every subject. It forced you to do your nightly homework (which was also graded). We had 45 minute classes so none of this going homework in class. Would you prefer this? If so, head over to a Catholic school because they’re still doing it. My son graduated from one in 2023.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teachers are burned out. I can’t repeat this enough.

High school teachers are in front of 140-150 teenagers each day, dealing with unimaginable behaviors. When their planning period comes, they are now covering classes since we have a shortage of subs. I didn’t even get to eat lunch twice last week.

Planning lessons and grading work doesn’t happen at school anymore. There’s no time. It happens after we cook our family’s dinner. It happens after we put our own kids to bed. It happens all weekend, and sometimes we have to use our own leave to catch up.

It is unfortunate that students have to wait for feedback, or not get any at all. But it is equally unfortunate that we demand that our teachers sacrifice their own families to get work done.

There's no excuse for not letting teachers have a lunch period or taking over their planning periods regularly. No excuse. I don't know how MCPS allows this.

But I'm not sure why you are complaning about after hours work. My parents were teachers and they always were grading at home and on weekends. This is not new. This is how salaried jobs work. Everyone I know who has a salaried job does some amount of work after hours and on weekends no matter what that job is. If you don't want to take work home with you you you should choose a different profession.

🙄 go touch grass. And teachers are leaving. In droves. It’s not your parents’ profession anymore. Get with it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Also this

All Tasks/Assessments: All assignments in the All
Tasks/Assessments category should add up to no fewer than nine
assignments, with feedback, each marking period.

Had anyone successfully raised this with a teacher who is violating this? Did you raise it or did your kid? My kid has a teacher who has only graded 4 all tasks and has one left to grade - so five total not the minimum of 9. A low mark in one of those all tasks has significantly brought down their grades even though As for all the others. More all task assignments would provide more opportunity to bring it up.

[Anonymous]

The MCPS grading policies are unworkable for teachers:

-No way to put “Z’s” in my MCPS even though this is required for missing assignments.
-9 assessments times 150 students is 1,350 basically every two months.
-I barely bother grading practice prep. I have no time to even look at it.
-Separate due dates and deadlines for to keep track of for students with extended time.
-Students who don’t show up for a few weeks are still expected to be offered to do the assignments. How the hell do they expect us to reteach and regrade without use our lunch “break”.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The MCPS grading policies are unworkable for teachers:

-No way to put “Z’s” in my MCPS even though this is required for missing assignments.
-9 assessments times 150 students is 1,350 basically every two months.
-I barely bother grading practice prep. I have no time to even look at it.
-Separate due dates and deadlines for to keep track of for students with extended time.
-Students who don’t show up for a few weeks are still expected to be offered to do the assignments. How the hell do they expect us to reteach and regrade without use our lunch “break”.

Are you saying that you don’t follow the policies and just screw over your students?