Wrong question. The culture we create by focussing on grades over progress fails to motivate students to achieve their potential. Students should aim to gradually improve their ability over time, that is what education is. A grade is a snapshot of their knowledge and ability at that moment in time, but it fails to capture their learning journey over months or years. A 95% or 45% score in a class test means nothing without the context of these students’ histories in that subject.
Today I stumbled across students smuggling the answers to a class test to students who hadn’t yet sat that test (blatant cheating). This is very troubling on so many levels. This class test is an incredibly powerful learning opportunity; being in focussed exam conditions, trying your best and pushing your brain to the absolute maximum. These students didn’t see it that way, they were more worried about their grade than their learning. This is such a shame. This incident inspired me to write this article.
Class Tests: What’s the point?
Schools tend to test students with a summative test every 6-8 weeks. There is a good reason for this. The testing effect is a learning theory that suggests that regular testing improves memory recall. There is a lot of evidence from psychologists and educational scientists to back this up. In essence, the act of a student’s brain trying hard to recall facts forces the brain to exercise exactly that; memory recall. This leads to long-term memories forming and being easier to retrieve when necessary. This should be seen as the primary purpose of class tests; learning.
Secondly, tests allow teachers to mark a piece of work completed in optimum exam conditions. This has two benefits: feedback for the students and feedback for the teacher. The student can (and definitely should) review and reflect on their marked work. They should use this opportunity to reflect on their strengths and weakness (I discuss exactly how to reflect here). The teacher also receives feedback on how well the class has understood the course content. More often than not, they realise that the majority of the class have common misconceptions or mistakes. This is normal. The teacher can now respond to this information with future planning.
In a distant third place, tests are useful for data tracking. It helps teachers understand their classes better and see the trends in the scores over time. It also helps ensure students are in the right classes (if the school arranges students in sets according to ability). However, in my view, this data tracking has little effect on students’ long-term learning compared to the other benefits of testing mentioned above. Either way, if the student moves up, down or remains in their set then that is positive because it means they are in the right environment for them according to the evidence. Moving down a set is good if it allows that student to receive better support in-line with their ability.
Context Matters
A student of mine got 41% in their November class test. His Mum was very concerned and didn’t understand why I was encouraged by this score. This score was a jump from his 32% in the previous test, but most importantly he was able to demonstrate a good foundation of the essential topics that we had been covering. Unfortunately, he still made some mistakes which cost him marks, but I saw his potential with his mathematical working out. His Mum had not looked past the cover page of the exam, how could she make any judgement on the quality of his learning from a simple percentage?
The underlying story hidden between the lines of his answers showed that he had been revising hard, practising and responding to my advice. This is impossible to see from the raw percentage grade. That percentage would be above 60% with some encouragement and practice on the easy fixes, well within his reach.
The grade also fails to describe the individual challenges students face. They are individuals with unique experiences. When a student is shy about maths and gets anxiety from the pressure of exams, a 17% score is a fantastic achievement because they overcame their fear of the test and were able to give it their best shot. I am proud of their perseverance and courage.
Now, of course a higher grade is better than a lower grade, I am just arguing that it’s very hard to say what “Good Grade” means, as the standards for “good” will change for each student every time. Students should be aiming high, but we should judge ‘high’ as impressive progress since last time they sat an exam, not some standard definition of ‘high’.
Changing the Culture
Schools and parents can both be guilty of focusing on grades over learning. The focus needs to change. We should ask students what particular questions they managed to get better at since the last test. Have they improved in solving algebraic equations since last term? Have they avoided that silly mistake with fractions this time? Have they learnt a new formula? If yes, then great, let’s celebrate that. If not, then positively encourage them to take responsibility for this. “What can we do to get our heads around this tricky topic?”. Celebrate learning and progress, not arbitrary grades.
Let’s foster a culture which sees tests as a learning opportunity, not a stressful grade factory. Let’s celebrate when students are self-motivated learners who take it upon themselves to revise instead of playing xbox. Or maybe they had a lightbulb moment where suddenly a concept that they had struggled with finally clicks, awesome!
Addvance Maths 