Last year, I was teaching high school and our administration assigned a book study to the staff. We read and collaborated on 15 Fixes for Broken Grades by Ken O’Connor. This iconic book is an interesting and provocative read. It challenges standard operating procedure in terms of the way students are assessed. The fix that stirred the pot the most amongst our faculty was Fix #2:
Don’t reduce marks on work that is submitted late
In the program, I mistakenly refer to Fix #2 as Fix #4. On its face, Fix #2 makes sense. You don’t want to punish a behavior academically. But, wouldn’t Fix #2 encourage procrastination and irresponsibility?
Interestingly enough, during my first day this past week with my college students, i challenged them to collaborate in groups on the creation of class norms. One topic that all struggled with was how to deal with late work. To a group, students were in favor of score reduction. I found this fascinating and so we embarked on a magnificent tangential conversation on should an instructor, which they all hope to be one day, punish a behavior academically? The ensuing conversation caused a titanic paradigm shift in many of my students. This episode might be similar to the discussion in my class last week in the sense that you might think about this issue differently.
I’ll discuss this fascinating idea thoroughly this week with Josh Frame. Josh is a middle school principal and he embraces the idea that students should not suffer academically for behaviors.
Josh Frame
We’ll talk about how he sold this idea to his staff, how he managed the pushback, and how he’s adapted his school’s response to students who are not appropriately pursuing learning. Here are some outstanding links Josh shared:
This is a fascinating discussion that may leave you with unanswered questions, but hopefully might inspire such conversations at your school.
Episode Template
The Problem:
Students are being punished academically for behaviors.
The Solution:
Embrace Ken O’Connor’s practice of not reducing marks on work that is submitted late.
What you can do Tomorrow:
- Inventory your school’s policies on late work.
- Consult with your principal about Ken O’Connor’s book.
- Create an ultra-engaging prompt.
- Assign students the prompt and explain that you’d like their completed work on Friday, but also indicate that you’ll not reduce their scores if it’s late. Just make certain they understand that they are required to complete it.
- Sit back and evaluate what happens.
Punishing kids academically for a behavior is wrong. Let’s explore ways that we can inspire students to learn without this destructive practice.
Listen to “124-Rethinking Deadlines…Starring Josh Frame” on Spreaker.