Troubles with Grades, Grading, and Change: Learning from Adventures in Alternative Assessment Practices in Teacher Education

From Section:
Assessment & Evaluation
Published:
Oct. 10, 2010

This article was published in Teaching and Teacher Education, Volume 26, Issue 7,
Author(s): Sherie McClam and Brian Sevier, ' Troubles with Grades, Grading, and Change: Learning from Adventures in Alternative Assessment Practices in Teacher Education', Pages 1460-1470, Copyright Elsevier (October 2010).

In this article, the authors are teacher educators who explore their own attempts to transform teacher–student relations by altering traditional grading practices.

Using actor-network theory, the authors examine the social effects produced across and throughout a school of education when they changed the meaning and significance of grades.
The authors analyze the retrospective reflections: narratives and dialogue.

The findings reveal the deeply ingrained and broadly interconnected role that traditional understandings of grades play in defining and stabilizing identities and responsibilities.
The outcomes reveal the authors’ complicity in the failure of their own change effort and offer implications for teacher educators attempting change.


Updated: Jan. 17, 2017
Keywords:
Alternative assessment | Educational change | Grades | Program effectiveness | Teacher education programs | Teacher educators