So, this isn't really a politics thread, but this is an active board, and I'm sure there will be some interesting points made here. I have two kids in a small school district. They are both doing well, but sometimes it feels like the academic side is a bit limited. I've just kind of accepted this is life in a small district, and the trade offs have been acceptable.

The other day, one of the math teachers informed my wife that they have been instructed to allow for "correct to mastery". Essentially, the short explanation is that students are allowed to do an assignment until they master it, and then that is their final grade. Based on my limited understanding, this is district-wide, not just limited to the elementary school. My immediate frustration is that it is now March, and it is the first time I've been informed of this. My second frustration is in wondering how do the schools differentiate between high performers, average performers, and low performers in this scenario.

I am coming to this board to get thoughts from other educators and curious if any other parents have experience with this. I plan to seek out information after the district returns from spring break. It seems so counter to my experience as a student that I don't even know where to start.

Some information for context:

https://www.nifdi.org/how-to-be-successful/teaching-to-mastery.html

What exactly is your issue with it?

Is it that kids are getting a chance to learn where they went wrong and make corrections, continually improving until they've learned the concept?

Or is it that it's unfair that Johnny mastered it the first time might get the same grade as Jimmy who got 4 tries?

My sister was a Home Economics Family & Consumer Sciences teacher in a 5A school. Over the course of 3 semesters, she went from actually grading assignments, to completion grades, to hand something in (put your name on the paper = same grade as 100% correct). Her pass/fail rate did not change.

Completely unscientific here, but I'd wager if the issue is #2 above, it's a nothing burger. Unmotivated kids aren't going to fix their work.

I guess my biggest issue is the lack of communication.

My second thought would be, why not just make it pass / fail? If you have a grading system, performance is part of it. Our school is big on extracurriculars, we wouldn't stand for that to not be merit based on performance in a game or at a competition. If my kid were in high school where ranking is part of the equation, yes, I'd have a problem if my little Johnny had a 4.0 after the first attempt and Joe had a 4.0 after the third attempt... and ultimately, that is why I am going to seek out information to better understand what it means.

I'll also add... My kid is fairly smart, but I don't think he is some genius. Let's take math as an example as he is good at that. When I see his tests, most of the time he misses a question because he rushes through it, not because he misunderstands the concept. I think missing points and thus getting a lower grade helps provide motivation to slow down and also take 5 extra minutes to check his work. To me, that's a life skill worth reinforcing.

Anyway, if it represents more of a move to self-paced learning, I'm on board with that over meaningless grades (especially in elementary). It doesn't seem like that is occurring as we get messages weekly about the upcoming test material for the class.

The idea is that the first attempt at learning isn't more important than a child actually mastering the content. I like the theory and think it's especially useful in math, science, and writing. The grade doesn't matter, the learning matters.

Of course there are issues with it and we all know kids that will game the system but they're already gaming the current system as well.

Mastery > Grades

Think of it this way: Grades as you know them measure past ability. If someone graduates with a 4.0, can they still crank out an analysis of the Shakespeare they read as a freshman off the top of their head? Can they still add and multiply matrices after getting an A on that test as a sophomore?

Maybe.

Could someone else with a 3.2 produce the same results now even though there was a larger difference then?

Maybe.

If they can, what is so important about the grade differential if their current abilities and mastery are equal? Who cares about grades they got 3 years ago? The grades are merely past point estimates and not indicative of anything they're capable of currently.


Yes, there's something to be said about measuring effort, but I will tell you right now that I had amazing grades in HS while putting fourth minimal effort and learning some things just long enough to ace a test.

Ghost of Andrew Eaton said:

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The idea is that the first attempt at learning isn't more important than a child actually mastering the content. I like the theory and think it's especially useful in math, science, and writing. The grade doesn't matter, the learning matters.

Of course there are issues with it and we all know kids that will game the system but they're already gaming the current system as well.

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Huh?

I'm not sure I can disagree with the theory in principle. I generally believe in the concept of use it or lose it so some past grade in a subject I never use is meaningless. If this mastery idea makes things stick longer term that would seem to make sense to me. I have no idea if there has been any long-term stuides on that to determine if that is the case.

Prime example for me is math - I had to relearn basic algebra and geometry to take the GMAT about 4 years after undergrad because you simply don't use that in real life at enough of a clip to retain it. If you asked me to do basic algebra and geometry right now I would have to relearn it again for a third time in my life only to forget it all in a few months when I still never used it in real life.

Caveat: I would be really dialed in on what they are being instructed to master in the first place. Based on a lot of what we've seen in the last few years, there is suspect content being pushed to our kids that has no place in schools.

This is refusal to hold students and parents accountable disguised as "mastery > grades."

The way to recognize mastery historically is by taking a test on the subject. The daily work is there to force kids to run through easy scenarios to get them used to the the steps.

I've always hated daily work, so the concept of it essentially being a free grade as long as you correct everything appeals to me. But I would rather prefer to just take a test at the end of the semester, and that be my only grade. I realize that idea freaks a lot of people, especially high schoolers, out. But if I take a comprehensive exam on a course and get an A, why shouldn't that be my final grade?

I really appreciate the thoughts - helping me broaden my opinions on the matter. I like the theory and especially like the idea of it turning into a self-paced system where kids just move on and we don't obsess over grades at the immediate moment we learn the subject.

One concern I have (and will need to research more) is, what is mastery? Many of us could say the same about geometry or algebra. It is impossible to take all of school and commit it into long-term memory - I doubt we even have the capacity for it. What does happen in math is you increase your ability to problem-solve and think critically over time, and it helps as you get into more complex topics. So, today, maybe I can't recall much of what I learned in calc, but I do know it changed the way that I think through a problem.

And as I write this out, I can see the argument to make it not about the grade achieved on an exam... but I guess it worries me to move away from achievement. How do we judge it? How do we work out the issue of admissions or scholarships when kids graduate from high school? How do we judge the schools? For example, I looked at the last board report. One campus was pumping up it's % of students that made honor roll. But now armed with the information I've been told, that feels... worthless almost?

I don't get people who say we don't need grades or that grading is bad. In this learn to mastery concept or any other model really, grades are needed to determine and report progress. I don't know how you do that otherwise.

Edit to add: I believe any system that removes grading and progress reporting is designed to protect the education system, not to promote the education of children. Change my mind.

I Have Spoken said:

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I really appreciate the thoughts - helping me broaden my opinions on the matter. I like the theory and especially like the idea of it turning into a self-paced system where kids just move on and we don't obsess over grades at the immediate moment we learn the subject.

One concern I have (and will need to research more) is, what is mastery? Many of us could say the same about geometry or algebra. It is impossible to take all of school and commit it into long-term memory - I doubt we even have the capacity for it. What does happen in math is you increase your ability to problem-solve and think critically over time, and it helps as you get into more complex topics. So, today, maybe I can't recall much of what I learned in calc, but I do know it changed the way that I think through a problem.

And as I write this out, I can see the argument to make it not about the grade achieved on an exam... but I guess it worries me to move away from achievement. How do we judge it? How do we work out the issue of admissions or scholarships when kids graduate from high school? How do we judge the schools? For example, I looked at the last board report. One campus was pumping up it's % of students that made honor roll. But now armed with the information I've been told, that feels... worthless almost?

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That is the crux of the matter. I like the theory but it's already been hijacked in many school systems as a way to just pass kids along and not hold them accountable. I'm sure there is a viable curriculum and process here but odds are you will only find it in private schools, magnet schools, and/or smaller school districts.

During my era in the Army, they would usually have the Pretest, the Test and the Retest. If you aced the Pretest, you didn't have to take the test and you got a 100%. If you took the Test, that was your grade unless you failed. Then you got the Retest and that was your grade. Anybody could screw up the initial test.

With the SAT test my daughter took a few years ago, they would send your scores to your preferred school twice. If you took the SAT a 3rd time, you had to pay for them to send a 3rd round of scores to the same school.

So, there's precedent in life for offering 3 tries let's say.

But unlimited tries, nah. As others have shared here, the kids who don't pass it on the 2nd or 3rd try aren't going to pass it on the 5th or 50th try.

At the school where my mom teaches they have this Credit Recovery deal where the kids can retake their basic classes like Algebra, etc. Of the kids she sees who have already failed Algebra, maybe 1 in 20 passes. The main reason they don't pass - because they don't do any work. Especially during online classes b/c Covid. These kids go out and get jobs because culturally, school doesn't mean anything to them.

TLDR; - I wouldn't lose much sleep over it. They're not fooling anybody.

Mastery is achieved in mathematics by working a large number of similar problems, until the error rate is minimal.

Mastery is not achieved in mathematics by iteratively correcting a small number of similar problems, until there are only a few or no errors.


It's very much like a coach-ism: "You don't just do it until you get it right. You do it until you can't do it wrong."

outofstateaggie said:

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This is refusal to hold students and parents accountable disguised as "mastery > grades."

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Please explain.

It's elementary school. Do you remember the grades you made in elementary school?

The teachers know very early in the year who the gifted children are, who are the smart ones, who had parents read to them, who gets a full night sleep, etc.

And in elementary school - no communication is good. Otherwise, it's usually because of a behavior issue.

Have a friend at a small district teaching at the elementary level. They were told the lowest grade will be a 70. Everyone passes... even if you didn't.

Wrangler said:

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Have a friend at a small district teaching at the elementary level. They were told the lowest grade will be a 70. Everyone passes... even if you didn't.

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Three big things that determine your variable funding in a TX school district (or this was the case 12 years ago during my ONE year of teaching high school before I GTFO) are attendance, standardized test scores, grades. They told me the exact same thing you just said...surprise surprise.

Kids are dumb, but absolutely not dumb enough to not find out that they can get away with doing nothing and skate along.

Or so they thought...guess what I did in the last semester before I quit

American Hardwood said:

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I don't get people who say we don't need grades or that grading is bad. In this learn to mastery concept or any other model really, grades are needed to determine and report progress. I don't know how you do that otherwise.

Edit to add: I believe any system that removes grading and progress reporting is designed to protect the education system, not to promote the education of children. Change my mind.

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Pass/fail grading is binary because either you know something or you don't.

The traditional letter grades and 0-100 grading scale really only help with ranking students, and even that is not very useful. Numerical grading can be highly subjective from teacher to teacher as well school to school, and, to put it succinctly, grading as an exercise in measurement lacks precision and repeatability. Take subjective assignments like book reports or persuasive papers. Different teachers may give different grades for the same work depending personal style preferences or different grading weights for things like structure, punctuation, etc. Teachers are also subject to human biases and tend to change their grading as they move through submissions. What your grade is can sometimes depend on where it was in the stack just as much as what you submitted (i.e. a teacher thoroughly reads and grades her first few papers harshly and is pencil whipping them by the time she's down to the last few). Traditional grading beyond pass/fail is simply not a good form of measurement.

As for your concerns about progress, you simply don't move on from a concept until you pass some examination on mastery. As it stands now, students pretty much move on regardless. If you had a 72 average in algebra, you knew enough to skate by but you probably haven't mastered it enough to use it other places like geometry.

The outcome needs a score that factors the number of attempts into the concept of mastery.

Below is a simplification of the idea.

If Student A passes on his first attempt it should show Mastery - 1 attempt

If student B passes on his 3rd attempt it should show Mastery - 3 attempts

I think overall student performance has been slipping for much longer than most of us have been alive, and this "Mastery" nonsense doesn't help at all.

Idc if you want to divide the percent score by the number of attempts x .75 to come up with your own goofy metric or unit, but it is important to congratulate those who either work hard, or are gifted intellectually. See The Incredibles for a tidbit of wisdom "When everyone is Super, nobody will be."

The problem I have with it is that it punishes and hinders those that either are smart and understand concepts early or are dedicated to put in the effort to understand concepts early.

They ultimately are the ones that get the short end of the stick, because 90% of the effort by the teacher is focused on the kids that aren't getting it or won't get it. The kids that do understand it get no reward for mastering a concept fast or putting in the work, and they get bored because the pace of the class is too slow based on those that don't master or won't master the concept.

So, like most everything else in public education, the overall quality of education is brought down tot he lowest denominator instead of forcing those at the bottom to raise the bar to meet the standards. All of this is done at the expense of those that we should be spending the most time on because they value education.

LOL, no more valedictorian. 1/2 of the school makes 100's on everything.

Everyone gets into Harvard Law!!!

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The grade doesn't matter, the learning matters.

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Competition is a good thing. Giving everyone a participation trophy is the mindset that will ultimately crater this great nation. We are not great because everyone is the same. Competition drove us to a high level of success.

School and grades are the first lessons in competition.

The concept at my kids' school now makes some sense. Your initial grade was whatever the first attempt was. However, if you chose to retake, you could receive a higher grade UP TO 50% of the gap from your initial grade to perfect score. Homework was handled the same way, though with corrections.

Therefore, If you scored a 90, you could retake/correct up to a 95. An 80 to a 90, a 70 to an 85, and so on.

If you bombed it and scored a 50, you could still end up with a C.... IF you chose to take the effort to retry or correct your work.

This allowed people who struggled the first time to improve their grade, while not penalizing the kids who achieved a high or perfect score on the first attempt. Also, what my kids found was that the other kids who didn't care wouldn't normally make the effort to improve their score.

jrdaustin said:

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The concept at my kids' school now makes some sense. Your initial grade was whatever the first attempt was. However, if you chose to retake, you could receive a higher grade UP TO 50% of the gap from your initial grade to perfect score. Homework was handled the same way, though with corrections.

Therefore, If you scored a 90, you could retake/correct up to a 95. An 80 to a 90, a 70 to an 85, and so on.

If you bombed it and scored a 50, you could still end up with a C.... IF you chose to take the effort to retry or correct your work.

This allowed people who struggled the first time to improve their grade, while not penalizing the kids who achieved a high or perfect score on the first attempt. Also, what my kids found was that the other kids who didn't care wouldn't normally make the effort to improve their score.

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It isn't a bad concept that it still will takes teacher resources to spend time on the make-up work and tests. This still penalizes the bright students. I think it would be better if there was a period in the day that was 'free time' for students and teachers to either do remedial work for the lower achieving students or advanced work for the high achievers. Basically, all the teachers open their doors and the students can choose where to allocate their time to either make up grades or take on new subjects for advancement.

Equal outcomes > Equal opportunity

ABATTBQ11 said:

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American Hardwood said:

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I don't get people who say we don't need grades or that grading is bad. In this learn to mastery concept or any other model really, grades are needed to determine and report progress. I don't know how you do that otherwise.

Edit to add: I believe any system that removes grading and progress reporting is designed to protect the education system, not to promote the education of children. Change my mind.

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Pass/fail grading is binary because either you know something or you don't.

The traditional letter grades and 0-100 grading scale really only help with ranking students, and even that is not very useful. Numerical grading can be highly subjective from teacher to teacher as well school to school, and, to put it succinctly, grading as an exercise in measurement lacks precision and repeatability. Take subjective assignments like book reports or persuasive papers. Different teachers may give different grades for the same work depending personal style preferences or different grading weights for things like structure, punctuation, etc. Teachers are also subject to human biases and tend to change their grading as they move through submissions. What your grade is can sometimes depend on where it was in the stack just as much as what you submitted (i.e. a teacher thoroughly reads and grades her first few papers harshly and is pencil whipping them by the time she's down to the last few). Traditional grading beyond pass/fail is simply not a good form of measurement.

As for your concerns about progress, you simply don't move on from a concept until you pass some examination on mastery. As it stands now, students pretty much move on regardless. If you had a 72 average in algebra, you knew enough to skate by but you probably haven't mastered it enough to use it other places like geometry.

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Pass/fail is the ultimate end of any education. As you said, binary. Can't argue with you there.

I disagree that letter/100 scale only helps rank. It seems you are talking about final grading, but if there are multiple grades along the course of the semester that certainly helps tell you the direction the student is heading before the final grade. Subjective grading only applies to certain subjects, not all. And there are ways around that. In writing persuasive papers there is a lot of objective content that can be graded such as grammar and essay construction as you said. I can think of a few ways to deal with the subjective parts as well. The problem with different biased teachers grading things differently isn't a problem of the grade concept, but one of teachers and policy. I'm all for standard practices, but sadly, teaching doesn't seem to be very consistent nor want to be.

The problem of kids moving on regardless is again not a problem of the grade system, but one of policy enforcement combined with the problem above of teacher bias. If you are hard lined about passing/failing grades, then this shouldn't be a problem. If a C is a passing grade in algebra, then your curriculum for geometry or trigonometry should reflect the fact that a C in algebra should be adequate. If it isn't, then the passing threshold should be higher or the curriculum should be lowered to match.

The grades are going to either mean something or they don't. I don't think the problem is grades, it's the lack of, or inconsistency of, the systems and policy nationwide that deal with grading. A B in Texas should be equal to a B in Kansas. But, when you standardize the testing, it doesn't take long for the flaws in teaching practices to show up. Guess who doesn't like that. Then you get in to the politics of demographics, and nobody wants to touch that except the grifters and opportunists.

schmellba99 said:

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The problem I have with it is that it punishes and hinders those that either are smart and understand concepts early or are dedicated to put in the effort to understand concepts early.

They ultimately are the ones that get the short end of the stick, because 90% of the effort by the teacher is focused on the kids that aren't getting it or won't get it. The kids that do understand it get no reward for mastering a concept fast or putting in the work, and they get bored because the pace of the class is too slow based on those that don't master or won't master the concept.

So, like most everything else in public education, the overall quality of education is brought down tot he lowest denominator instead of forcing those at the bottom to raise the bar to meet the standards. All of this is done at the expense of those that we should be spending the most time on because they value education.

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See, I think it would help the higher achiever because now the teacher has the opportunity to actual push that student further than they would before.

Science Denier said:

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Quote:

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The grade doesn't matter, the learning matters.

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Competition is a good thing. Giving everyone a participation trophy is the mindset that will ultimately crater this great nation. We are not great because everyone is the same. Competition drove us to a high level of success.

School and grades are the first lessons in competition.

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What competition? My grades aren't dependent on the grades of another student.

Ghost of Andrew Eaton said:

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Science Denier said:

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Quote:

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The grade doesn't matter, the learning matters.

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Competition is a good thing. Giving everyone a participation trophy is the mindset that will ultimately crater this great nation. We are not great because everyone is the same. Competition drove us to a high level of success.

School and grades are the first lessons in competition.

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What competition? My grades aren't dependent on the grades of another student.

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Good grades leads to rewards. An A on the report card. Recognition from parents and class mates, honor roll, etc... If you reward a kid thar flunks a test, gets the answers, retakes the test and gets an a, then what is the motivation for someone to work hard to get the A the right way?

Its competition to get the grades. Later, its competition for the class ranking and competition for the best colleges.

Ghost of Andrew Eaton said:

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outofstateaggie said:

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This is refusal to hold students and parents accountable disguised as "mastery > grades."

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Please explain.

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Sorry to just be getting back to this. At this point, I think it has been pretty well explained by others on the thread. I think it disincentivizes the need for students to keep up with what is being taught in class and getting work turned in on time. As it has already been stated, other students suffer if time has to be allocated spiraling back to concepts that some students didn't put the effort in to learn when it was originally covered. Why would they? What is the cost if they don't? This "approach" is just a way to rebrand not holding students and parents accountable for their own learning.

How are they being rewarded? They have to do the work to improve their learning. You're treating grades like a paycheck instead of a indication of their learning or mastery of the skill.

A kid who doesn't care about learning isn't going to try to remaster the material in either scenario. But if they do try to relearn the material, there is a cost.

So when your Dr grossly misdiagnoses your disease and you die due to improper treatment does he still get an "A" if he gets it right on the next patient or maybe the 4th next patient . If the bridge collapses due to a design error does the design firm get a " do over". I know these are extremes but it Seems like that's the culture being encouraged . I'm not saying that people shouldn't get multiple chances and that you should always learn something on the first try but I do see positives in valuing performance. The old competitive grading scales seem Better to me. Not that those with the best grades are necessarily the best performers in life or the best people but it does seem like a relative scale and competition raises the bar.