Home | How It Works | Stats Login | Register         Case: Unfair Assessment I have been a successful middle school teacher. I know it sounds strange when I call myself successful, but I have received recognitions at the school and county levels for the quality of my teaching. I have a big dilemma this year. I have two students who are not your ordinary students. Selena is a Hispanic student who is an English Language Learner, but her English proficiency is quite high. She fully participates in all class activities, she functions well in group and individual work, and she is always motivated. She is an ideal student. However, she never makes passing grades on tests. Her current grade is an F. Shelly is a White student. She shows no interest in course activities. You cannot even know if she listening or not most of the time. She chooses not to do group work. If I force her, she does not really contribute. She also does not turn in any assignments. What puzzles me is that she usually receives the highest grades in tests. Her current grade in my course is a high B. If she had turned in the assignments, her grade would be an A. The course grade in my class is determined mainly based on what students make on tests, because I feel that tests are the only means for me to know whether students have retained what they learned or not. Lately I have been thinking that my grading is not doing justice to Selena. At the same time, I think Shelly does not deserve a B with the attitude she has displayed. I need to revise my assessment system. Please help me with this. Solution: (Rates are posted for this solution!) Assuming your county does not have mandated percentages for grading, you can always adjust when you see issues. Perhaps a lower weight on your tests and a higher weight on your classwork would help with this situation. Yes, a test is one way to show that a student has learned the information, but there are other ways. Performance tasks is class, class discussions, and portfolios are all great ways to assess a student's learning. This change in weighting would help with Selena's grade and somewhat address your problem with Shelley as well. Selena's grade would be higher because she does well with classwork. Shelley's grade would more reflect her work ethic and attitude in class because her high test scores would not count as much. If changing the weighting of your test is not a viable option for you, perhaps allowing Selena to take the test in a different manner would help. Is she both a fluent speaker AND reader of English? Maybe allow her to take the test orally with you or a parapro. You could also have the test read to her and see if this helps with the issue. Tests don't always have to be paper and pencil. I hope some of this helps.