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Re: Concerned about grades

A colleague at school told me about a study he saw
recently. In 1967, 17% of the HS grades awarded were A
and 35-40% were C. In 1997, the %s were exactly
reversed. And meanwhile "non-normalized" SAT scores
are WAY down. Can anyone say "grade inflation"? John
Barrere
--- Dick Heckathorn <gnper090@WVIZ.ORG> wrote:
Greetings,
While teaching physics in high school in the 60's, I
came across a study in The Physics Teacher that
looked at why students were not taking physics.
There were two main reasons. One was that previous
science teachers had turned them off. The other was
that physics teachers were too hard a grader. The
first, I had no control over. The second I did.

So I looked at how I graded to see if I was too hard
a grader. For four or five years of class data, I
took the 6 6-weeks grades and made a "GPA" for each
student. I then determined an average "GPA" for each
class. Next, I went to each student folder and
obtained their GPA for all classes taken prior to
taking the physics class. I likewise found an
average GPA for the class. The result.....

My physics class "GPA" was from 0.6 to 1.1 lower.
Relative to the rest of the teachers in the school,
I was too hard a grader. Why, I thought. I think it
was because I was taught to use the bell curve. Yet,
I did not have a school wide student body. I played
around, adjusting my physics grades. Why, I don't
remember, I changed my bell curve to the center
being a 'B' rather than a 'C'. My class GPA then
fell in line with the student's GPA.

To this day, I adjust my average grade to a 'B' for
tests and quizzes. (Not for laboratory reports.)
Three times since then I have rechecked to see how
my GPA compared with their GPA before entering
physics. Each time my physics grades were in line.
My physics student enrollment hovers around 60% of
each graduating class. It was 25% before making the
adjustment.

Will it work for you? On analysis of your grading
will answer this question.

Helping teachers who teach, motivating students who
learn.
"Science is nothing more than learning how to
communicate with nature in such a manner that it
will talk back."

Dick Heckathorn 14665 Pawnee Trail Middleburg
Hts, OH 44130-6635 440-826-0834
Physics Teacher Cuyahoga Valley Christian Academy
4687 Wyoga Lake Road Cuyahoga Falls, OH
44224 330-929-0575 VM 120


-----Original Message-----
From: William J. Larson [SMTP:bill_larson@CSI.COM]
Sent: Thursday, March 16, 2000 1:33 AM
To: PHYS-L@lists.nau.edu
Subject: Re: Concerned about grades

My physics teachers (U of Minn.) tried to get the
test means to be 50%
and expected scores all the way from near zero to
100. Their thinking
was that that spread the scores out for maximal
discrimination between
performance. I remember one test being thrown out
because the mean
was too high (maybe 75% - I forget.) This was 20
years ago.

Cheers,
Bill Larson
Geneva, Switzerland
----- Original Message -----
From: Lemmerhirt, Fred
<FLemmerhirt@MAIL.WCC.CC.IL.US>
To: <PHYS-L@lists.nau.edu>
Sent: 2000 March 16 4:05 AM
Subject: Concerned about grades


Long ago (1964-69), as an undergraduate student
and graduate teaching
assistant, I was accustomed to exam averages and
corresponding grading
scales in physics courses being rather low. So I
was not surprised that
during my first few years of teaching on my own I
settled on a grading
scale
with "cutoffs" that were somewhat lower than
students were used to in some
of their other courses. My explanation to
students has always been that
there is very little "padding" on my exams, and
that someone who might get
30% or so on a multiple-choice exam in another
course without "opening the
book" would probably get something closer to zero
on a physics exam.

I get to know my students' level of understanding
and achievement fairly
well, independent of exams, and I usually feel
that the grading scale I
use
assigns appropriate grades to most students. So,
working in relative
isolation, I have been generally satisfied with
the grades I submit. But
now
that I am able to look at many course syllabi on
physics department web
pages at a wide variety of colleges and
universities, I find that the
great
majority of published grading scales use cutoffs
substantially above those
of my own scale. (Specifically, my C/D dividing
line is usually around
55%,
while I find the D/F line is most commonly 60%.)

In working with community college transfer
students, one of my goals is
that
their physics experience, including the way they
are evaluated, should be
roughly equivalent to what they would have
encountered at the schools to
which they transfer. So I am wondering if any of
you have philosophies on
this aspect of grading that you are willing to
share. How concerned
should
I be about this?

______________________________________
Fred Lemmerhirt
Waubonsee Community College
Sugar Grove, Illinois
flemmerhirt@mail.wcc.cc.il.us
<mailto:flemmerhirt@mail.wcc.cc.il.us>
http://chat.wcc.cc.il.us/~flemmerh/physics.html
<http://chat.wcc.cc.il.us/~flemmerh/physics.html>


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