Grading

One thing I've learned since taking over grading for my 9ers is that with a late policy, it becomes more about grading their timeliness than their ability. I do think it is important for students to learn the value of turning things in on time, but I don't want that to detract from their ability. With education becoming more and more standards based, we're supposed to be evaluating students on how well they met the standard, right? How can you do this when the grade that you put in the book is based on when they turned the assignment in? Should there be two grades for each assignment? One for timeliness and one for the standard? Is that realistic? I want my students to do well, and I want to be able to look at their grades to see how they are doing with the different standards, but I don't know how I can do that when the grades I'm putting into the gradebook are based on whether they turned it in on the right day or not.

Another thing that I'm finding tricky is being fair with students. One student has a concussion, which I was not made aware of until recently, so I am allowing him to turn in his missing work without penalty because of the medical excuse. Another student thought she needed to finish the pre-assessment to make semester goals, which wasn't actually the case, and since technical difficulties were involved, I'm also allowing her to turn in her assignment without penalty. As far as I know though, none of my other students have excuses to not turn their work in on time, so they will receive points off for it being late. If I get it...

Summary: It's hard adapting to someone else's grading policy, especially halfway through the year.