This chapter analyzes the metaphor of 'The Scarlet Letter' in the context of educational grading systems. It highlights how grades can stigmatize students, especially from marginalized backgrounds, impacting their identities and societal acceptance.
Josh Eyler shares even more problems with grades on episode 533 of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast.
Quotes from the episode
Being a dad who is an educator takes things from the academic and intellectual and brings them immediately to the surface, to the real world and to the real consequences for students and families.
-Josh Eyler
The conflict between what we think and what we value and what we want for our kids and what the world and our school systems say are important can sometimes be almost irreconcilable.
-Josh Eyler
We need to create environments that will cultivate intrinsic motivation.
-Josh Eyler
In situations where grades are given, students tend to be more fearful of making mistakes. They produce more behaviors of trying to get the grade rather than learning.
-Josh Eyler
Grades are not objective accurate measurements of learning according to this research.
-Josh Eyler
If grades don’t measure what they’re supposed to measure, why are we using them, and why are we putting so much pressure on them?
-Josh Eyler
Resources
- Failing Our Future: How Grades Harm Students, and What We Can Do about It, by Josh Eyler
- How Humans Learn: The Science and Stories Behind Effective College Teaching, by Josh Eyler
- Kariann Fuqua
- Mind Over Monsters: Supporting Youth Mental Health with Compassionate Challenge, by Sara Rose Cavanaugh
- Coaching for Leaders Episode 310: How to Reduce Drama With Kids, with Tina Payne Bryson
- Difficult Conversations: How to Discuss What Matters Most (Revised), by Douglas Stone & Sheila Heen*
- The Scarlet Letter, by Nathaniel Hawthorne*
- Punished by Rewards: The Trouble with Gold Stars, Incentive Plans, A’S, Praise, and Other Bribes, by Alfie Kohn*
- A meta-analysis on the impact of grades and comments on academic motivation and achievement: A case for written feedback, by Alison Koenka, et al.
- A Century of Grading Research: Meaning and Value in the Most Common Educational Measure, by Susan M. Brookhart, Thomas R. Guskey, et al.
- The Math Wars: Timed Tests, Math Anxiety, and the Battle Over How We Teach Our Kids, by Joshua Eyler for The Saturday Evening Post
- Off the Mark: How Grades, Ratings, and Rankings Undermine Learning (But Don’t Have To) , by Jack Schneider & Ethan L. Hutt *
- The Test , by Anya Kamenetz
- Lower Ed, by Tressie McMillan Cottom*
