What is Asset-Based Feedback? Feedback in the context of education is information provided following a learning activity that helps students and instructors: 1) identify current gaps in a student's journey from novice to expertise in a given domain and 2) clarify the steps toward filling ...

This morning, our six-year old first grader - a kid who has no experience with or conceptual understanding of school grades - showed us a "neat trick." On a piece of paper next to some of his writing (we'd been playing Boggle last night), he drew a lower case "f" next to a minus sign (-) and told us that "f minus is a bad grade." Oh, OK, we said. However, he slyly continued, "Look at this!" And then he drew a curved-ish line down, turning his lower case "f" into an upper case "A." With a finishing flourish, he also struck through the minus, turning that symbol into a plus (+). "It's an A plus," he exclaimed. "What does that mean?" we asked. He didn't know. And we have no idea where he picked up this knowledge of grading, perhaps from a chapter book because his first-grade teacher does not assign grades to the many projects he creates in class. He has never received a grade from an educator in his life, yet he's approximating the act of assigning a grade to himself and believes it's best to avoid an F- and aspire toward an A+. The logics of conventional schooling and success are so pervasive, are odd at face value, and are frankly incomprehensible to children unless they are first trained into a culture of what "counts" as rewarded achievement.

A statistical case against points-based grading

On alt grading research, justice and equity, and liking student writing

Please see below for the links to the slides and handout (with references and script) for my talk at The Grading Conference 2025 on June 11, 2025. Title: Tolerance for Error: A theory of how (some)…

The history scholar explains why it matters that there’s been a spike in students graduating with Latin honors.

What I learned by moving to a test-forward approach

Or, how not to scare away new alternative graders

A number of responses focused on the idea of mastery.

Students with alphabetically lower-ranked names often receive lower grades than their peers, according to a recent study from the University of Michigan.

We asked professors, students, and high-school counselors.

Wait, what am I being accused of now?

Some unsolicited suggestions for the ungrading community to start 2023.

The pandemic laid bare course policies and practices that disadvantage some students. Now, some say that professors should cool it with awarding participation points.

“Working on an essay on "rigor" in higher education, and boy howdy are there some real gems in the discourse:”

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Call it pass-fail-plus.

Our current grading system can be a way for kids to prove themselves and win college scholarships, or admission to selective colleges. It can also be a barrier, in sometimes surprising ways. What migh